Lowcountry Bribe by C. Hope Clark

Author:C. Hope Clark
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: BelleBooks Inc.
Published: 2018-07-07T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 18

I DROVE TOO FAST from the office, down the interstate with an anger difficult to control. Alan having an affair didn’t upset me as much as I thought it should. Wayne waiting to tell me, however, ticked me off.

Jean forever fought to claw back her years. Dye left her hair brittle as pine straw. And she packed her ass into a skirt like a butcher stuffed pork in a sausage skin. Whatever possessed her to join at the groin to a man like Alan? A man who despised any woman with the guts to escape the kitchen sink and pursue her dreams?

Wayne remained a dark horse, very dark, and I cursed myself for a lapse of sense in my attraction to him. Maybe he did prefer the vulnerable ones, drawing them into his bed. Thank goodness I hadn’t gone that far. Damn Alan. Damn Wayne. Damn the whole Department of Agriculture and its pillar of testosterone. To hell with all of them.

I cut in and out of cars. Taillights flashed ahead of me. I braked hard as the traffic stopped, striking the steering wheel with the palms of my hands.

As I took the freeway exit hard and gunned it through a yellow light, the grocery store caught my eye. A bottle of wine seemed in tall order. No, too civil. I needed beer. A six-pack. I turned late and clipped the curb.

The teenage cashier smirked through thick sparkly lip gloss as she ran my grocery items over the scanner. Beer, two sticker books and a large bag of spicy hot potato chips must’ve screamed lonely single mother. To hell with her, too. I swept up my bags and headed for the car.

I left the store and turned right, winding behind a subdivision instead of sitting in line to get back on the interstate. With five miles left to home, I chose the back way, two-lane roads that kept me away from the rush-hour madhouse and bumper-to-bumper mayhem at the exit ramps. The kids and I often came this way, past the pastures, away from billboards and eighteen-wheelers.

I didn’t expect company, but a brown rusted Ford gained fast on me. I would let it pass. Maybe he harbored a piss-awful day as well.

The car began to come around, and then swerved violently into me. Metal crunched metal. I accelerated and grappled to keep the car on the road. The Ford struck again and shoved my vehicle onto the edge. My right front bumper toppled a row of three mailboxes, throwing one up high enough to send spider vein cracks across my windshield. Grunting, I piloted the Taurus back onto the asphalt, raking the passenger door with another mailbox. I glanced to get a look at the madman, but he’d dropped back.

As my hands strangled the steering wheel, my mind raced through options. If I stopped, the asshole would corner me. If I headed home, he’d nail not only me but my family. So I drove as determined and fast as I could, in hopes he’d head off like he’d done on the interstate the week before.

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