Alaskan Hideout. Sarah Varland

Чтение книги онлайн.

       TWO

      Emma had the worst headache she’d ever had in her life, she was in a strange town and someone appeared to want her dead.

      And to top it all off, she was within miles of Tyler Dawson, which meant she was going to have to face him soon...and she still had no idea what she was going to say.

      Everything about her current situation terrified her.

      Emma sat up in the hospital bed. Luke. Where was Luke? She looked around, frantic. Surely the police who’d come to the scene would recognize that hers hadn’t been an ordinary accident, right? And they’d keep her son...their son...safe?

      She ran back over the details in her mind. The car following too close. The crunch of metal on metal as her car had rolled in the sunlight and then only darkness. She didn’t remember anything else.

      Emma pressed the call button for the nurse. First order of business, she had to get out of here and go take care of her son. And figure out if the wreck was some kind of weird coincidence or...

      A vision of a person with a gun stalking toward her, wanting her dead, solidified in her mind. No, this hadn’t been coincidence and there was no point in pretending it could have been. Emma had witnessed a murder, had had the audacity to correct the assumption that it had been suicide, something the bad guys had probably set up on purpose. And now, in their eyes, she had to die.

      The only problem was that she had too much to live for. Luke. Her desire to be the best at what she did in her job, even if she was clearly searching for a new one. The drive to convince Tyler to forgive her and maybe, just maybe, let them be friends?

      Emma wasn’t stupid. She knew he’d never take her back, never forgive the betrayal of keeping their son from him. Every day she’d not told him had driven the nail deeper into the coffin of their relationship and now it was too late.

      Too much water under the bridge.

      The door of her room creaked open and Emma’s shoulders relaxed. If the doctors hadn’t planned to discharge her yet, she’d make sure the nurse understood how important it was that she be released.

      But it wasn’t a nurse. It was Tyler. Looking better than she’d remembered even. Tall, broad-shouldered, with dark hair...and piercing green eyes she’d never been able to intentionally look away from.

      Except now. Emma looked down at the hospital bedding. Braced herself.

      The room was still. He said nothing. So she looked back up. Swallowed hard.

      “Tyler.” Emma said his name slowly, hating the injustice in the fact that she was seeing him again for the first time in almost a decade wearing a blue hospital gown, with at least one cut on her face, hair matted with blood.

      Not the impression she’d have preferred to make, but then again, there were lots of things about her life that weren’t how she would have preferred them. “I know you must hate me,” she continued, “But is Luke okay?”

      He gave the slightest of nods and then speared her with his gaze.

      “How. Could. You.”

      Emma looked into his eyes, realizing now that she’d always done that when she’d wanted to know what he was thinking. She had always thought she could see more in people’s gazes than others could, like she could see inside them. Someone had told her that before...

      Oh, Tyler.

      Her cheeks heated, embarrassment, regret and a maelstrom of other emotions all swirling inside her.

      “I’m sorry.” It seemed a good place to start.

      “I appreciate that.” His voice was measured and even. This was the Tyler she’d met at the start of college, the Tyler who’d not make a step without considering the implications to his five-year plan, the one who’d known where he was headed and had been so solid in his convictions.

      Except that one night...

      “I am, Tyler. For...for all of it.” She swallowed hard, still feeling responsible for the time their innocent relationship had derailed. “Not for Luke’s existence, though. I won’t be sorry for that.” She heard her tone harden as she remembered what she’d given up for him. Her parents hadn’t spoken to her since right after she’d given birth when they’d tried to convince her that just because she’d “insisted” on having Luke, didn’t mean she had to keep him. They’d brought up adoption and while she’d thought adoption was a wonderful thing, it hadn’t been what she’d wanted.

      At all.

      “Obviously.”

      Emma exhaled. At least Tyler seemed to understand that Luke’s life was a gift. She watched emotions chase across his face and sat there facing him, not knowing what to do. What to say.

      “Why are you here? And why is someone trying to kill you?”

      Emma let out of a breath.

      The door swung open again, both their attentions going that way.

      A man in uniform walked in.

      “This is my brother, Police Chief СКАЧАТЬ