The Wreck (2 page)

His eyes had gone dark with desire when
he glanced up at her. “It’ll be every bit as exciting.”

She wove her fingers into his hair.
“Bri,” she whispered. “I want you. Right now.”

He moved fast to get rid of their shorts
and wrapped the blanket tight around them.

Carly raised her hips, seeking him.

Brushing the curls back from her face,
Brian leaned in to kiss her. “I love you.” He filled her slowly and with more
patience than he should have had after waiting all day.

“I love you, too. So much it hurts
sometimes.” She worked her legs farther apart in the tight confines of the
blanket and took him deeper, so deep she couldn’t say where she left off and he
began.

“It’s not supposed to hurt,” he said with
a smile as he kept his hips still, possessing her as only he could. Gazing down
at her, he touched his lips to hers.

She squirmed under him, asking for more.

“Carly,” he gasped. “I can’t wait.”

Clutching him to her, she said, “Don’t.
Don’t wait.”

With a moan, he flexed his hips and cried
out. “Sorry,” he whispered, still breathing hard as he lay on top of her.

She skimmed her hands over his back,
which was slick with sweat. “For what?”

“You didn’t, you know…”

“I don’t care.”

“Give me a minute, and I’ll make it up to
you.”

“You don’t need to.”

His eyes danced with amusement. “Are you
saying no to having an—”

“Stop!” With her fingers over his lips,
she silenced him as her face heated with embarrassment. “Do
not
say it.”

He laughed. “What am I going to do about
you and your hang-ups?”

“Live with them?”

“How about I marry them instead? Will
that make it better?”

Carly stared at him. “What did you say?”

“Let’s get married. You’re freaking out about
living together, so let’s make it legal. Then you won’t have to spend the next
four years worrying about getting caught.”

“But, Brian,” she sputtered. “Our parents
will have a cow.”

“We’re going to do it eventually, so why
not now? We’re both eighteen. There’s nothing they can say.”

“They’re helping us with school
expenses,” she reminded him. “What if they refuse to do that if we get
married?”

“Do you really think they would? I think
my parents would rather we get married than live together on the sneak for the
next four years. And have you thought about the summers? We’ll be back to doing
it under the willow tree.”

Carly nibbled on her lip as she thought
it over. “Do you mean it? You really want to get married? Not just because of
my so-called hang-ups?”

“I can’t believe you’d ask me that. I
dream
about being married to you, Carly. I can’t imagine waiting four more years
until we can do it. We don’t have to tell anyone that we’re married if you
don’t want to.”

She shook her head.

“You don’t want to get married?”

“Of course I do. You know I do. But I
don’t want it to be a secret.”

“Carly Holbrook, I love you more than
anything, and I will for the rest of my life. Will you marry me?”

“Yes,” she whispered. “Yes, I’ll marry
you, Brian.”

He hugged her tightly. “We’ll talk to Fr.
Joe after mass on Sunday.”

“We should tell our parents first.”

“Probably,” he agreed. “So does this mean
we’re officially engaged?”

“I guess it does.”

He kissed her lips, her neck, and then
her breasts. “Good because I want to give my fiancée an orgasm.”

“Brian!”

His lips pressed against her belly, he
laughed softly. “I can see that getting engaged didn’t help with the hang-ups.”

“It might take a while,” she confessed.

“We’ve got the rest of our lives to work
on it.”

T
he night had turned cooler and the moon
had begun its ascent over the lake, but Brian and Carly made no move to leave
their secret garden—the only place they were ever truly alone. On this
momentous occasion, they were particularly reluctant to leave enchantment for
reality.

Carly snuggled closer to Brian, pulling
the blanket up over her shoulders against the chill. Usually they were fast to
get dressed after their voracious desire had been sated, but not tonight.
Caution had taken a back seat to the rare opportunity to linger.

“We should go,” he said.

“Not yet. Ten more minutes.”

“You’re awfully frivolous tonight.”

“I just got engaged, and the only place I
want to be is right here with my fiancé.”

He caressed her face and kissed her.
“I’ll get you a ring as soon as I can.”

“I don’t need one. Don’t spend the money.
We’ll need it for more important things like food.”

“I want you to have a ring,” he insisted.

“As long as I have you, I have everything
I need.”

“You’ll always have me.” He stretched and
yawned. “But we really should get going.”

When he would’ve sat up, Carly tightened
her hold on him.

“What are you doing?”

She slid her hand over his backside,
making him groan. “I’m going to my grandmother’s this weekend. Who knows when
we’ll get another chance?”

“We’ve never done it three times before.”

“First time for everything.”

“You’ll be sore.”

She urged him onto his back and straddled
him. “I don’t care.”

“Carly,” he whispered.

With a coy smile, she leaned forward to
kiss him, showering his face with fragrant curls. “You aren’t saying no, are
you?”

Looping the curls around his fingers, he
said, “I am definitely
not
saying no.”

“That’s good, because I don’t want a
husband who can’t keep up with me.”

The laughter that filled their secret
garden faded to moans as she lowered herself down on him.

They had been gone almost two hours by
the time they finally got dressed and began the mile-long walk to Brian’s house
to meet their friends. Above the lake, the moon cast a glow on the calm water,
but the path they took was dark and shaded from the moonlight by the canopy of
trees. The sound of crickets, another harbinger of spring, filled the air. When
Carly tripped over a tree root, Brian’s tight hold on her hand kept her from
falling.

