Chapter 20: Above the Creek

We didn't take the mountain road.

Mace said so before we left the lot, and I agreed.

But the main road was closed at the river bridge, with a county sawhorse across it and no work crew anywhere.

"He had that done," Mace said. "It's the only way up."

"Then he's waiting up there."

"Probably."

"Then we go together," I said, "and we don't stop."

He nodded once.

We rode up in the dark with his headlight just off my left shoulder.

The road climbed in long wet turns, and every one of them was a place I had never wanted to see.

Above the creek, at the sharp left, the guardrail ran silver in our lights.

I knew the turn before I got to it.

I felt it in the soles of my boots.

A single headlight came on in the trees ahead of us.

It was a big engine, and it came at us fast.

"Mallory!" Mace shouted.

I braked, hard, and the little Sportster slewed on the gravel at the edge.

Ray's bike came out of the dark with no lights on its tail and a roar I could feel in my teeth.

He didn't swerve.

He was aimed straight at my front wheel.

Mace's Road King shot across my line.

I heard the crash before I understood it.

Steel on steel, and a hard cracking sound, and Mace's bike went over on its side and slid along the pavement and into the guardrail.

Ray's bike went the other way.

It hit the rail at the top of the turn and flipped, and Ray went over the handlebars and landed in the gravel on his back.

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