Free Extreme Exposure by Alex Kingwell Page B

care. He spent a weekend in jail, got hold of a phone, and told her he was going to kill her when he got out. She believed him.”
    He ran a hand through his hair. “So we—my sister and I—decided to help her. We hid her out for a week while we set things up, got her a new identity. It wasn’t easy, especially since she had a daughter. Anyway, so far, so good. My sister talks to her once in a while. She’s moved on.”
    “Is she in contact with her family?”
    “A bit and her ex remarried, so maybe she’d be okay. But she doesn’t want to take chances.”
    “Why did you help her? It doesn’t sound like an easy thing to do.”
    “It would have been easier to just break his neck, or at least put a good scare into him, but that wouldn’t have been smart. In a way, it benefited me, too.”
    “What do you mean? Did you have something going on with this woman?”
    He scoffed. “No, it’s because of her that I’m doing what I’m doing. She had some money, but nowhere near enough to buy a house, and I realized there was a niche market, especially in cities. My company specializes in small, energy efficient designs for low-income people and retirees, or just people who don’t want to live in a big house. There’s more money to be made building bigger houses, but I get a lot more satisfaction out of this.”
    They picked up the highway heading inland, a long gray ribbon winding west across the state through farmland and forest. The traffic was sparse, mostly trucks. No cop cars.
    She fell asleep, waking just before four in the morning when Matt stopped for gas at a twenty-four-hour station. While she went to the washroom, he filled the gas tank and bought coffee for her.
    Back in the car, she took the wheel.
    “We should be in New Hampshire in a couple of hours,” he said. “Pull into the first old motel you see. We’ll stop, get cleaned up, get some new clothes, and rest up before we get back on the road.”
    She thought about asking him why it had to be old, but let it go.
    A minute later, he was asleep, as if he’d just flicked a switch. She wished she could sleep like that. Just before sunrise she crossed into New Hampshire, although it took another twenty minutes before she spotted an old motel. At least the sign was old, the words Carport Motel painted in faded black letters on a weathered sign.
    As she pulled off the road, he woke up, rubbed his face. “Where are we?”
    “Half an hour over the border. I found an old motel. And there’s a mall and a car rental place over there.” She pointed across the highway.
    The motel was a single-level, U-shaped building with a parking lot in the middle. At the front of one end was a diner with a dozen cars out front. There was no sign of a carport. She parked the car out of sight behind a truck and waited while Matt got a room. When he came back, they left the car where it was and walked to a room in the middle of the U at the back. The small room had thin green carpet, two double beds, and two tub chairs on either side of a small table next to the window. A door in the middle of one wall led to an adjoining room. She checked to ensure it was locked.
    Matt passed her an extra-large men’s T-shirt with “New Hampshire” printed on it. “They were selling them in the lobby. It was the only size they had. I got one for you, one for me.”
    “It’s great. I’m going to take a shower.” In the shower, she scrubbed herself with a little bar of soap. There was no shampoo, so she used soap on her hair. The T-shirt was long enough to cover her butt, which was all she cared about.
    When she came out, Matt smiled. “You could fit five of you in there.”
    She smiled. “It’s not exactly what a bride would wear on her wedding night.”
    She meant it to be a light remark, but he just stared at her, naked need in his eyes. “You could be wearing the proverbial potato sack. You know that, don’t you?”
    Feeling her cheeks warm, she looked away. Men just didn’t