Page 3 of Brave Horizons (Barrington Billionaires #19)

TOPEKA

Numb was becoming normal. Being shipped around like unwanted cargo had a way of dulling the senses in a dangerous way.

Alex and his parents were nice enough but Kenan had been too.

It wasn’t about kindness right now. It wasn’t the antidote to danger.

It wasn’t enough to quell the choking sense of the unknown.

And worst of all, every person who joined in on the crusade to keep her alive felt like one more soul she was putting in danger.

“You camp much?” Alex asked, his curly hair bouncing a bit as the truck lurched up a dark hill into the thick woods.

“This is so ironic,” she said, laughing coolly.

“What is?” He looked genuinely intrigued to hear her answer. Maybe that’s what a quiet life did. Made you fascinated by anything that crossed your path.

“Before all this happened, if I was in a truck with a stranger heading deep into the woods in the middle of the night, that would be my biggest problem. I never thought it would be part of the solution.”

“I agree, this wouldn’t normally be advice I’d give to women but in this case, the woods in the middle of the night is our safest bet. I’d have opted for a cabin or something besides the tents but I’m not willing to take any chances at the moment.”

“But you know these woods? You know what you’re doing?”

“Completely. I’ve spent half my life out here. The other half on an oil rig.”

“That seems like a tough life.” She leaned her head against the cold glass of the passenger window and sighed.

“I love it. Keeps me busy. And gives me the flexibility to do stuff like this.”

“You say that like this is a hobby. Something normal. It’s not.

How do you even get into this kind of thing?

I know how I got into it, but you?” She cocked up a brow and watched him closely.

It was fascinating to know there was this network of people in the world stepping into these situations.

She’d like to think of herself as someone who would step up for anyone who needed it, but these people really did.

“I was in the military. Then I wasn’t. Couldn’t be anymore because of an injury. I’d planned to stay in for a good long time. Then when I lost that option, I was a bit...”

“Adrift?”

“Wildly depressed,” he corrected with a chuckle. “And someone I served with came for a visit. It’s remote up here. That can be good for peace and quiet, sometimes tough when you’re struggling with mental health. I’m a man who needs a purpose.”

“Then I guess I should say, you’re welcome.” She smirked a bit.

“You should. That visit from my friend and the people I’ve been able to help since then have saved my life. I don’t know if there is any better way out of the darkness than being someone else’s light.”

Damn. She wanted to bury her head and shut herself off to everyone and everything. To forget the beauty of the world until she could experience it freely again. He was making that hard with his flowery optimism and kind words.

“You’ve done this a lot?”

“Not really,” he said with a shrug. “There are core places and people who work directly with the Kinross family. I’m not one of them. I’m like a backup. The person they call when?—”

“When everything is so messed up they don’t have other choices? I’m guessing they didn’t tell you the part where this was my fault.” The guilt had been eating at her like a carnivorous beast. She was losing limbs to it. Being torn apart.

“I don’t get a lot of information when the call comes. I knew about you from the news, that made this unique. But I don’t see how any of this would be your fault.”

“They should have warned you. I can’t be trusted. I led my father’s men right to me. I put many other people in danger because I didn’t respect the process. I don’t understand why they gave me another chance.” Her cheeks blazed with embarrassment and she was grateful for the dark cab of the truck.

“What did you do?” His voice seemed suddenly more serious, a relief. She was tired of being let off the hook. Everyone explaining away why she’d done what she’d done as if it were excusable. It wasn’t.

“There was a man helping me. Russ. He’d been the one to start all of this with my father.

He was an investigator and had been trying to take my father’s operation down for quite a while.

Approaching me was dangerous but he did it anyway.

I was reluctant but eventually I saw what was really going on and decided to help him. ”

“You’d have been in a unique position to do so.” Alex had his eyes fixed on the dark dirt road and, though it seemed he had it all under control, she imagined it was still tricky to navigate like this.

“Unique position as in his daughter. Someone he thought he could trust.” Her voice trailed off as she remembered the moment her father had suspected she had betrayed him.

“You regret your choice?”

“Not even a little bit. A monster is a monster. Just because you share the same bloodline doesn’t mean they should get a free pass. My father took other people’s fathers and mothers away from them. He destroyed lives. He deserves what he has coming to him if we can pull it off. But Russ.. .”

“Did he get out?”

“I don’t know. That was the problem. I had to find out if he’d been able to get safely out of town the way I had.

We had a cellphone. A burner. One I thought was safe to use.

I was wrong. It led them right to me which could have compromised the rest of the people who were trying to seek shelter and safety in Italy. ”

“Italy?” Alex asked with a hum of intrigue. “You really have been on a journey haven’t you?”

“Are you listening to me? I understood the rules they laid out for me to get assistance from the Kinross organization, and I deliberately disregarded them and put people in grave danger.”

“I hear you,” Alex said with a nod. “That’s pretty screwed up.”

Why that felt better to hear than some sort of blanket acceptance of what she done was confounding, but true.

She wanted to be scolded. She deserved it.

“I know it is and they should have warned you. Maybe you wouldn’t have let me come if you knew I’d done that.

I’d completely understand. And maybe you don’t want to keep going with this at all. ”

“Should I pull over and let you out? Would that be enough penance? The bears would be happy to make you pay for what you’ve done if that would make you feel better.”

“It’s not a joke.” She snapped her head around to look at him finally. “I’m lucky no one was killed or they found out about the place where all those people were trying to hide and rebuild their lives.”

“You did get lucky. And maybe that’s enough.”

“What do you mean?”

“It sounds like you wish you’d done it differently. You regret it. You understand how dangerous it was. And you got lucky. You won’t get that lucky next time. Agree?”

