Page 195 of Heartbeats & Highways

“What did he say?”

“He said that even though I was loyal and willing to protect the people I love, I live my life selfishly, and that’s why Acid is dead. He told me I’ve spent my life asking for forgiveness, but never permission. Taking a bullet for a brother is one thing but putting them in a dangerous situation is another thing entirely. That’s been sticking with me.”

He swallowed, like he was trying to swallow his pain.

“I’m the human equivalent of dynamite,” he said. “I walk into situations without thinking them through, and I make them worse. He’s dead because of me, Evie. I didn’t mean to, but I killed him.”

I didn’t know what to say, so I remained silent.

He sighed. “You can’t go back. Can you?”

“No. Only forward. So, let’s go forward.”

“It’ll be slow,” he warned me.

“No doubt.”

“And now we both have nightmares.”

“I’ll comfort you, and you comfort me,” I said. “Maybe it’s supposed to be this way. Maybe we’re the lucky ones.”

“Lucky? How do you figure?”

“Eight billion people in the world. And somehow we met. We met, and we fell in love, and now we’re a family.”

“Lucky,” he repeated.

I placed my hand on his heart. “So lucky.”

Chapter 51

“I’m startingto think road trips are overrated,” I said from the passenger side of the car. “And exhausting.”

He laughed. “Exhausting? I’ve done all the driving. Thank God I was cleared to drive, huh?”

“We can switch at the next stop,” I said.

“Nah, I like you as my passenger princess. And road trips aren’t overrated. We just haven’t seen anything good yet. Just motels and diners.”

“What are we going to do when we get to Idaho? Not live in a motel for three months, right?”

“No.” He paused a moment. “I found us a house to rent.”

“You did?”

“Yeah.” He reached into his pocket and extracted his cell and handed it to me.

It was a new phone. The one he had for the club was off and in the glove compartment.

“I don’t know the code,” I said.

“Your birthday.”

“Savage,” I murmured.

He shot me a grin. “Unlock it. Go to my email. It’s flagged.”

I did as he said.

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