Body Double by Vicki Hinze Read Free Book Online Page B

him.
    He nodded. “Yeah.”
    Apparently, he was getting damn tired of it, too. “Sorry.”
    That apology earned her a killer smile that knotted a hitch in her chest. She swallowed hard and told herself it wasn’t a hitch at all. It was too much potato salad. That was a lie, of course. It was him. But she needed this lie as much as he’d needed his lie about his love of privacy being the reason he’d set out alone on a three-month boat trip, so she hung on to it, slid into the Honda and keyed the ignition.
    The baking sun had heat rolling up off the seats and the dash, nearly suffocating her. The engine roared to life. She cranked the air conditioner full blast, cracked open a window, then risked blistering her palms to hold on to the steering wheel to drive out of the parking lot and away from the jail. She left the facility and headed south toward Highway 98. According to Mark’s instructions, she’d go through a five-mile barren stretch, then dead-end at 98, which ran east and west. She was supposed to hang a left and then drive until she saw the base. Providence was on high alert for terrorist attacks, like the rest of the country, which meant it could take a while to get through gate-guard security.
    So far, base police hadn’t turned up anything on the blackLexus. Maybe by the time she hooked up with Mark, they’d know if anyone had registered one. Every vehicle on the base had to be registered or have a valid ID and visitor’s pass.
    Midway through the barren stretch of open road, a blue pickup got on her back bumper and, no matter how many times she tapped on the brakes to warn its driver to back off, she got ignored. The truck windows were tinted dark; she couldn’t see who was inside. Getting more annoyed by the tailgater’s persistence, Amanda slowed down. At a wide bend in the road, the jerk passed her and then swung deep into her lane. She swerved hard to the right to avoid hitting him. Her right tires hit the soft, sandy shoulder and grabbed, twisting the car. Off the road, she struggled to get back control, but failed. The car fishtailed, careened through a wooded area. It took total, constant focus to dodge clumps of pine and oak. Near a tall-grass clearing, she finally got the car slowed down. The truck paused on the road and waited. To avoid being seen by the driver, she grabbed her purse, cracked open the passenger door and rolled out onto the ground. Her upper arm hit an exposed root, throbbed, and she clenched her jaw to keep from screaming out. Hugging the dirt, she hid in the deep, stringy grass. She didn’t recognize it, but it was pungent and she hoped, not poisonous. The car rammed into a sprawling oak and exploded.
    An impact bomb. Breathless, Amanda watched the flames in horror.
    The blue pickup slowly drove away.
    Amanda watched it leave through tall, spiked blades of grass, then pulled her cell phone out of her purse and dialed Mark.
    “Are you lost, Amanda?”
    He’d known it was her. Caller ID? No way. Not on her cell phone. Had to be either powers of deduction or perception? Interesting. “Not exactly.” She wiped the sweat from her forehead and watched the flames crawl through the car. “I had to make a pit stop.”
    “What? Where?”
    “You know that isolated stretch of road? Well, I’m stuck without a car somewhere in the middle of it.” And there wasn’t another car in sight to confiscate to go after the pickup. She fought frustration on that, then warned herself to accept what she couldn’t change to avoid wasting energy she didn’t have to spare.
    “Did the Honda break down?”
    “Not exactly.” The flames licked at the roof and the stench of burning tires made her queasy. “Someone in a blue pickup played road hog. There wasn’t a decent shoulder.”
    “Are you okay?”
    “I’m fine. The car’s totaled.”
    “From a soft shoulder?”
    “Not exactly.” She didn’t want to say too much. Cell calls were extremely easy to intercept.
    “I’m on my way.