Chapter 8 - THE COLLISION
The impact knocked my head against the passenger door window.
Brian screamed as the pickup truck fishtailed violently across the wet asphalt. David gritted his teeth, his muscles bulging as he fought the steering wheel, pulling the heavy truck back into its lane just before we hit a ditch.
"They're trying to push us off the road!" I yelled, gripping the dashboard for dear life.
"He won't risk crashing his eighty-thousand-dollar car!" David snarled, slamming his foot down on the brake pedal.
The pickup truck slowed down abruptly.
The Audi, expecting us to keep accelerating, shot ahead of us by thirty yards.
David instantly yanked the steering wheel to the left, taking a sharp, unpaved logging road that split off into the dense woods. The truck bounced wildly over deep ruts and mud, tree branches slapping against the windshield like whip cracks.
Behind us, we saw the Audi’s red brake lights flash as Richard Vance overshot the turn, skidding on the wet asphalt before reversing to follow us into the woods.
"Where does this trail go?!" I shouted as we bounced violently inside the cab.
"It leads to the old lumber yard!" David shouted over the roar of the engine. "It's a dead end, but there's a ranger station with a landline phone!"
The pickup truck roared through the thick mud, throwing up dark sprays of earth. But the old head gasket finally gave out.
White steam erupted from beneath the hood with a loud HISS. The engine sputtered, shuddered three times, and died completely.
The truck coasted to a halt in the middle of a muddy clearing surrounded by tall pine trees, fifty yards from an abandoned wooden cabin.
"Out! Out! Run for the cabin!" David yelled, throwing his door open.
We scrambled out of the cab into the pouring rain, slipping in the deep mud.
Behind us, bright halogen headlights swept across the clearing as the silver Audi roared into the lumber yard, blocking the only exit path.
The doors of the Audi flew open.
Richard Vance stepped out into the rain—a tall, heavily built man in a dark wool overcoat, holding a heavy iron flashlight.
Catherine stepped out beside him, wrapped in her white coat, which was quickly getting ruined by mud and rain. She didn't look like an angel anymore. Her hair was wild, her teeth bared, her eyes crazed.
"Give me my son, David!" Catherine screamed over the sound of the storm. "Give him to me right now, or Richard will make sure you spend the rest of your life in prison!"
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David stepped in front of Brian and me, raising his fists, his large frame shielding us completely.
"Touch him, Catherine," David said, his voice dropping into a low, terrifying growl that echoed through the woods, "and God himself won't be able to save your husband from me."
