Betrayed, I Rise novel · Chapter 2 of 32

Chapter 2: Nine Miles

A boatyard owner drives Carly to the motel, where Vincent and Skylar laugh at her arrival and Skylar zips up Carly's dead mother's yellow raincoat.

I watched myself run after the RV four times.

On the fourth time I noticed the laugh.

It wasn't only Skylar's.

Underneath hers, lower, was Vincent's.

The comments were scrolling faster than I could read them.

"Not the heiress chasing the bus 😭"

"Imagine being that rich and that helpless."

"Vincent is a SAINT for putting up with this."

My battery dropped to six percent.

I put the phone in my pocket so I'd stop looking.

Then a floodlight clicked on above the gate.

White light poured over the puddles.

A dog started barking, deep and slow, somewhere behind the fence.

I stepped back so fast I nearly fell.

A door banged. A flashlight beam came bouncing across a yard full of dark shapes.

Boats.

They were boats, up on wooden stands, covered in tarps.

The flashlight stopped on me.

"You okay?"

It was a man's voice. Calm. Not young, not old.

"I'm looking for a motel," I said. "The Gulfview. It's supposed to be three miles from here."

He unlocked the gate and swung it open.

He was tall, in a gray work shirt soaked dark across the shoulders. He had a big old yellow Labrador leaning against his leg.

The dog stopped barking and sniffed my knee.

"The Gulfview's nine miles," he said. "Back the other way."

"Nine?"

"Nine. Who told you three?"

I didn't answer.

He looked at me for a second longer, at my shoes, at my jacket, at whatever my face was doing.

Then he went back inside and came out with a towel.

It smelled like engine oil and laundry soap.

"Come on," he said. "I'll drive you."

"You don't have to."

"It's nine miles in the dark on a road with no shoulder. I kind of do."

His truck was rust-red and old enough to have a tape deck.

The dog climbed in first and sat between us.

I held the towel around my shoulders and watched the wipers.

He didn't ask what happened.

He didn't ask my name.

He turned the heat all the way up and pointed the vents at me.

"Troy," he said, after a while.

"Carly."

"That your camera?"

I looked down. I had my hand wrapped around nothing, around the strap that wasn't there. My camera was still on the RV's back seat.

"No," I said. "I left it."

He nodded like that made sense.

The Gulfview Motel was a long low building with a pink sign that said VAC NCY.

The RV was in the lot.

It took up four parking spaces.

COAST RUN was printed down the side in turquoise letters, with Skylar's face beside it, twelve feet tall and smiling.

Under the awning, Vincent and Skylar were sitting in camping chairs, eating takeout from foil trays.

Dry.

Vincent had his feet up on the cooler.

Skylar saw the truck first.

She sat up and grabbed her phone.

"Oh my God," she shrieked. "Everyone, look! She made it!"

A couple coming out of room four stopped to stare. So did a man with an ice bucket.

Skylar turned the camera toward them.

"She's been walking for like two hours! Give it up for her!"

The couple clapped, confused.

I opened the truck door and got out.

My shoes squelched on the asphalt.

Vincent didn't get up.

He smiled at me the way he smiled at me when I burned toast.

"Hey. You made it. See? Told you you could do it."

"You left me on the highway."

"I left you three miles from a motel."

"It's nine."

He shrugged. "So I'm bad at math. Relax, Carly. It was a joke."

"You drew the arrow backward."

"Skylar did the arrow." He pointed a fork at her. "I just drew the road."

Skylar laughed so hard she had to put her tray down.

"You should see your face right now," she said. "Hang on, do that again."

She stood up and held the phone closer.

That's when I saw what she was wearing.

A yellow raincoat.

Old and soft, with the left pocket mended in a slightly different yellow thread.

My mother had sewn that pocket back on with me sitting on the kitchen counter.

I was eleven.

She died the next year.

That coat had hung in the RV's little closet, zipped inside a garment bag, because I took it everywhere.

I didn't wear it. I just didn't like leaving it.

"That's mine," I said.

Skylar looked down at herself.

"Oh, this?"

She pulled the zipper up slowly, all the way to her chin, and smiled right into the camera.

"Vincent said you wouldn't mind."

← Chapter 1 · All chapters · Chapter 3 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend