Page 20 of A Little Jaded
“Yeah.” She breathes deep. “It’s me.”
She sounds like shit.
“Where are you?” I demand.
“Honestly?” A quiet, bitter laugh echoes through my cell. “I have no idea. I’m on the side of a back road somewhere between your house and mine.”
What the hell?
“Can you share your location?” I ask.
“Uh, yeah.”
Her pause makes me sit up even straighter.
“Yeah, I think I can,” she whispers.
I wish I knew her better. Could read her better. Because right now, I feel like I’m in the dark, and after everything that happened tonight, it leaves me even more on edge.
“I just shared my location,” she breathes out.
“Good.”
“Dude, what’s wrong?” Griffin interrupts.
My gaze cuts to him, and I shake my head, silently telling him to stay quiet.
“Are you okay?” I ask into the receiver.
“Uh, I mean, yeah? I guess?” She sniffles again. “Honestly, I don’t even know.”
“Do I need to bring backup?” I demand as I get straight to the point and fish my keys from my front pocket.
She hesitates. “No. No, I’m all alone.”
“Got it.” I toss the defrosted bag of peas on the coffee table. “Stay here. I got this,” I add to Reeves and Griffin, then I’m out the door in a flash. “I’m coming, all right? Stay with me, Raine.”
“Okay.”
I keepthe call connected through my Bluetooth, but we don’t talk. Not sure there’s much to say anyway. The asshole drove her into the middle of fucking nowhere, then left her on the side of the road. Who does that?
Fucking prick.
When a silhouette greets me fifteen minutes later, I let out the oxygen I’d been holding while Raine covers her facewith her phone-free hand, shielding the bright lights from blinding her.
“It’s me,” I murmur, ending the call and pulling up beside her on the side of the road.
Without a word, she opens the passenger door and climbs in, folding her arms and using her hair as a shield to hide her from my view. She looks so small. I hate how she won’t look at me. Not like I’ve earned her trust or anything, but her silence is suffocating. I want to know what happened. How she wound up out here all alone. What he did. What they said. It’s none of my business, but I can’t stop the questions from filtering through me. One after the other. Leaving me on pins and needles as I squeeze the steering wheel. Taking a deep breath, I force my muscles to relax.
Giving her the side-eye, I finally ask, “You okay?”
What little light from the dashboard makes her green eyes practically glow as they flick toward me for the shortest of seconds before she looks out the passenger window, avoiding me at all costs.
“I didn’t know who else to call.”
Where’s her family? Her friends? Is she seriously all alone? I can think of a dozen people I could call if I needed someone, so what’s this girl’s backstory? And why do I even care?
I don’t know her. I don’t know anything about her. The only reason I know her last name is because I did some light stalking, and even that’s flimsy at best. But getting any answers out of her feels like a moot point. At least for right now. Still, I can’t stop staring. Even then, she doesn’t look at me. Doesn’t do anything but stare out the passenger window, probably wishing she could disappear.