Chapter 9: The Road

I told my cousin to keep the brake line and to say nothing to anyone but Fern.

Then I went back in and told Clifford the Buick had a leak.

He looked at me for a long second.

"A leak," he said. "How inconvenient."

"We'll take Meredith's car."

"I'm coming too," said Meredith, from the doorway. "You aren't taking him to the doctor alone."

"Routine checkup," Clifford said, smooth as ever. "At my age everything's routine."

I put him in the back seat and Meredith in the front.

I took the wheel of her small blue sedan, because it was the only thing on the property with working brakes.

We took the beltway toward the hospital.

The traffic was thin. It was a gray day with a low sky.

I noticed the black SUV at the second exit.

It sat three cars back, then two, then one.

"Meredith," I said. "Buckle up."

"I am buckled."

"Tighter."

She turned to look at me.

The SUV hit us from behind.

It wasn't a tap. It was a hard shove, and the sedan's back end slid sideways.

Meredith screamed, and Clifford said, "Oh, for heaven's sake," from the back seat.

I held the wheel and let the car swing.

The road crossed the river ahead of us on a long, low bridge with concrete rails.

The SUV came up on our left side and nosed toward our door.

They wanted to push us into the rail.

I looked at the rail, and for one second I was somewhere else.

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