Love Like This (The Romance Chronicles-Book #1)

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Keira clutched the steering wheel of her rental car in her hands. She could only vaguely remember where she was going from the funny town name signs, remembering how Shane had sent photos to Bryn and Nina for her, how they'd laughed together that day. Was she behaving like a crazy person, driving somewhere she'd only been once to turn up on the doorstep of a man she'd known for less than a month to confess her love for him! Yep, it sounded pretty crazy in her head. If only Bryn could see her now.

It was midday and Keira realized she hadn't eaten any lunch and had no way to procure any for the next few hours. But she didn't care. She could forgo sustenance.

The drive seemed to take forever. All the adrenaline coursing through her body didn't help, since it had the effect of making time seem to pass slower. She checked her phone periodically, hoping that Shane would call her back and ease at least some of the tension she was feeling about him rejecting her. But he didn't. She ruminated on whether he'd listened to her most recent voicemail, what he thought about it if he had. Did he hate her? Would he be less than impressed—or even offended—when she turned up at his house like a possessed woman? But then she remembered Simon and Sylvia, their advice, their words, their love. That's what kept her going. All her memories of the festival converged together in her mind, each one another step that had taken her closer to this place, turning her more and more into a hopeless romantic.

It took her four hours total before she found herself on the road she recognized, the main street in Shane's town. She remembered the jokes he'd made about the different locations in the town. The "post office." The "nightclub." Doris the donkey. Her heart skipped with anticipation.

She craned her head, searching for the single track dirt road that led to the family's farm. Everything looked the same here—roads that were little more than muddy grooves made by tractor tires. Then suddenly she spotted it. She wasn't sure at all what made her know this was the road she was looking for since it looked exactly the same as the last three she'd passed, but something inside her told her this was it, she'd found it.

She yanked the steering wheel left, the car stuttering in protest as she failed to kick it down a gear into first. Consequently, she found herself thundering along the road at an uncomfortably fast pace.

Up ahead she saw something blocking the path. She just had time to slam the brakes on. The car ground to a halt behind a whole crowd of sheep.

Keira jerked forward, her chest straining against the seat belt, then thunked back against her seat. She felt the car stall, then everything fell silent.

She took a moment to check herself, to breathe and make sure nothing was broken—the car or herself. Confident that everything was indeed still in one piece, Keira glanced out the windshield at the backsides of a hundred sheep. There was no way through.

Without wasting a second to contemplate her next move, Keira threw the door open and leapt out the car, abandoning it in the middle of the path. She had to inch up against the hedges to squeeze alongside the sheep, who seemed to move like a slow-flowing river. The smell was less than pleasant, and the sheep didn't seem pleased by her intrusion. Keira had never realized quite how menacing sheep looked close up. They stared at her cautiously, and she couldn't help but imagine that they were sizing her up. She gulped and continued to shove her way past them.

Soon she found herself in the middle of the group. Everywhere she looked there was white wool, so much of it she couldn't even see below her waist. She could feel the pellets of sheep poo squelching beneath her feet, however.

At last she saw light at the end of the tunnel. She was just about near the front of the herd. She used her arms to help her wade through the crowd, like she was trying to propel herself through water. Then suddenly she was out. She wasted no time and ran the rest of the path toward the farmhouse.