The head honcho stalks off into the night, the blond girl trailing in his wake. I watch as Tyler mimes planting a bullet in Amy’s head before making a beeline for the Dodge, fist-pumping the air as he calls out to his buddies.
“Time to run!”
The crowd goes nuts, and I shut my eyes for a second, trying to make sense of what’s about to happen.
“What is goingonhere? Tell me you didn’t just gamble away my Dodge…” I rub my eyelids. “I poured every single cent I owned into that car. It’sregisteredto me, for fuck’s sake. How the hell have we ended up with some guy challenging you to a race to get it back? Tell me this is just some bad dream—like, that asshat isn’treallygonna race my baby, is he?”
I open my eyes.
She’s gone.
Amy’s nowhere to be seen.
I whip around to see her marching over to her car.
“Hey, I’m trying to have a conversation with you here!”
I sprint over to her, but just as I catch up, she’s ducking into her Firebird. I race around to the other side and fling open the passenger door.She wasn’t seriously about to just ditch me, was she?
“What the hell are you doing, Firebird?”
“Get out.”
Yeah. So, she was seriously about to just ditch me, then.
“You arenotdoing this.”
“Fine.” She kills the engine. “In that case, guess you better go kiss your Dodge goodbye.”
I shake my head. “There’s got to be another way.”
“How’s about you go sit on the sidewalk over there and think about it, while I deal with reality.”
“Why don’t we just beat him up? Pull some ninja shit on his ass and then make a break for it with the Dodge..?”
Amy sighs. “Lewis, get real. That’s basically like declaring war. Your car just got caught up in this whole situation you know nothing about, so just trust me—there is no other way. This race is our only shot.”
I’m scrambling for an alternative, but the truth is I have no idea how to deal with this kind of shit show. A race, though? A fuckingrace?
If Tyler slams my Dodge, it’s done for.
Without thinking, I snake my arm over Amy’s lap and grab the keys, pulling them out of the ignition and tossing them outside—or that was the plan, anyway. Only problem is, I forgot to open the window. The keys go tumbling to the ground, slipping somewhere between my seat and the door, which is good news for me—she’ll have to writhe around on top of me to look for them.
“Grow up, Conley.” She rolls her eyes at me, like she read my mind.
Suddenly, it hits me.
“Wait a minute. You bet your Pontiac—what do we do if he wins?”
“Wow, thank yousomuch for believing in me…”
She bet her fucking Pontiac!
I turn it over in my mind. She’s put her neck on the line. She’s taking a massive risk—for me.
I slide a hand down to scoop up the keys, keeping them pressed into my palm for a moment.
“Okay,” I start slowly, “if this really is our only option, then let’s do this. We can handle this run.”
