use, if I want. So I was gonna turn in the rental tomorrow in Taos, anyway...”
First off, that shrug? Made her hair shimmer around her shoulders, begging to be touched. So wrong. Second, the image of Emily’s perfectly polished person collided in Colin’s worn-to-nubs brain with whatever undoubtedly mud-caked 4x4 her cousin was referring to. The ranch vehicles weren’t known for being pretty.
Unlike the woman with the shimmery hair who’d be driving one of them.
So wrong.
Then he dragged his head out of his butt long enough to catch the amused smile playing around her mouth. “You really have a problem sharing a ride with me?”
Colin’s cheeks heated. “It’s not you.”
“Actually, I got that. No, really. But I’m beginning to understand what Josh said about you being a loner—”
“I’m not—”
“Even I know you haven’t been home in years,” she said gently. “That you’ve barely been in touch with anyone since you left. And then you don’t even tell your family you’re coming back? Dude. However,” she said, heading toward the rental desk, her hair swishing against her back. Glimmering. Taunting. “My only goal right now is to get to the ranch.” She glanced back over her shoulder at him, and once again he saw a flicker of something decidedly sharp edged. “Expediency, you know? Your issues are none of my business. Nor are mine yours. In fact, we don’t even have to talk, if you don’t want to. I won’t be offended, I promise. So. Deal?”
With the devil, apparently.
“Deal,” Colin grumbled, hauling the rest of the bags to the desk, wondering why her reasonableness was pissing him the hell off.
* * *
An hour later, Emily had to admit Colin had been right about two things: the farther north they went, the colder it got; and he was definitely a little on the gamey side. Meaning she’d had no choice but to keep the windows at least partly down, or risk suffocation.
Also, it was dark. As in, the headlight beams piercing the pitch blackness were creepy as all get-out. To her, night meant when the street lamps came on, not that moment when the sun dived behind the horizon and yanked every last vestige of daylight with it. Her heart punched against her ribs—so much for her oh-I’ll-drive bravado back there in the airport, when for whatever reason it hadn’t occurred to her she’d never actually driven the route before. Somebody had always ferried her to and from Albuquerque. Sure, she would’ve made the trek herself in any case, but being responsible for another human being in the car with her...
“Jeez, get a grip,” she muttered, turning up the Sirius radio in the SUV, hoping the pulsing beat would pound her wayward thoughts into oblivion. Not to mention her regrets, crammed inside her head like the jumbled mess of old sweaters and jeans and tops she’d stuffed willy-nilly inside her pretty new luggage. Clothes that predated Michael, that she’d rarely worn around him because he’d said they made her look dumpy.
Emily’s nostrils flared as her fingers tightened around the leather-padded wheel. Someday, she might even cry.
Someday. When she was over the hurling and cursing stage.
Beside her, a six-feet-and-change Colin snorted and shifted, his arms folded over his chest as he slept. They’d barely made it out of Albuquerque before he’d crashed, his obvious exhaustion rolling off him in waves even more than the funk. If it hadn’t been for that picture Dee had shown Emily—a very serious publicity shot of Colin the photojournalist—she would’ve never recognized him. As it was, between the five days’ beard growth and shaggy hair, the rumpled clothes and saddlebags under his eyes, she still wasn’t sure how she had. It must’ve been the eyes, a weird pale green against his sun-weathered face—
Emily released another breath, aggravation swamping her once more. Although with herself more than Colin, she supposed, for not having the good sense to leave well enough alone. Gah, it was as though she’d been totally incapable of stanching the words spewing from her mouth. Apparently heart-slicing betrayal had that effect on her. But seriously—after a lifetime of making nice, now she couldn’t resist poking the bear? And a grumpy, malodorous one at that?
From her purse, her phone warbled. Her mother’s ringtone. Good thing she was currently driving, because... No.
The man shifted again, muttering in his sleep, the words unintelligible. She imagined a frown—since that seemed to be his face’s default setting, anyway—
“Crap!”
At the laser-like flash of the animal’s eyes, Emily swerved the car to the right, hard, the wheels jittering over rocks and weeds before jerking to a spine-rattling stop. Colin’s palm slammed against the dash as he bellowed awake, a particularly choice swearword hanging in the cold air between them for what felt like an hour.
“What the hell?”
“S-something darted out in front of the c-car,” Emily finally got out, over the sudden—and horrifying—realization of exactly how close she was to losing it.
“You okay?”
How a gruff voice could be so gentle, Emily had no idea. How she was going to keep it together in the face of that gentleness, she had even less of one. But she would. If it killed her.
Her neck hurt a little when she nodded. “I’m fine.”
“You don’t sound fine.”
On a half-assed laugh, she leaned her head back. Or would have if the headrest had let her. “I almost took out Bambi. What do you think?” She dared to cut her eyes to his, only to realize she couldn’t see them anyway. Thank goodness. “Sorry about the sudden stop. Is everything... Are you...?”
“I’m good. Or will be when my heart climbs back down out of my throat.” Which he now cleared. “Good save, by the way.”
“How would you know?” she said, even as pleasure flushed her cheeks. “Since you slept through it.”
“We’re still upright. And alive. So I count that as a win.”
“Funny, you don’t strike me as a look-on-the-bright-side type.”
“You’d be surprised.”
“I already am. Well.” And her heart could stop break-dancing anytime now, she thought as she gripped the wheel. “I guess we should get going—”
“You’re shaking.”
“Only a little... What are you doing?”
This asked as he got out of the car and walked around to her side, motioning for her to open the door. “Taking over the driving, what does it look like?”
“You don’t have to—”
“Actually, I think I do.”
Emily felt her face go grumpy. “I thought you said that was a good save.”
“It was. And I mean that. But I’m awake now—”
“Sorry about that.”
“—and I’m probably a little better at recovering from stress than you are.”
“Heh. You ever driven on the DC beltway?”
“Many times. Although trust me, it doesn’t even begin to compare with Mumbai. Besides, once we hit town, do you have any idea where we’re going?”
There was that. Because, again, she hadn’t driven when she’d been out before. Of course her plan had been to either rely on the car’s GPS or—probably better—on Dee or Josh. Which she could still do. But by now she realized she was beginning to slip across that fine line between independent and mule-headed. And she was whacked, too.
“Emily?”
Again with the gentleness. Jerk.
“Fine,”