But that meant Al and Jerry had too. And they were in an ATV, faster and more agile than an aged RV.Take it upa notch,Mackenzie.She tried, but the waterlogged road and gloom made her keep to a crawl.
Gideon reached forward and cranked the heat lever.
“I think that was only four minutes,” she said.
“Close enough.”
The heater blew the faintest puff of lukewarm air until she’d rolled another quarter mile. Then it blasted out the most glorious warmth she’d ever experienced. The forceful stream of heat warmed her face. A measure of circulation returned to her hands with a mingling of pain and pleasure. Her rigid cheeks melted into pliable flesh again, burning and tingling.
“Should I turn the heater down?” Gideon said.
“Don’t even think about it.”
He laughed. “I was hoping you’d say that. Whoa.” He suddenly clutched the dash.
She slammed on the brakes.
Part of the road in front of them had disappeared into a water-filled sinkhole. The rippling surface made it impossible to judge the depth. Traversing it was out of the question.
“Do I have room to go around?”
He cranked down the window, letting in a cold blast of air as he craned a look out. “Yes, but we’re talking inches of clearance, no more.”
Would the rest of the road disintegrate under the weight of the vehicle and swallow them? Neither one of them wanted to voice the question.
Jaw clenched, she guided them around in a space so tight the side scraped the bark of the overhanging trees. It was an excruciatingly slow process, but inch by precarious inch they squeezed past the obstacle.
Gideon blew out a breath. “Good driving. They work on that in cop school?”
“My brother taught me.”
“I remember. For all his wildness, he was an extremely cautious driver, most of the time.” Gideon went quiet. “I offered to help with your lessons, but he declined every time. He said, ‘She’s my responsibility.’”
Mackenzie’s throat clogged. And Aaron was hers. Only she hadn’t saved him. There were so many ways she should have tried to pry into his secret life.
Too late.
“I didn’t know you signed up to help teach me how to drive.”
“Yeah, not altruistic, I’m afraid. I wanted to show off mostly. I had that sweet ride. Figured it would impress you.”
“It did.” A sleek sky-blue Mustang and a honey-eyed boy who fussed over every inch of it. He was gangly, with the lean physique that would later bulk out with muscle. Maybe if she hadn’t been Aaron’s little sister, two years younger, Gideon would have taken her for a ride in that gorgeous car, and ...
The painful what-ifs struck at her heart. It all seemed so terribly long ago, an innocent era when she’d known who she was, or thought she did. Now everything was surreal, confusing, and it left her numb inside. “I thought you were indifferent. Why did you want to impress me?”
He shrugged. “Teenage boy? Best friend’s hot sister? What’s not to understand?”
Her cheeks warmed. Hot sister? She’d never thoughthe’d seen her that way. “I wanted to impress you too, I guess,” she admitted. “But I never quite knew how.”
He steadied the palm tree deodorizer hanging from the rearview. “Just being yourself was enough.”
Being herself? The stubborn, hyperactive know-it-all? She couldn’t look at him so she focused on the route ahead. The graveled section ended at a larger paved two-lane road. Decision time. She braked while Gideon consulted his compass.
“Left will loop us closer to the highway.”
“So right would be the more direct route to the airstrip,” she said.
“That’s correct.” His tone was carefully neutral.
