A Surreptitious Relationship

:A Surreptitious Relationship: Chapter Forty-Four

Lance was speeding. And by speeding, I mean really speeding; not the five miles over like most people did. He was going ten to fifteen miles over. Not only was he endangering himself, but he was also endangering everyone else on the road as well.

My eyes flickered from my speedometer, to the street in front of me, to my rearview window, and back over and over again as I tried to keep up with him without putting myself at risk or having a cop pull me over. Being pulled over would be counterproductive.

For the fifth time my phone started ringing, causing me to cringe. As much as I wanted to answer my phone and tell Chris, who I knew was calling, what was going on, it was too much of a distraction at the moment. My mind was racing. Obviously there was no way I could stop Lance before we made it to Aaron’s house, the same with Lexi. She was already probably there. That meant two things could’ve happened: One, Mikey left her alone and she was safely inside, or two, he’d grabbed her as bait or worse… I was praying it was the former. Unfortunately since it was Mikey we were dealing with, I highly doubted it was. Which meant I had to think. Fast.

My phone went off again. Annoyed now, I used one of my hands to pull it out of my pocket and answer it. After putting it on speakerphone, I placed it on the dash, and returned my hand to the wheel. “Hello?”

“Holly!” Chris’s voice sounded relieved and angry at the same time. “Where are you?”

“Following Lance to Lexi’s house.”

He tsked. “That stupid boy. Pull over, Holly.”

“What? No!”

“Wait for me.”

I glanced at my phone in surprise. “You’re leaving? Don’t you still have class?”

“I said there was a family emergency,” he snapped at me. “Now pull over and wait for me.”

“If I’m not with Lance he’ll do something stupid!”

“That’s his fault!”

Shaking my head, I clenched my hands tighter on the steering wheel. “He’s my best friend. I’m not leaving him alone.”

“Holly!”

“I’m not!”

“Don’t be rash!”

“I’m not!”

“Pull over!”

“No!”

“Holly, don’t—”

The sudden blaring off a horn from my right cut him off. My eyes widened and shot toward the sound and I gasped when I realized a truck was heading straight for me. Letting out a surprised shout, I yanked my steering wheel to the left to try and swerve around it. As I did, my phone slid across the dash and hit the other side of the car before falling onto the floor. Somehow I’d managed to avoid the truck, but my heart was pounding in my chest. Easing on the gas, I slowed to the speed limit, not wanting a repeat. “Chris?”

No answer.

“Shoot,” I muttered, realizing the phone must have disconnected us when it fell. “Oh well.” It was better not to have him as a distraction anyway.

Lance took a sharp right, barely breaking and making his tires squeal. It took all I had not to honk at him. Could he be any more reckless? When he got out of that car I was going to yell at him so badly.

Putting on my blinker, I followed him down the street Aaron and Lexi lived on. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary… as far as I could see. Still, I couldn’t let my guard down. Lance pulled into the twins’ driveway, cutting off his engine before he came to a complete stop. He was lucky he hadn’t rolled into Lexi’s car, which was in front of his. Seconds later I pulled my car up to the curb, stopping completely before turning the key. Before I had a chance to even unsnap my seat belt, Lance was already running up the path to their front door.