“Do you remember Carson Taylor?”

Hunter’s words replay on a loop in my head as we drive along a lonely two-lane road. How could I possibly forget him? My first serious boyfriend, the charismatic guy everyone I loved warned me of, the troubled person who drifted further and further away from me the harder I tried to hold on to him.

He stole from me and lied to me to chase a high. That he’s in trouble with bad people doesn’t surprise me. That they think they can come after me to get to him absolutely does.

Carson and I had an instant, deep connection that left a trail of destruction in its wake. One he never seemed to get over, and one I’ve spent the last year and a half trying to forget.

We were a cautionary tale, a warning against falling hard and fast, of acting on impulse when you meet a stranger who feels like a friend, and letting yourself take more than you should.

Hunter’s been driving for what seems like hours. We’ve been on the highway and off again, along main streets and back roads, alternating one after the other. I know we were heading south earlier, but now? I have no idea where we are.

I guess that’s the point.

The adrenaline from our escape has worn off. I’m completely exhausted, and yet too anxious to sleep. Hunter must be running on fumes, but he’s awake and alert, his gaze focused on the road. Every minute or so he checks the rearview, constantly on the lookout to make sure we don’t have a tail.

I have so many questions for him but don’t dare ask them now. I wish he’d talk about something, though, because the silence is killing me.

Till now I’d been fiddling with the radio, playing deejay for this long, awkward road trip. But we’ve reached the point where we’re outside any broadcast areas, and this old car doesn’t have anything more than a cassette player and an AM/FM receiver.

It’d be nice to be able to distract myself with a game on my phone or something, but Hunter stashed it away in some alley by the club, worried that whoever is after me would be able to trace the signal to our whereabouts.

I sigh and sink back against the headrest. The brush scattered along the side of the road is nothing more than a blur in the darkness, illuminated by the headlights and then gone.

Every so often I’m tempted to turn and full-on admire Hunter here in the dark. There’s something about the way the shadows cut across his face that makes him even more beautiful than he is in the light. Maybe it has something to do with the intense look in his eyes, the focus that he has on keeping me safe. I know it’s his job, but having that intensity and protectiveness focused on me when I’m already attracted to him is a deadly combination. I could easily let myself get carried away and do something completely embarrassing like climb across the seat and attach my lips to his neck and see what his skin tastes like.

I tell myself it’s just the adrenaline talking and that this one-sided attraction will die down once we reach our destination and I can get some space away from him. The whole idea of tonight was that I’d hook up and move on. I can’t cut and run on Hunter, and I definitely don’t want something more, so maybe this is for the best.

This unrelenting desire is the same feeling that got me in trouble with Carson, and I do not want to go down that road again.

“You doing all right?” Hunter finally asks, startling me.

“Yeah,” I reply. “I don’t want to are we there yet you, but…are we there yet?”

Hunter grins, which isn’t the reaction I expected. “Bored?”

“The beginning of my evening was a little more exciting, yeah,” I tease, hoping to open him up a bit so we can at least pass the time with some conversation.

“I wouldn’t be very good at my job if I kept you in danger instead of getting you out of it, would I? The rest of our time together is going to be a real let-down if you’re expecting more of what you got earlier tonight.”

“Approximately how long are you expecting the rest of our time together to be, exactly?”

He shrugs. “Rest of the weekend, tops. You won’t even miss any work.”

“Wow.” My eyes widen. I’m not exactly sure how long I expected this little escapade to last, but a day or two seems like a pretty generous timeline.

“You’re surprised.”

“Yeah, a little.”

“We’ve located the threat, and removed you from the threat.” He checks the rearview mirror, refocuses on the road before us. “Now all that’s left is to neutralize the threat.”

“That sounds ominous,” I say, aiming for teasing but falling short.

“It doesn’t have to be. You’d be surprised at what can convince people to change their minds about something,” he replies with an easy smile. “It doesn’t always require force.”

“So…you don’t neutralize the threat?” I ask.

“Sometimes,” he replies, glancing at me out of the corner of his eye. “It depends on what the threat is. There are guys that work for me who have past ties to the group that Carson owes money to. Their experience is more beneficial in shutting them down. My experience is more beneficial to you here, getting you out of town and protecting you in case one of them miraculously finds us.”

“What exactly are the chances of a miracle here?” I ask.

“Slim to none.”

“Okay, good to know.” Trusting in a complete stranger isn’t easy, but he hasn’t given me any reason to think he’d lie about potential danger. “It’s not that I didn’t believe you when you said I was in good hands—”

“Alexa’s in good hands,” he corrects.

“Oh…kay,” I say slowly, not sure where this is going.

