A Bad Day for Sunshine (Sunshine Vicram #1)(119)

She was still warm. Her breaths were shallow, but she was still warm.

The medics arrived in a helicopter and stabilized her enough to fly her out.

The cabin, which was normally accessible by road, had been cut off due to the snow. If not for small miracles, Price . . . Cory could have just driven Sybil there and killed her before they could get to them.

Clearly, someone was watching out for Sybil. She wondered if it was the same entity that had given her the premonition in the first place.

After the helicopter took off, another one landed, blowing ice-cold bursts of snow around them. They would secure the scene and take Cory’s body to the OMI.

About twenty minutes later, the cavalry arrived. The engines of several emergency ATVs echoed in the clearing, and time was running out. Sun had been busy organizing the emergency personnel, but now she had to decide what to do with Levi.

She looked over at him as he leaned against the porch rails. He’d saved a life tonight. Possibly two. But he’d also confessed to killing his uncle.

His gaze didn’t waver as he watched her. Then, as though he were taking a stroll on a beach, he put a hand in his jacket pocket, tipped an invisible hat, and disappeared into the darkness surrounding him like he belonged to it.

She let him go.

For now.





26


Church parking only.

Violators will be baptized.



—SIGN AT DEL SOL CHURCH ON THE ROCKS

Auri woke up in the middle of the night, partially on her grandparents’ sofa, the buttery one she’d helped her grandmother pick out, and partially on the chest of a boy.

Cruz lay asleep underneath her, his long frame stretched across the length of the sofa. Only it didn’t fit, so his feet, still clad in an old pair of running shoes, hung off the edge and rested on a side table along with a hideous ashtray Auri had made her grandparents—who’d never smoked a day in their lives—at summer day camp.

She blinked in the low light, her head still spinning from being drugged, and looked across the room at a man sitting in the matching recliner. The one with a rifle in his lap.

Auri rocketed from a sleepy haze to a startlingly lucid awareness. She jumped and tried to fling herself off Cruz in a flurry of arms and legs and blankets. Her extremities were twisted and trapped, and she lost her balance. The floor rushed to get up close and personal with her face when two arms wrapped around her torso and scooped her up.

She landed right back where she’d started. On top of none other than Cruz De los Santos.

“You’re okay,” he said, his voice soft and calming. “You’re okay.”

She melted into the rich warmth of his dark irises. Then she remembered her grandfather.

“Grandpa!” She twisted around to look at him. “This isn’t what it looks like!”

But when she spotted him, he’d put the rifle aside so he could double over in laughter. Another round of laughs emanating from the love seat caught her attention, and she turned to see her grandmother prone on the chair, giggling it up.

“My falling is that funny?”

“No,” she said, trying to sober. “The fact that you thought your grandfather was here to chaperone.”

They doubled over again, and Auri almost cracked a smile. Cruz tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, fighting a grin himself, and Auri gave up. She laughed softly, feeling more than a little sheepish. Then a realization dawned.

“Hey,” she said, glowering at her grandparents. “What makes you think I don’t need a chaperone? This could be exactly what it looks like. You never know. We could be in the throes of passion right now.”

Cruz choked on air as Auri’s grandparents exchanged humorous glances and burst into laughter again.

“I’m sorry, hon,” Elaine said, wiping her eyes. “It’s just, your arms and legs flying about? You looked like a spasmodic starfish.”

Heat spread across her cheeks. “Thanks.”

Cruz offered her a sympathetic grin, but not too sympathetic. He brushed the backs of his fingers over her cheek, and she giggled and ducked.

Then everything hit her at once. Cruz. Her grandparents. Sybil. Her mom.

She shoved off her potential boyfriend, fought a dizzy spell, then sat up and refocused on her grandparents. They took her cue and sobered instantly, a knowing smile on their faces.

“Mom?”

Cyrus nodded. “She’s okay.”

Cruz sat up and took her hand.

She swallowed and asked, “Sybil?”

Elaine expression softened, and something akin to sympathy flashed in her eyes. “She’s going to be fine. They got to her just in time.”

The emotion Auri had been holding in for days threatened to erupt out of her. A happy sob escaped her, and she pressed her hands over her mouth as the news sank in. Then she sprang forward and hugged her grandparents.


“Your boyfriends left.”

Sun gave Quincy the barest hint of her attention as she strolled past his desk. None of them had gotten much sleep, but her inquisitive daughter made her tell her everything the minute she’d gotten home. She’d skipped the plasma facial, but she did tell her that Zee had delivered a fatal shot. She wanted Auri to have that closure.

But the story put Auri into a mild state of shock. Either that or she was figuring out how she could put it into a novel and get rich. Sun knew she’d see her daughter’s memoirs on a store shelf someday.