River loves you.
I walked with him to his truck, my own confession locked in my throat. Shame was creeping in, whispering how pathetic I was—driven by old demons to nearly drown myself. Someone who needed to be rescued and watched and taken care of.
“Hey,” River said at his truck, seeing the dark thoughts in my eyes. “Don’t do that. Whatever happens, we just take it one day at a time. We’ll figure it out, okay?”
I nodded and climbed into his cab, my ruined clothes getting sand all over the floor and dampening the seat. River got behind the wheel and put the heater on high. The warm air blasted over me as he pulled back onto the winding, darkened road to get us home.
The heat from the vents slowly made its way through my sodden clothes, and my dunk in the ocean had sobered me. Or maybe it was just River. I glanced at his profile—so fucking beautiful, his eyes on the road, a small smile playing over his lips. He looked as if he’d finally set down a heavy burden he’d been carrying for years.
Maybe this is real. Maybe I can have a different kind of life. With him.
Slowly, hesitantly, I reached over and took his hand, warm and strong, and held on. He turned to me, his smile widening, his fingers twining with mine. I’d never seen anyone look at me like he did inthat moment, and the sudden warmth that flooded me had nothing to do with the truck’s heater. It flowed between the broken pieces of me, melting them down so maybe they’d have a chance to come back together.
Love. This is love. I’m in love with him.
I swallowed hard, the words on my lips for the first time in my life. “River, I…” In my peripheral vision, I saw a dark shape in the road ten yards ahead. “Look out!”
River dropped my hand and gripped the wheel. “Oh shit,” he bit out and slammed on the brakes, swerving hard right as the headlights illuminated a deer bounding in front of the truck.
I saw the deer’s eyes, wide and black, and then the truck was spinning, sliding off the side of the road. My world tilted sickly. Turned upside down. The sounds of shattering glass, denting metal, and my own blood roared in my ears.
The truck hovered in a frozen moment that lasted forever, then slammed down on its four wheels. The impact reverberated in my skull. In my bones. I saw nothing but black and then the sudden white of an inflating airbag exploding in my face.
Silence. The only sound was the truck settling and the hissing of my breath. I waited for the pain to find me, but shock cocooned me in a bubble, and alcohol had made me limp and loose.
Slowly, I turned my head, and another agonized sound—born in my heart—fell out of my mouth.
River sat slumped forward, tethered by his seat belt. Blood streaked darkly across the white of the deflating airbag. With trembling fingers, I reached up and flipped on the cab light, and another strangled sound burbled out of my throat. River’s face was deathly pale, his chin resting on his chest that rose and fell in almost imperceptible breaths.
“River!”
My voice was tattered, torn to shreds with fear, my hands shaking as I fumbled at my seat belt, then the door handle. The door gave and I tumbled out onto the pine needle–covered ground. My body bentin half, and vomit spewed out of me in an acid fountain of vodka and sour bile.
When I could stand, I made my way around the truck, legs buckling every other step. The roof of the car was dented, and River’s side was crushed.
We rolled. Holy fuck…
With strangled moans, I made it to the driver’s side door. The window was smashed in; safety glass glittered over River’s black pants like diamonds. By the lone light of the cab, River looked asleep but for the blood staining his shirt. A gash had been torn into the left side of his temple, and his breath hitched shallowly. A fresh shock wave of terror bolted through me to see blood trickling from his ear.
“River, no…”
I yanked at the handle, but the metal was warped, the side mirror gone. Sagging against the door, I reached inside the broken window and took River’s hand in mine. He was limp, unmoving.
“Please…wake up. River, wake up…”
Tears blurred my vision as I fumbled my other hand in my coat pocket for my phone. The screen was cracked, but it still worked. With a trembling thumb, I dialed 911 and put the phone to my ear. Taking off my coat with my phone in it before I walked into the fucking ocean was the only thing I’d done right the whole night.
“911, what is your emergency?”
“There’s been an accident. It’s bad. Hurry, please.”
“Where are you?”
I fell back against the door, staring around the darkened forest and the ocean beyond, hopeless panic rising as I struggled to remember a road sign…anything.
This is my fault. And he’s going to die…
“I don’t know… On the 1, eastbound.” Then a flash of memory cut across the dark night. “We passed a sign…Wilder Ranch.”
