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  I took a drink of water and washed the remnants down. “You don’t trust my decision making, and yet you’re going to let me drive your brand new, fifty-thousand-dollar car?”

  “It was a bit more than that,” Cade mumbled.

  “How much more?”

  “Cade had the decency to look humbled. “Eighty-two.”

  Scarlet’s eyes bugged as she took a sip of her sweet tea, but she kept her mouth closed.

  “You’re going to let me drive your eighty-two-thousand-dollar car?” I asked.

  “It’s the reason I bought it.”

  It was my turn to gulp down some sweet tea. “You bought it for me to drive?”

  Cade’s chuckle was genuine. “Not quite. I bought it for the campaign—”

  “To look like a grown-up,” Scarlet added with a smile.

  “—to not look like I was still trying to hang on to my youth in the Camaro.”

  Scarlet’s grin grew. We both knew he was still a kid, even if he did act more grown up than the two of us.

  “But that doesn’t mean I want to drive it all the time.”

  I shook my head trying to act grown up. “Of course not.”

  “Besides the signs are in the car, and Dean just texted me and told me he’s done with the tune-up on the Camaro, so I’ve got two cars in town and one driver.”

  “I could take the Camaro.” I’d always wanted to drive Cade’s Camaro.

  “No.” That one word popped out so fast, I wasn’t sure I heard him correctly.

  “Excuse me?”

  Cade had the decency to blush and lowered his voice. “No one drives my Camaro. You know that.”

  I did know that, but I thought since he was willing to let me drive the Tesla, the Camaro was fair game. “What about Dean? Did he drive your Camaro?”

  Cade shook his head. “Dean is different.”

  “How so?”

  “He’s my mechanic.”

  “I’m your campaign manager.”

  “Exactly.”

  My eyes squinted. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It means I trust you with everything—”

  “Except the Camaro.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Fine. I’ll take the Tesla to Waco and be back by eleven o’clock.”

  Cade grinned. He got his way, but I was going to be driving a Tesla and having dessert at midnight. I was the winner in my book.

  Chapter 18

  Driving Cade’s Tesla was like driving a crotch rocket without the rumble between my legs and the bugs between my teeth. It handled like a dream, zigging and zagging through traffic like it wasn’t a four-door sedan. I understood why he’d chosen the car. I’d probably choose the same—if I had the money. Although, if I had my druthers, I’d pick the two-door Roadster model. Now that was a car.

  The stereo was also beyond anything I’d ever experienced. Especially when I Bluetoothed my phone, and my playlist tuned out everything but me, the luxury, and the road. It didn’t hurt that I could go zero to sixty in 2.5 seconds. The car was so luxurious, it was insane. And I felt spoiled to be driving it. Too bad I’d wake up tomorrow morning and still have an empty parking spot in front of the Barn. But for tonight, it was mine.

  I smiled. This job was turning out to be pretty awesome. I could get used to a job with perks like this. The drive to Waco had been all about getting used to the car and all its gadgets. The return home, however, was a different story. As soon as I’d hit the freeway, I had a hard time keeping my speed below seventy. I wasn’t about to try to engage the Autopilot. I wasn’t to that level of trust with the car…yet. No one who grew up with Linda Hamilton as their mom’s hero could possibly trust a machine with artificial intelligence right off the bat. Machines could destroy us.

  This one was destroying me for all other cars.

  I passed several vehicles and felt the power seep into my psyche. It’d been like this the whole trip. After dropping off the boxes of signs and talking to Suzie Springer about where she was going to place them, I’d given her and her granddaughter a spin around the block that had turned into a race down Pioneer Parkway. It was just a minor setback in my time, and I thought I could afford it.

  That was where I ran into my second hiccup on the trip—I got pulled over. Officer Buckholtz was ready to write me a ticket for racing down Pioneer Parkway, until he saw Ms. Springer’s granddaughter’s baby-blue eyes peeking out of the backseat. Apparently, the two had been flirting for weeks, and Ms. Springer told Officer Buckholtz it was time for him to start singing, or to get out of the choir, ’cause someone else was standing in line to put that choir robe on. I was pretty sure that meant he’d better ask her granddaughter out then or forget about her. Before Officer Buckholtz walked away with his full ticket book, the two had a date for Sunday brunch after church.

