“Where are you?”
“I…I don’t know. He just left me.”
“Who? What happened?” I jumped out of bed and wrestled my jeans on with one hand. “Never mind, tell me where you are.”
“I’m on a road somewhere. In the Bend, I think.”
My head whipped to the window streaked with rain. “You’reoutside?” I threw on a shirt and fought for calm. “Emery, drop me a pin. Okay?”
“O-okay.”
She was shivering. Teeth chattering.
He just left me…
Tucker.
Fury boiled in me and a red haze descended over my eyes, but thepingof a dropped pin brought me back. She was in my neighborhood, maybe a three-minute drive, but the houses were spread out and she was in the dark, in the pouring rain…
“Emery, I see you. I’m really close, okay? I’ll be right there.”
“Okay,” she said, her voice small.
“Don’t hang up. I’m putting you on speaker.” I tossed my phone on the bed, so I could pull on my sweatshirt and shoes.
“Thank you, Xander.”
Jesus Christ, I thought my insides were going to combust from the mix of fear and rage.
He’d better have only left her in the rain. If he touched her…if he hurt her in any way…
Then I was going to jail, end of story.
“Emery, you still there?” I asked and ran down the stairs. The house was quiet, thank God, my dad sleeping.
“I-I’m here.”
I grabbed my keys, then stopped at what made for a linen closet off the kitchen and grabbed an old camping blanket.
“I’m coming, Em.” I rushed into the garage. “Three minutes.”
“Okay.”
I threw the car into reverse and pulled out of the garage. Immediately, the windshield was doused, as if someone had thrown a bucket of water onto it.
“Fucking Christ.”
I drove into the night, into a downpour that showed no signs of letting up but was nothing compared to the storm boiling inside me.
He left her in this. He left her. I left her…
I’d left Emery.
If anything had happened to her that couldn’t be taken back, I’d never forgive myself. Not in this life or the next, or in any of the infinite possible lifetimes that might await me in the cold, black universe.
It took everything I had not to drive like a maniac. The only thing slowing me down was the thought that she’d be stranded if I skidded in the rain and wrapped the Buick around a tree.
After what felt like an eternity, my headlights splashed over a lone figure pressed against the trunk of a huge, white oak. She wore a black coat over a red dress, both clinging to her as if she’d swam in them.
