She would never take a day in this world for granted again. The girl she used to be was buried. Reborn.
But that didn’t mean she wanted to subject herself to them sending her away face-to-face.
They’d probably moved on. Maybe it had been only a dalliance like she’d told Jace. Maybe once they’d stepped away from the intensity of it all, they’d realized a relationship with her wasn’t what they really wanted. She’d been a mess the last time they’d seen her. How could she blame them for not wanting to get involved with her? They’d known she wasn’t ready to be with them even before she did.
And really, if they’d moved on. If it had only been a tryst. Then better to know that upfront. She wouldn’t go back and change what had happened between the three of them. It had saved her.
The opening bars of one of her favorite love songs drifted from the car’s speakers, and she promptly changed the station to hard rock, kicking up the volume. The guitar-heavy track filled the crammed corners of her mind, shoving away her ruminations. The late-afternoon view along the open highway was too pretty to waste thinking about things she couldn’t change.
She tapped her steering wheel in time with the music and found her foot pressing on the accelerator a little more aggressively. Her hair whipped behind her as the wind blew through the car. Roads like this made her want a sports car. Like Jace’s Viper.
She shook the thought from her head and belted out the chorus to the song, her off-key voice thankfully drowned out by the lead singer’s. The last note left her breathless and in the snippet of silence between tracks, a high whining siren pierced her ears.
Oh, shit.
She glanced in her rearview mirror and, sure enough, a flashing red light was quickly closing in from behind. She checked her speedometer. Almost eighty. In a sixty-five.
“Dammit!” She eased off the accelerator and made her way to the soft shoulder of the highway. This was going to be an expensive ticket. Just what she needed.
She put the car in park and watched in the rearview as the cop pulled behind her in an unmarked car and turned off the siren. The setting sun reflected off the windshield of the police car, not allowing her to see inside. Damn. She hoped it was a male cop. In her experience, she had no shot of getting out of a ticket when a woman stopped her.
Evan would fight for feminism to the death, but she was not above using a smile and a nice “I’m so sorry, officer” to get out of a ticket. Though, she did draw the line at tears. Callie had used that method once and Evan had almost died from trying not to laugh. Callie had gotten a ticket anyway.
“Keep your hands where I can see them and stay in your car.”
The loudspeaker voice startled her. Hell, she’d only been speeding. Evan kept her face forward and put her hands on the steering wheel as the cop stepped up beside her car. He put his palms on top of the car and leaned down to her half-open window. “Roll down your window, ma’am.”
The silky authority in the voice had every molecule in her body freezing in suspension. She turned toward the window, coming face-to-face with a pair of aviator sunglasses, dark hair, and a smirk she’d know anywhere.
Oh my fucking God. She tried to say something but a puff of air was all she could manage.
Andre straightened, the hard body outfitted in his full uniform coming into view. “Get out of the car, ma’am. Now.”
Her limbs couldn’t process requests. Her hands stayed cemented around the steering wheel. The moment of hesitation didn’t go over well. Andre yanked her car door open, leaned over her to unhook her seatbelt, then hauled her out of the car with a firm grip on her upper arm. “I said out.”
She stumbled, but he held her upright. “I’m sorry. What’s . . . What’s going on, Andre?”
“So disrespectful.” He dragged her around the front of the car to the passenger side, blocking them a bit from the view of the road. “You call me officer or sir, you understand?”
Heat zapped through her like lightning. Oh.
He shined a small flashlight in her eyes. “Have you been drinking?”
She winced at the bright light. “No, of course not.”
“So you’re just driving like a fucking maniac because you think you’re too good to follow speed limits?”
His grip on her arm tightened, and he crowded his body against hers, trapping her between him and her car. Her body trembled. She knew what this was. But damn if he wasn’t convincing enough to have a thread of fear lacing through her. “I’m sorry, officer. I wasn’t paying attention. I—”
“Yeah, you know what I think?” he said, his voice low and threatening. “I think that’s exactly your problem. You don’t know how to pay attention. You think a nice expensive speeding ticket is going to fix that?”
She wet her lips, letting herself slide into her own role. “I can’t afford a ticket, Officer. Please, just let me go. I promise I won’t speed anymore.”
“Look at you, you can’t even look me in the eye when you promise that. You think I don’t know you’re lying?” The disgust in his voice dripped off the words. He turned his attention toward the rear of the car. “I don’t think a ticket is going to do shit in changing her attitude. What do you think, Austin?”
She sucked in a breath, but Andre clamped her chin in his hand, not allowing her to turn her head and see Jace.
“Keep your attention on me,” Andre commanded.