Past the Broken Bridges

Chapter Thirty-One Banks

Chapter Thirty-One

Banks

I’m going to kill him.

Dialing his number for a third time, I pace where my truck should be. There’s only one person who knows where the spare key is, and I saw him leave the apartment over an hour and a half ago looking sketchy as hell.

He’s lost his damn mind.

“Pick up the fucking phone, Dawson,” I growl into the voicemail as soon as the recorded message finishes playing. “I’m not playing games. You crossed a line. If you’re not back in twenty minutes, I’m calling the goddamn police and getting your ass arrested.”

A lie, although tempting. So tempting.

And as if fate is taunting me for being such a pushover, I hear sirens blaring in the distance.

“What the…?” I hang up the phone and walk out toward the road, listening as multiple emergency vehicles roar by in the distance after the first siren sounds.

A few students who are walking from that direction look drunken and stirred as they head to some of the other student housing nearby, all looking behind them.

“What happened?” I ask one of the girls, who smiles at me.

She shrugs. “Somebody said there was an accident. I don’t know.”

One of the guys walking behind her stops beside me as his friends keep going. “My buddy said there was a head-on collision over on North.”

Ice coats every inch of me. “North Street or North Boulevard?”

The guy makes a face. “Uh…I don’t know, dude. Does it matter?”

Yes. Because the party Dixie told me she and Sawyer were going to is on North Street. I step closer, all but grabbing his shirt to stop him from walking away. “What did your friend tell you? Was it near a party? Did he say what vehicle? Who was involved?”

The group is clearly uncomfortable with my prying, and the guy I’m grilling holds his hands up when he sees the look on my face. “I think it was North Street, but I doubt you can get over there easily. If what Trevor said was true, they probably blocked it off.”

This time, I do grab his shirt. “ What did he say? ”

He winces, trying to get away from where my firm grip wrinkles his tee. “There are two people dead. Supposedly. Supposedly! But that may not even be true. You know how people get fired up. Rumors spread all the time about this stuff when it turns out to be nothing.”

Based on the sirens howling, I doubt it’s nothing.

I release him, letting him stumble backward until he almost falls into the road. One of his other friends catches him, cussing me out as I run into my apartment and grab my things.

The next twenty minutes are a blur.

I don’t know how I get across town or how I manage to avoid all the police officers who have multiple roads blocked as EMS and firefighters work on the scene.

But suddenly I’m there, along with a massive crowd of onlookers trying to get a better picture of the mangled mess of metal and debris of two overturned cars that’s destroyed the road.

From here, I can tell one thing for sure.

That’s my truck that’s upside down.

Or what’s left of it.

Elbowing my way to the front of the line that officers have taped off, I say, “I need to get through.” I’m unapologetic as I shove people to the side, working my way to the front until a police officer stops me.

“Whoa,” she says, holding her hands out to prevent me from going farther. “I can’t let you pass this line. You need to stand back, sir.”

I ignore her, grabbing ahold of the tape anyway. “I need to get through. That’s my truck. My friends are there.”

“Sir,” she repeats, blocking me with her body. She barely comes up to my chest, so I could easily overpower her if I needed to. “If those are your friends, you need to let my colleagues do their jobs without getting in the way.”

I can’t keep my eyes off the ambulance putting somebody into the back. It’s too far away to see. Moving my gaze down to the stern-faced blond in front of me, I ask, “Are they okay?”

Something crosses over her face before her expression neutralizes. “I’m not allowed to say, but…” Lowering her voice, she says, “If they are your friends, I’m sorry.”

I’m sorry.

My legs suddenly feel weak. “Sorry?” I whisper.

From the radio attached to her uniform, I hear a male say, “Two confirmed dead. Caucasian male, twenty-one years of age. Caucasian female, twenty-one years of age.”

Somebody beside me gasps.

I drop to the ground.

“Sir,” the officer says, trying to help me up.

Not willing to believe my ears, I use the advantage to dart under the tape and run faster than I ever have toward the accident site. There are tons of people in uniforms working around the mangled vehicles blocking the street, the car partially under my totaled truck smoking as firefighters work on it.

“Sir,” a male officer calls out from somewhere to my right.

I search frantically until I see blond hair on the opposite side of the street, the body small and curled into itself on the edge of the sidewalk.

Holy shit. I know before I can even process the features of the person on the curb that it’s Sawyer.

My Sawyer.

Swallowing down the realization that somebody else died, I manage to break free from the officers attempting to restrain me, and I run to her.

“Sawyer,” I scream.

She keeps rocking, mumbling words to herself that I can’t understand until I’m dropping to my knees in front of her.

“Sawyer,” I repeat, examining the blood caked to her face and hair.

She’s saying something under her breath.

I try tilting her chin up, but her body is frozen.

In shock.

As she continues to rock, I try listening to the words she’s saying over and over again. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

I shake my head, moving hair out of her face and trying to get her to look at me. “Sawyer, I don’t know why you’re saying you’re sorry. If it’s about the truck, I don’t give a fuck.”

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

When I swipe my hand along the hair framing her face, I stare wide-eyed when I see slivers of red underneath. Suddenly, the blond disappears, falling behind her until short strands of youthful red are revealed beneath my fingertips. “Sawyer—”

Two hands grab ahold of me from behind, pulling me away from the girl who looks so much like the one I knew.

Red hair.

Blue eyes.

Tom Sawyer . It’s a book.

“Sir, you need to move away, or we’ll be forced to arrest you for obstruction. We can’t have anybody else back here right now.”

I jerk out of his hold, uncaring of what happens to me. Kneeling back down, I cup Sawyer’s face until she finally meets my eyes. I look at her. Really look.

I’m Sawyer. Like Tom Sawyer . It’s a book.

Her lips are moving, but nothing is coming out. Over and over, they form silent words. Her arms are wrapped around herself. “What are you saying, Birdie?”

Her head shakes slowly, her blue eyes glazed and distant until they finally see me. A shallow breath escapes her. “It should have been me.”

It’s the last thing she says before two officers haul me away, one of them handcuffing me and another talking into his radio.

But all I can hear are those five words.

It should have been me.

They haunt me as I’m guided into the back of the cop car.

It should have been me.

They echo in my head as I’m driven away from the redhead who’s being looked over by the paramedics that take my place.