Page 111 of Strangers She Knows

She had to breathe.

She stopped. Closed her eyes. Concentrated on regulating the inhale…slowly. Exhale. Slowly. Inhale… Three times. She allowed herself three deep, controlled breaths.

She opened her eyes. With one hand, she clicked the safety release. With the other, she clicked the ignition.

At last! Her hands performed as she required. The spark sang. The flame ignited. “Yes!” Before it could extinguish, Kellen pointed the lighter at the end of the fuse.

The spark leaped.

With a hiss, the spark inched toward the front of the truck.

Kellen threw the lighter low and hard toward the workbench, hoping to send it under.

But she didn’t watch to make sure.

It didn’t matter now.

She crawled out and ran to the emergency radio. She cranked it up, turned it on, twisted the knob. Static blared from the speakers, static that would mask the fuse’s sizzling.

Kellen glanced out the window again.

Mara was limping faster, her gaze fixed on the garage.

Kellen smiled, and for the briefest moment contemplated jumping Mara and beating her into the ground. Physically obliterating her cruelty held an appeal that sang like a siren’s song.

But Kellen had to be practical. Mara might be injured, but Kellen was hurt far worse and she had no guarantee she would win such a confrontation.

No. The kerosene and dynamite were set.

The fuse was lit.

The only thing left was to convince Mara Kellen had tried to start the truck and failed.

Mara would comprehend the advantage of having a moving vehicle, but more important—she would always believe that where Kellen failed, she would succeed. It was Mara’s automatic response to Kellen’s failure that Kellen knew she could depend on.

Uh-oh. Maybe she did understand Mara’s mind a little too well…

Kellen ripped the charger cables off the car battery. Leaping into the driver’s seat, she turned the key and pushed the ignition button.

The engine gave that desperateI want to startsound. Once. Twice. Three times.

It sputtered. It coughed. For one moment, Kellen thought Max had actually fixed that engine and got it running.

Another fruitless attempt to start. “Come on,” she whispered to the truck. “You can do it.” If she could drive Mara into the ground…

Sense returned in a rush.

If she drove that truck over Mara, she’d die in the blast she herself had engineered.

Kellen gave it one last fruitless try, knowing Mara would snap at the challenge she had set.

From outside the back door, she heard a mocking laugh.

She leaped out of the driver’s seat, leaving the door open, the key swinging. She shoved open one of the wide carriage doors and fled outside. She ran. God, she ran, and as she did, her mind built the scene in her mind.

Mara entered the garage. She saw the truck, the lights on, the driver’s door open. She jumped inside, tried the key, heard the engine almost turn over. Maybe she saw the starter button, maybe she didn’t. Maybe she knew what it was for, maybe she didn’t. Who cared? She sat in that truck. That was all that mattered.

At a safe distance, Kellen stopped and turned, anticipating that moment when the lit fuse hit the blasting cap, the dynamite ignited, and the garage, and Max’s beloved truck, and Mara vanished in a fiery blast.

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