“I’m more than capable of carrying on a conversation. I’m probably smarter than you.”
“I doubt that.”
“Oh, please.”
“How smart is sitting on your ass, feeling sorry for yourself?”
She straightened and glared at him. “I was in an explosion,” she said, speaking slowly, as if to make sure he would understand. “I could have been killed.”
“But you weren’t.”
“I was seriously injured and I lost most of my eyesight.”
“Which you could get back tomorrow if you weren’t such a girl about the surgery.”
He glanced in the rearview mirror in time to see her narrow her gaze.
“A girl?” she asked softly.
“Yeah. You know. Chicken. Lacking in bravery.”
“That’s it!” she yelled. “Let me out, right here. Let me out or I swear, I’ll kill you myself. I’ll rip you apart with my bare hands and feed your body to the snakes.”
“Snakes wouldn’t eat human flesh.”
“Shut up!”
“Skye didn’t say anything about you being hysterical.”
“Let me out!”
“No.”
She grabbed the mesh screening and rattled it, but it had withstood a lot more than a scrawny woman without much muscle on her.
“She did warn me you would be difficult,” he said. “I charge extra for that.”
Izzy sank back in the seat and resumed staring out the back window.
“If you won’t have the surgery, then you have to survive with what you have,” he told her. “That’s where I come in. I teach you how to make it. You’re staying with me until you can be on your own.”
“What if I don’t want to be on my own?”
“You think your sisters want you hanging around all the time? They have lives. You’re what? Twenty-five? Twenty-six? You ready to give up so fast?”
“Go to hell.”
“I’ve already been there.”
He turned onto the familiar paved, private road and drove toward the two-story main house. He’d bought the run-down ranch nearly eight years before. Neighboring ranchers leased his pasture for their cattle, while he used the twenty acres of wilderness for his retreats. He kept a dozen horses in the big barn and had built several guest-houses where clients stayed. There were meeting facilities, a restaurant-grade kitchen that could serve up to fifty at a time and a big media room that rivaled a multiplex.
Not that Izzy would deal with much more than the barn. He planned to work her hard enough that she didn’t have time to feel sorry for herself. The little he knew about her told him she would fight him every step of the way, but he didn’t care about that. He would win, as she put it, in the end because he had to.
He parked in front of the house and turned off the engine.
“We’re here,” he said in the silence.
Izzy folded her arms across her chest and stared out the window.
“When I let you out, you can run if you want. We’re about a mile from our closest neighbor and ten miles from the nearest town. But if you want to go looking, I won’t stop you. The temperature is close to a hundred. Without water, you’ll last maybe three days. Assuming you don’t get bit by a rattler and die sooner.”
“Oooh,” Izzy said, still not looking at him. “I’m all tingly with fear. Want to threaten me with whips and chains next?”
“I don’t usually work with adults, but I’ve made an exception for you. Don’t think this is going to be easy. You’ll work for your room and board. No work, no food.”
She snapped her head around until she was facing him. “My sisters are paying you. You can’t starve me.”
He grinned. “I can do anything I want. I’m not the one who’s blind.”
“Fuck you.”
“You’re not my type.”
If there hadn’t been mesh between them, Izzy would have scrambled over the seat and gone after Nick with everything she had. He was so smug and mean and dismissive. Didn’t he know what she’d been through? She’d lost most of her sight. It was easy to be oh, so confident when you hadn’t suffered. She would bet Nick didn’t know anything about being afraid.
She hated him and right now she hated her sisters. It was hard to say who she resented more. Anger burned within her, making her want to lash out. The problem was there wasn’t anyone she could fight. At least not yet.
Nick climbed out of the SUV and walked around to her side. The door opened. She felt the blast of afternoon heat on her skin.
She wanted to be back at Lexi’s house, in the cool room with the window seat. Over the past month, the four walls had been a refuge. But her sisters had sent her away. She was on her own.
She slid out of the seat and followed Nick into a large house. The second they walked inside, the light dimmed and so did her ability to see. The world darkened until it was little more than blurry shapes.
“This is the main house,” he said. “You’ll be sleeping upstairs. First door on the left. There’s an attached bathroom. You’ll find your luggage there. You can unpack later. This is the living room. We don’t use it much. Through here is the kitchen.”
She knew from his voice he’d moved away, but had trouble seeing. She managed to follow him, only to bump into a table and then trip on a single step he hadn’t bothered to mention. She tried to catch herself, but there was too much momentum. The ground raced toward her.
A familiar strong arm grabbed her around the waist and jerked her to her feet.
“Maybe you should use a cane,” he said.
“Maybe you should warn me about stairs.”
“You’ll figure it out.”
“That’s it?” she demanded. “Let’s pause for a moment, because your incredible concern is making me all teary-eyed. I fell.”
“I know. So what? You’re going to fall. Then you’re going to get up and move on. Or are you the type to just lie there, feeling sorry for yourself? Never mind. I already know the answer.”
She wanted to tell him she wasn’t like that. She was the one who climbed mountains and jumped out of airplanes and swam with sharks. She didn’t believe in self-pity or giving up. At least she hadn’t until the explosion.
“You don’t understand,” she told him.
