“I’m sure you are, but I’m still driving. Non-negotiable.” Is he fucking kidding me? I open my mouth to argue with him. He steps into me, nose to nose.
“You will not win this. In most things, I’ll give you whatever the fuck you want. But not this. I’m driving. End of discussion. Get your pretty ass in the car, Cara. Now.”
His intensity, the force in his words, shut me up. I can’t remember why I was arguing in the first place. I mean, why wouldn’t I get my pretty ass in the car?
TWENTY MINUTES LATER, I FINALLY SNAP OUT OF MY DAZE. DECLAN’ S HANDS ARE LOOSE ON THE wheel, handling the curving mountain roads with confidence, but his shoulders are bunched around his ears.
“I really am a good driver,” I say into the silence between us.
Declan blows out a breath, his shoulders dropping. “I don’t doubt you, Cara. Not for a second.”
“Then why don’t you want me to drive?” He glances at me briefly, hands flexing on the wheel.
“Did you know I have a garage full of cars?”
“No. I only ever see you drive the one.” That actually always struck me as strange. If I had as much money as he does, I’d drive a new car every year. So, a garage full of cars makes a lot of sense.
He nods. “Well, I do. I love driving, always have. Stole my first car when I was eleven. Took it for an epic joyride before the cops caught me. That wasn’t the last time I did that. But I got better at not getting caught.”
“What happened when the cops brought you home?”
“My foster parents at the time kicked me out. I ended up at a small group home.”
I have so many questions for him. Like, why did they kick you out? How many foster homes did you live in? What happened to your parents? But I drop them and focus back on him.
“When we finally had crazy money. Money we could blow. I spent it on cars. And on driving lessons. When I was about fifteen, I developed an obsession with stunt driving. So I lived out that teenage fantasy. I paid the best stunt drivers in the world to teach me. Then we moved on to tactical driving.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s the kind of training security and military personnel get. It’s basically how to handle an attack on the road. How to get out of the situation, and how to disable other vehicles. That kind of thing.”
“Wow.”
Declan flashes me a grin. “I’ve spent thousands of hours behind the wheel learning everything I could about how to control a vehicle, Cara. I’ve been trained on icy tracks and through whiteouts.” He glances at me, his eyes intense. “If that storm hits us, I will keep you safe.”
Jesus. He’s protective. I honestly did not see that coming. What happened to shy, unassuming Declan?
“I thought you were being a chauvinistic dick.”
He chuckles. “I know. We didn’t have time to discuss it. We had to get the fuck out of there.”
“You could have said something once we were on the move.”
“Could I? You seemed pretty in your head. I thought it would be better to let you bring it up when you were ready.”
“Bring it up when I was ready?” I echo. Is it better? I’m not so sure. “I don’t think biting your tongue, waiting for the right moment, is a good strategy. I did that with Bree, and look how that turned out.”
He frowns, glancing at me. “What do you mean?”
“I saw some things with her in the month leading up to...that night. I was a little worried about how she was being treated, but I didn’t say anything. I didn’t want to interfere in her life like that. I thought she’d come to me when she was ready.” Instead, everything went to shit.
“But she didn’t, and you ended up having to fight for your fucking life.”
The dash lights play over his face, creating a pattern of shadow and light. His face is tight. He looks how I feel.
“Yeah,” I whisper. “I did.” I don’t want to think about that night. Or about what I had to do. Swallowing down the bile trying to climb up my throat, I play with the seat recline until I’m laying back a bit. “I’m going to sleep for a bit. Wake me if you need me.”
15
