She glared at her old friend. “I hate you.” It was predictable and lame. It was so very high school, but it was the worst thing she could think of right now.
“I know,” he replied.
“I’ll never forgive you for this,” she added after another few minutes.
“I know.”
Was that all he had? “You were smart once. This… this is an unbelievable low. Even for you.”
He faced her down. “What does that mean?”
“Youknow.” She tried to avoid slamming into Wyatt as Baker momentarily lost control of the SUV again. There were videos online about how to escape zip ties. Why had she never watched them? “If you’re the guide, guide him to a safer route.”
Tate swiveled in his seat. “She knows where we’re going?”
“Of course not,” Wyatt said. “She isn’t supposed to be here at all.”
She didn’t look away in time and the mean flare in Tate’s gaze made her shiver. He reached over and turned up the heat, aiming a vent right at her.
“Better?”
“Yes, thank you.” Better to agree with whatever he said at this point. When she’d seen pictures of Tate online, he’d seemed a polite professional. Of course now she knew it had all been a setup. In person, the hard edges were evident, along with a dark intent that frankly unnerved her.
Questions pelted her from all sides, most of them about how Wyatt had ever gotten tangled up with Tate. She didn’t dare ask those. Instead, she wondered why the man had targeted her. It was silly to give in to her hurt feelings when she might be killed at any moment, on purpose or by Baker’s inexperience behind the wheel.
“Why even pretend you were interested in my business?”
“I wanted a tour of the area,” Tate admitted. “Your company was the best fit for me.”
“Why?”
“What are you doing?” Wyatt asked in a hiss.
“Trying to understand how any of this happened.” She leaned forward, heedless that the blanket slipped forward. “Why, Mr. Cordell?” she repeated.
“Cottonwood is a small company,” Tate answered. “A small company in some financial stress worked to my advantage, plus with off-season I was guaranteed the best possible local guide. You.”
She sat back again and resumed her efforts to break free of the zip tie under the blanket.
“Don’t pout, Evelyn,” Tate said. “When I contacted you, my hope was to get enough information from you so your old pal there couldn’t screw me over. He tells me we’ll have a tough time reaching the rendezvous point in this weather. I’m tempted to ask if you agree.”
She didn’t want to know where the rendezvous point was. If he told her, an escape would be even more difficult. “We’ll have a tough time going another mile,” Evie muttered.
“He warned me it would be easier to hike part of it.”
She nearly choked. It was all she could do to keep the reaction off her face and keep her gaze away from Wyatt. They were driving north to a destination easier to reach on foot. Tate probably thought he was being vague, but Evie knew Wyatt too well. And like Wyatt, she knew the area too well.
They must be headed toward the ghost town that had once been a thriving community during the Black Hills gold rush. If she could get away, and reach the police before she froze in the weather, the authorities might catch them in time.
Beside her, Wyatt was stiff, a muscle in his jaw jumping, a sure sign of his frustration and stress. It shouldn’t have been any comfort at all and yet… it was a sign she recognized from long ago. That muscle would react whenever his mother embarrassed him or when he had to go smooth over her debts or insult with someone in town.
If he was stressed about this, maybe he wasn’t here because he wanted to be. The outrageous thought stuck in her head, refused to budge. Did she have an ally in this car? She bumped his knee with her own.
“Let me go,” she said. “I don’t care what you stole or where you’re going.” Baker took a curve too quickly and Karl fell into her, pressing her up against Wyatt. “He’s going to get all of us killed.”
“Someone shut her up,” Tate ordered.
As Baker straightened out the car, taking the majority of the narrow strip the plows had cleared, Karl pulled his scarf from around his neck and started to loop it over her head. Evie reared back, shoving herself more into Wyatt.