  This trip had been too good to be true, and I was enjoying every minute of the ride. It was as if the car and I were linked. It was an extension of me, and I was a part of it.

  The drive home was a dream…until I saw headlights closing in behind me from the three camera angles displayed on the digital dash. It had to be a cop. I look down at the speedometer and saw my speed had crept up to seventy-five miles per hour. I started counting the dollars that speed would cost me.

  Fuzz buckets. This car would destroy my wallet too.

  The headlights came closer, and I slowed to sixty-eight. The lights encroached on my space, to the point where I couldn’t see them except through the cameras. Nor could I see the driver, despite the three different camera angles, who was bold enough to ride my tail like a like a second skin.

  I pulled into the right lane. Giving him the opportunity to pass…or follow me and pull me over. He followed me, but not directly behind me. His headlights hit the side rear window right before I felt his bumper connect with the Tesla’s left rear quarter panel.

  “Holy crap!” The Tesla swerved after becoming the victim of what I could only describe as one of those pit maneuvers I’d seen a police cruiser do in a televised car chase. I fought the drag of the vehicle as it tried to spin out of control. The automatic breaking took over, but I had no idea how to handle it. I overcompensated. Tire tread burned. Smoke billowed. From where I had no clue. The grade of the shoulder made that thumpity, thump, thump, thump noise under the wheels that was supposed to wake me up if I’d fallen asleep.

  I couldn’t be more wide awake.

  I gained control of the spin just as the driver’s side rear window shattered behind me, and something hit the passenger seat. I instinctively knew it wasn’t just bits and pieces of broken glass. This was much more powerful—deadly. I spit every cuss word I could think of out the broken window as glass sprayed the plush interior.

  That was when I realized, I could be wider awake. Someone had just shot out the window! I gripped the steering wheel tighter and hit the gas pedal with everything I had. There were no emergency lights on that truck. It wasn’t a police officer trying to get me to stop because he thought I was fleeing. This was a madman hell-bent on killing me.

  And I wasn’t going to let him.

  I zoomed past a pickup and a sedan that appeared to be crawling at an ungodly speed. Three more cars were put behind me. I heard a horn honk as the breeze flowed through the interior of the car. Bits of glass riddled my hair, and I could feel tiny shards poking my back between me and the seat.

  Cade was going to kill me…if I survived. Warning signals beeped at me that I was too close to the next vehicle driving in the passing lane. I flashed my lights as the Tesla slowed down. I looked in the mirrors but couldn’t tell if any of the headlights behind me belonged to the shooter’s truck or if he’d abandoned the chase and took the last exit. Several vehicles merged onto the freeway but all I could think about was creating more distance between me and whoever wanted to obliterate my existence.
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  I passed a Fiat with Kansas tags on the right when it refused to relinquish the passing lane and floored the gas pedal once more, kicking it even faster when I hit a straight away.

  It was only then that I saw the curve. I should have remembered it. The state had vowed to fix it—make it less dangerous. My hands tensed on the wheel as I braked into the turn, and the automatic brakes engaged farther.

  The yellow sign warning drivers to slow their speed to forty-five miles per hour flashed in front of me, and I could have sworn it looked like a smiley face emoji laughing at my stupidity. The automatic braking engaged farther, and a truck loaded with lumber loomed in front of me. I tried to pass him on the left, but with the curve, his load shifted. My wheels held…at first. Despite my speed, I saw the stack of lumber snap one belt in half, releasing just above the buckle with the top section whipping in the air. The second belt stretched and strained as the lumber fell off the back, landing like a stack of pick-up sticks being tossed across a table. The load tumbled end over end, snapping and twisting. A piece hit the windshield before I even saw it coming my direction and spiderwebbed the glass. I didn’t have time to thank God it hadn’t penetrated the windshield and skewered me to leather—the truck and the road swerved.

