“Classic,” she said under her breath, her eyes still closed. “I saw them in Austin in2012.”
Jacques felt his brows climb in admiration. “Cool. So, like a year afterKing of Limbsreleased?” he asked, coming to a stop at the light on SouthCollege.
“Yeah… Hearing ‘Codex’ live moved me to tears.” The softening in her voice made him glance up. In the reflection, he saw her gaze had moved to the left window, but he could tell that she wasn’t seeing the scenery. He thought about the lyrics of the song, the way Thom Yorke sang of innocence — as though he missed innocence like one misses afriend.
When they stopped at the light at Doucet, he saw she still stared, seeing something he couldn’t. She didn’t look nervous anymore, but whatever had claimed her eyes — a memory, a feeling — didn’t seem happy, and Jacques found himself wanting to lead her away fromit.
“I’ve never seen them in concert, but that wouldn’t suck,” he said, and he watched her blink back to thepresent.
She offered him a half smile in themirror.
Even by half, she had an arresting smile that hit Jacques with ajolt.
Her phone bleeped with a text then, and she pulled her eyes away. He drove. “Karma Police” ended, and his iTunes library, which held more than eight hundred songs, switched over to Pearl Jam’s “Just Breathe.” Jacques fingered the opening chords on the steering wheel and hummed along with EddieVedder.
The light rain fell, slowing traffic, but at least the roads were clear. As the song reached its refrain, Jacques realized he was singing, not humming. He stopped and glanced in the rearview mirror to find the girl’s eyes on him again. The look they held was penetrating but unreadable. Had his singing annoyed her? He silently cursed himself. Uber riders didn’t want a serenade. His steering wheel wasn’t amicrophone.
But right after he clamped his mouth shut, she spoke up. “You soundjustlikehim.”
Jacques’s cheeks grew warm. Other people had compared his voice to the American rock god that was Eddie Vedder. It had never made himblush.
She’s prettier than other people,he decided. And she was pretty. Beautiful, in fact. Her honey-brown hair was pulled into a barrette, but a single loose curl fell against her cheek, the forerunner of those that spilled down herback.
“Thanks,” he managed, his eyes connecting with hers again in therearview.
“It’s a good song,” she added. She was right. For some reason, Jacques had never thought of covering it, but picturing it now, the idea flung a blanket of chills over his shoulders. With the right crowd in the right place, it would bring down thehouse.
He brought his eyes back to the road an instant before a red Dodge Durango knifed into his lane, tires screaming. Jacques hit the brakes, and the rear of the Impala sailed over the wet asphalt for a terrifying moment before he steered into the spin and corrected. Horns blared around them, and he narrowly missed the car one lane over, but he didn’t miss the cry of fright from his passenger or the sound of objects tumbling and spilling onto the floor of the backseat.
“Jesus,” he hissed. When he knew it was safe, he looked back at her, making sure she wasokay.
Her eyes were closed, her face the color ofash.
“Hold you ‘til I die… Meet you on the other side…”Eddie Veddersang.
She did not move. She just sat, rigid and pale, wearing a look of trauma. Jacques considered pulling over. “Hey, youokay?”
He watched her eyes flutter open, but they didn’t lose the look ofterror.
Jacques put his focus on the road and immediately ground his teeth as he spotted the Durango ahead of them, weaving in and out of traffic, the driver oblivious to the threat he posed on the wet roads. “You’re all good…right?”
Shifting his gaze between the traffic and the mirror, Jacques caught her blinking half-a-dozen times. Drawing in her lips, she gave a jerky nod, but she looked far from okay. The urge to reassure her overtookhim.
“I promise, I’ll get you there in one piece,” he told her. He forced a smile at her reflection, and the tightness around her mouth and eyessoftened.
“I was sure we were going to hit him,” she said on a shaky breath. Then she blew out a sigh. “Weshouldhave hit him. That was some qualitydriving.”
His own relief surprised him. Not because they’d missed an accident, but because she clearly knew the near miss wasn’t his fault. That he had not been careless. Because as far as Jacques as concerned, there were few worse things than being careless while in control of two tons ofmetal.
Behind him, she folded over and began picking up the items that had spilled onto the floor. A quick glance showed him they were paperbacks. Romance novels, by the looks of the covers.Steamyromancenovels.
Bodicerippers.
He couldn’t remember where he’d heard the term, but bodice ripping was definitely what those book covers promised. The stack of books she now stuffed back into the backpack was far fromsmall.
Had she read all those books?Wouldshe read all of them? Did she read them for the bodiceripping?
This onslaught of questions — and the image of the beautiful girl in his back seat reading bodice rippers — left him almost dizzy, so Jacques swallowed and tried to focus on the music. “This is How it Feels” by Richard Ashcroft followed Pearl Jam, and he made himself hum along. The light rain became a squall just as he pulled into the hospital parking lot. Luckily, Lourdes had a covered drive in front of theentrance.