What Fire Dragons Treasure - Cristina Rayne Page 0,2

fifteen minutes, they pulled up in front of a brick home that was completely dark. Amber’s eyes did a quick sweep out of all the windows in search of people as she unfastened her seatbelt, but thankfully, she detected no movement among the homes on either side of the street.

“Hopefully, your day’s better from here on out,” her driver said sympathetically as Amber opened the door as quietly as she could.

“Thanks, and have a good night, too,” Amber replied quietly.

Matty still didn’t utter so much as a peep as she awkwardly slid out of the car. She slowly headed towards the empty house’s front walk, relieved beyond measure when her rideshare drove off instead of politely waiting for them to make it into the house.

Once the car was out of sight, Amber turned and headed for the driveway that stretched a bit beyond the back of the house where a black, older model Honda sedan sat waiting for them as planned. A feeling as though she had just found the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow when she hadn’t really believed it would ever happen washed through her, nearly making her dizzy with euphoria.

It was finally going to happen! She and Matty were finally getting out from under that bastard’s thumb!

Amber had Matty strapped into the car seat in the back in record time, his T-rex plushie tucked securely into his side. The giddiness of escape didn’t leave her until they had made it out of Houston. With only the blackness of the highway ahead and her own racing thoughts as her companions, her earlier anxiety began to creep back in.

She had made it out of the city unmolested, yes, but they were still hours away from what she desperately hoped would be their final destination—North Point, Texas.

A folded sheet of paper tucked between the passenger seat and the center console abruptly caught her eye. Amber reached for it without taking her eyes from the road. Unfolding it one-handed, Keri’s messy handwriting immediately jumped out. Her friend’s message was short, and heartbreakingly to the point:

The burner phone you asked me to get you is in the glove compartment. Good luck and stay safe! Give Matty lots of hugs and kisses from me, and I hope to God to see you both again someday, happy and whole.

Amber’s eyes tightened and her heart clenched painfully, but the sudden memory that flashed through her mind’s eye of blood dripping from Matty’s mouth had her gritting her teeth in determination and anger instead of giving in to the tears that had been threatening all day.

Never again.

CHAPTER TWO

It wasn’t her imagination.

Amber had seen that silver sedan behind her back in San Antonio and again in Temple. Both times, it had been at least four cars behind her and too far away to get a good look at its driver and passengers in her rearview mirror.

Her pulse sped up. It might just be paranoia. She desperately hoped that’s all it was, but “better safe than sorry” had become her mantra ever since she had bundled Matty up in his jacket and set out into the dead of night.

Maybe I should’ve gone north to Lufkin or College Station after all… she fretted.

But no—the whole point of taking I-10 to San Antonio was to leave a false clue in the small chance that someone would remember her, make it seem as though she were heading for Laredo to cross into Mexico. She had made a point to take both their passports as well as Garrett’s, a feat that had only been possible because of the asshole’s insufferable arrogance in thinking that he had her completely cowed after that terrible night a couple of months ago.

He had left all three passports in the same unlocked desk drawer in his home office where they had sat since their foray into Mexico last summer, no doubt to taunt her. Hell, he hadn’t even bothered to lock his office door even though he always had at the beginning of their marriage. That very fact, that lack of trust, should have been a red flag, but Amber was the first to admit that she had been a naïve idiot from the moment she had met him during her freshman year of college to the first days of their marriage.

Her attention moved from the silver sedan in her rearview mirror to Matty. He was currently happily paging through one of his favorite picture books—a physical book—and munching on an animal cracker.