Free Pan's Conquest (Entangled Covet) by Aubrie Dionne Page B

inside Syrinx, but she couldn’t quite place where it was from. She’d seen a lot of women come into the floral shop.
    “Parker, did you see that?”
    Parker glanced at her, then focused on the road. Thick rain pounded the windshield, and he squinted to make out the turn. “See what?”
    “A girl just ran into the woods.”
    He shrugged. “Probably some hiker.”
    “I don’t think so. She had almost nothing on, and we’re in the middle of nowhere. Maybe we should go back for her?”
    Before Parker could respond, the girl surfaced again with one arm hugging the side of a tree. She stared directly at them with cold, dark eyes and a scowl on her face.
    “There she is.” Syrinx pointed up ahead. “How the hell did she catch up to us? We must be going seventy miles an hour.”
    “More like sixty in this rain. It’s too—”
    A deer bounded onto the highway, crossing directly in their path. Syrinx jabbed her finger at the windshield and screamed. “Watch out!”
    Parker swerved, and their tires screeched as they glided over the rain-slickened highway. The forest came at them. Syrinx reached out and shielded Parker with her arm as the other one held on to the passenger door.
    Time slowed and Syrinx felt numb, like the chain of events happened to someone else. They careered into the embankment, rolled twice, and hit an evergreen upside down. An airbag inflated in her face. She batted it down, trying to get her senses and assess the damage.
    Her other arm still held on to Parker, and she moved her fingers, clutching his shirt. “Parker, are you all right?” Her voice shook with panic. Parker was mortal, and something like this could kill him in an instant, although her side had taken the brunt of the damage. If she were a mortal woman, she’d have been dead on impact.
    Parker coughed and rubbed his head. “I’m fine. What about you?”
    She breathed with relief. Then a new surge of panic rose within her as she realized she had no way of explaining her superhuman fortitude. “I’m okay. It looks as though the embankment slowed us down, and the tree broke our fall. We’re lucky we’re not dead.” Hopefully, that theory and the fact that he’d just totaled his Jaguar will distract him.
    Syrinx remembered the young woman in the forest and fumbled with her seat belt. What if they’d hit her on their way down?
    “Can you get out?” She unclicked her seat belt and fell forward, righting herself when her feet hit the ceiling.
    Parker had already—somehow—unbuckled himself. He kicked open his badly dented door and jumped out, then turned around and offered his hand. “Come on. We need to get out before the car explodes.”
    That only happened in movies, didn’t it? Whatever the case, Syrinx didn’t want Parker anywhere near that car. She grabbed his hand, and he helped her out into the rain.
    They climbed the embankment, and Syrinx took in the scene in shock. The Jaguar was a twisted, banged-up piece of scrap metal. Tracks veered from the road, digging up clumps of earth and scarring the green grass on the side of the road. There was no sign of the young woman.
    Parker wiped rain from his brow. “You said you saw a young woman on the side of the road?”
    “Yes.” Syrinx used her hand to shield her eyes from the rain. “But she’s not here now.”
    “What did she look like?” Parker’s voice was insistent, almost desperate.
    “Young, with long dark hair. Why? Do you know her?”
    He grabbed both her shoulders. “How long was her hair?”
    Syrinx thought back. “Unusually long, tapering at her waist.” Coral had that same hair. But it was impossible she’d be here in the mortal world. They’d made a bargain.
    Parker turned away, but she could see him ball his fists in anger. Something isn’t right. Why did he care what she looked like? How the hell could he know a girl on the side of the road? He didn’t seem to care at all until after the accident, which made even less sense. A current of