Page 16 of The Grave Robber

I tugged it tightly around her and held the ends in aclenched fist, daring her to get it off. She was soaked to the bone and hadjust saved a life. I wouldn’t have made it in time without her help. And hererratic driving. She deserved a warm blanket.

“Is he okay?” the truck driver asked for the fiftieth time.“My damn defroster doesn’t work. I’ve told my company a dozen times.” Hescraped a hand down his face and walked off when he got a call.

“How did you get down there so fast?” Bobby asked. He wasstanding in the rain, holding onto his son with an arm over his shoulders.“I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“Adrenaline?” I guessed. Though the long legs didn’t hurt.

“You saved my life,” Zachary said, and I couldn’t be certainhe wasn’t still drunk. His words were slightly slurred, either from the alcoholearlier or the cold. As warm as the day had been, the rain felt like an ice stormin January.

I grinned at him. “Can I ask you something, kid?”

He winced at my use of the wordkid, but I had adecade on him, and I was going to use it.

“Why were you drinking so much?”

His eyes widened, and he cast a sideways glance at his dadbefore asking, “You mean at the bar?”

I nodded as the EMT irrigated one of my deeper scrapesbefore placing a piece of gauze on top and wrapping it.

“What are you talking about?” Bobby asked him. “How much didyou drink?”

Zachary cleared his throat. “A lot. I had something to tellyou, and I didn’t know how.”

Bobby eased his hold to face him. “What’s going on?”

“First,” Zachary said, taking a cautionary step backward.This would be good. “Just know I’m going to finish college, okay? If it’s thelast thing I do, I’ll get my degree.”

“Okay,” his dad said, his voice and expression wary. “Andsecond?”

Zachary kicked a rock. “Second, Teresa’s pregnant.”

Bobby’s jaw fell open as Zachary kicked another pebble andlooked away. After taking a moment to absorb that bombshell, Bobby pressed hislips together and patted his son’s shoulder. “It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not. Mom is gonna freak.”

“True, but we’ll talk to her together.”

Seeing their close bond warmed my heart. Not like…a lot,though. Maybe a twelfth of a degree.

“Wait,” Bobby said, scratching his neck in thought. “Ithought your girlfriend’s name was Lauren.”

Zachary stuffed his hands into his pockets and said, “Itis.”

“Then who’s Teresa?”

Zachary cleared his throat, then said softly, “Lauren’s sister.”

Halle gasped then turned to me and patted my arm, pretendingnot to hear. “Maybe we should head back now.”

“I think that’s a good idea.” I hustled off the gurneydespite the EMT’s protests.

“I don’t know how to thank you,” Zachary said.

Finishing college would not be the last thing he did. I sawhis new-and-improved last moment, and it would not happen for a very longtime—though still too young in my book.

“You could lay off the carbs,” I suggested.

I waited a few seconds then looked again. Damn it. No oneever took dieting advice to heart. He would die in his late sixties of cardiacarrest. In his defense, most of the last moments I saw were practicallycemented in stone, which was why I rarely tried to change history. Today’soutcome was unusual.

---