Oh god. They read my books. They’re using the forced proximity trope on me.
“Cara.” Nate’s voice is impatient. “We’ve got fifteen hours of driving ahead of us. You coming or not?”
I take a breath. Walk around to the passenger side. Haul myself up into the truck.
The door is heavy, the step up higher than I expected. I settle my bag on my lap and click my seatbelt into place.
The truck smells like him. Pine and woodsmoke, faint but there, mixed with coffee and something that might be gun oil. His scent isn’t locked down as tight as usual—probably because he wasn’t expecting to share an enclosed space with me for the next fifteen hours.
“Morning,” I say.
He puts the truck in drive without answering and pulls away from the curb.
We pull away from Main Street in silence. I catch a glimpse of Ashpine Books across the road, the hardware store next to it, the little park at the end of the block where we used to hang out as kids. A few seconds later, we’re past it all—because that’s Honeyridge Falls. Blink and you’ll miss it.
I watch the town shrink in the side mirror and wonder how the hell I’m supposed to survive this.
“You don’t have to do this,” I finally say as we hit the highway. “I can drive myself.”
“Lucas asked.”
“Lucas schemed.”
That gets a reaction—the barest twitch at the corner of his mouth. “Probably.”
“Definitely. Theo’s back is fine. They set us up.”
“I know.”
“And you came anyway?”
He’s quiet for a long moment. The highway stretches out ahead of us, mountains fading in the rearview mirror, and I think he’s not going to answer at all.
“Lucas said you needed help.” His voice is quieter now. “I wasn’t going to let you make this drive alone.”
My heart does something complicated. “Even though you can barely stand to be in the same room as me?”
His hands flex on the steering wheel. “I can stand it.”
“Could’ve fooled me.”
More silence. The radio is off, and the only sound is the hum of tires on asphalt. I dig through my bag, pull out a muffin, pick at it without really eating.
This is going to be a very long drive.
We stopfor gas two hours in.
Nate fills the tank while I use the restroom and grab two coffees from the attached convenience store. When I get back to the truck, he’s leaning against the driver’s door, arms crossed, looking like a model for some kind of rugged outdoor magazine.
I hand him a coffee. “Black, right?”
He takes it, surprise flickering across his face. “You remembered.”
“I remember everything, Nate.”
Something shifts in his expression—surprise, maybe, that I’d bother. Then he turns and climbs back into the truck, and the moment is over.
But it’s a start.
