Treacherous Read Online Free PDF Page B

normalize.
    She looked
back at him, trying to comprehend what he was saying and comply. She couldn’t
stop shivering.
    “Listen to me.
Slow breath in, slow breath out. Just breathe with me. That’s it. Nice and slow.”
    Fiona never
took her eyes away from his, and eventually her breathing slowed. And the
shivering began to subside.
    “That’s
better. We need to think clearly. We don’t have much time.”
    After a moment
the tension, the panic, began to leave her body. “Okay, I'm okay,” she said.
    “In and out.
Deep breaths,” Luke whispered.
    “You smell
nice,” she said absently.
    Her comment
made him smile. “And you smell like Krispy Kremes,” he replied. “Delicious.”
    She forced a
laugh.
    “Start moving
things. One at a time,” he suddenly ordered. “Fingers, arms, ankles. Not too
much. Just make sure nothing is broken, that you can walk.”
    Fiona did as
she was told. “Good to go,” she said. “Except that I’m very thirsty.”
    “Fear does
that to people. Sorry to say, my martini spilled, so you'll have to stick it
out. We need to move on, leave here as fast as we can.”
    “What
happened?” she asked in a low voice.
    “The best I
can make out is that the train derailed, just as we crossed the Delaware from
New Jersey into Pennsylvania,” Luke explained, speaking casually so as not to further
panic her. “Most of the railway cars made it to the other side, but we are in
the last car.”
    “So we’re
still in New Jersey? Bummer.”
    Luke laughed
out loud, in spite of the situation. “Do you know,” he said, “that I just might
fall in love with you?”
    There was a
moment of electricity as their eyes met.
    “Happens to me
every time I’m in a train crash,” she said lightly, trying to break the
intensity of the moment. She licked her fingers, and wiped a dried patch of
blood from his forehead. “So what’s the plan?”
    Before Luke
could answer, the car shifted and they were sliding. The train car was twisting,
and turning over, as it slid downward toward the river, taking a stand of
willow trees with it. She clung to Luke, shaking, swallowing the scream in her
throat. He held her against him, his arms tight around her.
    People were
screaming again. And then, miraculously, the car bumped up against something, a
tree, a rock, or a small clump of bushes. It stopped with a jolt. The carriage
had somehow managed to right itself in the process.
    “I’m getting
you out of here,” Luke said. “But you must stay put. Don’t move.” He crawled to
the other side of the car, where the window was partially shattered. Pulling himself
up onto the seat, he lay on his back. Using both feet, he kicked out the rest
of the glass.
    “Come on.” He
held out his hand to Fiona who started crawling up toward safety. “Small,
careful movements. Nothing big. Just work your way to me.”
    She kept her
eyes on him, and did as he said. Just as she reached the window, a baby cried
somewhere behind them. Fiona froze. The cry was not loud enough. A baby in this
situation should be screaming its head off.
    Without a word,
both Luke and Fiona started crawling on their bellies, Marine style, toward the
whimpering. Hands clutched at Fiona.
    “Under the
seat,” a woman’s voice said weakly. “She's under the seat. I couldn’t hold on.”
The baby’s mother was pinned under the crushed wall of the carriage.
    “I’ll get her,”
Fiona told the desperate woman. “Don’t worry. I’ll get her.” And she inched her
way toward the baby sounds, brushing broken glass away from her path as she did.
    Luke stayed
with the woman. It took almost super-human strength, but somehow he managed to
pull her out from under the twisted metal of the train wall.
    The baby gave
another little cry, and Fiona slid under the seat. “There you are! Hi. Hi,
baby. Don’t be afraid. Everything’s going to be all right.”
    She reached
out, and carefully, very carefully, using the blanket the baby was wrapped in,