Hope - Book 1 of the Bad Boy Vibes series

Chapter 5

Chapter 5

"I can't believe I am actually doing this," Anna couldn't help saying as she got into the passenger side of the front seat of his jeep.

"I can't believe I am doing this," returned Rafe, with a rueful grin, before he set the ignition alight and sent the car into motion.

Anna spared a moment to turn and wave at her tearful mum. Her own tears were quick to water down the usual startling greens of her eyes. The image of her mother grew smaller as the car drew away from the curb and picked up speed. She turned those watery eyes to then face forwards.

"It's the right decision," murmured Rafe, reassuringly.

Was it though? Anna wasn't sure.

"You wanted her out of this," said Rafe, correctly seeing her doubts. "So this is the only way. With you moving in with Aunt Bella and me, we can file the police report and keep your mum out of this."

The police report...that was the other thing bothering her. Would they even believe her? It was quite literally her word against Brian's and the Prestons'. And then there was the fact that Brian actually killed John Simmons. Rafe didn't yet know that. And the police had no idea either. What if that came out? Would her mum and Anna be liable as co-conspirators for keeping mum about it all this long?

There was no easy decision around all this. No easy way out. To get out, Anna didn't doubt they would first have to dig themselves in deeper. Deeper into the pit of mire. She turned her head away from where she was staring out unseeingly at the passing scenery to stare straight at Rafe.

Two weeks later, and Rafe's plan begun its first step forward.

"You sure you have everything you need," Rafe asked casually and moved his stick shift into the correct slot forward. He pressed on the gas, putting pedal to the metal to blow out of town, so to speak.

"Yes," Anna answered absently, her thoughts back on her mother's reaction to all this. Jane was a pushover. There was no other way to put it. A flash of charm and she fell head over heels for Rafe placing, him on a pedestal, right up there with the gods. It was clear she had misconstrued the whole matter about her and Rafe. It was clearer still she had not liked Matt at all, for her to completely disregard his absence from Anna's life for the past month. It was evident, she had put Anna's initial subdued nature down to a break-up and quite possibly saw Rafe as her rebound. In that, it was apparent she had not yet learnt from her own bout of mistakes either. Trusting the male of the species to solve her problems was obviously ingrained bone deep. A fate Anna herself may share as well, for hadn't she turned to Rafe for just that reason? Anna took some consolation over that fact, that she was not alone in that sentiment. Perhaps it was archaic, that need to turn to a man for help. Yasmin would undoubtedly approve, but that in itself should be the deterring factor.

"I can't believe my mum was so eager to see me go," she couldn't help saying with a hesitant chuckle. Jane had even helped Anna pack up some clothing before bundling her off into his rustic car—the battered old jeep he drove as an excuse for a car.

"She knew you would be well cared for."

Anna made a non-committal murmur at that.

"Right, so it's off to the police first. I called ahead and booked us in with the sex crimes unit."

That made her flinch. Knowing that she was a victim of such a crime still took some getting used to. Anna was not at all eager to head into a police station for anything. It didn't matter that she would be going in there as the victim seeking justice. Having to go in there at all just felt bad.