“We can slow down a bit. A few more
minutes won’t matter. We’re already in for a serious ball busting.”

She cringed at the idea of the teasing
they would receive from their friends. “Can we tell them we’re engaged?”

“Shouldn’t we tell our parents first?”

After a moment of silence, they said,
“Nah.”

Carly giggled. “Like we could keep a
secret like this from them anyway. Michelle will be able to tell something’s up
in two seconds—if it takes that long.”

“True.”

They were about a hundred yards from
Tucker Road when the sickening screech of metal colliding with something hard
and unyielding sliced through the peaceful night.

“What was
that?”
Carly asked as
they broke into a run.

“Do you smell smoke?” he asked a few
minutes later, panting from exertion.

“Yeah.”

Running as fast as they dared on the dark
path, Carly and Brian emerged from the thicket and stopped short at the sight
of an inferno. A car had hit one of the big oaks that lined the road and was
fully engulfed in flames.

“Oh my God,”
he gasped.

At the same moment the stench of burning
flesh reached the side of the road where they looked on in horror, it
registered with Brian that the car was his own station wagon. “
No!
” he
shrieked, bending at the waist as if he had been punched.
“Sammy!
Noooooooooo!”

In an effort to break free of him, Carly
tugged at the grip he had on her hand.

“No, Carly!”
He lifted her off her feet to keep her
from bolting across the street.

She struggled to break free.
“We can’t
just stand here!”
she shrieked
. “We have to do something!”

Tears coursed down his cheeks as he
turned her face into his heaving chest. “There’s nothing we can do.”

The initial blast of flame began to die
down, making ghastly silhouettes of the bodies burning inside the car.

“Don’t look,” Brian said, choked by sobs
and acrid smoke. “Please don’t look.”

Despite his pleas, Carly turned her face
toward the heat and stiffened when realization set in. Her screams shattered
the night.

Standing by the side of the
road, across from the smoldering remains of the car, his brother, and five of
his best friends, Brian Westbury felt the fragile hold he had on his childhood
give way to the stark, agonizing reality of adulthood. While the paramedics tended
to Carly, who had screamed herself hoarse, the first cop on the scene focused
on him.

“Do you know where your father is
tonight?” asked Lieutenant Matt Collins, a man Brian knew well. Brian’s father
was the chief of police, and his officers would need his guidance as the full
magnitude of the tragedy began to seep through the smoke. That the chief had
lost the younger of his two sons maybe hadn’t occurred to Matt yet.

Brian ran a trembling hand over his face.
“They went to my aunt’s in Cedarville.”

“Do you know the number there?”

Brian’s voice broke as he rattled off the
number. “You aren’t going to tell him it’s Sam over the phone, are you?”

Lieutenant Collins put his arm around
Brian’s shoulders. “No, son.” He barked out orders to the cops who had arrived
after him, sending one of them to call in the chief’s contact number to the
dispatcher. When Brian’s knees buckled, the lieutenant eased him to the ground
and sat next to him.

“Is Carly all right?” Brian asked. He
couldn’t see her with the paramedics hovering over her, but her agonized
shrieks continued unabated.

“They’re taking good care of her. Don’t
worry.” With his hand on Brian’s shoulder, the lieutenant’s voice was gentle.
“I know this is awful for you, Brian, but can you tell me who was in the car
with Sam?”

Brian took a deep breath and recited the
names of five people who meant more to him than life itself. That they were all
gone was simply unimaginable. The staggering weight of the tragedy settled over
him, and sobs shook his body. Lieutenant Collins put his arms around Brian and
held him until he had collected himself.

“I can ask the paramedics to give you
something if you think you need it,” the lieutenant offered. “There’s no shame
in taking the edge off after what you’ve just witnessed.”

Brian shook his head and wiped his face.
“I need to be clearheaded for my mother and Carly.”

“Can you tell me what you saw?”

While they waited for the medical
examiner to arrive, the other cops secured a perimeter around the wreck and
held back the small group of onlookers that had gathered.

“We didn’t see it happen. Carly and I
were walking on the path from the lake when we heard the car hit the tree.”

“What did it sound like?”

“A huge boom followed by the crunch of metal.”
If he lived forever, Brian would never forget that sound.

“Did it sound like an explosion?”

“Not really, but I can’t be sure. It
happened so fast.” Brian swiped at the tears on his face and struggled to
continue. “We ran as fast as we could, but we were still quite a ways from the
road. By the time we got here, the car was burning.” He began to cry again at
the memory of the burning bodies and Carly’s horrified screams. With a
certainty he couldn’t explain amid the thick fog of shock and disbelief, he
knew he would also never forget the sight of the people he loved burning in the
car, the sound of Carly’s screams, or the horrific smell of death.

“You know I have to ask if Sam was
drinking tonight,” Lieutenant Collins said tentatively.

Brian shook his head. “We were together
earlier at Toby’s house, but there was no booze. They went out for pizza while
Carly and I took a walk. You can check at Ricardo’s to see what they had, but
they don’t serve us there. They know we’re not legal.”

“I appreciate you keeping it together,
Brian. Your dad would be proud of you. I’m going to have someone take you home
now to wait for your parents.”

“I want to stay with Carly.”

“Let me see what’s going on with her.
Stay here.”

Brian rested his head on his knees and
imagined his parents receiving the call every parent dreads. New tears filled
his eyes at the thought of his mother hearing Sam was dead, that he had burned
to death along with five other kids who had been in and out of their house for
so many years his parents considered them their own.