Simone turned it over in her hand before hitting a button that lit up the screen, but it didn’t reveal anything. “I… I’m not sure. Maybe.”
“The hunters didn’t teach you about cell phones either?” he asked.
“They were starting to before I left Nathan’s stronghold; I chose not to learn,” she admitted.
Killean extended his charred fingers toward her. “Let me see it.”
Simone winced at his brutalized skin, but she handed the phone over before she accidentally broke it.
Killean frowned when he saw the missed calls were all from the same number and all within the past hour. For every call, there was a voice mail. Whoever was calling wasn’t a contact of the woman’s as the phone didn’t reveal a name, only a number. He glanced at the road before turning his attention back to the phone as it lit up in his hand with another incoming call. The phone made no noise, but the same number displayed on the screen.
Killean waited for voice mail to pick up and the call to end before scrolling through to listen to the first message. He hit speaker and set the phone in the cup holder as he switched hands.
“Hello, Killean.” His grip tightened on the steering wheel, and his charred skin broke apart when Joseph’s voice filled the car. “I see you.”
The message ended when Joseph hung up. Beside him, Simone’s hands gripped her thighs, and her lower lip trembled. She cast him a fearful glance before gazing around the car.
“Hit delete,” Killean instructed her.
Simone gulped, found the delete button, and pushed it.
“Now hit the arrow in the middle,” Killean said.
When Simone did, Joseph’s voice came over the speaker again. “Peek-a-boo.”
The sick feeling in her stomach grew as she deleted it before moving onto the next message. “I seeeeee you.”
Then the next one. “She sure is a purty one, Killean. I always was a sucker for a beautiful lady myself, but I think there’s something more between you, isn’t there?”
“I’m going to kill him,” Killean muttered.
Simone went through the rest of the taunting messages and deleted the last one before the phone started ringing again. Before Simone could figure out what to do, Killean hit the green button on the screen. The ringing stopped, but he didn’t speak.
“Well, helllllooo,” Joseph purred. “I was wondering when you’d answer.”
“Joseph,” he greeted dryly.
“Killean.”
The silence stretched until Simone’s fingers became cramped from clenching her legs so fiercely. She glanced between Killean, the phone, and back again. She swore some of the smoke wafting from Killean had nothing to do with the sun and everything to do with the fury he exuded.
“Do you really think you’re going to get away from me, Killean?” Joseph asked.
“I already have.”
“Ahh, but you haven’t gotten far at all. You’re only about a hundred miles from where you started. Quite a pathetic escape attempt in all honesty.”
Killean didn’t respond as he switched lanes to pass a Mac truck. Pressing on the gas, he surged past the truck and over in front of it. Unwilling to risk being pulled over and caught on the camera in a police car, Killean had kept his speed down, but now he wanted to floor it all the way to the state border.
Instead, he eased off the gas as he struggled to rein in the Savage side of him seeking to be freed.
“And where are you going to go?” Joseph inquired. “We both know Ronan won’t take you back; you’re too far gone. All enshrouded against the sun—”
Killean hung up when Simone gasped. She stared at the screen in horror before her gaze swung to him. “Heiswatching us!”
“He had someone at the motel who saw us leave,” Killean said. “And this car has GPS; he’s probably tracking our every move.”
“What do we do?”
