“She’s his number-one priority right now.”
“I figured that out. Shocked me, honestly, seeing as the Wilder I remembered never saw past his need for an X Games medal.” She leaned forward in her seat, staring up through the windshield.
“He’s changed. We all have,” I said, defensiveness creeping in. “You know, I get it. What happened was horseshit, but we’re not the same as we were back then. It’s been two and a half years, Rach. Don’t you believe in change?”
“Sure. I just think people have to be capable of it. From what I’ve seen in the media, you’ve only gone from bad to worse.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I squinted against the driving sheets of rain, trying to focus on the road. The last thing we needed was for me to drive off the edge of the road.
“Want me to take over?” she asked.
“Ha. I’ve seen you drive. You’re far safer with me behind the wheel. So is the entire population of Sri Lanka.”
“Weren’t you just the one telling me that people change?” She went back to staring up at the hillside through the windshield.
“And you were just telling me that my change didn’t live up to your standard.” My muscles tightened, and I tried to breathe through my flash of anger. I needed every spare ounce of concentration for the road.
“Live up to my standard? Damn. At least I have standards.”
“What? And you’ve been a nun since we…”
“Since you left me?” she snapped. “No. I’ve had boyfriends. I’ve had sex. Really good sex. I just didn’t chase every penis I came in contact with.”
Of course she’d had sex with other guys. She was gorgeous, funny, smart, and fully in control of her sexuality, which was hot as hell. But that sure as fuck didn’t stop me from wanting to beat the other guys to shit for touching what was mine.
Not yours, moron. You gave up that right.
“You know what? Let’s just back out of this line of conversation,” I suggested, flicking the windshield wipers on the highest setting. “Apparently we both have some pretty strong feelings—”
“Landon,” Rachel whispered.
“No, it’s okay that we have strong feelings. We should. That means there’s hope. I’d rather you hate me than to not care—”
“Landon!” Rachel screamed. “Look!”
I lurched forward, ducking my head to look up the hillside where she pointed. Wait…was that…?
“Holy shit!” I slammed on the brakes, sending us into a skid as half the mountain came down in front of us.
“Landslide!”
The roar was deafening, and all my powers of speech failed. Rocks, trees, chunks of the earth plummeted, all carried by a deluge of mud. I’d never seen anything so terrifying in my life. The car in front of us by fifty feet or so was in the clear.
My eyes darted to the hillside above us that held steady, and the instinct to flee took over. “We have to get out of here.”
There was no chance I was dying on a remote road in the middle of Sri Lanka, or that I was letting anything happen to Rachel.
I slammed the Jeep into reverse, put my hand behind Rachel’s seat, and hit the gas. Thank God there was no one behind us. The rain still pummeled us, but at least the canvas top didn’t cover the back portion of the Jeep. I could see out. Barely.
Adrenaline flooded my system, my body familiar with the hormone, and everything became sharp, clear, like I was in the middle of a snowboarding run or a stunt.
I’d just never had Rachel’s life in my hands before.
“Oh my God. Landon, go faster!”
I looked forward only long enough to see that the small barricades to keep us from falling off the road were helping to channel the debris flow, and it was headed straight for us.
Thick trees, green branches, and that little white car ahead of us had all been picked up by the raging river of mud.
“Shit! Watch that.”
I set all my concentration to the road behind us and prayed that my driving skills were enough to get us out of this alive. There had been a small outcropping right after we’d come through the bend in the road. We just had to get—
“It’s gaining on us,” Rachel said quietly, the calm in her voice almost eerie.
I skirted around a car that was trying the same maneuver, passing him on the left…the right. Shit, it was all jumbled.
“Tell me if it gets to that car.”
“Okay.”
The engine protested the high speed in reverse, the whine almost enough to drown out the sound of the landslide approaching. The road was the worst possible place for it to channel—the liquefied soil would carry debris far faster than without pavement.
I sure as hell wasn’t telling Rachel that.
“It’s picked up the second car.”
I chanced a look back and saw it coming at us with only twenty or so feet to spare. This is so not good.
Turning my attention back to the road, I saw it. “There!” I yelled. “Hold on tight!”
I spun us into the small outcropping, flipping our direction. Before we came to a stop, I had the clutch in and the car ready for second gear.
“Now!” Rachel instructed.
As I straightened the wheel, I popped the clutch and launched back into the road just as the mud took the outcropping. Then I hit the gas and we sped down the road as quickly as I could safely get us down in the driving rain. Third gear. That was all that was safe on these winding roads, and I had no clue who could be waiting around the bend.
Who might be driving into their worst nightmare.
“It’s not going to stop,” I told her, knowing we were only halfway down the mountain. “Find another road. We have to get off this one.”
The glove box clicked as Rachel opened it, taking out a map. Her fingers flew over the accordion-folded paper. “Where are we…where are we?” she muttered.
I knew better than to answer her.
A quick look in my rearview mirror told me the slide was picking up speed, and we were the next obstacle in the chute.
“Here!” she exclaimed, pointing to the map. “There’s a road a half mile on the left. We should be able to get to the highway if this one…isn’t available.”
She sucked in her breath, and I caught her looking in the rearview as I slammed the car into fourth gear. “Don’t look.”
“Kind of impossible, seeing as the mountain would like to eat us.”
“Yeah, I know.”
I cursed, braking through a steep turn, knowing it cost us precious seconds. A glance back confirmed it. I couldn’t see the end of the landslide, only the two cars a little farther back in the debris, which meant we were in serious danger of hydroplaning and becoming part of the slide.
“There!” Rachel yelled, pointing to the road on the left.
“Hold on!”
“Never stopped,” she whispered.
We locked eyes for a precious millisecond, and then I ripped the car to the left, braking at the last possible second as the car skidded around the ninety-degree turn. I threw it into 4x4 low for the steep incline and tore up the gravel road, the rain forming a creek exactly in the middle of where I wanted to be.
“Landon!” Rachel yelled.