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

her earlier would round the corner. What then? No one would hear her screams. No one would rescue her.
    She could stand it no longer. Jenny broke down and hot tears flowed, slowly at first, then in a torrent. It was as if she had restrained a great dam of emotions during a long storm. Now, able to be contained no longer, the dam burst in a gushing, headlong wave, her sobs fracturing the silence of the enveloping darkness.
    She felt a stifling sense of vulnerability. She was tired of the world, the cold, anonymous world. Life was too difficult, much, much too difficult. In a way it would be a relief to just die and fade away. At least then there would be peace. And all she had ever asked for was a good and decent life, a man to love, a family someday. But nothing of the sort was to be hers. She was reduced to the life of a fugitive who always has to look over her shoulder. She would never find love, happiness, peace. At best she could hope to survive and exist.
    By now it was raining hard and she was getting legitimately scared. Suddenly headlights flashed up the road. The thought crossed her mind that Ivan might have been tracking her somehow. He was into all the latest technology and just days earlier he had watched a television report on tracking cars with a GPS device. Jenny could tell he was fascinated with the concept. Given time, she was sure, he would have been monitoring her. Hopefully he had not gotten the device before she ran.
    Jenny got out of her car and hurried to the road. The vehicle rounded the corner and came toward her, its wipers steadily swishing. Was this salvation? Or was it those men? Those men, who, like Ivan, wanted to hurt her? Was it, somehow, Ivan himself? Jenny’s heart raced, torn between hope and terror. If she had to, she would run into the woods. She would run so fast they would never catch her. But if they somehow did, they were not going to take her without a fight. This time she would not cower in fear from a man. She would kick and scratch and do whatever it took.
    As the vehicle approached, part of her wanted to flag it down and another part of her wanted to run. And what if it really was those men? Drunken, lawless men? This was worse than a Hitchcock movie. This was real. And in her mind she was about to become an innocent victim, a curiosity for some grizzled homicide detective.
    Then, in a moment of glorious relief, as when a soul lost at sea is spotted by a search plane, she realized this vehicle was a pickup truck. A huge weight dissolved off her chest. Suddenly it didn’t seem so dark and isolated anymore. Her initial resolve returned and she was convinced she had made the right decision in fleeing to Nova Scotia.
    Jenny wildly flailed her arms to attract the occupants’ attention— no way was she going to let them pass. Headlights flashed over her and the truck slowed. She could not make out who was inside, though it was obvious she had been seen. But the truck drove past without stopping. Jenny shouted and again waved her arms in near panic. Finally, forty yards down the road, the brake lights came on and the truck pulled over to the shoulder. Jenny frantically ran toward the truck and noticed a small lamb looking at her from the boxedin back.
    The driver turned on the interior light, rolled down the window, and looked back at her. An immediate and undeniable jolt of electricity surged through her body. She visibly trembled. And so did he. Jenny saw it, plainly and unmistakably. The spark between them was so obvious that for a moment they both seemed embarrassed.
    The man before Jenny was handsome. Brutally handsome. As fine-looking a man as she had ever seen. He opened the door and stepped out, highly surprised to have encountered a woman under these circumstances. Over six feet tall, with an engaging face, he was the type of man women immediately notice. Wearing only a T-shirt and blue jeans, he was much bigger and more muscular than anyone she had ever dated, but there was