Once, when she was much younger, Holly had a dream in which the bridge featured prominently. Her dad had given way to the traffic coming toward them, then nosed the car out and started to cross.
Then the car engine stopped.
To add to the trouble, a car was headed straight for them from the other direction. Instead of holding back and giving way, it was trying to force its way through and make them retreat.
As the cars sat, one idling, one stalled, the bridge began to shudder, crumbling under the weight. Before Holly woke, screaming, she had felt the car tip and plunge toward the river beneath.
Crossing it since had made her nervous.
“Faster or slower?”
“Pardon me,” Holly said, trying to look anywhere but out the windows.
“You’re scared. Would it be better if I drove faster or slower?”
“Faster and please don’t judge me if I close my eyes.”
“There’s no judgement here. The only thing I’m curious about is how you made it over the bridge, to begin with.” After a moment’s pause that verged on uncomfortable, Dale continued, “Please don’t tell me you came over the exact same way.”
Holly gave a brittle laugh. “Scouts honour, I looked at the road.”
Holly’s heartbeat raced and sweat beaded out on her forehead. With her eyes still squeezed shut, she reached up and pulled down her daisy crown, wiping her brow with a surreptitious jerk of one hand.
“Almost there,” Dale reassured her. “Nothing’s coming the other way.”
Even though she knew it was stupid, Holly’s jaw continued to clench harder. If they didn’t get over the other side soon, a headache would reward her for the remainder of the day.
Then Holly felt the vehicle gain speed and turn. She cracked open one eye to investigate just as Dale happily announced, “We’re over.”
Holly breathed out a shaky sigh of relief and rubbed her damp palms together. “You must think I’m an idiot.”
“Lots of people don’t like bridges,” Dale said. “My mother couldn’t stand it, either. I think that’s why she stayed with my dad as long as she did—the only alternative was taking the one bridge out of town.”
He turned the car off the main route back to Christchurch, onto an old gravel road winding down the side of the hill.
“I’m sorry.” Holly sat up straighter in the seat, knocking the daisy chain to the floor. “I didn’t realise your parents had split up.”
“That’s old news. Even the hardiest of town gossips have moved on with their chatter.” Dale winked at her. “Though I’m trying to convince Dad to sign up for Tinder. If I succeed, that’ll get their tongues wagging again.”
Holly laughed and bent forward, minding the dashboard, to stretch her fingers out for the daisy chain.
“Are you okay?”
“Just dropped something,” Holly said, trying desperately hard not to grunt.
For a moment, her brain couldn’t understand what had happened. They were travelling along, gravel crunching under their wheels. The next second, she was flying, her neck striking the dashboard and her body hitting the roof as she tumbled out of her seat restraints.
Down was now up. A branch crashed through the front windscreen, filling the car with the sharp tang of pine.
Holly blinked, looking at the world from an entirely different angle. They’d gone off the road and flipped.
As she understood the only thing standing between them and a fall down the hill was a pine tree, the boot began to creak ominously, and the weight of the four-wheel-drive shifted.
Her worst nightmare was coming true.
Chapter Fourteen
Dale asked, “Are you okay?”
Holly had to twist her head around to look at him. While her position in the car at the moment it drove off the road left her free of the seat belt, the restraints held Dale fast. At her angle, it looked like his hair was standing on end. In another time or place, it would be funny.
“I think so.” Holly tried to move, then froze as the tree gave a second ominous creak. Now that her worst fear had come to pass, she didn’t need it to escalate.
Dale reached across to the release of his seat restraints. Holly held her hand out, wanting to stop him, scared that any change in position would cause the car to break free and tumble down the mountain. That was stupid, though. There only hope now was to get out and make it back to the road.
“What happened?”
“A car drove us off the road.” Dale pressed the button, and nothing happened. He twisted his body to try again. “I thought at first it just didn’t see us, but then it came level and drove at my door.”
“Someone just tried to kill us?”
Holly’s fear exploded in an escalation that she wouldn’t have believed possible. She turned her head to look up through the rear window of the car, expecting to see a killer coming down to finish them off.
Nobody was standing there.
A second later, Holly’s neck went into a spasm, turning rock hard. She cried out from the pain of the tensed muscle. Dale struggled to free himself with more urgency.
“What? What is it?”
“My neck. It doesn’t matter. It just hurts. How are we getting out of here?”
Dale’s belt sprang free, and he fell, knocking face-first onto the roof of the vehicle.
Behind them, the tree gave another groan.
“Can you open the door?”
As the pain in Holly’s neck eased, she turned and felt for the handle. The handle lifted, but the door didn’t budge.
“Try putting some pressure on it.”
Dale manoeuvred himself, so he could also reach his door. Together, they fought to pop them open.
Finally, Holly’s door came free. She pushed harder, forcing it open. Gravity took hold and wrenched it all the way.
Holly inched toward the exit, stopping short as the tree offered another objection. When she looked through the passenger window, now facing straight down, Holly backed into the car.
“We can’t get out that way,” she said, her voice shaking with terror. “There’s nothing below us.”