“I told you Alexa is in good hands, and she is.” Hunter tears his eyes away from the road, pinning me with a look that’s so intense it makes my breath catch. “You’re in the best hands.”

I don’t want to read into things that aren’t there. I mean, protecting me is literally Hunter’s job, and the flirting at the club must have been part of a ruse to lure me in without scaring me. But there’s such intent behind his words. He’s looking at me like this means something, and I could’ve sworn he’d wanted to kiss me back in that alley…and no. No, I can’t let myself go there.

“So,” I say, drawing the word out as I trace the hem of my dress, trying to turn the conversation in a different direction before I do something completely embarrassing like crawl onto his lap and kiss him. “No high-speed car chases is what you’re saying.”

Hunter shakes his head. “No chases of any kind if I do my job right. And I always do my job right.”

“Good to know.” If my voice shakes a little, Hunter doesn’t seem to notice.

“So you can relax. The scary part is over, no one’s going to hurt you.”

“I don’t know. The scary part wasn’t as scary as it could’ve been,” I tell him, before I can think better of it. “You have a very calming way about you, even in circumstances that don’t exactly warrant calm.”

I glance in Hunter’s direction and catch his smile before it disappears.

“Is this the way you always operate? On the fly like this? You said earlier that you didn’t plan on introducing yourself to me the way you did.” A flurry of other questions fly into my mind even before he answers the ones I’ve just asked. “How did you find me? Would it creep me out?”

“Not as much as the way the other guys found you.”

My body shudders involuntarily. That this could’ve been going on for god knows how long without me knowing…an icy cold shiver works its way across my spine at the mere thought of being watched.

Knowing what I know now, I realize that it’s going to take a long time for my life to go back to the way it was, assuming it ever does. Walking around oblivious, assuming I had my privacy…those days are over. But that’s a train of thought I can chase later, when I’m back at home in my bed and my life looks a little more like I remember it.

“Then don’t tell me,” I say. “I don’t want to know.”

Hunter tears his eyes from the road, watching me carefully. “Are you sure?”

“I’m sure,” I tell Hunter. “Do my parents know about this?”

Hunter shakes his head. “No. I thought it was best to limit the circle of people who knew what was happening, since we’re expecting to be able to take care of it pretty quickly. Did you want them to?”

“No!” I say quickly, then take a deep breath to calm the panic. “No. They weren’t Carson’s biggest fans. They warned me of him, but I didn’t listen. I thought I knew him better than they did.” I let out a bitter laugh. “Turns out I was wrong.”

“I understand that feeling.”

“It’s a real bitch, isn’t it?”

With a laugh, Hunter turns and looks at me. “It definitely is.”

“You know, this is probably an awkward time to bring this up, but I can’t pay you for any of this,” I explain. “I mean, I don’t know what the hourly rate for private security is, but I do know that I don’t have it.”

“It’s already taken care of.”

I glance over at him with a raised brow. “What does that mean?”

“It means that you don’t have to pay me.”

“And your boss is okay with that?”

He smiles. “I am the boss.”

Oh, well…that was sexier than it should have been. I want to push him on it, but I decide not to, given that he’s put his life on the line for mine tonight. Asking about how he’s getting compensated seems rude.

“I don’t really understand why these guys would come after me,” I admit. “Carson and I broke up a year and a half ago. It did not end well. That someone would try to use me as leverage over him…I don’t get it. He had to have said something that made them believe it, since I wouldn’t be here otherwise, but…”

“There wasn’t a lot of time for him to get into the whole story,” Hunter says, drumming his fingertips across the steering wheel. “He didn’t come to me until it was almost too late. But I think that when someone’s as far gone as he is, they grab on to the last good thing they had and romanticize it, thinking that as long as they have that, they’ll keep a piece of the person they used to be. Maybe that’s what Carson is doing with you.”

My stomach flips uneasily considering that possibility. It makes me feel unfathomably sad and angry all at once.

“He didn’t want help, and I couldn’t give him what he wanted. I wouldn’t give him what he wanted, because it was too much.”

Hunter nods sympathetically. “When someone’s drowning, you don’t have to let them take you down too.”

The pain in his voice is unmistakable. “It sounds like you have some experience with this yourself.”

“Generally, yes,” he admits. “Specifically with Carson.”

That shocks the hell out of me, but the more I think about it, the more this whole situation makes sense. It’s a favor, not a job.

“He’s a friend?”

Hunter lets out a sharp, bitter laugh. “No. More like…a responsibility.”

I’m not sure what to make of it, and I don’t want to pry, but I desperately want to know more.

