Mated To My Mate's Worst Enemy (ARIA) novel Chapter 639

Chapter 639

ARIA.

The specific energy of the first hour shifted into the specific energy of the second — the initial readjustment to the new configuration, people finding their positions and their relationship with their snacks and their drinks.

The conversations started the way conversations started on long drives — sideways, without formal beginning, topics arriving from the spaces between other things.

Jordan started it.

"Do you remember," he said, "the navigation incident."

Nina made a sound from the front that was part laugh and part something else.

"Which one," Kael said.

"The specific worst one," Jordan said.

"There were several candidates for specific worst," Nina said.

"The one that produced the most screaming," Jordan said.

"That doesn't narrows it down," Nina said.

"Ivory," Jordan said.

"I was looking at the map," Ivory said.

"You were looking at the map," Jordan confirmed. "And you were telling us to continue straight. For forty-five minutes."

"The road was straight," Ivory said.

"The road was straight until it wasn't," Jordan said.

"The turn was unexpected," Ivory said.

"Ivory," Nina said, from the front, in the tone of someone about to deliver testimony that had been waiting years for its moment. "The turn was signposted. It was signposted for three kilometers. There were four separate signs."

"I was monitoring the map," Ivory said.

"She was monitoring the map," Jordan said, to me and Killian, with the expression of a man presenting evidence to a jury. "While the four signs passed. While the junction approached. While we were, according to the map she was monitoring, approximately seven seconds from the turn."

"I called the turn," Ivory said.

"You called the turn," Jordan said. "Yes. Let's talk about when you called the turn."

"I called it at the appropriate—"

"TURN RIGHT," Jordan said, at a volume that was clearly a recreation of the original event.

The car lurched.

"JORDAN," Nina said.

"I was recreating the historical record," Jordan said.

"Recreate it at a volume that doesn't make me drive into oncoming traffic," Nina said.

"The original was louder," Jordan said.

"I know how loud the original was," Nina said. "I was there."

"She said TURN RIGHT," Jordan said, to me and Killian, returning to the testimony, "at a volume and a timing that meant we were already at the junction. We had passed the center of the junction. The turn was behind us. And she said TURN RIGHT."

"I called it," Ivory said.

"You called it late," Jordan said.

"I called it," she said.

"Kael was driving," Jordan said. "Kael heard TURN RIGHT from a person who had been monitoring a map for forty-five minutes and who had confirmed three times that the road was straight. Kael, what did you do when you heard TURN RIGHT?"

"I turned right," Kael said.

"He turned right," Jordan said. "From a position that was past the junction."

"There was drifting," Kael said.

"There was significant drifting," Jordan said.

"There was screaming," Nina said.

"From Jordan specifically," Kael said.

"From everyone," Jordan said. "Do not revise the record. Everyone screamed."

"I was calm," Ivory said.

"You were the one who said TURN RIGHT," Jordan said. "You generated the situation. You don't get to be calm about the situation you generated."

"I remained calm," Ivory said.

"She remained calm," Jordan said, to me and Killian. "While the rest of us were coming to terms with the possibility that we were about to be involved in a collision. She remained calm. She looked at her map. She said, and I quote—"

"I said we made the turn," Ivory said.

"She said we made the turn," Jordan confirmed. "We did not make the turn. We executed something that was technically a turn in the sense that we changed direction. But making the turn implies—"

"We arrived at our destination," Ivory said.

"We arrived at our destination," Jordan said. "Yes. After the drifting and the screaming and Elite briefly becoming airborne—"

"I was not airborne," Elite said.

"You were not fully in contact with a seated position," Jordan said.

"That's different from airborne," Elite said.

"The door," Jordan said.

"The door was secure," Elite said.

"The door," Jordan said, to me and Killian, "was not fully secured. Elite, who had been in the right-hand rear seat, was—"

"Adjacent to the door frame," Elite said.

"—adjacent to the door frame in a way that suggested a different outcome was possible," Jordan said. "And then Ivory, from the passenger seat, said—"

"We made the turn," Ivory said.

"She said we made the turn," Jordan confirmed. "As though this were a normal statement to make following what had just occurred."

"We did make the turn," Ivory said.

"The fact that we made the turn," Jordan said, "does not address the specific quality of how we made it."

"The outcome was correct," Ivory said.

"Ivory," Jordan said.

"The outcome was correct," she said.

"The outcome was correct," he said. "Yes. And also we nearly died. Both of those things are true."

Then Jordan, from the front, said: "Someone navigate."

"Not Ivory," Kael said.

"Hey," Ivory said.

"Not Ivory," Kael said again.

"My navigation is—"

"Ivory," Nina said. "Remember the Henderson territory incident."

The car went quiet.

"That was one time," Ivory said.

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