Page 2 of Crossing the Line
Waverly watched in horror as the motorcycle once again drew alongside her.
“Smile pretty for the camera, sweetheart,” he shouted. She saw the glint of a gold tooth.
He didn’t see the pick-up truck coming down the hill, but Waverly did.
“Jesus, look out!”
The photographer gunned the bike and swerved in front of her, clipping her bumper. She cut her wheel to the right and hit the brakes as Death Wish lost control of the bike and went into a slide.
She heard the scraping of metal on metal as the Mercedes met guardrail and felt a small sense of relief when there was no sickening thump of a human speed bump.
“Ma’am? “Ma’am?” the 911 operator’s dispassionate voice came through her car’s audio system.
“There’s been an accident,” Waverly said, her voice miles calmer than she felt. “We’re just south of Mountaingate. Send an ambulance.”
She cut her engine and shoved open her door. She hurried around the front of her car, her flip-flops echoing on the asphalt. Death Wish was facedown and motionless. His bike was a tangled mess wrapped around the guardrail.
“Crap,” Waverly muttered.
The pick-up truck had come to a harmless stop on the opposite side of the road. “Are you all right?” A man in his fifties decked out for a day on the golf course called out the window.
Waverly nodded. “Yeah. Are you?”
“Better than that asshole on the ground. I’m gonna move my truck back to the other side of the hill to control the traffic,” he told her.
Waverly nodded and returned her attention to Death Wish. She tiptoed her way through glass and metal to kneel down next to his unmoving body. Blood trickled from a dozen shallow scrapes on his legs, but it was the nasty gash on his forearm that looked dangerous. Blood was pumping out of the jagged tear at an alarming—and disgusting—rate.
“So gross,” Waverly muttered under her breath. They were miles from the closest hospital, which meant Death Wish might just get what he wanted if she didn’t do something.
She yanked her tank top off over her head and wrapped it around the wound. When she applied pressure, Death Wish flinched.
At least he wasn’t already dead.
When he started to move his legs in a bid to sit up, she shoved him back down. She flipped up the half visor on his helmet. “Stop moving or you’ll probably die,” she warned.
“Where’s my camera?” he whined through gritted teeth.
Waverly glanced around the debris field and then grinned.
“Ah, gee. It looks like your camera went over the cliff.”
“Un-fucking-believable. I’ve got Waverly Sinner involved in a car accident doing first aid with her shirt off and no god damn camera.”
“Un-fucking-believable,” Waverly agreed and flipped the visor back down.
“Holy shit.”
It looked like the driver of the Toyota had finally caught up. A shaggy stick figure in jeans and a camo t-shirt picked his way around Waverly’s car, fancy camera in hand.
“You know this guy?” she asked.
“Sure, that’s Douchebag Joe,” he nodded, still studying the scene with more curiosity than concern.
“Fitting,” Waverly muttered under her breath.
“Hey!” Douchebag Joe had apparently taken offense.
“He’s not dead?”
