Lillian was belted in, but she felt as if she were being flung about in dizzying circles. Glass shattered and steel collapsed all around them. Surely, the entire world was exploding in a violent, thunderous end to all existence.
When at last they slammed into a grove of poplars and the world went quiet and still, it took a few seconds for Lillian to wake from the shock of the crash and become aware of her heart pounding against her rib cage.
“Freddie?”
She felt no pain. Was she bleeding? No. She was alert. Hyperalert, in fact. Sparks of adrenaline shot through her veins like bullets.
“Freddie!”
He was slumped forward over the steering wheel, and his face was covered in blood. Fearing the worst, she reached out and touched his arm.
He lifted his head and groaned.
“Are you okay?” she asked. “Look at me.”
He turned his befuddled gaze in her direction and cupped his nose with both hands. “I think I broke my nose.”
The fact that he was speaking to her in full sentences was a good sign, so she unbuckled her seat belt, opened the car door, and found herself looking straight down the nearly vertical side of the forested mountain. Her stomach spun like a wheel.
“Oh my God. We have to get out on your side. Hurry. Get out!”
He fumbled to unbuckle his seat belt and fought to open the driver’s side door, but it was mangled from their trip down the hill and wouldn’t open. Overwhelmed with panic, he slammed his shoulder against it, but that only made the car rock back and forth, creaking and groaning.
“Stop!” Lillian shouted. “Don’t move.”
Just then, the back door on the driver’s side swung open, and a man peered in at them. “Is everyone all right?” He spoke with a British accent.
Lillian was never so happy to see another human being in all her life. “I think so, but we can’t open the door.”
He glanced over the exterior of the vehicle, then peered in at them again. “Right. That door’s finished. Can you climb over the seat, into the back, and come out this way?”
The man looked at Lillian as he spoke, but Freddie was first to scramble out of the driver’s seat, crawl into the back, and spill out onto the steep slope at the man’s feet.
Lillian crawled out next, her thoughts ablaze with the terrifying possibility that the poplars would bend and snap and the car would tip sideways and fall over the edge of the mountain before she could make it to safety.
“Give me your hand,” the man said. “That’s it. You’re doing fine. Out you come.”
She fell onto her hands and knees, never so happy to see blades of grass up close. Fisting big clumps of them in her hands, she shut her eyes, pressed her cheek to the ground, and breathed in the heady scent of the earth.
A hand came to rest on her back. “Are you hurt?”
She sat back on her heels. When she finally lifted her gaze, she saw Freddie rising unsteadily to his feet beside her and realized she was shaking uncontrollably.
The man who had come to their rescue knelt beside her. His green eyes studied her with concern. “Can you stand?”
“I think so. I’m just a little shaken up.”
“No wonder.” He helped her rise, then spoke to Freddie. “Are you all right as well?”
“I think so.”
The man glanced up the steep slope. “My car is up there. Can you both make it up the hill?”
“I can do it,” Lillian replied.
“Me too,” Freddie said.
The man remained at Lillian’s side, helping her stay balanced as she made her way up to the road and finally to a silver Mercedes convertible parked on the shoulder.
Lillian hobbled toward Freddie, who had reached the top first. “Are you okay?”
“I don’t know.” He was cupping his bloody nose.
“We should get you to a hospital,” she said.
The man stayed close. “I can take you. It’s not far. Hop in.”
Lillian got into the front seat, and Freddie slid into the back. As the man turned the key in the ignition, Lillian shaded her eyes and pointed at the buildings on the hilltop. “That’s where we were going. I’m supposed to start work there today.”
“At the winery?”
“Yes.”
It was madness to worry about her job at such a moment, when Freddie’s nose was bleeding all over his trousers, but she obviously wasn’t thinking clearly.
The man spoke with understanding. “It won’t be a problem. That’s my winery.” He pulled onto the road. “What’s your name?”