Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 75578 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 378(@200wpm)___ 302(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75578 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 378(@200wpm)___ 302(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
“Which foot?”
I raise my brows in a how-can-you-be-this-dumb look, and she flushes some more. “The right foot, Rayne.”
“Okay.” She looks down at the pedals and puts her right foot on the gas. The engine revs.
“Yep. That’s the gas. Now press the brake and hold it while you shift into drive.”
Instead of doing what I say, she turns the key. Since the car was already running, it screams at her. She screams back and releases both hands, holding them in the air like she just got burned.
“Fuck,” she mutters. She doesn’t look at me. She's staring through the windshield, breathing hard, like she’s an out of shape human who just ran up three flights of stairs.
“Look at me, Rayne.”
She doesn't look.
“Chill the fuck out. You’re making this too hard. Look at me.”
She turns her head and literally flinches when she sees my face, even though I thought my expression was pretty neutral. “What?”
“You can do this. Humans learn to drive every day, and you’re better than a human.”
Inexplicably, tears fill her eyes.
First instinct–they anger me. Enrage me, almost. Like I want to shift and tear her apart.
No. Not her.
Whatever made her cry.
Which, of course, is me.
In the next breath, I experience a massive subduing of my aggression, like a lead blanket got thrown across me to calm me down. Both impulses were powerful, and the ricochet between them leaves me lightheaded.
“Knock it off, Rayne,” I manage to say gruffly. I flick my fingers toward the windshield. “Press the brake and hold it.”
For once, she does as she’s told.
I take her hand and tug it to the gear shift, molding mine over the top to guide her to depress the button at the side and slowly slide it into drive. The gears engage, and the car tenses, ready to move forward.
“Slowly let off the brake.”
She obeys. We roll forward. She whimpers, steering too sharply right and left, like a little kid pretending to drive.
I bite my tongue to keep from giving her further instruction. Some things you just have to figure out by feel.
“Now give it a little gas.”
We lurch forward. She screams and presses the brake.
“You’ve got it,” I murmur. I’m surprised to hear anything encouraging come out of my mouth, but there it is.
She darts a worried glance my way.
“Keep your eyes on the road, Runt. Don’t worry about me. If you drive off a cliff, I’m indestructible.”
That forces a humorless chuff out of her.
“It just takes practice. Drive up to the mesa and turn around and then drive back down this hill.”
She sucks in a long breath then bobs her head. “Okay.”
She white-knuckles the wheel but makes it up to the mesa and manages to turn around. I make her practice K-turns a half dozen times before instructing her to drive us back down the hill. When we get to the end of the dirt road, she pulls over.
“What are you doing?”
“Getting out so you can drive.” She throws open her door.
“No, you’re not. You’re driving us home.”
Her eyes fly wide. “Hell, no. That’s a hard no. Absolutely not.”
I debate whether to go savage or soft on her. I don’t know why, but I choose soft. “You’re doing great, Rayne. The only way you get comfortable driving is driving. Now put it back in drive, and let’s go.”
I expect arguments, but she must be feeling slightly more confident because she closes her door, slowly slides the gear shift into drive and gives it too much gas, sending us jerking forward.
I hold back criticism. We make it to the first stop sign, where she stops and looks both ways four times before slowly rolling forward, even though there’s no one there.
“Were you waiting for the ghost cars to pass?”
“Shut up, Wilde.”
I smirk. Better. She’s got the fight back in her again.
By the time we make it home, she’s got quite a bit more starch in her backbone, and the attitude is fully in place.
She parks in the center of the driveway, which will make it impossible for my dad to get his truck in, but I don’t make her move it. I let her get out and escape to the house before I repark and saunter into the house.
Except we’re not alone. The entire firing squad is here.
My dad, the pack alpha, and several members of the council stand in the living room, arms folded across their chests.
Chapter Five
Rayne
I go to my bedroom to give them privacy although I’ll be able to hear everything through the walls. I may not be a shifter, but my hearing is still better than a human’s.
“Have a seat, Wilde,” Alpha Green instructs.
I hear the scrape of chairs from the dining table and imagine the council members forming a semicircle around Wilde, interview style.
Or maybe I should say interrogation style.
I don’t know why my own stomach is tied up in knots over Wilde’s situation. I have nothing invested in his situation. I don’t even know what exactly happened. I don’t know what he did or didn’t do, other than land in jail on drug trafficking charges. I don’t know whether he has an excuse or reason for it.