Page 103 of Jessica, Not Her Real Name
She took a step closer to him. Blew out a breath. “Okay. So you tell them that while you were filling up at a gas station outside Mobile, I got out of your car and, before you could stop me, climbed into an old silver Cadillac. And that was the last you saw of me. You don’t even know if I survived the storm.”
He opened his mouth, but no words came out. Was he actually considering this?
“I’ll change my name when we get to Memphis,” she said. “I have to start again from scratch, anyway.” She paused, then added, “No one has to know about us.”
All he could do was stare at her for a long time. When he could finally engage his vocal cords, the only word that came out was, “Us?”
“There doesn’t have to be an ‘us’,” she said quickly. “I mean, I could stay at an Airbnb or something for a while, then?—”
“Do you want there to be an us?” he interrupted.
She chanced a glance at him. When she spoke, her voice was barely above a whisper. “Do you?”
He appeared to have lost the ability to do anything but stare at her. Like an idiot. Then he felt something in him break. The part of him that always tried to do the right thing. The decent thing. The thing that would assuage that permanent feeling of guilt he carried around with him. It just snapped, like a ligament off a bone. He almost heard it go.
He took two steps towards her, took her face in his hands and kissed her. She gave a little gasp against his mouth, and he pulled back, only to have her press her lips more firmly against his. Her mouth opened for him with a soft moan. When he finally broke it off, he kept her face cupped between his palms and rested his forehead against hers. “Good God, I want there to be an us.”
She wrapped her hands around his back and clamped herself to him. Their mouths locked together again, and he didn’t realize they had been walking backward until she bumped into the van.
He placed his hands on the hot metal roof, on either side of her head. Her hands were everywhere, running over his chest, tugging at his belt.
He encircled hers, stopping them. Wishing he didn’t have to be the pragmatic one. “Jessica, we gotta get off this road. We’ll keep heading north. Find a town. Find a motel room. Figure out what the hell we’re gonna do next.”
Actually, he knew exactly what they were gonna do next. Motel rooms had beds. With sheets. Clean ones. Where he could lay her down. Take his time with her. Taste her. Make love to her real slow. And then do it all over again.
He tilted up her chin and kissed her mouth again. Then he took his phone out of his pocket, turned it on and unlocked it, then handed it to her. “See if you can find a couple of bars of signal. Figure out where the hell we are. I’ll finish clearing the road.”
THIRTY-FOUR
Jessica leanedback against the van door, the metal warm against her skin. She watched as Ryan dragged the last of the branches off the road, muscles flexing with each movement. Her body still hummed with the lingering imprint of his—of the way he had pressed against her moments ago, heat and strength wrapped in the scent of rain and earth.
For the first time since leaving Florida, hope didn’t feel like some distant, unattainable thing. It swelled inside her, displacing the weight that had been crushing her chest for days. A lightness spread through her, as if a storm had passed, not just the hurricane, but the one inside her.
She looked down at his phone, suddenly remembering what she was supposed to be doing. Finding a signal. Figuring out where they were. Searching for a place to sleep tonight.
Although, she had the distinct feeling there wouldn’t be much sleeping involved.
That thought sent a rush of warmth through her veins, the lingering tingle in her blood turning into something effervescent.
She focused on the screen. The phone had finally latched onto a network, and notifications began rolling in, one after another. Missed calls. Texts. Updates. A string of alerts scrolled past, but her eyes caught on one name—Dad.Ryan’s father had tried to reach him. More than once.
News alerts pinged in rapid succession. Headlines about Hurricane Petra flashed across the screen, each one painting a picture of devastation. The storm had carved a path of destruction from Galveston to Pensacola, ripping off roofs, washing out roads, and setting off landslides. It had now tracked northeast, unloading months’ worth of rain onto North Carolina.
But as she scrolled, one alert stood out—something that had nothing to do with the hurricane.
And the moment she read it, that lightness inside her turned to lead.
U.S. Marshals hunt for one of their own after a woman is abducted from Panama City Beach, FL.
Her thumb jabbed at the screen, leaving a sweaty mark behind. The story took forever to load because the signal kept losing bars. She swallowed, her throat suddenly dry, and glanced up at Ryan.
“Anything?” he called.
She shook her head quickly, trying not to notice that her hands gripping the phone were shaking. Finally, the article finished loading.
TALLAHASSEE, FL. U.S. Marshals are today hunting for one of their own after a Florida woman, 31, was abducted from her home in Panama City Beach on Friday night by Deputy U.S. Marshal Ryan Inglis, 34. The woman is believed to be a member of the ultra-secret Witness Security Program, and the alleged abduction was carried out by Inglis under the guise of relocating her to a safe site in Louisiana. The motive remains unknown, as does the location of the two individuals.
Inglis, who serves as a Deputy U.S. Marshal with the U.S. Marshals Service in the Western District of Tennessee, is a veteran fugitive hunter with a sterling record. He is the second-in-command of the Two Rivers Violent Fugitive Task Force, based out of Memphis. It is understood that he used his position within this multi-agency Task Force to access highly confidential information about the missing woman, including details about where she was living and working. He then used this information to gain her trust and convince her to leave with him.
