Description
Dusk burned itself into the late summer sky, and the sun set fire to the heavens, burnishing the clouds in shades of orange and gold. Oh, it was beautiful all right, but it was blinding, as well, Carrie Williams thought, squinting as she drove into the light. Granted, she was on a dirt road barely wide enough for two cars. No one ever really drove down it except her and her husband. There wasn’t much out in the direction of their house, ten miles south of Kilbrough, Oregon, the nearest town. Still, Carrie prided herself on being safe, and, as her free hand reached down and smoothed the dress over her full belly, she knew she had a reason to keep staying safe.
“I think I need my sunglasses,” she whispered, reaching for the glove box. Yes, she should’ve kept them closer at hand, but she was lucky she’d even remembered to stow them in the car at all. Her fingers fumbled for them, and she’d barely shut the glove box when her cell began to ring.
Glancing at the display, she saw Robbie’s picture lighting the screen. He was probably looking for her and with good reason: she was an hour late and had a bad habit of not checking in. He’d merely been grumpy about that before she’d gotten pregnant, but now he was overbearing about it, and she tried to humor him. Today, she’d been shopping for his birthday present, and time had slipped past unnoticed.
She gauged how long it would take for her to get to the house versus whether she should answer the phone–not that she wanted to because she was driving–but he was probably out of his mind with worry, and she had been negligent. It was getting late. She should’ve been home long ago.
The phone kept ringing. “Crap,” she muttered and reached for her phone. Of course, her fingers pushed the cell off onto the floorboard.
Carrie glanced at the road, checking to make sure no other vehicles were coming as she undid her seatbelt. The road was clear, and the phone was still ringing. The one sure way to make Robbie get into his truck and drive to find her would be not answering. If he were worried, he wouldn’t just wait for her to get home, which meant she’d better go ahead and get it.
Holding her breath, she bent lower so her fingertips touched the phone, trying to grab it, but she wasn’t close enough, so she had to reach farther, sighing as her hand finally wrapped around its slick plastic surface. She didn’t like the way the car wobbled along, bumping down the road, and as she started to sit upright, she caught a glint of bright light in front of her, blinding her.
Horrified, she hit the brakes. The car suddenly started to slide as the flash of light blurred out of her way. What was that? she wondered, yet the next few seconds proved it didn’t matter. Her car suddenly began to flip over and over, leaving the road and heading toward a pasture. Her body bounced around the interior of the car with every motion, and her screams abruptly died to a whimper as the car finally came to a stop, Carrie still inside the mangled fiberglass body that had crumpled around her, crushing her legs.
Pain ripped through her body in every direction, and even though her eyes were open, everything was blurry and distorted. There was a haze she couldn’t explain, and even breathing was almost too much.
The baby, she thought, immediately trying to move her arms, but her body wouldn’t obey even the simplest command. Fresh pain shot through her while trying to free her hands from wherever they were trapped. She couldn’t even see enough to tell.
A shiver ran through her, and Carrie knew that was a bad sign. It was August. She should be burning up. She finally managed to clear some of the haze and discovered the problem: there was blood everywhere—her blood.
A wordless, desperate cry escaped her, and she wondered how much blood she’d lost and how much more she could stand to lose before…. Tears pricked her eyes as panic set it. No, it wasn’t about her. All she could think of was the baby who had never had a chance to take his or her first breath, the baby neither she nor Robbie had been willing to discover the gender of. They’d wanted a surprise.