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I eyed the driver’s seat warily. Veronica lay slumped over, her head against the steering wheel. She was barely moving, except for the slow rise and fall of her back. A shiver went down my spine at the sight of her. Her eyes were empty and her chipped red-polished fingers were wrapped around the steering wheel like the thin legs of a spider. I hardly recognized her.
“Monica.” I tried again, placing my hand on her shoulder and gently shaking her.
“Hmm?” she said dreamily.
“It’s me,” I assured her. “I’m going to get you out of here.”
“Mmm.” Her voice was as if she were far away.
I wrapped one arm around her lower back and scooped the other under her legs, pulling her from the seat and carefully out the window, avoiding the sharp edges of glass. She breathed steadily in my arms, as her eyes fluttered closed. She was here. She was okay. At least, I prayed she was as I stood in the darkness of the trees clutching her against me.
Chapter 53
Monica
As I blinked slowly, the shadows and shapes of the tall trees taking a sharper form as my vision adjusted, I couldn’t understand where I was. My head felt fuzzy, like an old television covered in gray static. The clouds overhead darkened the forest around me and I suddenly felt very cold besides the large hands that gripped me. I knew those hands. I just couldn’t quite place who they belonged to.
I looked to my right and saw crushed red metal and the splintering of a tall tree, its insides light and splayed out for the world to see. Smoke rose, or was it mist? I couldn’t tell through the orange haze of headlights that jutted through the trees. I saw broken glass scattered along the rocks and grass of the floor beneath me.
I felt like I was having an out-of-body experience, knowing I was just in that car. Or was I still? My mind was too blurry to understand where I was. Who I was. I sucked in a breath at the woman who sat in the driver’s seat, or rather lay there. Her head was bent in a way that made my insides cold, her light blue eyes slowly blinking as they stared at the window toward me.
“Oh,” I gasped, sucking in air that I didn’t think would come.
“It’s okay,” said a soft voice as a hand ran through my hair, softly combing it.
I turned my head toward the voice and looked up. I wasn’t sure if I was seeing correctly as I took in the green eyes that were as dark as the forest around us, or the mouth I swore I had kissed hundreds of times, now pressed in a hard line of fear. I studied his face for a long moment, not believing he was real.
Troy. Troy was here.
As if seeing this idea register in me, his mouth curled up into a small smile.
“Hey you,” he whispered.
I blinked a few times.
“How?” I started, my mouth dry and desperate to ask questions I needed answers to.
“Shhh,” he said, placing a finger to my mouth gently. “Ask questions later.”
He pulled me closer to him, my face against his chest. I breathed him in, still not believing the mirage that was before me, holding me in the arms I never thought I would feel again.
As I felt him breathe, I looked through the trees and saw flashes of red and blue bouncing off them. The wind picked up and rustled the leaves, the air cold as it seeped through my clothes. I shivered and his warmth held me tighter. I heard footsteps and muffled voices approaching, and I buried my head in Troy’s chest, feeling overwhelmed.
“Mr. Gunner,” said a man gruffly.
Hearing someone else say his name meant someone else saw him too. He wasn’t an illusion. Troy was real. I wrapped my arms around his neck and clutched him tightly. His hands tightened their grip on me as I kept my face buried in his chest, his familiar scent enveloping me.
“Are you—is everyone…okay?” asked the man I could only assume was a police officer.
“I-I think so,” said Troy, his deep voice sounding in my ears like music. “But the driver…er… Veronica. She’s still in the car. I don’t know if she’s…”
Veronica. The woman who had abducted me. Troy’s ex-wife. That was who was behind the wheel. It was all coming together now as I pieced together the conversation before me. It had felt like a nightmare, but now I knew it was real. The red car. The speedometer arrow shaking on the dash. The sound of tires squealing. The crunch of metal around me.
She had been more dangerous, more deadly than I could have ever imagined. I couldn’t believe I had let her take me with her, accepting her bald-faced lie as the truth. I couldn’t believe I had fallen for it, and almost died because of it. But Troy was okay. He was here with me. There had been no accident, except my own.
“We’ll check it out,” said the police officer. “Paramedics are on the way.”
“Thank you,” said Troy.