We’re quiet for a mile or two, then Hunter turns to me. “You aren’t going to ask?”

“I want to know, but only if you want to tell me. If your experience with him is anything like mine, I imagine it’s not an easy story to tell.”

“He was a friend of my brother’s,” Hunter says after a long pause. “Bobby liked to party, and Carson was new in town, looking for some friends. Bobby was always happy to get people involved in his lifestyle, and…it, uh…” Hunter anxiously rubs the back of his neck. “It didn’t end well for Bobby. I was hoping I could keep Carson from meeting the same fate.”

After my own experience with Carson even before he hit rock bottom, I have nothing but admiration for someone who stuck around and tried pulling him out of the depths of his addiction.

It’s mostly a losing battle, but every day you have to wake up ready to fight.

“You’re a good person,” I tell him.

I don’t know much about Hunter, but I do know that.

* * *

“You know, you’re taking this pretty well.”

It’s taken a good fifteen minutes for the heaviness between us to dissipate, but I’m glad to move on to a somewhat lighter topic. “It’s a little too surreal to digest at the moment,” I admit. “You probably won’t think I’m dealing so well when the fear insomnia kicks in tonight.”

Hunter reaches out, places his warm hand on the sleeve of his jacket, which I’m still wearing. “You’re safe with me, you know that, right?”

His eyes are incredibly earnest, even in the dark shadows of this beat-up old car. And the truth is, I do know that. Trust isn’t something that’s easily earned with me, but based on what he’s done for me this strange night, in these strange circumstances? Hunter definitely has mine.

“I do know that.”

He gives a decisive nod at my confirmation. “It’s okay if you need to freak out. You don’t have to pretend like you’re dealing if you’re not. I can listen, lend you a shoulder to cry on. Anything.”

“It’s not that I don’t appreciate the offer, because I do,” I tell him. “But freaking out isn’t going to change the fact that tonight definitely didn’t go the way I hoped it would. And it won’t stop whoever’s shooting at me from shooting at me. It’ll just give you a distraction that you clearly don’t need, and it’s not going to make me feel better anyway.

“So, don’t think that because I’m not freaking out that I’m not terrified. I am. I…was. But you asked me to trust you and proved that I could, so…that’s what I’m doing. Besides,” I continue, trying to break up my awkward ramble, “I figured after throwing your body on mine to keep me from getting shot that crying on your shoulder wasn’t the best way to repay you.”

Hunter full-on smiles, more gorgeous than he has any right being at a time like this. “The offer stands whether you take it up or not,” he explains. “For as long as we’re together, and after, if you need.”

“Thank you.”

I don’t have much time to dwell on said offer, because Hunter takes a right onto a dimly lit street, and all of a sudden we’re back in some kind of civilization. It’s not much of a town from what little I’m able to make out, but it’s something. The neon sign for a diner lights up the corner at the end of a long row of what looks like a lot of empty storefronts. Another right takes us down a street littered with a few houses here and there, long stretches of road in between them.

A left turn and a short ride down a narrow, bumpy gravel road later, Hunter brings the car to a stop in front of a cabin that looks like it has dubious structural integrity.

“Stay here for a sec,” Hunter says, taking the keys and locking me in behind him.

I have absolutely no desire to venture out of this car until he gives me the okay, so I do what he tells me to.

Hunter walks along the perimeter of the place. It’s so tiny that he’s barely out of sight for more than a few seconds. He returns to the car, pops the trunk, and rummages around back there for a while. The car creaks as Hunter lowers the trunk lid, and then he opens my door.

“C’mon,” he says with a gentle smile, holding out his hand.

He pulls me up, and I shuffle my feet a little, thankful to have some good blood flow after being stuck in the car for god knows how long. He makes his way to the front door, a huge duffel slung over his broad shoulder, dragging a cooler in tow.

He jiggles a few keys in a few locks, and when the door opens with a high-pitched squeal, he enters a code on the touch pad on the wall.

“What is this place?” I ask, stepping over the threshold.

“It’s a safe place,” he replies, dropping the bag by the floor and taking the cooler over to the kitchen, which is on the far side of the main living area—what appears to be the majority of this cabin. “And it’s what we’re calling home for the foreseeable future.”

Even though it’s a little musty, it’s a whole hell of a lot nicer on the inside than you’d guess by looking at the outside. Don’t judge a book by its cover and all that.

The cabin resembles a studio apartment, with a fairly modern-looking kitchen on the far side of the room. There’s a little bathroom off to the right. The walls are painted in a homey yellow, and there are pictures—photos of people and landscapes—hanging here and there.

There are worse places to stay when you’re running for your life.

Only problem is, there’s just one bed.