over an embankment into black nothingness.
Becca screamed. In her mind’s eye she saw Hudson cold and bleeding. Eyes closed in death.
Blam! The Jetta hit the ground with force enough to break the axle entirely. Becca’s teeth slammed together. The car surged through underbrush. Ringo yipped. Hudson swore and then suddenly the bole of the tree raced toward them.
The driver’s side hit the tree dead on. Becca jerked into her seat belt again. The windshield shattered. Cold air and glass rained.
“Hudson! Hudson!”
Becca didn’t immediately realize she was calling his name. She surfaced as if from a dream and saw something stuck into the arm of her jacket. A sharp chunk of wood. She reached for it and pulled it out, felt searing pain. It had been jabbed into her bicep. She yanked it out before any of that penetrated her brain and she felt the ooze of blood on her skin.
Hurry, she told herself. Hurry!
Her gaze shot to Hudson. He was slumped over the wheel. The area above his right ear was dark with blood. The steering wheel had pinned him to his seat. “Hudson,” she said brokenly.
Steam sizzled into the cold night. Rain poured in through the half-missing windshield.
“Hudson,” she whispered again. She tried to move forward but the seat belt held her fast. The dog whimpered and she glanced back. Ringo was trapped in the backseat. The car had folded inward on the driver’s side and the dog was blocked from jumping to the front, but he appeared to be unhurt.
Hurry! He’s coming back!
With dull fingers Becca unclasped her seat belt. It zipped back as if the car were in perfect working order. She was having trouble getting her brain to command herself to move with urgency.
She pushed on her door and it groaned open with the sound of grinding metal. A frigid wind slapped her face.
The cell phone.
She glanced at Hudson again. He was pale and his breathing was labored. Was that the effect of being crushed by the steering wheel? Please, God, let him be okay.
Think.
The cell phone, yes.
She reached a hand around the floor of her seat, feeling dull and disconnected. Where was it? She couldn’t find it.
Hudson kept his cell in his jacket.
Gently, she reached a hand in his right pocket, but it was empty. Making mewling sounds of distress, she reached over him, flashing anger at the steering wheel, throwing her shoulder against it as if that could help to release him.
She caught the other side of his jacket and hauled it up, heavy with his phone. She struggled to get it free and when she did, she flipped it open.
No service.
Tears squeezed from her eyes. Ringo was whining and whining and she gazed back at him. “Stay put, boy. It’s okay. It’s all right. We’re okay.” She glanced around and felt a zap of pain jump up her neck. Something twisted there. Muscle pain. Immediately her arms went to her abdomen, but she was fine. Her baby was fine.
Rage ran through her like wildfire, burning through her torpor.
Bastard. Murdering, killing bastard!
With new strength she pulled herself from the car, slipping in mud and fir chips and needles. Glass tinkled against itself and fell off her clothes as she hung on to the car. She could feel the pain in her left arm. The wrench of her neck. And there was something with her left hip—a deep bruise.
But her head was clearing rapidly. The rain was good for that, at least. She blinked against the drizzle and listened hard. No sound but the rain and the whoosh of an impish wind.
No engine. He had moved on. He had driven his truck far away.
Just like last time.
Her teeth started instantly chattering. She felt a headache building. From the accident? No! A vision. For the first time she welcomed it.
Please. Please, Jessie.
And suddenly there she was. Standing precariously on the headland. Alone.
Where was he?
Jessie mouthed the word to her. Two syllables. A warning.
Becca wanted to cry with frustration. “What is it?” she cried aloud.
“Justice,” Jessie answered.
Becca came back to the moment as if someone had turned a switch. She turned her face to the high heavens and shrieked, wanting answers, not riddles.
And Hudson?
She had to get help.
Struggling, she grabbed on to exposed tree roots to help her scale the embankment back to the road above. She was glad for her beach clothes, her sneakers and jeans and jacket, but she still scrambled for purchase against the slippery mud.
Gasping for breath, she finally reached the top, hauling herself up with shaking arms onto the asphalt. She stared down the highway from where they’d come. No sound of an approaching vehicle. She glanced toward the east. The road curved toward the right. Nothing approaching from there, either.
She wanted to lie down and rest her head on the wet road. She needed…rest.
But Hudson needed help.
With an effort, she staggered to her feet. You’re unhurt, she told herself. You’re okay.
She was only a couple of miles from her first accident. Where someone had run her off the road. Where she’d lost her baby. Again, she cradled her abdomen.
Which way to go to find cell service? Toward Portland, or toward the beach?
A toss-up.
Becca chose Portland. She stumbled east. A car would come by soon. A good Samaritan. Hudson was okay. He wasn’t in any immediate danger. He was okay. But tears formed in the corners of her eyes and she silently prayed for him as she trudged along the road.
She reached another curve of the road and trudged around it, looking through the rain ahead. Was that a car stopped on the road? To her shock, headlights suddenly blasted her in their bright glare. She saw the grill guard.
For the briefest of seconds Becca was paralyzed. Then she heard the door slam and a tall figure was backlit in the headlights. He held something in his hands. A knife.
She turned and fled like an Olympic runner, racing down the road away from him.
His footsteps slammed hard behind her.
Not toward Hudson, she thought. She had to lead him away. To the other side of the road.
She crossed the center line and zigzagged toward the opposite cliffside, sliding over the ledge on purpose, brushing a low Douglas fir branch, scratched by stickery limbs.
