She nodded. “Let’s go check on the girl.”
My stomach hollowed out. I’d hit someone. I hit a person.
What if I killed her? This was not happening. Could not be happening. I yanked my seat belt off and shoved the deflating airbag to the side enough to find the door handle. My head swam, and my vision tilted, but I blew it off. I had to help the girl.
She was all that mattered right now.
“What was she doing in the middle of the road like that?” I yelled.
“I don’t know! Come on!” Jessa said.
My head spun as I fumbled with the door handle, and a wave of nausea threatened to pull me under. Finally, I managed to get out of the Jeep and hustled around the front. My hood was right up against the car the girl was standing near, so I was blocked. I bolted around the back end to find Jessa leaning over a sprawled-out girl.
“Hey. Are you okay?” she asked.
The girl was lying on her back, auburn hair splayed all over the ground, a deep contrast to the thin layer of white snow coating everything. The girl held something furry in her left arm tight to her chest.
She was wearing a maroon GORE-TEX jacket, tight black leggings, and what looked to be running shoes. She couldn’t have been out here running, could she? No, no way. It was freezing and the streets were coated with ice.
“Is she dead?” I asked, praying like hell that she wasn’t.Please don’t be dead. Please…
Her eyes flung open, and she gasped.
The bundle in her arms wiggled and let out a high-pitched bark. How the heck had she held onto a freaking dog while getting hit by a car?
“Oh my gosh!” Jessa gasped.
“You’re okay,” the girl said, looking at the dog. “Thank goodness.” She stroked the dog, then sat up suddenly. “Wait, where’s my car?”
Jessa pointed to an embankment to my left. “Is one of those yours?”
“Son of a bitch!”
I’d collided with both vehicles, but the Ford SUV got most of the damage. The front end had crumpled and the windows were smashed.
“You wrecked my car!” She sat up, holding the dog, her glare ripping a hole through my chest.
“I’m so sorry,” I said. “Are you okay? Are you hurt?”
“Well, I don’t see any blood.” She held up a hand and wiggled her pointer and middle fingers. “Oh, ouch! I can’t move my wrist.” She held it close to her chest, her fingers directly next to the little dog’s face. “I can’t feel my fingers. They’re tingly.”
My gut clenched. A wave of jittery energy coursed through my legs, and I was pretty sure they were going to give out. The adrenaline crash was hitting hard, and the world tilted slightly. A headache bloomed at the base of my skull. It knocked, hard, too, like Wind was taking slap shots at my head.
“I’m going to call 911,” Jessa said.
Jessa helped the girl, who looked like she was about our age, to a seated position a few feet away from me. We were on the shoulder of the road, next to my Jeep, so Jessa propped her against the front passenger-side wheel. The bundle of fur wiggled in her grasp.
“This little guy needs some attention. Found him on the road.”
“Ryan, your head!” Jessa was suddenly in my face, examining me. “Let me see.”
A wave of pain swept over me, and it felt like I’d been kicked in the stomach. This was not good. Not good at all. It was after midnight, which meant we were all out driving past the state-mandated curfew, and here we were, sitting on the side of the road, two banged-up cars.
“Oh my gosh, that looks deep! Hang on.” Jessa reached into the passenger’s side of the Jeep and then pulled out one of her mittens. “Here, use this. Put pressure on the cut. That’s always what they say to do in TV shows.”
She slapped her maroon mitten against my head, and a jolt of pain sliced down the side of my face. “Easy!”
“Sorry!”