The front of the roof was crushed, the windshieldshattered.
Panic seized my lungs and squeezed.Kaci…
I pushed my way to the front of the small crowd. “There’s a man! Someone help him!” A woman shouted, and sure enough, when I got to the edge of the embankment, I saw Jared Taylor trying to crawl out the passenger’s side of the inverted vehicle. Blood dripped from his temple and his hands looked scratched up, but none of that explained his trouble making it out of thecar.
But my heart leapt into my throat when I saw that the rear windshield was totally covered in smears of blood. If Jared was driving, Kaci would have been in theback.
No.
“I got it,” I shouted as I scrambled down the rocky embankment. “Everybody stand back. The car could blow.” I highly doubted that was true, but the last thing I needed was human interference. Unless there was a doctor or nurse in the crowd who could administer first aid toKaci.
ScrewJared.
At the bottom of the embankment, I ran twenty feet to the overturned Honda Civic, now characterized as much by dust and dents as by the dated blue paint. “Justus,” Jared called, and though his voice was strong, my name came outslushy.
His slurred speech and the bloody scalp told me he had a concussion, but I walked right past him and squatted to peer through the backwindow.
The rear of the car was empty, but…weird. A thick sheet of plastic had been screwed to the backs of the front seats, like the barrier between cops and criminals in a police car, and the bloody fingerprints on one end told me Kaci had snapped the damn thing in half to get out of the wreckedcar.
And that she’d been bleeding when she’d doneit.
She washurt.
He would pay forthat.
I squatted next to Jared, hyper aware that the crowd was still watching us, and that if I didn’t at least appear to be helping him, someone else might step in. And that we were probably already being filmed on someone’s cellphone.
“Where is she, you psychotic bastard?” I whispered as I peered past him to see that his legs were tangled in his seatbelt, one pinned between the steering wheel and the edge of his seat, which had been compressed during thewreck.
“She ran.” Jared flinched, as if it hurt to speak, and I hoped to hell it did. “I think she’sokay.”
“You better hope she is, because if there’s a scratch on her, I’m coming back to rip your armsoff.”
“Big talk from a trust fund brat,” he growled, and his words sounded clearer, as if anger were giving him focus. “Your bitchy little bride caused this wreck, so any ‘scratches’ are her ownfault.”
“Is he okay?” someone shouted from behindus.
I turned to look up at the crowd, shielding my face from the sun—and any cameras—with one hand. “Yeah. His leg’s caught, but I gotit.”
“An ambulance is on the way!” another voiceyelled.
“Great, thanks!”Damn it. I turned back to Jared. “I’m going to get you out of here, and I hope it breaks your fuckingleg.”
“Do it,” he growled. “I can’t get in a humanambulance.”
But I was more motivated by his potential pain than by keeping him out of the hospital. “You know you didn’t make it, right?” I said as I grabbed him beneath both arms. “You’re several miles shy of the border. She’s still in the freezone.”
I pulled, and he shouted in pain. Then he clenched his jaw and spoke through gritted teeth. “If it were up to me, I’d tell you to take her. She’s not worth this. Man-eating littlebitch.”
I pulled harder, and something popped. Jared screamed, and I peered into the car to see that his kneecap looked…odd. Even through hisjeans.
It was dislocated. Or maybe I’d torn the damn thingoff.
“She’s wortheverything, and you’llneverget near heragain.”
“It’s not her we want, you idiot,” he growled as I hauled him onto the dirt several feet from the car. “It’syou.”
“Well, you’re not getting either of us.” Before he could argue, I turned to the crowd still gathered up the hill. “Hey, could I get some help here? I think the car’s pretty stable, but this guy’sheavy.”
