The Bite (Book 1)

CHAPTER ONE

By the time I got to the border, I knew I wouldn't make it much farther. I could feel how bloodshot my eyes were with every blink. The border services agent took one look at my passport and asked me to take off my hood. His expression went from suspicious to alarmed in half a second flat.

"Ma'am, can I ask if you're all right?" he said, handing back my passport.

"I'm fine. Thank you."

"Not in any kind of trouble, are you?"

"No, sir. Not at all." I smiled, and felt the cut on my lip crack open a little. "Is there a rest stop near here?"

"Yes, ma'am. One about a mile up from here, and another one about thirty minutes past that."

"Thank you."

He nodded. "You be safe out there, ma'am."

I pulled away from the booth, wondering if I should've kept Nate's passport with me. The Pacific was deep, but it wasn't that deep.

The water in the bathroom at the rest stop thirty minutes into Canada was warm, at least.

I scrubbed and scrubbed until my skin was raw, the baking-soda paste I'd mixed with lemon juice washing away the fake orange tan that stained my skin, causing the water to turn a resentful yellow.

My hair was another story. It'd sucked up the dark dye like water in the desert. I thought I could make it better by giving it a quick cut. I wanted a change. Instead, I got a chop job that looked like a fifth grader had done it. At least the color looked good.

My reflection almost scared me. I hadn't seen the woman looking back at me in years. A complete stranger. A doe scared of every headlight that pulled into the rest stop parking lot. Dark, wet hair. Blue-gray eyes full of fearful resolution. Yoga and the cute little Zumba classes at the country club had kept her thin, but not strong.

I could be strong, though. I had to be.

I slept in my backseat that night and dreamed I was in a motel instead. Through the watery, bruised void that was my dream, Nate kicked in the door and dragged me out by my freshly dyed hair.

• • •

It took two days to drive the coast of Canada. Two days of gas station junk food bought with Canadian cash that a nice man in a town called Quesnel had traded me for a couple of American hundred-dollar bills. I had no idea if he'd ripped me off, but I didn't care about the exchange rate, because I was here. In Alaska.

And I was fucking starving.

I'd had too much time to think on the drive up here. My mind had marinated in the things that had transpired to lead me here, and it was all my fault. God, I'd screwed up. I should've never talked to him. Should've never gotten in that deep. Should've never given up my life for him.

Should've never taken that long to get out.

I felt tears on my face again. My body wasn't going to forget that last beating for a long time. And I didn't want it to. The pain reminded me of that last horrific night. He'd chased me into the guest bathroom of our condo, and our maid, Yulanda, had found me on the floor hours later. I needed to remember what she'd said, the way she'd rushed me out of the house, so I could keep my foot on the gas.

I don't want to find your body.

"I know," I whispered to myself now, letting her words roll around in my head.

I mashed the gas pedal down to the floorboard.

Yulanda was how I escaped. Yulanda had known this day would come. Wise beyond her years, she cleaned me up that day and yanked me to her cousin's used car lot where we traded in my shiny silver Mercedes for the 4Runner. She helped me pack my bags in a hurry, then placed a key in my hand before I ran out the door. The key was to a cabin her brother owned out in the middle of the mountains. She said he only went up there during the summer, liked to go fishing for salmon. Luckily for me, it was the off-season. Fall had started, which meant I could be alone in the woods, where I could have a proper fucking meltdown and let my bruises heal before figuring out what I was going to do with myself.