Page 43 of Final Exit

He slammed the phone against the gearshift over and over until it was a mangled mess and the computer components were hanging out in pieces. He rolled down the window and tossed the ruined phone like a Frisbee onto the highway. A semi traveling behind them finished the job of reducing it to roadkill.

“Remind me not to ever let you borrow my phone,” she teased. “Anyone following us?” She wove around a slow-moving car before accelerating again.

Kade watched the road behind them for a minute. “I don’t think so. But they don’t have to be tracking us to know we would have headed to the highway. It was the fastest way to put some distance between us and the hospital.”

He motioned toward her pocket. “If you can trust me with your phone, in spite of my destructive tendencies, I’ll use your maps app to plot an alternate course.”

“Don’t bother.” She downshifted, then squealed around another car amidst a flurry of honking horns, barely making the next exit without rolling the car. “I know where we are. I’ve got this.”

It took a full minute before he could breathe normally again and force his fingers to uncurl from the armrest.

“I hope you’re right,” he finally said. “Because to me it just seems like you’re going to get us killed.”

She smiled and pressed the gas pedal all the way to the floor. “If I do, we’ll die happy. This is fun.”

Kade stared at her incredulously. Who knew she was Thelma and Louise all rolled up into one person? Hopefully there wasn’t a cliff nearby for her to drive off.

Chapter Twelve

Saturday, 7:03 p.m.

Bailey punched the security code into the keypad, then hopped back into the Mustang. As soon as the garage door was high enough to clear the roof of the car, she zipped inside. By the time Kade had even opened his car door, she’d already gotten out and pressed the button on the wall to close the garage.

Was he limping worse than before? He was definitely moving slower. She was about to ask him about his leg when he looked toward the driver’s side.

“You’re hell on a paint job,” he said.

She leaned over, wincing when she saw the damage. “I guess I scraped it worse than I realized.”

“Scraped?” He laughed. “We’re lucky that guardrail held. You took that last turn way too fast.”

“I’ve driven ’Stangs before. I knew what I could get away with. What matters is that we’re alive and no one knows where we are.”

“I have to admit, I’m impressed.” He waved his hand to encompass the single-car garage, brightly lit by buzzing fluorescents overhead. “I never realized you had a home in Colorado Springs. How did you manage to hide it from me? I found all the other properties you own.”

She quirked a brow. “The house in Florida?”

“Naples. Lovely Victorian. Could use a new paint job, though, like the Mustang.”

She frowned. “North Carolina?”

“Hatteras Island is gorgeous this time of year.”

“Damn. Canada?”

He arched a brow. “You don’t own a house in Canada.”

She smiled. “You’re right. I don’t. But I don’t own one in Colorado Springs either. The owners use this place for vacations two or three times a year. The rest of the time I’m free to stay here if I want.”

“That’s generous of them. Old family friends?”

Her smile faded. “I don’t have a family. And they’re more Hawke’s friends than mine.”

He limped toward her and gently brushed her hair back from her face. “I’m so sorry for your loss, Bailey. I wish... I wish it could have been different.”

She searched his eyes. “Do you?”

“Of course. I didn’t want Hawke hurt any more than I want you hurt.”