Chapter Twenty-Five
The truck blasted over the spikes. Grace screamed as the truck shook and rumbled.
The tires blew out. Panic flooded her system.
Callum gripped the steering wheel and fought for control.
Their shredded tires thundered around them like angry highway gods.
The truck wanted to stop. He pushed it along the isolated road, and she understood that pulling over would be a death trap.
Grace checked her side-view mirror. The SUV behind them had crawled up so close that she could barely see it behind them.
“Listen to me carefully,” he said with a calmness that made her focus. “Keep your head down. Reach into the backseat. Grab the rifle.”
“I can’t.”
“I won’t ask you to do anything you can’t handle.”
She wanted to believe him. Her heart slammed in her chest. “Callum…”
The truck roared in protest as he pushed it beyond its limits. “You can, babe. Head down. Do it now.”
Her teeth chattered as she ducked down and reached into the second row for the rifle.
Its cool metal was heavier than she expected.
She eased toward the front seat, scared of doing something wrong, and—the back windshield exploded.
She screamed again. All she could do was scream.
The heavy gun almost dropped. Grace hung onto it as Callum covered her head and slammed her down.
He jerked the truck from side to side. “Grace?”
“I’m not hurt.” Her lungs screamed in her chest. Panic punched in her temples. Every part of her shook.
Another bullet blasted into the truck and tore off its side-view mirror. Callum zigzagged their dying vehicle. He would have to pull over, and whoever was behind them would shoot before he even sighted the gun in their direction.
“Gotta listen to me, babe.”
She could hear it in his voice and already knew what he would say. Tears caught in her throat. “I can’t do it.”
“You don’t even have to aim. Just point and keep your head down.”
Why was this happening? She listened to his instructions, moved her hands the way he told her to.
“Do you feel that? It’s like a switch.”
She nodded.
“Flip it. Brace yourself and hold the trigger down.”
She did. The gun roared. She couldn’t hear. The air burned. She could taste the gunpowder, but refused to let it stop her. It just fired and fired and kept firing.
Callum pulled over. Her ears rang. Her eyes burned. Steam and smoke billowed from the engine behind them as it lost forward momentum. “They’re stopping.”
God, did she kill someone?
They wanted to kill her, so why not?
Except she couldn’t handle it if she did. That was why the world needed people like Callum and Hayden.
“Stay down.” He took the gun and twisted in his seat. “You blew their engine up.” He reached into the backseat and handed her a handgun, taking the rifle from her hands. “Anyone comes at you, pull the trigger. I’ll be back.”
The gun shook in her trembling hands. It had to be more dangerous to hold it than not. She set it down and peered out the space where their back windshield had been.
Callum had the gun up and was yelling. Her ears rang, yet still she heard the pop, pop, pop of guns. The car she had seen on the side of the road with the tire spikes raced toward them. Callum jumped onto the smoking hood of the SUV she’d shot and crouched down.
Two people from the car that had just arrived rushed toward the disabled SUV. Grace didn’t know how Callum could see them, but they definitely couldn’t see Callum.
As one drew even with him, he swung the back of his gun like a baseball bat. The person dropped and didn’t move. Callum jumped on top of the other, and they crashed to the asphalt, wrestling.
She didn’t know what would happen if someone pulled over and tried to help. She hadn’t seen any vehicles, and wouldn’t know if they were their enemy or a Good Samaritan.
Callum landed another punch, and the attacker fell back. He strode up to their truck. “Get our bags. Phone.” He reloaded his weapons and pulled zip ties from a compartment. “Let’s go.”
A minute later, he tied up the two men and took pictures of their faces. She followed him to the car, barely able to feel her legs. Hell, she couldn’t feel any part of her body. Only the sensation of every muscle jittering under the flood of adrenaline.
Callum snapped pictures of the truck and the SUV, and their plates and the plates on the car they were about to take. “Let’s go.”
“We’re leaving them here?” she asked.
“A cleanup team will handle them and extract intel.” He quickly inspected the new vehicle. “Get in.”
“We’re taking their car?”
“Got a better idea?”
She didn’t and shook her head. Callum placed his weapons in the backseat and gestured for her to do the same with their bags.
“What are we going to do now?” she asked.
“Be anywhere but here.” He nodded toward the car. “Kinda like that joyride you and your friends went on in my car your senior year.”
Laughter bubbled in her chest when every part of her wanted to curl into a ball and cry. “But without anyone shooting at us.”
That night seemed so long ago and like it was just yesterday, both when she would have done anything for his attention, including taking his car from the neighborhood pool and driving around the block. “You were mad enough that you might have if you’d had a weapon.”
Callum pulled onto the quiet road and left the wreckage of the run-in behind them.
Their new ride had an impersonal scent of pine and plastic.
Its clean carpets and console reminded Grace of a rental car, which reminded her that everything in her life over the last few years had been temporary.
A rental cabin. A loaner vehicle. A friend’s house.
