“You don’t need to adopt that . . . attitude. It’s unimaginative, and it’s below you. You’re capable of more.”

His candor threw me. “Not easily impressed, I take it?”

“You impress me. Just not the act.”

The act. He was right, actually. Call it my act; call it my armor. I called it coping. The only trouble was, I didn’t know anymore if I could let my real self shine through. What would I even sound like? Who would I be?

I watched as he downshifted. The car whined in low gear. He quickly raked his dark hair from his brow and then popped the car back into third. His arm flexed with the movement, and each glimpse of his tattoo transfixed me.

I hadn’t known guys like this even existed.

“Wait.” I noticed he’d turned off onto a weird one-lane road. Alarm instantly cleared the dreamy thoughts from my head. Just my luck—the guy really was a serial killer. “Where are you taking me?”

“I’m thinking perhaps you’d rather travel to the coast by plane.”

CHAPTER FOUR

“A plane?” My voice was shrill with disbelief. Ronan had driven us to a private airport, where he’d parked in driven us to a private airport, where he’d parked in front of an airplane. A sleek, shiny, private jet–looking thing. I craned my neck, looking out the window at a dingy, grayish brown airstrip. Small puddles spoke of a recent Florida downpour, and moisture blackened fissures along the pavement, making it look like crackle pottery.

The concerns that’d nagged me earlier slammed full force to the front of my mind. Hopping in a sports car with a mysterious fellow student was one thing, but private jets were a whole other reality. Uncertainty brought back my sarcasm full force. “Who are you, John Travolta?”

“John Travolta?” He pulled off his sunglasses to study me. There were flecks of gold in his green eyes.

“You know, the movie star. He’s got all those planes. I just mean . . . who are you to own a jet like that?” And what makes you think I’m getting in it?

“It’s not my jet, precisely.” He crooked his mouth into a half smile.

I had to look away, back to the plane. I refused to let him distract me. The feel of this strong, attractive, huskily accented guy sitting so close was a lot to bear, but not so much that I’d get on a plane with him. Surviving my father had honed my instincts. It didn’t take a sage to know that smart girls don’t fly off with strange men.

“Well, okay,” I said warily. “Then who are you to have access to a jet like that?”

“The question is: Are you brave enough to find out?” The challenge in his voice brought my head swinging back to face him. He was staring at me with those smoldering eyes that made my breath catch. He reached over and placed his hand on my shoulder, leaning closer. “The question is,” he repeated, “are you ready to embrace a whole new life?”

A new life. No way something like that was even possible. Was it?

I looked back at the plane, holding my arms stiffly in my lap, desperate not to fidget. Because I knew the answer was no, good things were not possible. I’d had that lesson backhanded into me from a young age.

The real question was: How was I supposed to get myself out of this situation? We were alone, in the middle of nowhere. Where was I supposed to go and how was I supposed to get there?

A shadow flickered in the cockpit and then was gone. So, okay, check that—we weren’t entirely alone. There was a pilot in there, readying for takeoff. Almost as though he’d been waiting for us.

And I’d discovered a new problem. The longer Ronan’s hand rested warmly on my skin, the less intense my concerns became. I shifted away from him, at least as much as I could in that tiny sports car. His touch was muddling my mind, almost as if he had some hypnotic power over me.

Because I was starting to ask myself some crazy questions. Like, what if I did climb into that plane? It’d be an irreversible thing, a path from which there’d be no return. But was it a dangerous path, or might I find a pot of gold at the end?

But how was it that some guy from the registrar’s office spotted me and decided I was the one for his jet-fueled getaway? I leaned away from him, into the car door, and tried my best glare. “Why me?”

He shifted so that his hand still rested lightly on me. It was a casual gesture, and yet I felt the heat of his touch like a brand. “Why not you, Annelise?”

Why not indeed?

I gave my head a shake. Because normal people—safe, sane people—don’t whisk seventeen-year-old girls they don’t know off in private jets.

I flinched my leg away from his hand, and as I broke contact, doubts swamped me. Was he part of some high-tech slavery ring with a penchant for younger girls with high IQs and lame senses of humor? “But we just met.”

“You’re special,” he said in that husky voice, shifting his hand to my shoulder.

Special. The word echoed in my head, and for once in my life, it didn’t sound like a curse. I wanted to wrap myself in the feel of it even as I struggled to get a grip. I tried to concentrate on my skepticism, but that touch was burning through the fabric of my shirt. I felt myself slipping.

