for pity’s sake—” He got hold of his temper. Even so, he snapped the next words out. “I was fighting jet lag.”
It had obviously not been much of a fight from what she’d seen. “Sounds like the jet lag won.” Turning her face forward again, her eyes widened as she saw a maroon Chevy coming from the right, running the light. She braced her feet hard against the floor. “Watch out!”
But it was already too late.
A half second after the warning was out of her mouth, the front of Jack’s silver Jaguar made contact with the side of the car that had flown out of nowhere. The Chevy, at least fifteen years old, dented and its paint peeling in half a dozen places, was the heavier of the two vehicles. The impact sent the silver Jaguar spinning in a full circle, winding up exactly at the original point of contact.
The next moment, a sound like rushing water filled the interior of the car. Jack’s vision was completely blocked by a wall of white fabric.
The air bags had deployed.
Along with what remained of his already frayed patience.
Chapter Six
There was white everywhere.
Panic clawed sharply at Gloria’s throat. She felt as if she had been plunged into the center of a marshmallow.
Claustrophobia, a failing she hadn’t managed to conquer that accompanied her into every elevator, every small space she found herself in since she’d been six years old, rose up on its hoary hind legs to grab her by the throat and threaten to block out the very air into her lungs.
The fact that the air bag had her pressed back against her seat with no room for movement and the seat belt was biting into her shoulder and lap, holding her fast, only added to the tidal wave of panic that was building up inside her.
She couldn’t help her next reaction. It came without thinking, without warning. Gloria started to scream. Not a small gasp or a yelp, but a full-bodied, blood-curdling scream that could have shattered water glasses within a one-mile radius.
Jolted, Jack’s senses alert and at their peak, the scream ripped right through him. Heart pounding, he could only imagine what could have prompted that sort of a reaction from the woman who was completely blocked from his sight. Memories of the car accident with Ann came bursting back into his brain.
Ann screaming.
Just before she died.
Terror seized his heart. Struggling, pushing against the deployed air bag, Jack managed to unbuckle his seat belt and get the harness off his shoulder. Adrenaline running high, convinced that Gloria had to be severely hurt, possibly even dying, he groped for the door handle on his side. Locating it seemed to take forever. Finally successful, Jack yanked on it and applied his shoulder to the door, shoving his way out.
“Hang on!” he yelled to Gloria as he rounded the trunk.
Operating on two very distinct planes, he saw the offending driver and glared at him. Jack could just barely make out the man’s face. The other car engine was still running and the driver looked ready to make a break for it. Now.
“Don’t even think it!” Jack barked. Making his way to the passenger side of the Jaguar, he glanced quickly at the other car’s license plate, committing it to memory. A photographic memory allowed him to absorb and retain everything he had ever seen. “I’ve got your plate number and I swear I’ll hunt you down.”
The man behind the wheel of the dented Chevy froze and raised his hands in surrender. He began to babble an apology. His words were just so much noise in the background. Jack barely heard him.
All of his attention was focused on Gloria.
If she could scream like that, at least she was alive, he thought, taking comfort in that. The very hair on the back of his neck was standing on end as the sound skewered its way through his system.
Jack yanked open her door. He groped around the air bag, trying to find Gloria’s hand. “It’s okay, I’ve got you. It’s okay,” he told her over and over again.
The panic wouldn’t leave even as she heard his voice. Her terror was too huge to overcome. In saner times, it bothered her no end, reacting this way, but right now, all she could do was shriek.
“Pull me out,” she pleaded. “Pull me out!”
And then she felt a hand reaching across her waist, brushing against her lap. The next moment, the belt that was holding her prisoner was released and she was being pulled out of her living tomb.
The second she was clear of the car, she began gasping for air, sucking it in as if there wasn’t even an ounce of it within her lungs. Her legs weak, her body a heavy liquid, she clung to the man who had pulled her free.
Shaking, she was still aware of the soft feel of suede against her cheek and the infinite comfort of the arms that had locked around her. She fought to regulate her breathing.
“Where are you hurt?” Jack demanded. Had she hit her head? Broken something in the split second before the air bag had cocooned her?
When Gloria didn’t answer, Jack tried to move her back and hold her at arm’s length to see her injuries for himself. At first she wouldn’t let go of him, her arms locked around his neck in a death grip. Finally he managed to gently but firmly push her from him.
“Where are you hurt?” he asked again. Scanning her face, he saw nothing. There were no scratches, no cuts, no marks at all except for what appeared to be the beginning of a slight bruise along her forehead. That could have come from the air bag itself, he judged. But one thing was abundantly clear. The dark-haired woman he’d been verbally sparring with not a few minutes earlier was clearly shaken.
That made two of them, he thought.
And then, suddenly, there were people crowding all around them in the intersection.
“I saw the whole thing,” one man behind him volunteered.
A woman in a flaming-red scarf that was wrapped around her neck pointed to the other driver. “It was his fault.” The accusation was made in a high-pitched voice.
A businessman craned his neck as he leaned out of his car window. His vehicle was directly behind the bruised Jaguar. “Need a witness?”
Voices were coming from all sides, swelling in volume. Gloria tried to block them all out as she struggled to regain her composure. She was only vaguely aware of Jack leading her to the sidewalk. She followed him like some docile child, hating this role she’d been forced to play. Hating the way she’d reacted. Still unable to do anything else.
She’d completely lost it back there and she was ashamed of that. But it had felt as if she was being buried alive.
Jack was taking her face in his hands, examining it closely. Was he trying to figure out what kind of a lunatic his father was lending money and support to?
Gloria felt like an idiot but her heart refused to stop racing.
“You okay?” he asked gruffly.
The
