Passions in the North Country (Siren Publishing Classic) Read Free

betrayed her secrets. They were laughing at her clumsy attempt at concealment, and absolutely everyone was aware she had cut and dyed her hair. At times she wanted to just come out and say it, to put all the subterfuge and lies behind her, but that would have been a disaster. Her life was now a lie, and only lies could save her.
    Jenny bit her lip and knitted her brows, but though she kept checking the rearview mirror, she did not see the strangers following in the old car. If she had, she might have lost it. Suddenly, behind her in the distance, she saw headlights flash in her back trail. Those men! They were coming back for her, like ravenous wolves bearing down on a tender fawn stuck in deep snow. No, she would not be a victim any longer. She sped up.
    She checked the mirror, her breathing shallow, her heart pounding. So strong was the apprehension that Jenny studied the mirror a moment too long. She drifted to the right and slipped off the pavement at a point where the shoulder was low and the edge jagged. The inside of the front tire instantly ripped.
    Thump, thump, thump.
    Though she swerved back onto the road and continued driving, it soon became apparent the car would literally travel no farther. She had to stop. Up ahead, to her left, was a small parking area overlooking the ocean. Jenny pulled into it. No one else was there and she felt a tremendous sense of loneliness. For a moment, just a moment, she almost—almost—wished she was back in Florida. At least there everything was familiar. But Ivan was there, too, and any sentimental value for her home was more than offset by memories of him.
    A short time later the car behind her passed. It was a small, foreign-made car driven by a woman. Had she known that, she would have flagged her down. It started to sputter rain. Jenny realized she would either have to walk all the way to Newbridge in the rain, sit in the car the entire night, or entice someone to stop and help.
    Ten minutes passed. No one came.
    On this warm, rainy evening in mid-June, Jenny Ashbury had never felt more alone in her life. She felt a crushing, staggering sense of loneliness. Yet as darkness began to settle over the Atlantic, its vastness stretching further than the eye could see, a sense of calm suddenly started to pervade in her spirit. The ocean put everything into perspective. Its contempt for time made her realize how insignificant were the dramas of human life. We live, we die, but the ocean just keeps on rolling, oblivious to people with their hopes and dreams and fears. In an odd kind of way, her own insignificance made her feel strangely powerful. She was nothing but a speck in the universe, which made her problems an even smaller speck.
    As the light faded into darkness, Jenny was jolted back to reality. She was stranded on a darkening road in a strange place. Her sense of power evaporated like morning dew in a parched desert. One moment she felt powerful, and the next she felt anything but powerful. Jenny Ashbury was a mess. Her life had crumbled around her and everything was chaos happening at lightning speed, as if she had been drawn up into a Kansas twister and was holding on for dear life. She had no job, no prospects, no home, no past…no anything. She didn’t even have a reason to exist. Really, if she disappeared, who would even notice? Only Ivan, she was sure, and that was only because he would be upset he did not have a chance to kill her himself.
    The mere thought of him made her shudder. But what to do? Walk…Along this road? No, it was now raining harder. It was better to stay in the car. The car was at least familiar, comforting.
    More time passed…
    Jenny tried to remain composed, but it became more difficult by the second. Total darkness fell and not a single car passed in either direction. There really was no reason to feel any heightened sense of fear, but what had begun as a dull foreboding grew by degrees into accepted fact. Any moment those rough men who passed