I looked toward her truck under the mesquite. The thing wouldn’t make it ten miles without boiling over, let alone five hours. Her phone had been dead. She had no backup. No family here. No one waiting except a job and an apartment she hadn’t even slept in yet. She was alone in a way I understood too well, and I’d just made sure she remembered it.
The fire popped, sparks jumping up into the dark.
Sienna smiled with her mouth and nowhere else.
I dragged a hand down my face and tasted dust when I breathed.
Women like her weren’t my problem.
That was what I kept telling myself.
But the desert had gone quiet around us, and my instincts had shifted. They weren’t scratching danger anymore.
They were pointing straight at her.
CHAPTER 5
SIENNA
The desertbefore sunrise felt like the world holding its breath.
Cold slipped under my thin T-shirt and raised goose bumps along my arms, sharp enough to wake me faster than coffee. The firepit had burned down to black ash and stubborn orange embers, the smell of smoke hanging low over the yard, mixing with dust, dry sage, and the faint ghost of spilled tequila. Above me, the sky stretched wide and bruised, deep navy bleeding into gray at the edges while the first pale light cut along the mountains like a blade.
Everything was still.
Still enough to leave.
I moved quietly through the Airbnb with my boots in one hand and my overnight bag over my shoulder. The house slept around me, all soft breathing behind closed doors, settled beams, and that expensive-rental silence that made every floorboard sound accusatory. Nobody stirred. No Regan appearing in the hallway with a mug and a prophecy. No Amber wrapped in a blanket asking where I thought I was going. No Savannah twirling my keys like she had legal custody over my bad decisions.
Good.
Bandit, unfortunately, had not agreed to participate in stealth operations. The second I crouched beside his crate, he opened one green eye and hissed at me like I’d interrupted an ancient curse.
I glared back. “Don’t start.”
He started.
By the time I got him outside, he had clawed my wrist through the crate door and screamed loud enough to notify several counties. I shoved the crate into the passenger seat, breathing hard, hair falling in my face, dignity somewhere in the gravel behind me.
“Traitor,” I told him.
He answered with a furious yowl.
My truck looked worse in daylight. Rust along the wheel wells. One headlight fogged over. Dust caked thick across the windshield. The blue tarps tied over my belongings had loosened at one corner, flapping sadly in the cold wind like even my possessions were trying to escape. My whole new life sat packed under rope and plastic in the bed of a truck that had begun looking less like transportation and more like a rolling metaphor.
Sad as hell.
Fitting.
I tossed my bag into the cab, climbed in, and put the key in the ignition. For one optimistic second, I pictured a clean getaway. Not dramatic. Not rude. Just gone before anyone woke up and decided to pity me with eggs, sisterhood, or another background check.
I turned the key.
The engine coughed, clicked, and died.
I sat there, hand still on the key.
Bandit let out a long, judgmental yowl.
