Desert Gift (40 page)

“As if moving four miles per hour on the freeway could technically be referred to as driving and thereby a breaking of the law.”

She laughed out loud. If her husband were there, he’d roll his eyes and question once again his sanity for marrying a lawyer. River swore her favorite pastime was looking for a fight. After three years, though, his rolling eyes still sparkled whenever he said it.

The radio announcer wrapped up his report. “The time is now twelve minutes and thirty-five seconds past ten o’clock.”

And then the shaking began.

As always, the unexpected movement registered about half a point on Teal’s scale of awareness. One eye on her phone, one eye on the Iowa license plate of the minivan in front of her, she inched forward and braked. Her body trembled as if she were on a train.

“What . . . ?”

And then her coffee mug jiggled and rattled in its holder. Static hissed from the radio.

“Nooo.”

The mug bounced onto the floor.

Yes.

Adrenaline surged through her. What to do? What to do?

Duck, cover, and hold on to a sturdy piece of furniture.

In the car? She was in the car!

Teal dropped the phone to her lap, shifted into park, and grasped the steering wheel tightly with both hands. It shook. Her body quivered. The car vibrated. Her seat belt constricted. The glove box popped open. The world rumbled, a hurtling train on rickety tracks to nowhere.

Her pulse throbbed in her throat. Her thoughts raced in circles. What to do? What to do?

If you are driving, stop.
Okay. Okay.
Move out of traffic.

Out of traffic? Not a chance.

She caught sight of the driver to her right. He clutched his steering wheel, his sunglasses askew, his face scrunched shut. Waiting. Holding his breath.

Teal had learned to deal with earthquakes. She and her daughter had lived in Southern California for fifteen years. Tremors came. She panicked. Maiya grinned. Tremors went. She walked off the adrenaline rush. Maiya laughed. They talked about what they should have done. Life got back to normal.

These tremors should have
gone
by now.

People should be exhaling by now.

She should be out of the car by now,
whew
ing with those Iowa tourists in front of her, exchanging nervous chuckles, talking about Disneyland.

Do not get out of the car.

Do not stop under an overpass.

She stared at the overpass. According to the huge green sign to her right, the upcoming exits at the overpass lay one quarter of a mile ahead. Hers was one of them.

Cars and vans and pickups and semis and SUVs and RVs moved where there was no space for movement. Drivers jockeyed to get out from under the bridge. Horns blared. Metal crunched against metal.

And then the tremors went. The shaking stopped. It was over.

Or not.

In horror Teal watched the chain reactions of vehicles slamming and shoving and sliding into each other not far ahead of her. Straight lanes of traffic were now a massive logjam of cars facing every direction.

And then the unthinkable.

The overpass shifted. It happened in agonizingly slow motion.

The right-side concrete abutment twisted, a giant robot turning, losing his footing, falling, falling, falling. It splayed out over the freeway below, over five lanes of logjam. Then the bridge above it toppled across five lanes of logjam.

The air exploded with shrapnel. Crashing noises reverberated.

Teal burst into tears, released the seat belt, turned off the engine, and ducked. She squeezed herself under the dashboard, covered her head with her arms, and began shaking all over again.

The first aftershock hadn’t even hit yet.

* * *

River Adams gazed up at the rafters of the garage ceiling. If it had been The Big One, he would be buried under those beams instead of a mountain of blue plastic storage tubs.

Teal.
Where was she? “Please, Lord.”

A sharp pain shot through his right side. It had the familiar
as long as I don’t breathe, I’m fine
tug of a broken rib.

Many of the tubs were full of books. Or rather had been full of books before crashing on top of him. The entire set of Anne of Green Gables hardbacks lay scattered about. They belonged to Maiya, his fifteen-year-old stepdaughter, a childhood collection she could not bear to part with.

Teal’s panic would be sky-high. Maiya would be laughing.
Whoa, dude! 5.9 at least.

They would be . . . if they were okay.

River refused to follow that rabbit trail. His girls had to be okay. In the four years since he had met them, they had become the center of his universe. Teal was the epitome of femininity with her big gray eyes, bouncy personality, and short black hair framing a heart-shaped face. Maiya called him Riv and seemed more his own than Teal’s in some ways. Her easygoing attitude did not come from her mother, nor her goofy sense of humor.

And the icing on the cake? They adored him.

He needed to reach his girls.

Taking shallow breaths, River pushed aside what he could from his upper body. The majority of the tubs pinned his legs against the concrete floor. From their weight, he suspected they contained Teal’s law books and files. When he had moved into her bungalow, she cleared space in her office for him to use for his teaching materials.

He broke out in a cold sweat and lay still.

“I’d say we’re pushing a seven, Maiya. Epicenter . . . really close.”

It was the worst he’d experienced in his forty-two years, all lived in the Los Angeles area.

Just before the earthquake struck, he had carried a trash bag out to the garage and put it in the can at the far end. As he walked back toward the kitchen door, the world started its belly dance. There was nothing in the attached single-car garage to duck under or hold on to. He covered his head with his arms and made a dash for the house.

The dash ended abruptly. The bins struck him, cannonballs shot at close range and full force. Whoosh, straight out from the wall where they were stacked. He went down, flat on his back.

Slowly, River pushed aside some books and felt for the phone attached to his waistband.

It wasn’t there.

He scanned the floor and saw it.

Under the corner of a bin.

Crushed.

He struggled to break free of the trap, his side screaming for him to stop moving, to stop breathing.

They have to be okay! They have to! You owe me, God! You owe me this one!