Show me a hero and I’ll write you a tragedy.
—F. Scott Fitzgerald
Sleepy Hollow, NY
August
You will give me the keys.”
Cyn Hargrave’s eyes opened wide. She didn’t know it, but her pupils were dilating. Black swallowing green irises. The man in front of her was defenseless.
“Sure.”
He handed over a small plastic key fob. The sappy, love-struck grin on his face disgusted her.
“Stop staring at me like that,” she ordered. Anxiously looking over her shoulder again, Cyn could almost hear the police sirens that she knew would be coming.
The besotted man just sighed happily. Like he didn’t care what she was doing.
“Yeah—okay, then.” She grabbed the key ring and turned toward the silver sports car sitting two inches away from the nearby curb.
Stop. Forgetting something.
She turned back to the man, pupils flaring again. “You, sit. Wait. And don’t think about me while I’m gone.”
“Okay,” the man said, and promptly sat down.
Cyn returned to the car, wishing as she threw open the door that she had more time to admire the black racing stripe curving sexily up the hood. A red-leather interior screamed her name, and she answered its siren call, sliding behind the steering wheel.
With a flick of her wrist, the engine roared to life, and for just an instant she closed her eyes, savoring the feel. Finally. Something she was in control of.
But the sweet rush didn’t last long. It was chased away again by the pounding urge to check her rearview mirror for those flashing red and blue lights.
They have to know what I did by now. There was so much blood. . . .
A streak of crimson still stained the back of her right pinky. She’d scrubbed for twenty minutes to get it all off, but it wasn’t enough. She wondered if Hunter’s blood would always be on her hands.
Flinching at the sight, Cyn quickly rubbed her hand against her leg as she peeled out, pushing the car into third gear and then fourth as soon as she hit the highway.