His hand settled on the back of her head, holding her against him. “Tell me where you’re going.”
“Three hours from here.”
“Which direction?”
“West.”
“The desert?” He tensed. “Have you lost your mind? A beautiful woman in no man’s land? Alone? It’s crawling with rattlesnakes and scorpions and hell knows what else. Not to mention there’s no cell service. No hospitals. What in God’s name is out there worth risking your life?”
“Closure.”
“So this is about the ex-husband.” His fingers angrily fisted in her hair.
“Not exactly.” She shut her eyes, searching for an ambiguous version of the truth. “I need to deal with some things. Personal issues I should’ve put to rest a long time ago.”
More specifically, she needed to deal with the boy who had been writing to her—or rather, his dead girlfriend—for ten years.
Except Tommy wasn’t a boy anymore. He was twenty-seven. And dangerous.
It was never her intention to announce herself to him, let alone meet him in person. Hell, she never should’ve logged into his girlfriend’s account. But if she hadn’t, she wouldn’t be alive today to contemplate whether or not she was doing the right thing.
He’d been there for her on that bridge without knowing it, and she’d been here for him ever since.
For over a decade, weekly emails arrived in the Tommysgirl account. Each message came from a different anonymous address, but they were all from Tommy. After she read each one, she snapped a photo of it, marked it as unread, and deleted her IP address from the activity log.
The day after sending each message, he always went in and erased it. He only needed to change the password on the account once, and she would’ve been locked out. But he never did. Because that would’ve locked out his beloved ghost.
An absurd thought, but she knew how his mind worked, perhaps better than he did. He was smart. Too smart to believe that dead people read emails.
But sometimes, beneath his brave, self-assured words, she sensed the lasting sorrow of the boy he’d been. A boy who’d lost his girlfriend in a car accident, his only parent to cancer, and had been abducted and raped by a heartless sex trafficker, all at the age of seventeen.
He’d survived things that most people couldn’t fathom and found the courage to write down his trauma in harrowing detail. She never wanted him to learn she’d invaded his privacy. His emails hadn’t been meant for her, and responding to them would’ve been cruel. But when he sent that last message a week ago, she had no choice.
“What the fuck are you going to do in the desert for a month?” Evan leaned down, putting his scowl in her face. “Sprinkle sage on some coals, trip on peyote, and take a revelatory journey until you’ve vanquished these issues you think you have?”
“Something like that, but without the psychedelics.” She pursed her lips. “And we both know I have issues.”
Almost as many as Tommy.
First off, he was going undercover to infiltrate a Mexican cartel, which was by far the most reckless, idiotic thing he’d ever attempted. He had training and experience with his vigilante team, but not enough. Not to take down an entire cartel.
When he made that announcement in his last email, she panicked. Then he ended the message, stating he wouldn’t write again.
It was a final goodbye.
A sucker punch to the gut.
No more emails. No more contact. He was going to shut down the account.
If she hadn’t written him back, she would’ve lost him. She might’ve lost him anyway.
It had been a week without a response to her email. She worried herself sick, wondering if she would ever hear from him again. He used so many different accounts. What if he didn’t check them all?
No, he was too meticulous. He probably didn’t read her message until he was deep undercover. Man oh man, his reaction must’ve been boiling, volcanic fury. No question, he was plotting her death at this very moment.
She’d violated his most private thoughts, infringed upon his darkest moments, stole his secrets out from under him, and he didn’t even know she existed.
Until now.
It was such a fucked-up situation. From her perspective, he was familiar and intimate. A friend she dropped everything for. Someone she cared about and fretted over. It was the only relationship that worked for her because she didn’t have to give any part of herself in return. He couldn’t hurt her as long as he didn’t know she was there.
She didn’t need a degree in psychology to recognize how unhealthy that was. Every time she read his emails, she knew exactly what she was doing. She also understood the consequences of responding to the last one.
He was coming for her.
While that scared the ever-loving piss out of her, it’d been the only way to draw him out of the life-threatening operation he was undertaking with the cartel.
He’d saved her life on the Pecos River Bridge, and now it was her turn to save him.
So she’d devised a plan. An insane, treacherous, terrifying plan. Then she emailed him back, confessed to reading his emails, and told him when and where to meet her.
Evan knew none of this. He didn’t know about the bridge or the Tommysgirl account or the man, whose name she learned a few years ago was Tomas Owen Dine.
God, if Evan even suspected what she planned to do, he would tie her up and never let her leave.
“I’m going with you.” His hands ghosted along her back.
“Oh, really? You’re going to take off work for a month?”
“For as long as you need me.”
She didn’t need him. The thought made her feel like a bitch, but this was something she had to do alone.
“I need you to look after my house.” She pinched his rigid jaw and gave him a stern look. “You’re not going. That’s non-negotiable.”
“I figured you’d say that.” He eyed the camping gear in her pickup truck in the driveway. “What happens when a hungry bobcat attacks your campsite?”
“Mosquitoes are a greater risk to humans than bobcats.”
“Because most humans don’t camp out in wildcat territory.”
“I have a shotgun.”
He already knew that. He’d gone target shooting with her at the range.
“I guess there’s just one thing left to say.” He gripped the backs of her legs and hooked them around his hips, holding her so close his breath kissed her lips. “And one thing only—”
“Just say it.”
He smiled, his teeth blinding white in his suntanned face. “I’m going to miss your hot body.”
With a quick dip, he claimed her mouth. Warm tongue, firm lips, clean taste, his kisses were always agreeable. Pleasing. Yet something was missing. Nothing she could label. Just an itch at the back of her mind.
It was her, not him.
She tried to lower her feet to the ground, but he tightened his grip. She leaned away, but his mouth chased hers, intent on recapture.
“Evan.”
“One for the road.” He pulled her tight against his erection, grinding seductively. “I’ll settle for a quickie.”
“No.”
“Come on, Rylee. How am I going to go without you for an entire month?”