“Yes. As much as I want to know if Russ is all right, I’ll never take that kind of risk again. I honestly didn’t think my father would go to those lengths to find me. He wants me dead. He’ll stop at nothing. I thought that maybe. ..”

“Maybe because he’s your father you’d be somehow immune to his violence and thirst for power?”

“It was na?ve.”

“No. It was exactly how it should have been. Your father is putting on a hell of a show on the news. Getting weepy for the cameras. Pleading to whoever has you to bring you home. He’s afraid, but not of what might happen to you. Afraid of what might happen if he doesn’t get his hands on you first.”

“Don’t let me off the hook.”

“How about I don’t do that, but I also don’t let you out in the woods in the middle of the night either. Maybe we just keep moving forward and you learn from what happened.”

“How can you trust I won’t do something like that again? It could put you in serious danger.”

“I don’t trust you,” he said flatly. “I just met you. But I don’t need to trust you yet. I know enough for us to be doing this right now.”

“What do you know?”

“You’re willing to risk your life and everything that was once important to you in order to do the right thing.

You’re loyal and apparently strong enough to deal with what’s come your way so far.

I might not have done this very often but I can tell you the people who show up at my door, they aren’t like you. ”

“They aren’t?”

“Nope. For them, the fear was winning. They were completely spiraling. Breaking down. Which is understandable. But you didn’t show up letting the fear win. I suspect you don’t like to lose in general.”

She snorted out a laugh she wasn’t expecting and covered her face. “I do tend to be a tad on the competitive side. I’ve lost some friends over board games gone wrong.”

“It will help here. That will be what gets you through. I can’t imagine what it’s like to have your father want you dead. But I can imagine the fire it takes to make sure he doesn’t succeed. You have that.”

“But you don’t trust me.”

“Not yet.”

“How do you think I feel? I don’t have a choice but to trust you.

If you turned out to be some creep who was driving me into the woods to chop me up and wear my bones like a necklace, I’d have no way to defend myself.

Think how much trust I’m stuck having to give right now without even knowing you. ”

“That part must suck actually,” he agreed with his own little chuckle now. “But I don’t really wear jewelry, if that makes you feel better. And the only thing I like to do in the woods is fight the elements and make sure I stay alive.”

“That’s camping?” she asked, leaning in a little. “To answer your earlier question, no I haven’t camped much. You’re not making it sound very fun. Why do people do it?”

“This won’t be camping really,” he said apologetically. “No campsite. No bathrooms. We won’t be camped out by a silly cast of characters who we bond with over the campfire. No s’mores with the neighbors. It’ll be rustic. Remote. But that’s how it has to be for now.”

“I don’t like that kind of quiet. I’m not built for it.”

“Why? It’s actually kind of incredible.” The corner of his mouth cocked up as though tugged by some memory he was recalling. She could see him out in the wilderness, all zen and having a moment of clarity next to a waterfall or something. That was not possible for her.

“I miss my job. I never thought I would, but I do. Even the people in the office who used to drive me mad. That pace, the way we used to get things done, I miss that. I’m not someone who thrives in peace and quiet.”

Alex navigated the truck around a sharp curve as the road narrowed even more. Now the leaves of the trees on either side of them brushed against their windows.

“What was your job?”

“I was a consumer engineer.” She thought back to those long nights in the office. The deadlines and the frenetic pace of what it took to meet her goals. Now her goal was to stay alive and try not to wonder where she’d pee now that they were out in the middle of nowhere.

“What the hell is a consumer engineer? You build things?”

“Not exactly. It involves understanding consumer behavior, needs, and preferences to create more user-friendly and effective solutions for products or services we all use. I love that what I did combines elements of engineering, design, marketing, and psychology. It’s probably boring to hear about though. ”

“Lesson one in wilderness living: the barometer for boring can quickly change dramatically. We’ve got another forty minutes of driving. Give me the long answer.”

“We conducted studies and surveys to gather data on consumer preferences and behaviors. Then collaborated with design and development teams to create products that meet consumer needs. We’d oversee testing products with real users to identify problems and pinpoint areas for improvement.

I work with marketing, sales, and customer service teams to ensure a cohesive consumer experience.

I like to make things better for people. ”

“Okay, what have you improved? Did you reinvent the spatula or something?”

“Not quite. Think bigger. I’ve been on teams that designed an intuitive dashboard for an electric vehicle that displays essential information clearly and offers advanced features like route optimization and energy consumption tracking.

We also developed a fitness tracker with an easy-to-use interface, accurate health monitoring features, and seamless connectivity with other devices.

It’s about listening to what people need and then trying to problem-solve your way to a better outcome. ”

“I guess I’ve never really known how any of those things were done. I figured some fairy came and waved a magic wand.”

“It’s a kind of magic to me and I miss it. For months I’ve been doing nothing of any merit. Running for my life isn’t exactly rewarding.”

“But if this works, you’d be doing something incredible. Saving lives. Taking down someone who has had unchecked power for far too long. That will be an accomplishment.”

“What will my life look like on the other side of this? There won’t be anything for me.

I can’t step back into what was. That’s gone.

There is no world where my father and his men are completely neutralized as a threat.

I’ll have a target on my back for the rest of my life.

I’m not going back to my career. My apartment. Nothing.”

Alex didn’t try to make her feel better with that flowery optimism now.

Instead he reached for the knob on his radio and put on some melancholy country music with a deep twang and sorrowful lyrics.

This was no love song. There was pain pouring out through his speakers and she soaked it in like a thirst being quenched.

And she hoped it played long enough to be able to drown in it.