Dale twisted his body to face back up the length of the vehicle. The nose was buried in the pine tree that stopped their fall. The back was only a half yard down from the edge of the road.
“Can you crawl up and open the hatch?” Dale asked, pointing. “You should be able to pull yourself onto the road.”
Holly desperately wanted to say yes. With each cell in her body swamped by fear, she wanted only to escape.
But her logic centre wouldn’t let her.
“You need to go first.”
“I’m not letting you stay in here while I escape,” Dale said in a stern voice. “Now, can you make it?”
“You’ve got a radio. You can call for help. Also, you’re stronger than me. You can help lift me up.”
“No. Ladies first.”
“If I get out and the car falls, then we’re both stuck. I can’t call for help. You can.” Dale’s refusal to accept her offer made her more determined. The stubborn streak that ran through her soul came to the fore.
“You know I’m right. Get up there. I don’t even know if I have the upper-body strength to pull myself onto the road. You do. Drop the heroics and do your job!”
Dale saw her logic, or maybe just his instinct to follow orders kicked in. He squeezed his body through the gap between their front seats, hauling himself into the back.
As Dale progressed, Holly tried to counterbalance his shifts in position. She moved closer to the centre of the car, then to the right as he swung his leg over the back seat.
With each shift, the tree protested loudly. Holly was grateful that the windscreen had shattered, staying in place but with a myriad of cracks that made it hard to see through. There was nothing in that direction that Holly wanted to view again.
“Just a moment, the door’s stuck.”
The hatch on the back of the vehicle should lift to
lie flat on the hillside. Instead, Dale struggled with it.
“I think there’s something caught in the hinges.”
Holly looked at the hatch, picturing the joint buckling as it hit the side of the road. “Can you kick it open? If you rest your weight on the rear seat, it should give you better leverage.”
After tracing the moves need with his eyes, Dale began to manoeuvre into position. Another twinge struck Holly, this time lower down her back. She fought to keep breathing through the pain. No yelling. It wasn’t allowed when Dale needed to concentrate on getting out.
When Holly thought she couldn’t endure the pain for another second, the spasm began to ease. Coldness seeped into the back of her thigh, despite the heat of the day. With horror, she realised that her back must be hurt worse than she’d first thought.
Now that he was in position, Holly could barely see Dale. His butt was visible through the gap that should be above the seat but was instead below.
“Are you ready?” he called out.
“Go for it.” Holly clenched her teeth and stiffened her muscles in anticipation.
The whole car shuddered with the blow as Dale kicked at the door. Again. The tree groaned. Holly wanted to raise her hands to block out the noise but was scared to move. Scared that another shift in her weight would push them over the tree’s tipping point.
“It opened up a little,” Dale called out. “Ready?”
“Just do it,” Holly called back through clenched teeth. She squeezed her eyes shut as though that would help the nightmare go away.
The vehicle shuddered once more with the impact. This time, along with the trees ominous creaking, Holly heard the squeal of metal on metal.
“One more.”
Again, the car shuddered. Tears streamed down Holly’s face. Coherent thought was leaving. Now, her mind just broadcast the same word, over and over. Please. Please. Please.
“The gap’s wide enough.” Dale moved. Holly was past the point where she could shift to offer a counterbalance. When she ordered her limbs to move, they refused.
“I can reach the road,” Dale called back, overjoyed. “I’ll need to step on the hatch. Are you ready?”
No. No. No. Please. Please. Please.
“Ready,” Holly called back from a throat as dry as a salt flat in the hot sun.
The car bucked as Dale’s weight concentrated on one point, then lifted off entirely. Below Holly, she could hear the tree screeching as though in pain—the trunk tearing its deep roots from the ground under the weight.
“Call for help,” Holly whispered, scared that volume would prove the final tipping point.
Dale’s voice seemed so far away. She should open her eyes to hear him better.
The lids stayed pressed together in furious denial of the request.
“Can you crawl up the vehicle?” Dale called out. “If you get to the point you can stand on the hatchback, I’ll be able to reach down to pull you up.”
A great suggestion. Also one that Holly’s body utterly refused to heed. The cold patch in her thigh spread further, nudging frost into the back of her knee and up around the curve of her hip.
“I’m coming,” Holly tried to shout. Instead, only a croak emerged.
“Holly? Are you still there? An ambulance and fire crew are on their way.”
How many minutes away from the stations are we?
The car shifted. Something dropped to a perilous fall far below.
“Don’t be stupid. Do it! Crawl up the car.” Holly’s voice was low but firm. The talking to jolted her into action. She reached an arm up between the seats and levered herself through the gap.
As her weight shifted, so, too, did the vehicle. A red cloud of panic swamped Holly’s brain, and she panted, waiting for it to clear.
One seat down, one to go. If Holly arched her body right, there’d be enough room to crawl under the gap. She stretched, using her elbows to hook her forward. She inched ahead, then slipped, her injured back hitting the top of the seats and howling with pain.
“Holly? Keep going. You’ve got this.”
No. Nope. I definitely do not ‘got this!’
