The Lasaran (Aldebarian Alliance #1) - Dianne Duvall Page 0,66
him.
“I was hoping you wouldn’t notice.”
Her brown eyes met his. “I notice everything about you, Taelon.”
The way she said it… the emotion behind those simple words… sent warmth spiraling through his chest. He reached across the table and offered his hand, palm up. When she placed her own in it, he gave it a squeeze. “I’ll be all right.”
Her throat moved in a swallow. Then she nodded.
A vehicle pulled up beside them and stopped.
Taelon stiffened.
The passenger window rolled down and a young man with glasses leaned over with a smile. “Hi. Are you the couple that called for a Forward Mover?”
Lisa smiled. “Yes. Are you Chad?”
“Yes ma’am. Nice to meet you. Would you like me to help you with those?”
She shook her head. “We’ve got it, thanks.”
Rising, Taelon gathered their bags together.
Lisa ended up not feeling bad at all for screwing over the car dealer. They found an older-model car free of GPS tracking that seemed to be in good condition. She had learned very quickly how to recognize, diagnose, and even repair some problems on cars once her family’s money had all gone to her mother’s healthcare. And the little economy car she test-drove seemed solid.
The dealer, on the other hand, was a total ass, a stereotypical good ol’ boy who hadn’t even wanted her to test-drive it. He’d wanted Taelon, the man, to do the test-driving because they both knew women were terrible drivers. Nudge. Nudge. Wink. Wink. Know what I mean?
Taelon had not been amused.
The dealer had also haggled over price with Taelon and acted like Lisa was just an empty-headed bauble. When she asked pertinent questions, he either ignored them or in a roundabout way told her not to worry her pretty little head about it, so Taelon had to repeat each question in order to get an actual answer. The only part of Lisa the damn man didn’t seem to view with disdain was her pregnancy-enhanced breasts. And Taelon had growled—actually growled—when the man kept ogling them.
She glanced over at Taelon now and smiled.
Sensing her gaze, he turned his head away from the darkness whipping past outside the window and looked at her. His lips tilted up. “What?”
Her smile widened. “Nothing. I just like being with you.”
His white teeth flashed in a smile. “I like being with you, too.”
Her heart tripped over itself in her chest.
The baby kicked.
She dropped one hand to her belly and kept the other on the steering wheel. A green sign whipped past. “Looks like we’re coming up on Lafayette, Louisiana. We should stop and get some rest.” Her stomach growled.
He chuckled. “And something to eat?”
She laughed. “Yeah.” They had stopped briefly a few hours ago to stretch their legs, use the restroom, and make peanut butter sandwiches. But she was ready for a little more sustenance, and the long drive was starting to make her groggy. Or maybe it was the adrenaline rushes she’d experienced earlier in the day.
It didn’t matter. Either way, she was tired.
“Do you think it’s safe? I could drive while you eat and rest.”
She shook her head. “We should be good. I haven’t used the credit card since we were in Austin, only cash, so they can’t trace us that way. And if they accessed Walmart’s surveillance-camera feeds and tracked down the Forward Mover who picked us up, the car dealer he took us to couldn’t tell them where we went after we bought the car. You even made him see a different number on the temporary license plate he gave us. So I doubt they would be able to track us here. They know we were in Texas all week and probably think we’re still in Austin.”
“And if they don’t?”
“If they don’t…” She shrugged. “There are only so many traffic cameras… and I don’t even know that they could gain access to them. But if they did, I’m sure they lost us once we hit Houston. It’s a huge city with a lot of traffic, and this car is silver and blends in pretty well. As soon as we reached the outskirts, I left Highway 290 and took a roundabout route to I-10 that took us through a lot of residential neighborhoods and away from traffic cams. We should be in the clear.”
And whether he admitted it or not, he needed rest, too.
At last he nodded. “Okay. I trust your judgment.”
After dealing with the asshole car dealer, that meant even more to her.
Lisa found a small, cheap motel that had few patrons. Fewer patrons meant