  I hit the brakes harder and yanked on the wheel, but my reaction was too much, too frantic, and my fate was sealed. The car spun out of control. I hit the rumble strip running alongside the left lane faster than I had the last one. All four wheels spun across as the Tesla hit the median like Jimmy Johnson tearing up the infield after winning the NASCAR Sprint Cup series at the Texas Motor Speedway. Grass flew, and the car bounced over the rough terrain. I could see headlights coming at me from all directions, or maybe it was because I was spinning and seeing the highway through psychedelic sunglasses.

  The car slammed to a stop, and three airbags hit me, filling the vehicle with smoke and powder. My heart lurched, then pounded when I began coughing. The stereo was muffled and sounded like a pillow had been pressed against each one of the speakers. Then again, the effect could have come from the pillows blocking my ears.

  I released the seat belt and fumbled with door handle as I fought the airbags. I fell out of the car into a drainage ditch that ran down the center of the median and looked around from the vantage point of my knees as someone ran toward the car. If that was the man who shot at me, I was a sitting duck.

  “Charli! Jesus, woman, is that you?”

  I looked up from the snakeskin boots to the lanky man wearing them. “Dallas?”

  The king of recycling reached down and grabbed my arm. “Are you hurt? Maybe you shouldn’t move. I should call an ambulance.”

  “No!” I yelled over the noise of the freeway from the traffic going the opposite direction. The cars on my side of the road had come to a standstill thanks to lumber scattered across the interstate.

  Dallas helped me to my feet, and I got a better view of the carnage. The Tesla was silent in the median, its rear driver’s side dented and caved. The windshield wasn’t just cracked like I thought, it had been speared by an eight-foot two-by-four that I hadn’t even seen. My legs nearly buckled at the thought of that wood penetrating all the way to the passenger seat, but Dallas held on to me, steadying the Jell-O that had once been my legs.

  He looked around and then pulled a large knife from his waistband. It flipped open with the push of a button, and I stumbled backward, but he wouldn’t release my arm. Full of panic, I struggled against him until he stabbed the airbags blocking the driver’s seat.

  “Charli, I got you. Relax.” His tone was smooth and calming as if he was coaxing a newborn calf to his side.

  Another man ran up as Dallas closed his knife and eased me back into the driver’s seat.

  “Is she okay?” he asked. “I called the police. They’re on their way.” He paused and then blurted out, “She was driving this thing like a mad woman. She nearly rear-ended me!”

  “You were driving too slowly to be in the passing lane,” I argued but the man wasn’t listening. He was checking out the totaled Tesla. I looked over the seat and saw Cade’s extra boxes of campaign posters strewn across the back seat in a crumbled mess. “Cade is going to kill me.”

  “Cade?” Dallas squatted down in front of me and touched the bump on my forehead. His touch was gentle and caring, and after the horror I’d just gone through, I welcomed the tenderness. A tear slipped down my cheek, and he wiped it away. “It’s going to be okay,” he whispered.

  I nodded, embarrassed that my emotions got the best of me, but unable to stop a second tear from falling. “This is the mayor’s car. I delivered boxes to a volunteer in Waco. Just a quick trip there and back.” I pointed to the rest of the posters in the back. “These were supposed to go to Austin tomorrow.”

  Dallas was sympathetic and a good listener. “We’re lucky you’re okay. That’s what really matters.”

  “I need to call Cade.”

  “Cade can wait.”

  “No, you don’t understand.” I got up and tried to open the falcon wing back door, but it wouldn’t budge. “Dagnabit.” My head slumped. “This was supposed to be a good night.”

  Dallas’s voice was gruff. “He doesn’t deserve you Charli, if he’s more worried about the car or his posters, or whatever you think he’s going to be upset about.”

