Love Inspired Suspense April 2021--Box Set 2 of 2 Laura Scott (speed reading book .txt) 📖

the way he shielded her from Chance’s ugly words like he was a solid wall that had to be pierced before an attempt could be made on her, and it was in the strength he showed as a team leader, displaying wisdom to protect her and his people.

It wasn’t that his smile was amazing but the way it reassured her that things would turn out for the good. These crazy feelings weren’t born from his gorgeous blue eyes, but from the way they held tenderness and fierceness at once and his hopeful attitude and his thirst for justice. In a horrible situation where she ought to be cowering, he could make her laugh. And yes, she yearned for his touch, not because of the physical pull it brought but the ember of hope that maybe love was worth the worry and the risk.

She was taking it one day at a time. It might be worth the roller coaster of emotions.

“Georgia,” Colt called.

She blinked out of the thoughts that had her easing from her fortress of solitude and opening up to the idea of falling in love—not with just anyone but with Colt.

“It’s time to go. As much as I’d love to stay.” Pain colored his voice, and she wondered if he meant this moment or when the case closed and he had to leave for Atlanta. Which brought on another heap of anxiety. If she opened up to the possibility of a relationship with him—if he even wanted one—then that would mean uprooting everything she loved and that was familiar to her, and giving up the editor in chief position, which she’d wanted for years, all to go somewhere unknown, unfamiliar and fast-paced.

She wanted to prolong their time. Their reality was threats and mayhem. “How about we walk back instead of taking the hayride?”

He paused and searched her eyes. “Yeah. Let’s walk. I’m over bumpy rides.”

Nothing was truer. Life had been a bumpy ride for them both. No way to control the dips, divots and ditches. Colt tried to control it by fighting the past with cold cases. She tried to control it by isolation. Did he feel the vacuum sucking up all the joy and surprises in life as much as she did?

Colt took her heavy basket of apples, and they strolled in silence to the barn entrance, where employees weighed their apples and Colt purchased them. Colt scoured the lot and kept Georgia close to him. “Ready?”

For reality? No. “I would like to visit my fur babies later, if it’s okay. To at least let them know I haven’t abandoned them.”

A flash of sorrow passed over Colt’s face. Abandonment. His mother must have popped into his mind with that word. But Georgia was certain their last conversation before they broke up would echo in his ears. It was one of the last words he’d hurled at Georgia when she ended their relationship.

You’re going to leave me? Abandon me? Did you ever love me at all?

And Georgia had lied.

I don’t know.

It killed her even now to think about it, but she hadn’t had the fight in her to keep him at bay, so she’d had to hurt him to heal and help him. At least at the time, that’s what she’d thought she was doing—helping and healing.

Now, she regretted what her teenage self had done. Lying never was the right thing in any circumstance. Truth was bound to surface. Should. She quoted her mama often about truth.

He opened the truck door for her then rolled onto the main highway and cracked the windows. “We forgot to buy a gallon of cider.”

The cider could wait. The truth couldn’t. “I—” The sound of a pop, then another cut her off, and Colt frowned.

“Hold on. I think a tire blew.” He veered off the empty highway onto the shoulder. Nothing but woods on either side. Georgia’s stomach roiled.

“Colt.” She grabbed his arm, panic pushing pause on her confession.

He laid his hand over hers. “It’ll be okay. I need to look.” He squeezed her hand. “But slump in your seat a little, just in case.” Colt jumped out of the truck and rounded to the passenger side to inspect. Suddenly, he whipped his attention to Georgia. “Get—”

Pop!

A bullet slammed into her door. She shrieked and dived onto the driver’s-side floorboard, her chest tightening and her heart racing.

Pop!

Pop!

Pop!

“Colt!” she screamed, unable to see, and all she heard were the sounds of gunfire and metal crunching. Was Colt safe? Had he been injured? What if...what if the shooter killed him?

Her stomach spasmed and sweat broke out over her flushed skin. All she could do was pray.

“Stay down, Georgia!”

Thankfully, his voice reached her ears, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t hurt. What if he was hurt and the adrenaline was keeping him going? When it crashed he could bottom out, bleed out and die.

Her roiling stomach threatened to retch.

Another sound of gunfire.

Colt cried out, and spots formed in Georgia’s vision.

The door opened, and pain washed over Colt’s face. “We gotta move. Now.”

Georgia’s head buzzed and dizziness overtook her. Then she blinked and saw his shoulder was covered in crimson. “You’ve...you’ve been shot!”

“Georgia,” he said calmly, “focus on my eyes. Breathe. I’m going to be okay.”

But how could he know this? He wasn’t a doctor!

Colt wrapped his good arm around her and tugged her from the vehicle. “We can’t barrel out of this. He’s in the trees. Our only chance is to use the truck as cover and roll down the ditch and into the woods on the other side of the road.”

“What if he follows?”

“It’s a good possibility, but we’ll have a big head start.”

Another bullet rammed into the windshield. Georgia’s brain wouldn’t signal her to move, but she had to in order to stay alive and get Colt some help. She forced herself to speak. “Okay.”

“Stay down but run hard. Now!” Colt yanked on her hand, and they darted across the road. A bullet hit the pavement by her foot and broke up the concrete.

Colt