Page 97 of Dead Love
I hated that. What did it mean to love Kora when she hadleftme, only to come back to fix everything she could?
Two headlights appeared in the rearview mirror, the high beams bright. I flicked the angle, then leaned to the side mirror. It was that same truck: the raised wheels, the faded yellow and white paint, the same loud country music. I couldn’t see the driver through the tinted windows.
I lowered my window and motioned for the truck to go around me. Guitar blasted from the speakers as the car sped up, and laughter trickled over the music. The truck rammed into the back of my car, lurching it forward.
“The fuck?” I yelled. My blood boiled. I sped up as much as I could, but the truck raced along with me. I whipped my car around, nearly rolling it in the process, barreling down the other side of the road, but the truck did the same. Who was this person and why were they chasing me?
I flipped around again, speeding up as quickly as possible, and when I was sure I had a good distance, I slowed down, flipping around again. But the truck sped up, his engine revving, and as the headlights neared, I knew it was over.
The metal crunched and hurled my car forward into a tree. The glass shattered. The airbag deployed, knocking the wind out of me. A bassy voice from the truck’s radio echoed through the night. My whole body pulsed with adrenaline and pain shot through my bones. My head pounded. I punched at the airbag, making it deflate, then I fumbled for the dashboard. I kept a handgun in there. My head throbbed, my balance off; I couldn’t seem to pull open the glove box.
The truck’s door opened, and two feet crunched on the asphalt. Finally, I unlocked my seatbelt and leaned over, grabbing the handle for the glove box. The shadow appeared in the side mirror.
I leaned over to grab the gun, but as I pulled back the hammer, I remembered the gun wasn’t loaded. The bullets were locked in a small case in the back of the glove box, but sometimes I moved them. Where were they now? I grabbed my phone, dialing emergency services.
“Nine-one-one operator. What’s your emergency?”
“Sheriff Mike,” I said. “Get Mike to Willow Highway.”
“Sir?”
“There’s been attempted murder,” I said. The footsteps came closer. “Someone attacked me with their car. A truck—”
A fist landed on the back of my head. I dropped the phone to the ground.
“Hello? Sir?” the operator said. “Are you there?”
The truck driver cracked his knuckles. “Erickson,” a familiar voice said. I turned around, holding my forehead. Luminescent white hair flared around the sides of his face.
“You’re back at the crime scene,” Andrew said. “The murderer always returns. It’s textbook, really.”
I scowled at him. “You’re back here too.”
“Now,” he started again, ignoring me, “they won’t find Echo in your system.” He dropped a plastic baggie full of green powder on my car. “But they will find it on you. And a drunk driver is still driving under the influence, according to the law.”
I hadn’t taken a single sip. “No one is going to be fooled by this,” I said.
Andrew chuckled. “They don’t have to be.”
A crowbar smacked into my side, knocking me down into the seat. As he bashed me with the metal bar, I hid the unloaded gun under my arms, waiting for the right moment to use it like a hammer. He took an ice pick from his back pocket, raising it up.
“Guess I’ll have to find a new fuckup to blame these deaths on,” he said. And right as he went to puncture my chest with the ice pick, I smacked the back of my gun into his hand, knocking the tool out of his grip, then I quickly brought the gun down on his nose. He ripped away, clutching his palm to his chest, cursing to himself, and I fumbled through the glove box. Where were the bullets?
Sirens blared in the distance like a soft chorus. Andrew glanced at the noise, then turned back to me. “Nice one, Erickson,” he said. Then he rammed the crowbar into my head, and my world turned black.
CHAPTER32
Kora
In the morning,Nikki stumbled with the bleach on the back patio, while I cut ribbons for a slew of back orders in the storeroom. The phone rang, and Nikki ran to it.
“I can get that,” I said.
“I will,” she said, with a big smile on her face. She took the message and then went back to her task. If a woman came in, she let me handle the sales, but if it was a man? She nonchalantly closed the door to the storeroom, pretending like she didn’t know what she was doing.
My mother must have instructed her on that before she left. It had been like that since we had opened. Shea must have been having second thoughts about giving me more ‘responsibility.’
A shadow flickered in front of the windows. I leaned past the doorway to see a woman in a black blazer with a magenta scarf fixed around her neck, the sides of her head shaved. Catie. Before Nikki could lock me in that room, I burst through the door and ran toward Catie, throwing my arms around her.
