“You know, Adrian, I’ve had about enough of this.”
He glanced over at me like I was nuts.
“I mean…Really?” I scoffed without humor. “You’re kidnapping me?Kidnapping me?It wasn’t enough that you beat me? That you used me? That you made me feel like a freak every day we were together? That you forced me to pack up in the middle of the night andflee the freaking state?” I shook my head in disbelief. “No. Apparently not. Because here you are. Fucking up my life, yet again!”
“You’re the one who?—”
“I am not done,” I cut him off. “You are a waste of my time. You are a waste of my energy. You were nothing but an anchor around my ankles, keeping me down. And when I left, I cut you loose.”
“Dollface—”
“I came here. And I found people who aren’t an anchor. They don’t hold me down. They lift me up. They support me. They don’t want to use me for money or manipulate me for profit. They’ve cared about me more in nine freakingdaysthan you did innine goddamned months.”
He made a hairpin turn, teeth gritting together as his temper rose. “You can’t just?—”
“Do you see that cop car behind us?” I cut him off again. “The man I love is behind the wheel. He’s coming for me. He will always come for me. Because he’s loyal. He’s selfless. He’s also sweet and he’s kind and, I would be remiss not to mention, he’s a fucking god in bed.Waybetter than you ever were.”
“I’m dynamite in bed!”
“If you could locate the clitoris, or actually cared whether or not your partner finished… I’m sure that might be true.Maybe. Alas...”
He took a wild turn and, like the machismo idiot he was, accelerated through it instead of braking. The Ferrari’s tires skidded through a deep puddle. We started to fishtail. I screamed, sure we were about to careen out of control. Adrian spun the wheel at the last second, straightening us out before we could fully hydroplane.
“You’re going to get us killed!” I screeched at him when we were once again racing down a straightaway on solid asphalt.
“If I go back to A.C. without you, I might as well be dead!” he yelled back. His dark, sultry eyes were wild. Frantic. “Viggo will fucking kill me if I don’t square up with him!”
“Not my problem.”
“Itisyour problem! You’re the one who bailed on the residency!”
Christ.
I wassonot about to have this fight with him for the umpteenth time. I glanced around, trying to spot Cade through the rear windshield. Three SPD cruisers had joined the pursuit, flanking his dark SUV. Behind them, I thought I spotted Graham’s black Ford Bronco, bringing up the rear.
Adrian took another turn — too sharp, too fast. My neck spasmed with whiplash as I was flung bodily across the cab, into the side door. My head cracked against the window, hard enough that I saw stars. When I’d blinked most of them away, I belatedly grabbed my seatbelt and clicked it into place.
“Adrian,” I said, trying to breathe through my mounting panic. “Please slow down.”
He was beyond listening. “We were good together. You know we were, doll. We can be good again. You’ll see. We’ll get back home, and I’ll fix it. I’ll fix everything.”
“It’s too late.”
“Don’t say that!” He gripped the wheel tighter and jammed his foot against the gas, accelerating us to twice the legal limit. We were flying down the road, now. Running red lights, weaving through lanes.
If he kept this up, we were going to crash.
Cade and the others had fallen back slightly. Eased their pursuit. Perhaps they realized the close tail was only exacerbating the problem. But it wasn’t enough. Even without the sirens breathing down our neck, Adrian was driving with a recklessness that terrified me.
“Adrian…” I tried again. “Slow down. Please.”
“It doesn’t have to be this way! Don’t you get it?”
“Put on your seatbelt at least.”
“Don’t act like you care about me!” He swerved around a slow-moving car in the left lane, bringing us into oncoming traffic in order to pass. “If you’d just?—”
He didn’t see the truck.