Saving Kylie - Taryn Quinn Page 0,1
noise from the snowmobile, he had no clue. A weird sort of sixth sense, maybe, born from years of expecting a phone call about his mother.
He stopped and shut off the engine before digging out his cell, managing to grab the call before it went to voice mail. As usual, he forgot to look at the readout first. “Yeah?” he barked.
Unless it involved blood or death, now was not the time for someone to be bothering him.
“Justin.”
The soft plea, barely audible over the wind, hit him deep in the gut and made him wrap his fingers around the handlebars.
Kylie.
Her image sprung into his mind so fast his breath caught. Sunny, shoulder-length hair, wide, expressive eyes the clearest blue he’d ever seen. She grinned while she mopped the bar, sang while she polished glasses. Invariably she dripped beer on her tight beige Rough and Ready tank top, and every so often, the liquid would soak onto the nipples that always seemed as hard as stones under his gaze.
They’d been friends in college and lovers for one brief, unforgettable night. At least to him. Then they’d fallen out of contact, until the day more than six months ago he’d walked into Rough and Ready and found her smiling at him across the bar. He’d come back almost every day since.
“Justin?” Anguish was plain in her tone. “I need you.”
His pulse skipped. How many times had he dreamed of hearing her saying those words?
She’d said them once, on the night they’d slept together. He’d hoped that night would lead to something more.
Wrong answer.
By graduation they’d barely been acquaintances and she’d been dating some burly guy who drove a classic car and wore leather like most guys sported denim.
“What’s wrong?” She didn’t answer, so he asked again. “Kylie? What is it?”
“I’m near your house. I went riding and”—wind swallowed her words—“and then I crashed. Stupid. Shoulda went when I wasn’t mad. So…dumb.”
Her broken speech caused the twisting in his gut to intensify. “Where are you?”
Oh yeah, brilliant question. If she went snowmobiling near his house, the trails were surrounded by lots of landmarks. Like trees. Leafless branches that looked like dancing skeletons when caught in the breeze.
But if there wasn’t something to identify her location, how else would he find her? He needed something to go on.
She didn’t answer.
“Kylie? Sweetheart, can you hear me?”
“Not far from your house. I could see the lights. Pretended…I could see the lights.”
The line went dead.
Cursing under his breath, he kicked the snowmobile back into motion. He didn’t have time to waste. She couldn’t be too far if she’d seen the lights of his cabin, though how she knew which was his, he didn’t know. She’d never been to his house. Never called him before right now, though he’d given her the number. She’d also never given him her number, which he understood.
Hated but understood.
“Fuck.” He tightened his fingers around the handlebars as he ducked his head to avoid a snowy branch that aimed for his eyes. So much for paying attention.
If anything could make him forget what the hell he was doing, it was Kylie Fisher.
God, she was fucking gorgeous. And funny. And she knew what the hell she was talking about when she called out the plays during the games he’d become addicted to watching with her.
He’d become addicted to her, period. He didn’t know why she’d be in such a hurry to get to him that she’d risk her safety, but he’d be damned if he didn’t ride to her rescue anyway.
She wasn’t easy to read, on any level. Sure, she smiled and flirted and laughed as freely as anyone he’d ever met, but something dark lurked in her eyes that hadn’t been there in college. He didn’t know what her deal was or why her habit of standing on the sides of her battered tennis shoes while she watched the basketball games on the TV behind the bar was so damned irresistible.
One thing he did know, however, was that she was taken, with a live-in boyfriend and commitment ring on her fourth finger.
Which meant paws off.
He’d find her. Somehow. Even if he had to comb these damn trails all night.
He pushed down on the gas, pausing as he glimpsed a bright pink glove up ahead poking out of the snow like a talisman.
Or a warning.
The only place he’d seen quite that shade of pink before was Kylie’s gloves and matching coat, though in the dark the color didn’t match his memory. But still.
Shit, what if