Page 14 of A Ranger for Christmas
She never spent Christmas Eve or Christmas Day with her dad, a point her mother had demanded at the custody hearing. It was always the week before or the week after.
She glanced at the clock on the dash. If she hustled she would cover forty-five minutes worth of road in thirty.
Twenty-three years had passed since that sad Christmas, and still she and her father never saw each other on Christmas Day. After she turned eighteen, her mother always found a reason to travel with Marisa over Christmas. She’d never put up another tree again, and though she gave Marisa a gift, she always claimedit had nothing to do with Christmas. Though her mother had died seven years ago, Marisa had found her dislike of the holiday lingered.
Shifting in her seat, she tried to embrace the positive. She really tried. But the more she thought about the coming gathering and the explosion of reds and greens waiting for her, the more somber she grew.
Shoving out a breath, she shifted her thoughts from the holidays to Lucas’s puzzle, the one she’d cracked. She took pride in the accomplishment, remembering Lucas’s stunned face when she’d told him she’d nearly broken his secret messages.
She fished her cell phone out of her purse on the passenger seat. Excitement stirred with an energy she’d not felt in a long time. Reminding herself it had to do with the code and not Lucas, she punched in his number. As she readied to hit SEND, she noticed the headlights in her rearview mirror. She glanced at her speedometer and realized she was driving a little slow and assumed the driver behind her was impatient. She sped up and focused on her driving. The headlights faded into the distance.
She hit SEND and after one ring his crisp, deep voice echoed in her ear. “Lucas Cooper.”
“It’s Marisa. Marisa Thompson.”
“I know who Marisa is,” he said, his voice heavy with an unnamed emotion.
She swallowed, pushing aside the feelings she’d had in Merida when they’d been together. Frightening, how alive one person could make another feel. She cleared her throat. “I cracked the code.”
“Really?” The surprised pleasure in his deep voice warmed her heart.
The headlights returned, bright and annoying. “I created the key barely an hour ago.”
“Marisa, that’s great.”
“I’ll be back in town early in the morning, and I’ll come by your office to review what I’ve discovered.”
“Excellent.”
The headlights grew closer, and she checked her speed. She was driving exactly five miles over the speed limit. She glared into the mirror as if willing the driver to back off. The other driver drew closer and closer.
“Marisa?”
Lucas’s deep voice cut through her worries. “Sorry. Look, I don’t want to sound paranoid, but there’s someone right behind me on my bumper. I’m on Route 290 headed to Fredericksburg.”
“How close is the car?” His voice had dropped and a low menace hummed under the words.
“Five or ten feet.”
“I’m calling the sheriff’s office and having them send a car in your direction.”
As much as she didn’t want to sound the alarm bells again, now was not the time to wonder if she’d made a mistake. The car edged closer and in a split second it bumped her back bumper. “He just hit me.”
“What?” She imagined him standing and reaching for his gun as he headed for the door.
“He bumped my bumper.”
“Speed up.”
“I’m tossing the phone in my lap.”
“Keep me on the line.”
She gripped the wheel with both hands, the instruments of her dash lit up by the glare of the other car’s headlights. Despite her increased speed, the car caught up to her again. This time it hit her harder. Her car swerved left before she made a hard correction to the right to keep the tires on the road. If there had been another car approaching in the other lane . . .
Heart hammering, she refused to consider what might have happened. She pushed on the accelerator. Again, more inches separated her from the other car and, again, the gap closed as the stranger matched her speed.
This time the car cut left and quickly came up on her driver’s side. She glanced over, but shadows obscured the other driver’s face. Before she could think to speed up or slow down, the car jerked into her lane, and this time when she swerved, she couldn’t correct in time. Her car ran off the road, banging over a ditch and plunging along a rocky ravine toward the dry bed of a creek. She screamed.
