Total pages in book: 108
Estimated words: 104869 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 524(@200wpm)___ 419(@250wpm)___ 350(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 104869 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 524(@200wpm)___ 419(@250wpm)___ 350(@300wpm)
He didn’t speak, merely shut the door again, said something to Harris on his way around the front of the Land Rover toward the driver’s side.
Then they were on their way.
His four-wheel drive made the road seem easy.
“Where would this road eventually have taken me?” she asked, sluggishly dragging her seatbelt across her chest and clipping it in with more difficulty than the task warranted.
“Nowhere good. It’s abandoned, and only occasionally used by the odd quad biker.”
“I could have been there for days,” she said, her voice taking on a luridly morbid tone as she considered the ramifications, had she continued even farther. “Weeks. Nobody would’ve known where to find me until someone stumbled across my desiccated corpse months from now.”
The look he slanted at her was incredulous and contained a hint of horrified amusement.
“I’m sure the car is fitted with a tracker.” He choked out the words in a bemused tone before coughing. “The rental company would have found your corpse long before it reached desiccation. And surely you told your family where you were going?”
“I told them you were vacationing at your sister’s place and I intended to join you. The GPS suggested this route as a shortcut. It was supposed to cut an hour off my journey.”
“Nuts when you consider that Riversend is only half an hour away from the turn you took.”
“Seriously?” Kenny didn’t know why, but that pissed her off even more than the damned GPS guiding her to certain death. “It’s supposed to make life convenient. How is adding an hour to a half-hour trip convenient?”
“Since this road would’ve taken you nowhere near Riversend, and you would’ve been stuck out here for God knows how long if you hadn’t found a signal, I think you’re directing your outrage at the wrong thing.”
“Don’t gatekeep my outrage, Smith. I can damned well be outraged at whatever the hell I want.” She whipped her head around to glare at his profile and caught the whisper of a smile at the corner of his mouth before he schooled his features into neutrality again.
He shot a quick, inscrutable look at her, before directing his gaze back to the awful road again.
“You’re not usually so easily riled.”
Why did he have to make her sound like a fractious child?
She shrugged and threw caution to the wind to tell him, “As you pointed out the night before you left, you never really knew me.”
The only indication she had at all that her words affected him was the bunching of muscles along his jawline.
“And why is that, Kenna?”
“Fear, I suppose.” His head turned sharply and his eyes narrowed on her face, as if he was trying to gauge her honesty.
“Watch the road, Smith.” He glowered before his head swiveled back toward the road.
“Fear? What the fuck are you afraid of? I’m not some kind of monster. I’m damned sure I never gave you any reason to fear me, Kenna!”
“Of course, you’re not a monster, Smith. I didn’t fear you. I was just so…” She rubbed her eyes tiredly. They were gritty and sore from the dust. “I was insecure. About you. Us. We went into this marriage for a reason that no longer exists. Before my miscarriage, I felt like something you had to endure to get what you really wanted. After…I expected you to leave. Not because I think you’re a bad guy, but because I always knew I wasn’t good enough for you.”
“This is…I don’t…” He kept his eyes fixed on the road, but the frustration she sensed in him mirrored her own. Admitting things out loud that she hadn’t even admitted to herself wasn’t easy for her. It was all coming as something of a surprise to her as well. “You’re not an insecure woman, Kenna. You’re confident. Accomplished. I’m having a hard time believing this.”
“I know this isn’t the time or place to talk about this. But I don’t think we’ll have another opportunity, so I just wanted to tell you that I know…” She paused and tried to gather her thoughts, so exhausted she could barely think straight. But right now, in this car was the last time she’d ever have the chance to talk to him like this. And she wanted to make it count. “I know I excluded you. I know I isolated myself from you at a time when we should have been able to lean on each other for support. And I-I’m sorry.”
His mouth thinned and his hands clenched around the steering wheel, knuckles white.
“And what are you hoping to accomplish with this apology?”
“Nothing. I just…”
“What?” The word was delivered in such an abrasive tone that it scraped against her nerve endings. “You wanted to make yourself feel better? Is it working? Do you feel better?”
“Not really.”
“And why is that?”
“You still hate me.”
“Hate is such a strong word. I don’t hate you, Kenna. You have to give a fuck to hate someone. It’s as emotionally exhausting as love. And that’s just way too much bandwidth to waste on you.”