“Don’t you wish to go?” he pressed. “With me?”

Ronan was waiting for my answer. His expression was tight, and it exaggerated the cleft in his chin. The shadow of a muscle flickered along his jaw. He was fierce and masculine in a way I’d never before encountered. What girl didn’t wish for such a man and on such a jet?

But this was feeling too unreal, too much like the genie in the bottle had come for me. I struggled to think rationally. “Where would we go, exactly?”

“You wanted the coast. But tell me, Annelise: Will any coast do?” He gave me a squeeze, then removed his hand, and my shoulder felt chilled from the loss. But then he swept the hair from my neck and I tingled—no, I burned—where his fingers brushed my bare skin.

Any coast, I had the urge to answer him, as long as it’s with you.

I chafed my arms from the shiver rippling across them. I needed to get a hold of myself. I wanted to flee Florida, flee my family and my life, but was I ready for the point of no return? “Why not drive? Florida’s big, but not that big.”

“Are you saying you don’t want to leave Florida? The Gulfstream IV can travel more than four thousand nautical miles.”

“Oh, well, that’s a relief, then. Particularly as I generally calculate things in terms of nautical miles.”

His answering silence was loud.

What was he thinking about? I spared a glance for him, unable to stop myself. He was watching me with that I expect more face I now recognized.

I took a deep breath. Though I felt raw and exposed, I mustered some honesty. “I mean, yes. Of course. I long to leave Florida. My life here . . . It’s been hard. I’ve always dreamt of leaving.”

I’d spoken the truth, but it had come out so quietly. Did my voice always go all hesitant and soft when speaking truly?

All this honesty. And with a total stranger. It was too intense. I felt too defenseless. It was too much.

He was too much. He made me feel so strange. Like, for the first time in my life, I knew what hope was.

I looked back at the plane, wondering just who this guy was. I strained my eyes, trying to make sense of the shadowy cockpit.

Ronan touched my chin, and it was a shock. His finger was warm and gentle, and I wanted to shut my eyes. I wanted to lean my cheek into his hand and stop time.

What was happening? Maybe there was such a thing as knights in shining armor, and mine had a black T-shirt and a tattoo, and liked to hang out at the registrar’s.

He turned my face to his. Not that it took any great feat of strength. I’d been longing to clamp an uninterrupted stare on him since I first spotted him.

“I’ll take you someplace very far away.” Ronan’s voice was subdued, and it came out as a rasp. “Far from your father. From the people who don’t understand you.”

He’d touched a nerve. I considered pulling away, but didn’t have the heart. Instead, I let my eyes fall into his, and they were so very green, the color of a deep, dark, haunted forest, and it made some delicious, dangerous sensation shiver across my skin.

He toyed with the hair at the nape of my neck, and again I felt that buzz of electricity shimmer across my skin. He gave me a little half smile. “But will you have the courage?”

I squinted my eyes shut tight, trying to clear my head. Something wasn’t right. He was just a guy, and I never had this sort of reaction to guys. Yet every time he touched me, I went all limp and easy. With one brush of his hand, the guy could probably sell me a bridge, much less sweet-talk me onto some swanky private jet.

“Will you or won’t you, Annelise?” Heat fanned from his fingers, penetrating deep into my brain, confusing me, making me putty to his touch.

“Yes,” I heard myself whisper. “I will.”

As I opened my eyes, he pulled away from me, and cold clarity prickled my brain like blood returning to a numbed limb.

I watched Ronan as he studied his fisted hands. His muscles were tensed and his eyes looked fierce, making me suddenly uneasy. I was itching inside my skin, longing to feel his reassuring touch once more. Eager to break the silence, I asked, “Where are we going?”

He gazed blindly out the window, resting his hands on the steering wheel. “Far away. Life as you know it will change utterly.”

I stared hard at his profile, wondering if I’d seen uncertainty shadow his face. Did he regret asking me? Had I heard hesitation in his voice, or was it just my imagination?

He’d pulled his eyes from mine, and that earlier sense of unreality was creeping back in, clinging in the back of my mind like shadows in corners. His silence unnerved me, and I wanted to normalize the situation. “Far away?” I asked. “Are we going west?”

“No. We’re leaving the country. For an island.”

My brows rose at the word island. “Like the Caribbean?”