Chapter 13 - THE CRASH AT DEVIL’S BEND
"Hold on to Noah!" Daniel shouted, wrenching the wheel hard to the right.
Metal shrieked against metal as the heavy front bumper of the Escalade sideswiped the station wagon. Sparks exploded into the darkening twilight like miniature fireworks. The impact violently jolted Clara against the door frame, her arms locking Noah into his car seat with maternal ferocity. Noah screamed, a high, piercing cry of pure terror.
"Hang on, Noah! Daddy's got us!" Daniel roared.
The Escalade swung wide, preparing for a devastating T-bone blow that would send their lighter wagon hurtling through the wooden guardrail and plunging three hundred feet into the churning white water of Blackwood River. Through the SUV's pitch-black windshield, Clara caught the momentary silhouette of a driver in a tactical vest, lifting a suppressed pistol.
*They don't want us alive,* Clara realized in horror. *They only want the boy.*
Ahead loomed Devil’s Bend—a vicious hairpin turn flanked by a rusted runaway truck ramp covered in deep gravel. Daniel slammed his foot on the brake pedal with explosive force. The tires wailed in agony, burning rubber filling the cabin as the station wagon skidded sideways. The Escalade driver, anticipating Daniel would accelerate through the turn, shot forward at ninety miles per hour.
Realizing his fatal miscalculation too late, the assassin hit his brakes, but physics was merciless. The massive SUV clipped the edge of the guardrail, flipped end over end in a monstrous cartwheel of twisted steel and flying glass, and plummeted over the cliffside, crashing into the rocky riverbed below with a sound like a detonating bomb.
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Daniel didn’t stop to watch the smoke rise. He spun the wagon around, tires spraying gravel, and shot down an unmarked dirt logging road cutting deep into the coastal pine forest.
Noah was sobbing, trembling uncontrollably. Clara climbed into the backseat, gathering the little boy into her lap, burying her face in his hair as tears finally broke free. But beneath her sorrow, a fiery rage began to ignite. Victoria Sterling thought she was hunting animals. She had no idea she was backing a mother bear into a corner.