  Dallas didn’t understand. I was bringing more drama to Cade’s campaign. I was supposed to be helping, making things right, but I’d just brought more trouble his way. Who would vote for a candidate who continued to be surrounded by one disaster after another?

  The voters would have to be crazy to back him.

  Chapter 19

  The first deputy on the scene asked if I’d been drinking. Dallas answered for me. Otherwise I may have taken his head off at that point. I was the campaign manager for a man running for US Senate. If anyone else at the scene got wind of Deputy So-and-so wanting to give me a breathalyzer it would create a scandal bigger than Cade would be able to handle. But he had kept me from calling Cade and giving him the heads up. My phone had gone flying in the middle of me doing donuts in the grass and since it was a crime scene, the officer wouldn’t let me search through the car. I suspected he was hoping to find some type of illegal substance with my prints all over it.

  The highway was a disaster, but the only fatality was the Tesla. The only injury was my pinky from the airbag deploying. Mr. Fiat told the officer I was speeding, and the truck driver confirmed it. Of course, he was trying to distract the officers from recognizing his crime of having an improperly secured load. Two straps for a trailer load of lumber—hello? In what world was that secure? He would have lost his load whether I’d been there or not.

  An ambulance came, and paramedics checked me over, but I declined treatment. They wrapped my finger anyway and told me it was probably just a sprain, but if it continued to bother me, I should have it checked out.

  Detective Youngblood arrived and told me that Cade and Mateo were en route to the scene. Then he called MacAlister’s Auto Shop and had Dean dispatched to pick up the car. I wasn’t going to let anyone else touch the car no matter what they said about it being a crime scene, so I was happy MacAlister’s was on the list of approved city tow services for the Sheriff’s Department.

  Dallas had gone back to his car and got a jacket for me to wear, and I was thankful to have someone from Hazel Rock there with me. It wasn’t that it was that cold leaning up against the trunk of the police car; it was that I was that shaken up. The unused adrenaline in my body kept my hands quivering and my kneecaps twitching. It was as if the synapsis between my nerves and my brain had shorted with the damage to the artificial intelligence in the car. The stupid thing had ruined me.

  I saw an unmarked police car drive down the exit ramp and knew it was Mateo. I wasn’t sure I’d ever been so happy to see that Dodge Charger.

  “I can give you a lift
home, if you’d like. It’s no trouble,” Dallas offered.

  Before I could answer I heard Cade calling my name. I looked up and saw him running down the shoulder as if he had two linebackers hot on his trail. Before I knew it, I was off the ground being smothered in a bear hug.

  “I can’t breathe,” I forced out.

  Cade released me and set me on the ground and rubbed my biceps as if he was trying to warm me up. Then he saw the bandage on my hand, and something within him snapped. “You’re fired.”

  “What?”

  “That’s it, you’re fired.”

  “You’re going to fire me because some…some…”

  Mateo joined us. “Don’t say it, Charli. There’s no reason to get yourself all riled up.”

  “Riled up! He just fired me!”

  Dallas stepped up. “I can take you home, if you’d like, Charli.”

  Mateo looked at Dallas like he was ready to throw him on the ground and handcuff him. That was the last thing we needed. “Thank you, Dallas. But I suspect I’m going to be a while, and I’m sure the sheriff will take me home.”

  “Yes, I’ll make sure she gets home.”

  I started to take off his jacket, but Dallas stopped me. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll get it from you another time.”

  I reached out to shake his hand, and Dallas hesitated. He looked at my hand, and then enveloped me in a hug. It felt awkward, and I knew Cade and Mateo were watching, wanting to know what the heck was going on. But Dallas had been there for me when they hadn’t been, so I couldn’t deny him.

  “If you need anything, just holler.” He lowered his voice and said, “You’re too good for him.”

  I pulled away and gave him a we-can-only-be-friends smile. He smiled back, and I wasn’t sure the message got across before he turned and walked through the string of cars piled up in the traffic jam.

  “What’s that about?” Cade asked.

  “None of your business.”

  Mateo’s eyebrows rose, but he kept his mouth shut.