It Wasn't Me - Lani Lynn Vale Page 0,63

on said road, there was likely no one that would be passing by any time soon.

However, I knew that Jonah was on his way home to change.

After he’d left our house earlier that morning, apparently his day had gone from bad to worse. And then had gone even further from worse to awful as he worked wreck after wreck.

I was told to go ahead and get the dogs without him, which was what I was on my way to do.

Which led to now, me on the side of the road, in a ditch, tipped over.

He was going to freak.

I just knew it.

Knowing I just needed to get it over with, I bit the bullet and reached for my phone that was still miraculously in the holder where I’d put it.

Though, granted, it hadn’t been a hard roll. More of a tip, really.

But it was still enough that I couldn’t get out.

Shit, shit, shit.

Pressing the phone button, I dialed the first name on the list.

“Jonah?” I said the moment he said ‘hello.’

“Hey, baby. What’s wrong?” he asked.

I licked my lips.

“Well…” I hedged a bit. “I kind of sort of found myself in the ditch again, and I can’t get out.”

That wasn’t a complete lie.

And he wouldn’t be hurrying over here like a bat out of hell if he only knew part of the story.

“I’m about ten minutes away,” he said, sounding amused. “What happened?”

“Somebody was a little too far over, coming in my direction, when I came around a bend,” I admitted. “I thought it was better to go with the ditch rather than hitting him.”

“Did he stop to see if you were okay?” he asked, sounding miffed.

“No,” I mumbled, my eyes going out the windshield that wasn’t even cracked. “They drove off.”

And they had, the dicks.

There was no way in hell that they hadn’t seen what happened.

“Assholes,” Jonah muttered. “I had two hit and runs today.”

There had almost been three…

“All right. Well, I’ll see you when I get there, then we can go together to go get the dogs. Will you call them and tell them you might be a few minutes late?” he suggested.

I nodded.

“Yeah, I can do that,” I said softly.

And I could.

I was only hanging sideways while I would be doing it.

“All right. I’ll see you in a few minutes. Love you.”

Then he was gone, leaving me feeling a fluttering sensation in my chest.

My next call was to my mom.

“Hello?”

She sounded frustrated and short, and I bit my lip.

“Umm, is this a bad time?” I asked carefully.

“No,” she said. “I’m just frustrated with your father because he refuses to use his crutches. What’s up, baby?”

I brought my hand to my hair and scratched my scalp. “Do you think you could do me a favor and pick my dogs up and bring them to me? I’ll pay you back. I just…find myself in a bit of a pickle.”

“Of course,” she answered immediately. “Do you want me to just keep them at our place and then you can come get dinner or bring them all the way to you? I’m fine with either, but if I bring them to you, I’ll have to have someone else come get your father. Which…now that I think about it, I might be okay with.”

I snickered. “I’m okay with either, Mom. Whatever is easiest for you.”

I heard something said in the background, then my mother sighed.

“Your father wants to come with me. He wants to see Jonah’s place anyway,” she murmured. “We’ll be there in about thirty minutes.”

After saying our goodbyes, I once again tried to get myself free of the seatbelt only to find that I still couldn’t. The way all my weight was hanging on the buckle made it almost impossible to slip my hand into the crack. And when I pressed down on the button as best as I could, I still couldn’t quite push it in far enough to release the latch.

Which left me hanging there.

I wasn’t there for long, and Jonah definitely hadn’t been the ten minutes that he said he was going to be, because not even a minute later I heard the pipes of his bike turning off the main road and onto our road.

Ten seconds after that, I heard the pipes go from sedate to almost insane, and knew he’d spotted the Jeep.

Jonah’s worried face appeared in my front windshield about fifteen seconds later.

He was dressed in his uniform, and I licked my lips, completely turned on by it despite the situation I found myself