Three men stood among the stationary vehicles, shoving one another and throwing punches. Their deep, echoing shouts mingled with the screams of a woman and girl who were trying to stop a fourth man from diving into the fray.
“We’re not stepping in,” Tim said. “The lady and kid are fine. The barbarians can sort themselves out.”
Instinct screamed at me to get involved, but logic told me to mind my own business. It was serious—hospital and police level serious—but calling for help was pointless.
“I’ll need to do a U-turn.” I checked my mirrors ?for activity behind me.My pulse skittered, and I pulled in a deep lungful of air.
“Do it now before we run out of room,” he said, abandoning the live feed on his phone.
With my gut in knots, I swung around and sped down the street until I reached the next turn. Once I’d slowed and hung a left, I eased off the accelerator and reminded myself to breathe.
“Everyone’s losing the plot,” Tim said in a hushed voice.
“I’m not even joking when I say it feels like the beginning of the end.” I pulled up at the next intersection and paused as two cars drove by. “How’s the protest going? What were you worried about before?”
Tim checked his phone and made a hissing sound. “Men on motorbikes were stirring up trouble,” he said. “It worked. People from the front are breaking away from the group and running ahead.”
“To do what?”
Were they planning on storming Parliament House? All those people crammed in together with a highly contagious disease rampaging out of control… God, we’d be in worse shape than ever by the end of the day.
“I’m not sure they know,” Tim said.
As I took the next turn on the longer route home, a message alert chirped. “Can you check that for me?”
Tim grabbed my phone from the console, holding it up to my face and unlocking the screen. “It’s Ava.” He paused, then read out her message. “Flight brought forward. Getting bad here.”
I tried my best to focus on driving, but my thoughts were racing. “What does that mean? How’s it getting bad?”
“Wait a minute. Don’t panic.” He stared at the screen, calm and patient, because it wasn’t his sister. “Another one just came through.”
My skin turned clammy, but I only had to wait a few more minutes. As soon as I got back, I could call her. Listen to her voice. “What did she say?”
He didn’t get the chance to find out.
Screeching tyres pierced the air, and a split second later, a car ploughed into us from a side street. A horrificbangfollowed, and airbags deployed around us like violent clouds.
“Oh, God. Hold on, hold on.” My stomach pitched as the impact threw me toward Tim.
He grabbed the handle above the door and flattened his other palm on the roof, trying his best to defy physics.
I clutched the wheel in a death grip, propelled into a one-eighty I had no hope of controlling. I didn’t even have time to scream or think. All I could do was hang in there and hope we survived.
The smell of burning rubber filled the interior, and my phone clattered into the footwell, Ava’s message left unread.
My heart pounded a wild beat, and we both made sounds I’d never heard either of us make before.
When we thudded to a stop in the centre of the road, the sudden loss of momentum yanked me into place again.
I sucked in a breath and uncurled my fingers, locking eyes with Tim as silence flooded the car.
My ears were ringing. Blood had pooled inside my cheek. The reality of what happened sank in, and so did the reminder that my car was still running. I shoved it into park and turned off the engine. “How… what was—”
Tim reached over and squeezed my knee. “It’s okay.We’reokay. You’re not hurt, are you?”
I lifted the edge of my seatbelt and touched the raw skin on my collarbone, wincing as it stung. It appeared to be the worst of my injuries, so I shook my head, fairly certain I was telling him the truth.
We weren’t the only ones involved, though.
