With shaking fingers, she dialed Travis number. The phone had slipped from her fingers more than once. He answered on the first ring, and her voice hitched on raw emotion. There was a burning in her throat and a gigantic hole in heart that could only be filled by him.
“Travis,” she said his name in sadness.
“Emma. What’s wrong?”
She could always count on Travis understanding her, whereas her dad didn’t bother to listen. Travis had a way of knowing what she needed, and the sound of his voice was like her personal salvation. “My dad and I had a fight. I need to see you. I can’t be there tonight.”
In the back of her mind she knew that Travis’s was the first place her parents would look, but she didn’t care.
He could hear her struggling with her emotions. The sound of her voice so dejected was like an open knife wound on the heart. “Of course. Do you want me come get you?”
They both knew he could be there in seconds. “No, I’m already on my way.” She could tell he wanted to keep her talking on the phone, but she needed a few minutes to collect herself. This was new territory for her, disobeying her parents. “Thanks. I’ll see you in a few?”
Against his better judgment he hung up the phone with those three letter words on the tip of his tongue. He couldn’t say why but he had the overwhelming urge to lay out his heart. The timing just didn’t seem right, not with her crying tears of sorrow and hurt. What she needed now was comfort.
Later.
There would be time later to tell her how much he cared.
It was darker than usually as she coasted her car down the country road. The well of tears blurred her vision. She swiped away each eye with the palm of her hand, sniffling away the hurt. The darkness around her was like a cloak. So when a car stalled horizontally across the road came upon her in a blink, Emma slammed her breaks like a mad women to avoid a collision.
Their piercing screech vibrated her eardrums, and her frightened heart dropped to the floor. Before she had the chance to register what was going on her driver side door was ripped open. A man’s hand wrapped around her mouth, suffocating her screams for help. He was unrecognizable, disguised in a mask, and tore her from the car.
She didn’t have the strength to fight off her attacker. He was just too brawny and burly. A voice from behind her cleared his throat over the roaring blood pounding in her head. He called out her name, and she panicked. There was more than one of them, and they knew who she was. Gazillion horrific images tumbled through her mind.
Trying to focus on the man walking toward her, she struggled to get loose. Arms of iron wrapped around her body, securing her tight. The pain brought tears to her eyes.
“Emma! Stop!” the voice coming at her commanded. And like an obedient child she stilled her efforts.
That voice. That voice was unmistakable.
“Dad?”
Then Emma’s world went black.
Chapter 19
He was pacing like a caged animal, wearing a neat little path in the rug. Lexi’s eyes were going bonkers watching him.
“Travis!” she hollered. “Sit down before you make me go cross-eyed. Permanently.”
He glowered at his sister.
“Look I know you are worried, but I am sure she will call as soon as she is able. There is not point tearing the floor off this place in the meantime,” Lexi scolded, thinking maybe he needed a stern hand.
He didn’t agree. Every bone in his body was screaming that something was wrong.
Dreadfully wrong.
He heard it in her voice when she had called. Tears stung her words, and she was clearly upset. Maybe she had gotten in a car crash on the way here. She had been in a hurry when they last spoke an hour ago, but it didn’t take an hour to get to his house. Not even close.
He was done waiting. He had waited long enough.
Whipping the front door open, a blast of cold air hit him. There was an ominous vibe in the raven night. He didn’t like it. Not one freaking bit. Right now he was berating himself hardcore.
He should have gone to her immediately, insisted he’d pick her up. Then maybe he wouldn’t be going bat-shit crazy with worry. Not bothering with a car, he took off on foot into the massive woods that separated his house with Emma’s. When he came out in her backyard, lights illuminated from the house.
Travis prayed that every fear, every heart-pumping anxiety, and every trickle of unease was for nothing. That she was inside that house safe and sound and with an exceptional explanation for shaving ten years off his life.
The decision was made before he could talk to himself out of what was sure to be a disaster of epic magnitudes. Though, for Emma’s safety and his peace of mind he would walk the ends of the earth, through the fiery pits of hell, and climb the mountain of doom.
Walking up to the Deen’s front door, he knocked just enough to be heard but not wake the whole house. It wasn’t his intention to disturb anyone, just to verify that Emma was alive and okay. A part of him expected to see Emma’s serene face behind the door. Unfortunately he took a gamble that didn’t pay off.