Page 94 of Beautiful Secrets

33

Mika

My body rolls gently from side to side. That motion paired with the drumming of rain on the car’s roof and thethwick-thwackof the windshield wipers should have been soothing, but I do not think I can ever be soothed again. In a few hours, I will be back at home.

Father will not let me escape again.

I will be trapped.

“Do you hate pregnant women?” I ask quietly. “Or is it just me?”

Cole lets out a dark chuckle that makes my stomach drop deep into my guts. “You’re a fucking lark, you know that?”

I do not know what that means, but I get the gist of it from his tone. “I thought you liked me.”

There is a beat of silence before he speaks. “I’m taking you back, aren’t I?”

“You could be taking me to the airport.”

“Christ,” he mutters.

“You can keep whatever money is left.”

“What are you on about?”

“The money you take with passport. I buy plane ticket, you keep the rest.”

I know it is pocket change to him, but it is the thought that counts, yes?

Cole laughs, but it is a tired sound. “You’re adorable, you know that?”

I sit up in a rush, glaring at the back of his head.

Oh, how I wish I still had his gun. This time I would put a bullet in him just to make a point.

Not to kill him—I do not need a man’s life on my hands—just to wipe that smile off his face.

He glances at me in the rearview mirror, but his eyes go back to the road almost immediately. He pulls a face, and then switches on something that whooshes loudly. “Would you stop breathing so hard?” he demands. “You’re fogging everything up.”

No wonder it is so chilly inside the car. He must have turned down the heat to stop the windows from misting up.

It is pouring outside. Cole must be driving twenty miles an hour, maybe less. I cannot blame him—there is barely a yard of visibility in front of the nose of the car. That is why this trip feels like it taking forever.

“Is it safe to drive like this?” I ask him warily, glancing out of the side windows. I cannot even see the side of the road, never mind other cars. Are we still on the freeway?

“It was,” he says. “But if this gets any worse, we’re looking at a news headline that may or may not mention suicidal tendencies.”

My lips curl into a brief smile before I thin my lips. But not before Cole catches a glimpse of my amusement in the mirror.

“Think this is funny?” he demands. “This is all you, you know that right?”

“I make it rain?” I raise my eyebrows at him.

“Wouldn’t put it past you,” he says in a low voice.

“We stop?”

“Yeah, I don’t think so. Unless we start hydroplaning, we keep going.”