Larger Than Life by Alison Kent (bill gates books recommendations .TXT) 📗

she'd never seen anywhere but in People Magazine or on the People's Choice Awards.

But still! He could turn a molehill of evidence into a big fat mountain and put Jase away forever! Then what would she do? Who would she have to date? How would she ever get away from this dump? She didn't have anyone else on her side!

Jase tried to clear his throat. "Yeah, well, Holden's not really the one I'm worried about."

Liberty heard the break in his voice and grew still. "What do you mean, he's not the one you're worried about? Who else is there?"

"Holden may be all powerful, but even he can't get away with murder. I'm not so sure that's the case with the guys I'm dealing with here. The amount of money I took? It can't be legal, which means they won't be going to the sheriff. They'll be taking care of it themselves."

She sat up slowly, her ears ringing with the word murder. Murder! Her heart thudded in her throat until she thought she would never again be able to breathe.

"Jase? What's going on?" Her hands were shaking so badly, she drew up her legs to her chest and tucked her fingers in the pits of her knees. Her voice cracked and she barely managed to whisper, "Tell me what's going on."

Jase sighed, hung his head. Light from the moon made his bleached blond hair look white, the spikes look like tufts of dead grass. The hoop in his ear sparkled. Sweat ran down his cheeks from his temples. "It wasn't only a couple grand like I said." .

"What are you talking about?" Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god!

"It was a couple hundred grand. There's no way it was all the store's money."

She started rocking back and forth where she sat. "You stole two hundred thousand dollars?"

He shoved both hands through his hair, clamped them down on top of his head. "The deposit slip said one thing, but there was an extra two hundred G's in the bag."

"So you just kept it? Not even knowing whose it was?" She sounded hysterical. Shoot, she was hysterical! "What is wrong with you? What were you thinking?"

"I was thinking about us, Lib," he yelled back, really screaming now. His voice echoed in the night. "I was thinking about you. I want us to get out of here. Me off the ranch and away from my dad. You so far away from your parents that they could never force you to marry some old geezer."

He was rocking now, too, and almost crying. "This town is fucked up, Lib. Pastor Straight's hold over everyone is insane. It's like a commune or a cult, and the way the church treats the women is as bad as the Taliban. I'm not going to stay here. I want you to come with me. We only have to hide out a few days, wait for whoever the money belongs to to lose our trail, then we can hitch to Mexico."

Everything he was saying suddenly made so much sense. She'd been so wrong. He wasn't stupid. Not if he could get her out of here. He was smart, and she decided then that she loved him and wanted to be with him forever. "Don't you think they'll look for you in the hunting blind?"

"No, see, that's the beauty of this." He scooted closer, excited now. "My dad tore down the blind two seasons back. He hasn't leased out that plot since and has no idea I put it back up and come out here all the time."

She didn't respond right away, and he went on. "We'll only stay tonight if it makes you feel better. We'll hide out long enough to come up with another plan. That's all we've gotta do, Lib. That's all."

His desperation tugged at her heartstrings like he was playing music just for her. "Okay, okay. But I broke the thong on my shoe and have to go barefoot. I don't know if I can keep up with you."

He got to his feet, brushed dirt from the butt and knees of his jeans. "C'mon. I'll piggyback you."

He was so totally cute sometimes. She shook her head. She could do this. She could. "No, I'll be fine." She pulled off the scarf she'd wrapped around her waist like a belt. "I'll just tie the shoe to my foot—"

"Shh. Listen." He backed a couple of steps away. "Do you hear that?"

She did. A diesel engine grinding hard as the truck it belonged to fought the uneven terrain. She knew the sound well. Eighty percent of Earnestine's population of just under four thousand drove the same.

She finished tying her shoe to her foot, though she didn't know why she bothered. They'd issue her some pair of tacky granny lace-ups in jail, because back in California she'd watched enough cop shows to know she'd be charged as an accessory. Unless she was killed, too, she thought with a big, fat, ugly-sounding sob.

"Stay here," Jase ordered. "Don't move. I'm going to draw them away."

"No, Jase!" Panic rose in her throat and tasted like the bad, cheesy ranch dressing she'd had on her salad at the Dairy Barn.

"I'll lose them and circle back to get you. Just stay put."

He would never find this place again. She'd be lost out here forever. "Wait! I'll come with you!"

But he was already running away. "I love you, Liberty. I love you!"

"Jase, no!" She couldn't even see him anymore. He'd vanished into the darkness. She was alone with dirt and rocks and creepy crawly things. This was all so sucky and so so stupid.

The truck was getting closer. She could hear the gears shifting, hear men shouting. Shaking like mad, she wrapped her arms around her knees and tucked her chin to her chest, praying Jase was as fast dodging tumbleweeds as he was dodging tackles on the football field.

A second later she heard a loud thudding pop. What looked like a bottle rocket arched up