Kill Me Again by MAGGIE SHAYNE Page A

solution.
    Before they’d traveled ten miles, however, she was digging her cell phone out of her oversize handbag.
    â€œTurn that thing off.”
    She shot him a quick look, probably startled by his deep voice breaking the nighttime silence. “But I have tolet the university know I won’t be in for a few days. I’ll just tell them I’m sick. And I have to call Carrie, too.”
    â€œIt’s 3:00 a.m., Olivia.”
    â€œI was just going to leave messages.”
    â€œNot yet.”
    She turned off the phone, but she frowned at him, and he knew she was going to argue. He could see her gearing up for it in the way her jaw got a little tighter and her eyes a little more intense. He thought she might be about to lose her temper with him. And he found himself looking forward to it.
    But then she licked her lips, took a breath and let it out slowly. “I’m not going to tell anyone where we are or what we’re doing,” she said, calmly and rationally. “But if I wanted to do that, and I thought it would be best for me, I’d do it. You need to know that about me.”
    Logical. Straightforward. The closest she’d come to losing it had been when she’d thought her dog had been dead on her living-room floor. Threats to her own life seemed to have far less emotional impact on her.
    â€œYou wouldn’t have to tell anyone where you are. You wouldn’t even have to make a call. With your cell phone on, anyone with the know-how can track you.”
    Her brows went up, and she stared at him, the stubborn intellectual gone. There was worry in her eyes now. Maybe even fear. He decided he preferred the stubbornness. He knew what had instigated the change, though. She must be wondering how he’d come by the knowledge he’d just imparted. She had to be, because he was wondering the same thing.
    â€œI must have done a lot of research—for my writing,” he said, attempting to answer her question before she could ask it. But it rang false to him. It felt like a lie.
    â€œYou never wrote any crime thrillers, Aaron.”
    â€œNow how can you be so sure about that?”
    She averted her eyes. That was telling, that little thing. Looking away, as if embarrassed or ashamed or lying right back at him. She cleared her throat, lifted her chin a little. “I’ve read everything you’ve written,” she said.
    â€œOh.” He fell silent for a moment, trying to come up with an answer that would reassure her. This wasn’t going to work if she was going to turn suspicious of him at every turn.
    What wasn’t going to work? his mind asked him. You don’t even know what the hell you’re doing, pal.
    But he felt as if he knew exactly what he was doing. As if this kind of thing was second nature to him. Running, hiding, going off the radar to get his shit together. To regroup. To strategize.
    He gripped the wheel a little tighter and came up with what he hoped was a reasonable answer. “You’ve read everything I’ve published, ” he said. “I could be an aspiring thriller writer with stacks of unpublishable crime novels under my desk, for all you know—or for all I know.”
    Her head came back around, eyes interested, brows raised, fear erased. “That’s true, you might.” And thenshe smiled, sighed as if in relief, and shook her head in a self-deprecating way. “That’s got to be it. You know all of the things you do because of research you’ve done.”
    â€œOr books I’ve read,” he said. “Maybe I’m a big thriller fan, even though I write…what would you call it? Sappy, emotional melodrama?”
    â€œI would never call it that, and you shouldn’t, either. It’s not sappy. It is emotional, but not in that way. It’s…emotional realism.”
    From the back, Freddy released a loud, long snore that sounded like some cartoon sound effect more than a