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“You’re going to kill us. I’m truly going to die this time.”
Gripping the hard plastic steering wheel, I point us toward the only exit I see opposite us.
Coming out of a sub-level basement into traffic should never be done at sixty miles an hour.
Trust me.
Horns blast and pissed-off New Yorkers hang out their windows to share their true feelings about my driving style. I’ve never heardbitchhurled in three languages in less than ten seconds before. Go me!
“Don’t be so pessimistic, drama queen.” I shove Hark back into a sitting position when I see him struggling to stay upright. “Hold on, I’ll get you to a hospital, okay. You fucking die, who will I have left to help me?”
We bump, slide and grind past three red lights and a man texting while walking. Bad idea, dude. I nearly eat the tail end of a Mercedes Benz swerving my two-and-a-half-ton truck around him.
“Thank God, this old thing doesn’t have airbags, right?” I throw toward Hark who grips the oh-shit handle with his good hand looking as scared as I feel. It would be game over before we got fifty feet from his fancy bar if they deployed. Hark grunts some caveman sounds as I veer left to miss a slow-moving minivan with a pack of rowdy kids in colorful uniforms distracting the driver.
“Damn it, woman. Watch out!” he grits and I guess he needs to focus on more than my lack of driving skills because he slams me with a hard-ass question.
“How the fuck did you end up married to that piece of shit?” His voice grows weaker by the second. Please, God, don’t let him die a second time.
How do I answer that without giving him a stroke? Um, yeah. I play it over in my head. So, I’m married to a man who thinks you’re dead. Did I mention this same psycho is out to kill me too and you now that he’s seen your face?
Probably needed some sugar-coating on that of which I am all out of.
“Long story. So far, the ending is up for a rewrite. Just focus on breathing and staying awake, okay? One damn problem at a time.” I take his hand in mine and don’t let go as I squeal tires around a ninety-degree turn. “Another three blocks and I’ll have you on a stretcher in the ER.” Then I can give myself permission to breathe. Until then, my foot turns into lead.
“No, no fucking hospitals. Take me to Doc.”
“Doc? Doc who?” I screech thinking all the gunshots must have made me deaf. “I need details, Hark!”
“Our compound. Get me there.” He releases my hand and pulls a phone from his pocket. “Map.” He gestures a bloody finger at the screen.
“Okay, and?” I switch between watching the road, him, and getting his thumb to open his phone.
“Hark!”
I don’t get an answer. “No, Hark, open those damn eyes, you hear me!” I smack his face a little butnada. My fingers tremble uncontrollably. I drop the phone and try for a pulse. Between looking at the road and running red lights without getting T-boned, it’s kind of hard to see if he’s still breathing.
And then I find it. Thank God. I sag with relief at the faint thump of a pulse against my two fingertips. It’s weak as hell, but there. In this case, it’s way better than nothing given the alternative. I try the phone again and have to guess the address that reads home is where we are going.
I point us out of the city and start to feel nervous as hell when I pull off a road and get stopped at a guardhouse. I made what normally would be a thirty-minute trip in less than twenty. It is a miracle no patrol car spotted me. Another truth, there is no doctor this far outside city limits. I look at Hark and see his chest still rising and falling. Another small miracle.
A man looking like a dirtied-up younger version of Gerard Butler if he had neck tattoos and dressed like a biker considers my attire and then the truck as I roll up.
Slamming on the brakes, I crank down the window old-school style.
“State your business. And why the fuck do you have Prez’s truck?” The man steps up to my window about to lay down some law. Large iron gates keep me on this side from whomever this Doc is.
I lean back and show the guard a bleeding Hark wearing the same vest with the same markings as Hark. “I think I have one of yours. I need someone called Doc. Like right the fuck now.”
Shock passes over the guy’s expression who has to be about my age. “Ah fuck, yeah go through. I’ll call ahead.” Guessing he’s going for a phone and not a gun inside his pocket, I only nod.
He hits the release and the gates swing open before jumping in the back of the truck.
I test the limits of this old truck’s abilities on a single-lane drive, hoping the new guy knows how to hang on.
Tires crunch on gravel and I slow when a mansion rivaling my father’s in size comes into view. There has to be half a dozen vehicles and another handful of bikes parked out front. Rolling lawns to either side of me disappear into thick woods.
“No, not here. Around back.”