It had all been temporary and left her untethered to anything that was actually hers—like Callum. He was hers, wasn’t he?
He swiped his thumb across the screen of his cell phone, opened his phone app, and called his office.
Vivian answered, “Have a game plan?”
“No, but I need a cleanup team. Who’s with you?”
“Gage and Dean.”
Callum explained the last five minutes and handed over his phone again. “Send the pics in the same way you did before.”
Grace selected the pictures and uploaded them through the secure portal she had used for the first person who had shot at them. She returned the phone to Callum as he waited for his office to receive them.
“Look,” Callum grumbled. “We need a plan, but you need to get a handle on whoever’s tracking us and how. Any idea who’s behind this?”
“Not yet.”
“They’re moving faster than we are—”
“Which is why,” Vivian said, “we want to move the attorney meeting up as soon as you can get there. No more messing around. Find out what’s going on. Deal with it and move on.”
“Now?” She wasn’t in the right headspace. Her clothes were dirty, and she’d been sweating through the hot August heat while shooting a gun and probably smelled as bad as she looked. Grace glanced over and could tell that Callum’s scowl was less about his clothes and more about the change in plans.
“The more we know,” Vivian continued, “the more we can anticipate the problems. Since no one will tell us a damn thing, this is our best option.”
“I need five minutes.” He ended the call without waiting for their response.
Tension flexed in his jaw.
“You don’t think we should go.”
“I think… if I trusted them, then yeah, we should. Their logic is sound.”
“But you don’t.”
“At this point, Grace. I don’t trust anyone but you.”
The air conditioning cooled as the car devoured the miles. They drove in silence, and she thought about his distrust and hers. They distrusted his headquarters for different reasons. Dominic could buy anyone, though they didn’t think he was involved. She didn’t see how he wasn’t.
Her stomach knotted. What had he said about after all this was over? Grace dropped her focus to her hands in her lap. The after would never come if they didn’t get rid of her ex.
“I want to call Dominic.”
He tore his gaze from the road. “What? Why?”
“I won’t tell him you’re with me. Just that someone is chasing me, and I want to know what he wants.”
“Screw him and whatever he wants. I’m so sick of his name.”
“Then call Vivian back and say we’re on our way.”
“Why?”
“I want to get it done because I want the after. After this crazy day from hell, I want to know if this is real between us, and I don’t want to wait to figure it out.
” She stared at the road. For as bold and outspoken as she had been with what she wanted, this was too scary, and she didn’t have the guts to look at him.
“I want to start my life over, and I can’t until this is done. ”
Callum pulled off the road onto the shallow gravel shoulder. He shifted into park and reached for her face, turning her chin to face him. “This is real.”
“I know that…” She felt horrible for needing to hear it again and again.
“You don’t have to wait to clear things up with your ex. I had thought that too. You know that? I was waiting, but when I hear you questioning us?” He shook his head. “No. You need to know exactly what I think.”
“I already know you want to be with me. I can’t explain what I mean.”
“I’m in love with you. I’ve been in love with you.”
Her heart stopped.
“I didn’t want to tell you this now. If this could all be behind us, and I could fucking hold on to you while I make you understand…
But now’s the time you need to hear it. I’m here for everything you need.
Hear me like you’ve never listened in your life.
This feels fast, but it’s a lifetime in the making. ”
Her eyelashes fluttered. Emotion choked away her words.
“You know that,” he whispered, “and I know that.”
Tears sprang into her eyes. His thumb smoothed over her cheek. She should say something, but she couldn’t talk.
“You’re not ready to hear that, baby,” he said softly but with unwavering confidence. He believed in her. In them. “You’re about to panic. About to run.” His smile wasn’t hurt. It was more like understanding, and that scared her even more. “And we can’t have that.”
“Callum—”
“I’m not worried. I can predict the future when it comes to us. Not this mess of today. Not with your ex. Not the attorney general’s office or the leak with my team. But I know you and I work out.”
“Everything had moved so fast with Dominic, and this is faster than that.” Comparing the two men made her stomach turn. Callum was nothing like Dominic. He wasn’t taking away her independence or folding her into another person like some kind of make-a-wife origami.
He didn’t flinch at the comparison. “We are a long time coming.”
Callum wasn’t talking about moving in together or marriage like Dominic had. Grace had thought she’d fallen for Dominic when he hadn’t given her a chance to breathe. That wasn’t what Callum was doing. Still, the slamming staccato of her heart screamed for her to slow down. They needed speed bumps.
His phone rang.
How about that for a speed bump? Not what she wanted, but she needed the interruption to catch her breath. Grace read the display on his screen. It was his office calling back. “It’s been five minutes.”
Callum tipped her head to his and casually kissed her as if she weren’t panicking. He answered the call. “We’re taking the meeting.”
“Sending a location and directions to you now. I’ll have someone meet you there and take care of whatever car you’re driving.”