“Mia,” he said carefully, “I don’t smell gas. Either the gauge is lying, or there’s nothing in the tank.”
“That’s not possible,” she said immediately. “I checked the gauge before I left. It was over half full.”
“Could be a bad gauge,” he said calmly. “Or a slow leak. Either way, you’re not driving this anywhere right now.”
Relief and frustration tangled in her chest. “So … bad luck,” she said, forcing a small smile.
“Yeah. Bad luck.”
He moved to the front again, crouched, then stood. “Headlight’s cracked, but it’s not dangerous. We’ll deal with it later. Come on,” he said, already opening his truck door. “We’ll get gas, then come back for the van.”
“Okay,” she said softly.
As she climbed into his truck, she told herself the same thing that she’d been repeating all morning.
It’s just bad luck.
Even if it didn’t feel that way.
Caleb hadn’t gone more than half a mile before Mia reached for her phone.
“I have to call a potential client,” she said. The phone rang twice before the woman answered.
“Hi, this is Mia Whitmore,” she said. “I’m so sorry to do this last-minute, but I’ve had a car issue and am running behind. I didn’t want you to waste the trip.”
There was a pause.
“Oh,” the woman said. Polite, yet distant. “That’s unfortunate.”
Mia swallowed hard. “If you’d like to reschedule, I’d be happy to…”
“I think we’ll hold off for now,” the woman replied. “Things feel a little … up in the air. Thank you for calling.”
The line went dead.
Mia stared at her phone.
“I’m sorry,” Caleb said quietly.
“It’s fine,” she lied. “They weren’t committed anyway.”
But she knew how this worked.
Hold offturned into “We heard things.”Up in the airbecame “unreliable.”
She told herself it was just bad luck. She wasn’t sure she believed it anymore.
CHAPTER 32
Roy hadn’t planned it.That was the part he clung to afterward.
He’d gone out to the van that morning telling himself he was just checking something. Just looking. The gas can was already in the back of his truck from the mower, and when the idea slid into place, it felt almost reasonable.
Just a little. Enough to slow her down.
His girlfriend hadn’t told him how much. She hadn’t needed to.
He worked fast, heart thudding, the faint smell of gas sharp in the cool air. He didn’t measure. Didn’t think about how low the tank already might have been. He stopped when the can felt heavy enough, capped it and slid it back into his truck.
