AllFreeNovel
Share Us
But there was nobody there to hear it…
We weave around a few cars whose drivers lean on their horns. They do it again once our pursuer passes. “Dad, I’m scared.” It doesn’t need to be said, but I can’t hold it in either.
“I know, baby.” He jams on the gas and the sudden burst of speed presses me against my seat. “There’s a police station two exits down, just off the ramp. We can make it there.”
Two exits? No way whoever is driving that car is going to let us make it that far. Not when they’re up our ass again, the lights getting brighter, bigger.
“God damn it!” Dad shouts as he pulls into the right lane, where we swerve onto the gravel at the side of the road before swerving back into place. The car follows us.
When the phone starts ringing in the back seat, frustrated tears fill my eyes. I know who it is—call it instinct, or maybe a mental connection forged over the past few months. It has to be Callum. Maybe he’s calling to see if we’ve arrived yet.
My body moves before my brain knows what it’s doing. I start to turn, to look for the phone, but the car jerks forward and I’m tossed back.
“Face forward!” Dad barks as he fights to regain control.
“It’s probably Callum! We need help!”
“What is he going to do?” he demands, almost leaning over the wheel. The speedometer reads eighty-five but the needle keeps drifting toward ninety. Of all the times for there to be no cops on the road, why is there no one out here to help us?
The question is still running through my head when the pursuer veers to the left, then starts inching closer like he wants to come up alongside us. “Dad, he’s coming!”
“I see that. Hold on.”
Meanwhile the phone continues ringing, and ringing, and all it does is remind me of who’s waiting at home. How will he ever get over this? He will never stop blaming himself. If I could only reach the phone, but every time the car swerves from one side to the other my cell slides along the back seat.
I glance over my shoulder and now that the lights aren’t directly behind us, I can see inside the other vehicle. It doesn’t surprise me to find Dominic Moroni behind the wheel, and it looks like he’s laughing. I could be imagining that, but I don’t think so. I know he’s crazy and that’s exactly what he would do.
He takes his eyes off the road for a second, no more than that, and our gazes lock. He sees me and he knows I see him. All it takes is the slightest turn of the wheel to bump us, hard enough that we skid off the road.
“Motherfucker!” Dad shouts while I scream, bracing myself as the car speeds toward the woods alongside the road.
Everything goes through my head at once: Callum, Tatum, the ultrasound, Mom and Dad, Mom’s funeral, even Lucas. The good mixes with the bad, all of it overlapping in the short time it takes us to tear through the overgrown brush bordering the tree line while Dad slams on the brakes.
Then it’s all over. The car crashes into a tree, the impact stopping us in an instant. At first I’m stunned when the airbag hits my face and chest, but I shake it off, pushing the deflating bag away and looking into the passenger side mirror once it’s visible. He’s not back there—the road is quiet. I doubt he could come to a dead stop all at once, as fast as he was going, but he’s coming. I know it deep down in my gut.
“Dad. Are you okay? Oh, my God.” My heart’s still pounding when I turn to him. It feels like I’m moving in slow motion as I clear the deflating airbag away and find him knocked out cold. “No, no, Dad. Wake up. Come on, wake up!” I don’t want to shake him too hard, though, since I don’t know if he’s injured. All I know is he’s slumped over the wheel, but when I hold my hand up close to his face, I feel his breath on the backs of my fingers.
I unbuckle my belt and turn in the seat, scanning the area through the rear window. There’s smoke rising up from the front of the car.What should I do?Should I try to get him out in case there’s a fire? I don’t know if the smoke means something’s already burning. I’m not sure I could move him or whether I should even try. I don’t know anything.
One thing I can do is finally reach the phone. Once I have it in my hand, I decide to dial 911. Until it occurs to me I have no idea where we are, exactly. I wasn’t paying attention to the mile markers and I don’t know the number of the exit we were approaching. But none of that matters, not when Dad needs help.
My eyes flick up to the road, searching for some kind of landmark, and land on a car as it backs its way down the shoulder of the road. A car with damage to its front passenger side. A car that comes to a rolling stop.
“Oh, god!” I drop the phone from my shaking hands and reach for Dad. “Dad! Please, wake up! Help me!”
It’s no use. I might as well be alone, and again, I can’t help the thoughts of Mom that flood my mind as the car door opens, then slams shut.
He’s coming for us. He’s going to kill us...
All at once, a sense of calm washes over me. Everything comes into sharp focus. It could be the sight of Dominic sauntering around the car, his silhouette lit by his headlights, before he begins strolling across the soft ground torn up by speeding tires. He acts like he’s on a leisurely walk.
Mom might have been alone and defenseless, but I’m not, because driving isn’t the only thing Dad taught me how to do. Twisting around, I open the glove box, where the gun he told Callum about sits. There’s a round in the chamber when I check.
Please, Mom. If you’re there, if you can help, I need you.
“Anybody alive in there?” he taunts, laughing like the maniac he is.
Any lingering nerves or questions about whether this is the right thing to do vanish when I hear that menacing laugh.He wants to kill me. My father. My baby. No fucking way. If it’s a choice between my life and his, I’m choosing me. My first instinct is to jump out of the car and start firing but I have to be smart about this. The element of surprise is what’s going to give me a leg up.
