1. Eva

My palms slipped on the sticky steering wheel of my piece-of-shit car. Sweat trickled down between my breasts even though the air was so cold my breath steamed with each panicky exhale.

The massive trees lining the side of the winding mountain road looked menacing in the dark, but they didn't scare me half as much as the faint flickering headlights in my rear-view mirror.

The car never got close enough for me to see who the driver was, but my sixth sense screamed it was him. He was supposed to be at work, but if he'd come back early, or one of his buddies recognized the car, he would have guessed I had run away.

I should have known better than to think for one second that I could escape him. He promised me I'd always be his.

He wouldn't stop this time.

I knew it in my bones.

Adrenaline flooded my system, pushing my heart rate to dangerous levels. Panic threatened to consume me, but I forced it back down, swallowing the toxic bile as it spilled into my mouth.

Losing my shit wouldn't help me right now. Not on these icy roads. Pale flakes drifted down from the inky sky, a prelude to the storm rolling in. I needed to cross over the summit of the pass before the snow grew thicker or I'd end up stuck on the mountain.

The engine whined and shuddered as I pressed my foot harder on the accelerator. The lights in the rear-view mirror faded away and some of the tension left my body. Maybe I was being paranoid.

Snow fell harder, settling fast and thick. The summit of the pass was still a few miles away, and the road was treacherous, even in daylight. I should have cut my speed but the car trailing me had left me spooked. If it was Brent, he wouldn't wait much longer before he tried to take me off the road.

There was nobody out there to help me. This pass was one of the most isolated sections of my route. If I could make it through the night unscathed, I planned to disappear into New York City. Even Brent would struggle to find me in a metropolis of 27 million people. I'd be a needle in a proverbial haystack.

Wet white flakes fell faster and the road ahead blurred. I could barely see ten feet in front of me, but I didn't slow down. Behind me, it was black as pitch and some of the fear leached away.

The other driver probably lived around here. Maybe he took a side road to some remote hunting cabin. I couldn't imagine many people making this inhospitable mountain their home, but it was possible.

Hell, if I could have survived in the wilderness, I'd definitely have stayed here. I much preferred living somewhere like this than in a city. But I stopped having a choice the day Brent came into my life, so if disappearing in NYC was my best chance of escaping him, I had to do it.

Finally, I passed a sign telling me the summit was one mile ahead, and I breathed a sigh of relief. The snow was worsening by the minute, but the road remained passable. There was still a chance I'd make it into the next valley.

I sped up a little, panic overriding the voice in my head that told me to be careful. In the rearview mirror, a blanket of snow obscured my tire tracks. Ahead, the road was pure white, and it was becoming increasingly difficult to tell where the boundaries were. But I refused to slow down, no matter how treacherous it was.

The wind roared, whipping up piles of snow into a whirling dervish of white flakes. For a horrible moment, I couldn't see a thing. In a panic, I touched the brake pedal, causing the barely legal tires of Brent's old junker to lose traction.

The car skidded sideways. I tried to steer back on course, but it was hopeless. There was too much snow, with ice already forming in the sub-zero conditions.

Time slowed down. The car drifted to the edge of the road, unable to gain traction on the slippery surface. For an infinitesimal moment, it hovered on the cusp of a steep drop. I held my breath. Maybe for once, luck was on my side, but no. It slid another few feet, and down we fell into the abyss.

The car rolled over and over, throwing me around like a rag doll until it hit an immovable object, and then everything went black.