Ignoring the internal voice of defeat, Holly levered herself forward again. Red pulsed in her vision with every beat of her heart. Her ears hummed as though an angry swarm of bees had taken up residence.
“You’re nearly there.”
Holly stretched her arm forward, feeling the ridge of the open hatch. She clung to it, moving her other arm up to join it. With an enormous effort, Holly pulled her body up.
The hatch door shifted in her slippery fingers, then began to pull itself closed under her weight. She struggled, trying to move her legs to press against the seatback. The cold one refused to move at all. The other slipped on the shiny leather, shifting her weight with it. The hatch closed further. Holly opened her eyes wide, catching a glimpse of Dale, flat on his belly, arm reaching for her.
The car began to slide to the side, gathering momentum as it moved until it broke free of the supporting pine.
Holly screamed as vehicle gathered speed, careening down the hillside.
Chapter Fifteen
“Holly? Can you hear me?”
Dale’s voice drifted through into Holly’s consciousness like it was floating on a cloud.
“Squeeze my hand if you can hear me?”
Holly tried, but now everything felt like it was a cloud. Her fingers were wisps of steam, her throat full of condensation puffed out like cotton candy.
“We’re going to cut through the door now. It’ll be noisy.”
Who was that? Holly frowned, wrinkling her nose as the sound of shrieking metal filled the air. A hot spark landed on the cloud of her forearm, and she puffed out her cheeks, trying to gather the energy to blow it away.
“You’re just trapped in between the door and the seats. That’s all the noise is, someone cutting in to free you.”
Pressure on her fingers. A knotted fireball in her back. Holly’s eyelids began to flicker, letting in shards of cruel light.
“I think she’s conscious,” Dale said, but not to her. “Do you want to get in here and check?”
Her fingers were dropped, and Holly wanted to call out for Dale to come back. She liked having her hand held. Simon used to do it, ages ago when they were first dating. It was the best feeling to grip tight onto somebody and have them hold you in return.
The light transformed into piercing needles. Holly tried to blink but even with her lids closed, the red glow bit into her, making them water.
“Mrs Waterston?”
Perhaps that’s when their relationship began to go sour. When Holly didn’t want to take Simon’s surname after marriage.
The name Waterston meant something to her, tied her to the family. Simon’s surname was Phillips. Ridiculous. Like having two first names.
The screech of rending metal stopped. The absence of noise was so shocking, it was nearly as loud as the sound had been.
“I’m going to run a pen up your foot, just to check for your reflexes.”
It tickled. Holly’s toes curled. The cloud was disappearing now, being replaced by hunks of muscle and flesh, all of it in pain.
“Can you pass me that neck brace? I’ll secure her as best I can, then we’ll lift her out. Are you ready?”
Was that Dale again?
“Ready,” she whispered back. Dale needed to kick out the back hatch so they could get free.
Her body lifted, the position change caused her neck to shift, and Holly opened her eyes and screamed. When a hand pressed on her shoulder, she tried to knock it away. Her arms were bound with restraints. Holly struggled in desperation, trying to wriggle free.
“Just keep still, Holly.”
Dale’s face appeared above her, a hand reaching out to cup the side of her face. Holly stopped fighting. She closed her eyes. Tonight, she must remember to tell Crystal that. For some reason, Holly felt sure it would delight her. The unfortunate girl needed somethi
ng to make her feel better. Dad’s death had really knocked her loose.
“Are you going to use the siren?”
“She’s onboard already. We’re looking after her. The noise would probably shock the patient and do more harm than good.”
A poke in her arm. Holly opened her eyes, blinking against the flood of light. Tears turned the brightness into a kaleidoscope of colours, twinkling.
“Dale?”
His face was instantly back above hers, the brow wrinkled in concern. This close up, Holly could see for the first time the signs of ageing. Creases ran out from the edges of his eyes and lines were deepening into wrinkles on his forehead.
“Holly, you’re in an ambulance. You’ve been in a car accident. Do you remember?”
No. Thank goodness. That sounded horrible.
Holly tried to point at her neck, show the paramedics where it hurt, but someone had dipped her arm in cement. She smiled. That was funny. They must be making her into a statue, unaware she was still alive.
“It won’t be long. We’re taking you to Hanmer Springs. A doctor will check out your spine for damage.”
Thank goodness. No way did she want to be like Mr Masters and be whisked back to Christchurch. Nothing good came out of that place, just heartbreak and betrayal.
“Where’s Crystal?”
Her sister should be here, shouldn’t she? Holly frowned. Wasn’t Crystal in some sort of trouble?
“Just lie back and go to sleep. We’ll be there soon.”
Holly closed her eyes and smiled. It was nice to be taken care of.
When she next opened her eyes, Holly felt like she’d gone ten rounds with a raging bull. Her neck contained nothing but pain. If she tried to move it, sparks of agony would fly down her limbs to set her fingers and toes on fire. Just breathing was an effort. Somebody needed to up her morphine drip. This was no way to run a hospital.
“You’re back!” Dale said, leaning over her.
Holly didn’t know what he had to smile about. She was in a world of pain, and he was grinning like it was the best day ever.
First Among Equals Page 10
