Page 79 of Vicious Betrayal

I don't argue. I take small sips of the cold ginger ale until I can stomach a little more food, and then crawl under the scratchy motel quilt with my clothes on. I lie facing the peeling wallpaper, listening to the heavy cadence of his breathing in the dark, my heart aching with an agony that feels like dying.

—

By mid-morning the following day, we're back on the road again. The sky looks more ominous than ever, matching my mood. The weather report on the radio is warning of tornado watches and flash flood warnings with heavy winds coming in.

After a little while, the rain starts, not too heavy yet. My eyes constantly flick to the side mirror. For an hour, the road behind us has been empty, nothing but gray pavement and trees.

Then, over the crest of a wooded hill a mile back, a pair of lights cuts through the gloom. A dark Ford Explorer, matching our speed. My breath catches in my throat. "Cormac."

"I see them," he says calmly, though the muscles along his jaw bunch.

"Is it the same one from yesterday?"

"Doesn't matter. They've probably got a few guys watching out for us," he mutters, his fingers tightening on the steering wheel.

He doesn't speed up. He waits until the road curves around a bluff, blocking line of sight for a minute, and then he yanks the wheel hard to the left, diving down a narrow, unpaved logging road.

The car jolts violently, tires spitting through gravel and thick mud. Mud splatters across the side windows. The rain is coming down harder now, until it's hard to see in front of us at all, and the wind is picking up heavily.

"Cormac, please! You can't see the road. You need to pull over!"

"We can't stop," he bites out, leaning forward over the wheel, his eyes narrowed as he strains to see through the deluge. "If we get caught out here, we're done."

"The road is washing out!" I cry, grabbing the handle above my door as the truck slides sideways through a deep rut filled with water. Panic clenches my chest. "Cormac, stop! Think about the baby!"

"I am thinking about the baby!" he roars back. "I'm trying to keep them from being born in a fucking prison!"

The road dips sharply, and the headlights barely cut through the curtain of rain. Then, out of the dense underbrush on the right, a massive whitetail buck leaps directly into our path. The animal freezes in the glare of the high beams, eyes glowing white, barely ten feet from the front bumper.

"Look out!" I scream.

Cormac reacts on pure instinct. He stomps the brake pedal and wrenches the wheel hard to the right to avoid hitting it. The tires lose all traction and the car hydroplanes, flinging into a spin. The world outside becomes a dizzying blur. "Hold on!" Cormac shouts, throwing his arm across my chest and pinning me hard against the back of the passenger seat.

The car slides, crashes through a line of trees with a deafening screech of tearing metal, and slams head-on into the trunk of a massive oak.

My seatbelt locks painfully across my chest and hips. The sound of crumpling steel and shattering glass fills the cabin. My head snaps forward and back, my skull bouncing off the headrest.

Then there's silence. A ragged gasp escapes my lips.

I blink through the haze of white dust from the deployed airbags. My chest aches where the strap caught me, and my knees are bruised from hitting the underside of the glove compartment, but my hands immediately fly to my stomach. No sharp pain. I don't feel like I'm bleeding. I think the baby is safe.

"Cormac?" I whisper, my voice shaking uncontrollably.

I turn my head. My heart stops dead in my throat.

The driver's side of the cab took the brunt of the impact against the tree. The door frame is crushed inward, the steering wheel warped at an unnatural angle. Cormac is slumped forward, completely limp, his forehead resting against the cracked driver's window. A deep gash along his temple is bleeding freely, dark crimson running down the side of his pale face, but that isn't the worst of it.

Something sheared through the door and sliced into his shoulder. Dark, thick blood is already soaking through the torn leather of his jacket and black cotton shirt beneath, pooling over his collarbone.

"Cormac!" I scream, yanking my seatbelt free and scrambling over the center console, ignoring the burning ache in my own ribs. I grab his face in both hands, turning his head toward me. His skin is cold, his eyes closed, his breathing wet and shallow. "Cormac, wake up! Please, God, wake up!"

He doesn't stir. A faint groan catches in the back of his throat, but his head sags heavily against my hands.

He's bleeding out.

Panic threatens to swallow me whole, but the sight of his blood dripping onto my fingers snaps something into place. If I leave him here, he'll die. If the feds find him like this, they'll lock him up, and he'll never see the light of day again.

I reach down, unclick his seatbelt, and pull the gun out of his waistband, jamming it into the pocket of my oversized cardigan. Then I grab the edges of his jacket near the metal shard that sliced him.