Chapter 30 - Caleb
I SMILE AS I WATCH her get into Jimi’s Mercedes. My sunshine has balls. Then my smile disappears as I remember how little driving experience she has. I shouldn’t be standing here with a smile on my face. I should be chasing Abby.
“I’ll get her!” I shout, blowing past Lynette and Brian who are standing in the middle of the driveway, dumbfounded.
I hop into the ’Cuda, silently thanking myself for leaving the top down. I blast the car horn for them to move out of my way so I can pull out of the driveway. It takes them a couple of seconds to figure out what’s going on. A couple of the longest seconds of my life. I want to shout at them to get out of the f*cking way. Finally, I pull the ’Cuda out of the driveway and peel out down the street.
She’s not even on Sandpiper anymore. She must have turned left or right on Lumina already, but I have no idea which way she went. I make it to the end of the street and inch forward into oncoming traffic, trying to get a glimpse of Jimi’s Mercedes speeding away in either direction. A horn blares in my left ear as the ’Cuda’s nose juts out into the street. I don’t give a shit. I’d block all the traffic on this damn street if that’s what it takes to find Abby.
Then I see it! The black Mercedes is heading for the Highway 74 on-ramp. I pound the horn a few times to warn people as I punch the gas pedal and gun it onto Lumina. I swerve to avoid a woman who’s getting ready to jaywalk, then I maneuver around a slow-moving pickup truck and spit curses when I hit a red light.
“F*ck!”
A large crowd of pedestrians crosses Lumina toward the beach, completely oblivious to the fact that their need to get to the water could cost Abby her life. I want to shout at them to hurry the f*ck up. Instead, I tap the steering wheel anxiously. Once the pedestrians have passed, I inch forward, checking for cross-traffic. A single gold Buick crosses Lumina, then I punch the gas, running the red light and leaving the car horns and slow pedestrians behind me.
My tires squeal as I turn onto Highway 74 at a dangerous speed. The ’Cuda fishtails a little on the on-ramp, but I manage to get it back under my control and I race forward onto the highway. I need to call her and tell her to pull over.
I fish my phone out of my pocket, glancing back and forth between the screen and the road as I hold down the voice command button and tell my phone to call Abby.
“Calling Gabby,” the pleasant voice responds.
“No!” I shout at the phone. “Call Sunshine! Call Sunshine!”
F*ck. Why did I have to change her name in my phone?
“Calling Sunshine,” the voice says and I let out a sigh of frustration.
The car in front of me slows down to exit, so I begin to switch lanes to get around them and the car next to me blares their horn.
“Shit!”
I try to swerve back into my lane, but the car in front of me has slowed down so much I’m going to clip his rear bumper.
“Hello?” Abby’s voice is soft, almost tired, and it’s the last thing I hear before I drop the phone onto the floor of the passenger side.
I slam on the brakes to avoid hitting the car in front of me, grumbling as I wait for the car to exit the highway. Then I punch the gas again for two reasons. First, so I can catch up with Abby. And second, so the inertia will make the phone slide backward across the floor of the car toward me.
I keep one eye on the road in front of me as I reach for the phone, but it’s just out of my reach. I take one long look at the road ahead of me and it’s clear, so I take a chance. Keeping one hand on the steering wheel, I throw myself across the seat and grab the phone.
“Abby!”
When I sit up, the ’Cuda is drifting to the left, right into an eighteen-wheeler truck. I swerve to the right, but I overcorrect and my 65-year-old car shreds through the guard railing as if it were Swiss cheese. The front wheel goes over the edge of the overpass and my first instinct is to slam on the brakes. But the moment I do this, the tail of the ’Cuda flies upward as the nose goes over the edge. All I can think as I’m thrown from the car into the deep ravine is that I failed.