Stars Over Alaska (Wild River #4) - Jennifer Snow Page 0,93

him. He claimed to hate LA and said the job was a stepping stone to a career with the NYPD. That mutual sense of not really belonging in California and not identifying with most people living there had been one of the things that had bonded them. Either he’d really presented himself as someone he wasn’t or he had a reason for targeting Selena.

He glanced in the rearview, but this time his gaze was locked on Selena as he spoke. “I was fifteen when she starred in Surviving Junior High.”

The after-school special that taught morals in a fun, often lighthearted and touching way. Leslie vaguely remembered watching it as a teen. Selena had said she’d been ten acting like a tween in the popular show. She’d seen her sign posters for her fans with catchphrases from her character.

“In the show her parents were going through a divorce—so were mine,” Eoghan said. “I felt like she understood what I was going through. Her struggles were my struggles, even though she was only twelve in the show.”

Leslie nodded. “I can understand that.” He was a teen and going through a hard time. Easier to sympathize with that than the stalker he was turning out to be, but plenty of children lived through divorces and deaths and tragedies; it didn’t turn them into dangerous people.

“For three years I watched her on that show. Our connection grew stronger and stronger...”

Connection? He really was twisted up in this tortured, warped kind of way. Confusing fiction with reality...as a means to escape?

She glanced at Selena, but the woman just looked even more terrified as Eoghan continued to explain the origins of his obsession.

“Then out of nowhere, the show was canceled.” The irritation in his voice warned Leslie to tread carefully. He was driving really fast on snow-covered, slippery, winding roads.

“She abandoned me,” he said, his glare icy as he stared at Selena.

An oncoming transport truck wailed on the horn as the vehicle started to swerve into the other lane.

“She abandoned me,” he repeated, hitting the steering wheel and pressing down on the gas a little harder.

Jesus, they may not even survive wherever they were going.

Could she talk him down? Help him realize that his anger was misdirected? “It wasn’t her choice,” she said softly. “Shows get canceled all the time...”

“She wasn’t there anymore,” Eoghan said and the car sped up. He struggled to keep it from sliding off the road and Leslie saw Selena shut her eyes tight.

“I’d turn on the television and she was gone,” Eoghan said, to no one in particular now, as though talking to himself. “She left me all alone. I had no one. My father left and my mother was useless. Kids were assholes.” He hit the wheel with his fist over and over and then drove even faster, coming up close to the bumper of the truck in front of them. “I had no one and she didn’t give a damn. I wrote letter after letter and she never responded.” He looked in the rearview at Selena. “You never responded! Why didn’t you respond, April?” Calling her by her character’s name, he wasn’t seeing Selena Hudson. He was seeing the young girl he’d watched on his television, the one he’d felt understood him, was there for him. “You left me all alone,” he said.

Tears slid down Selena’s cheeks and Leslie knew the star could sense the immediate danger they were in. Engaging Eoghan in this conversation had been a mistake. He was losing his temper and with it, his ability to navigate the treacherous roads.

She had to do something. She tugged on her hands, desperate to loosen the ropes enough to break free. She scanned the back of her vehicle for something—anything—to use as a tool or a weapon, but Eoghan had wiped the back seat clean.

Selena glanced at her and her expression changed. Gone was the terror and the tears had stopped. Now there was only a look of sheer determination.

Shit. What was she going to do?

“Selena...” she whispered, a note of caution in her voice. One wrong move and this guy could snap—or worse, they could go off the road. Plunging to their death off the side of the highway wasn’t the way Leslie wanted to die.

Selena motioned toward Leslie’s head and Leslie inched slowly and quietly as close to her as possible. She saw her raise her hands and quickly slide a bobby pin from Leslie’s messy bun.

Eoghan glanced at them over his shoulder and neither of