Page 34 of Reclaiming Adelaide

“Adelaide, chill.”

I flipped the lock, erasing the graphic mental images of my battered body in the middle of the road, my arm bent at a horrid angle and my vacant eyes staring up at my soul staring down, and opened the door. Tires rolling along the asphalt at breakneck speeds rode the seventy-mile-an-hour winds blasting through the cracked door.

A semi’s horn blared behind us as I stuck my head out and watched the broken white lines pass as one solid streak.

I took a deep breath.

My thumb on my belt buckle.

Click.

10

“Adelaide!”

My torso vaulted to the side, my shirt tight against my throat as he fisted the material with deathly white knuckles, the door closed with my hand still wrapped firmly around it. A gasp breezed past my lips as the car skimmed three lanes and came to a screeching halt on the side of the freeway.

Jake turned off the music, making our exasperated breaths a chaotic chorus surrounding us. He released my shirt and wrapped his bandaged hand around the back of my neck, pulling me close. “You pull that shit again, and I’ll take away your hesitation.”

My breath hitched as a strangled cry erupted from my throat.

I almost died.

What the hell was I thinking?

“I’m trying to help you, dammit.” He jerked me closer like he used to do when he wanted to kiss me and stared at me with wild eyes flaming with rage. Or was it concern?

“You don’t want to help me. You said so yourself.” I swiped his damaged hand off of me, a quiver of turbulent lightning striking through me and down to my toes.

And now he wanted to take me to a place no one would ever find me? Was I just supposed to shrug and comply with such a ridiculous notion?

I shrugged out of the seat belt and bolted from the car. My shirt ripped through his fingers with the popping of threads, the collar burning my throat from the friction.

“Get back in the fucking car!” His thunderous voice sent my feet moving faster into the woods, my hip snagging on bruised flesh with each stroke.

Twigs snapped, echoing their fractured cries around me as he rushed after me. “Adelaide, would you fucking stop?”

His furious shouts urged me forward until he twisted me around by the arm, pinning me against a tree. Its bark pressed into my skin, reminiscent of the time he’d taken me in public. When he cared enough to search for me.

“You aren’t going anywhere. I told you that.”

“Jake. Please. Just—”

His body pressed into mine, his heat flaming my skin with lust and repudiated desire. I shouldn’t have felt that way about him now. He should have repulsed me asIdid him.

“Why can’t you listen?” His tone grew cold and quiet, sending ice down the fine hairs on my arm, hardening my nipples.

I shook my head, and his bloodied hand gripped my jaw, his fingers digging into my cheeks.

“You’re so fucking stubborn, and it’s only gonna get you killed. You know that?”

His gaze bounced from my lips to my eyes, up and down, side to side, until his lips slammed against mine in a virulent turn of tongues, lips, and teeth. Our torrid bodies melded together as one until he ripped himself from me like a blast of cold water on two mating dogs.

“That’ll never happen again.”

I gasped, the breath sucked from my lungs as a cruel, twisted reality settled in.

Jake dragged me back with his bitter, unfeeling grasp and threw me into the car. I sank down on myself. The driver’s door rocked the vehicle as he closed it.

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