Page 74 of Walking in Darkness

I knew what was going through her head.

No question, she was replaying that horrible vision of the way we’d rolled up on Peter.

How we’d been one fucking minute too late.

We couldn’t let this turn out the way it had for him.

Couldn’t fathom what we’d do then. How it would affect Aria. The guilt and grief that would consume her sweet, beautiful soul.

So I refused to contemplate if it was even a possibility.

“That’s great,” she whispered.

Aria at least knew Dani’s address since everyone had exchanged info the other night.

After I slung an arm over Aria’s shoulders like we were a regular couple on a trip, we walked down a hallway covered in industrial carpet. The longer corridor was separated by a rope that ran down the middle—one side for arrivals and one for departures.

Aria breathed out in disbelief when we got to the end and saw there was a small security area where passengers had to show their IDs and run their bags through a scanner, plus walk through a detector to get clearance.

We would never have made it through had we been traveling in the opposite direction.

Not without our IDs, and sure as hell not with the gun I had in my bag.

“That was some kind of luck,” I muttered, turning my mouth toward her ear as we pushed through a door at the end that let us out into the unsecured side of the small terminal.

“I just hope our luck hasn’t run out,” she returned, the words soggy with apprehension.

We moved to a large bank of windows that overlooked the front. Aria fidgeted as we watched, chewing at her thumbnail and shifting on her feet. She flinched every single time a car came around the curved drive to the drop-off and pickup area just outside the doors, her breaths shallow as she anxiously waited.

Relief clashed with the trepidation that boiled between us when I saw a sedan roll up with the name of the taxi company written on the side. “That’s us.”

“Thank God.”

We rushed out into the damp, cold air. Vapor puffed from our mouths as we jogged to the car, which pulled to a stop at the curb.

We hopped into the back, and I tossed out the address of a café in the shopping center nearest to Dani’s address. Didn’t want any record of us being dropped off directly in front of her house.

I knew Aria probably didn’t care; she would take any risk to get to Dani. But I had to protect her, too. Everything hinged on her survival.

“All right,” the driver said, glancing at us in the rearview mirror. There was some kind of speculation in his tone, unease that glided through his being, no doubt picking up that we were different.

Something he didn’t trust.

“Gonna cost you fifty.”

I pushed three twenties through the plastic plate that separated the front from the back. “No problem.”

He didn’t say anything else when he pulled back around the loop and headed out onto the highway.

Aria twitched the entire way, apprehension rolling through her in waves. I had my hand on her knee, trying to keep her calm as we traveled.

About twenty minutes later, he took an exit off the highway. I could feel Aria’s heart rate increase. Her anxiety ramped up higher with each second that passed.

The driver slowed and made a right into a parking lot that housed what looked like a few local businesses. He rolled up toward the small café that sat in a freestanding building up near the road. The brick walls were painted teal, and there was a flower mural on the side.

Aria had her door open before he’d even come to a full stop.

“Thanks,” I said as I grabbed our bags and slipped out the same side as her.