The Hazel Wood (The Hazel Wood #1)(44)

“Hey. Wake up.”

“I am awake,” he said, muffled, then lifted his head like a turtle and blinked at the road. “Is that an accident?”

“I don’t know.”

As we got closer, the bleached shape of a policeman swam into view, a flare in each hand. I pulled up next to him and stopped.

He ducked his head down and peered into Finch’s window. He was wearing aviators nearly identical to mine. Combined with his mustache, they looked like a disguise. “You all need to turn around. Road’s closed for the foreseeable.”

“What happened?” I asked, peering through my windshield. I could see two cop cars and a handful of officers scattered between them. One was talking into a radio, holding it like an MC holds a microphone. Beyond them was a white SUV, half-on, half-off the road.

“Accident.” His voice was clipped, a shade below civil.

I flipped off my headlights to get a better look. The SUV’s doors were open, all four of them. There was a hump of something on the road beside it that made my throat go dry. But it was too small to be a person. A jacket, maybe.

“Car looks okay,” I said. “Was anyone hurt?”

“Sweetheart, I’m gonna need you to turn around now.”

“Sweetheart?”

The cop chewed on something, gum or the inside of his cheek. “Son, please tell your girlfriend to turn her lights back on and turn the car around, before I write her up.” His voice was mechanical, the metallic eyes of his shades pointed toward Finch.

The feeling started in my cheeks, like it always did, and flooded my skin with cold fire. “You can talk to me,” I said. “I’m right here. Or were you under the impression that a woman can’t follow a simple command?”

“Alice.” Finch put a hand on my arm, and I shook it off. It was too late to count to ten.

“Just because we’re in whatever shitstain town is under your jurisdiction, it doesn’t mean you get to act like I’m a baby. How dare you treat me like a fuckin’ housewife!”

For a minute the cop stared at me, a muscle bouncing in his cheek. When he pulled down his shades, the eyes behind them were irritable and brown. Human. “You kiss your mother with that mouth? We’re in the middle of something here, I don’t have time for your shit. Turn on your headlights and go.” He straightened and walked back a few paces, flares hanging at his sides.

I stayed put for a moment, unspent adrenaline sending a dying glitter through my limbs, until Finch leaned over and punched the headlights back on.

“Turn around,” he said. “For fuck’s sake!”

I glared at him. “What is wrong with you?”

“What’s wrong with me?”

The feeling of knowing you’re being an asshole is as bad as feeling wronged, but without the satisfaction. I turned the car around hard and fast, screeching over the grass on the opposite side of the road. “What are you talking about?” I said through gritted teeth.

“You know what I’m talking about. How privileged can you get?”

“Me, Ellery Djan-Finch-whatever? I’m privileged?”

“This isn’t about money!” he exploded. “You argued with a cop because you know you can. It’s so damned arrogant. Look at me.” He gestured at the obvious; he gestured at his skin. “What do you think would’ve happened if I’d been the one screaming at a cop? And he didn’t even give you a ticket!”

“Did you want him to give me a ticket?” I said, ignoring his point. “Should I go back and ask for one?”

He shook his head, staring out the window.

Nothing made me angrier than someone refusing to answer me. The edges of my vision fizzed into something humming and black, till I felt like I was looking at the road through a tunnel.

“Come on. Tell me what I should do. Tell me what I should’ve done.”

“Just stop,” he said tiredly. “Let’s go to the nearest motel, find a reroute tomorrow.”

I should’ve shut up, but I didn’t. “Hell no. You started a conversation, now let’s finish it.”

“God, let it rest! You shouldn’t have insulted a cop, okay? He could’ve dragged me out of the car because you were being an idiot. You think rich matters in this situation? You think a cop looks at me and sees rich? You’re pretending you don’t get it, but you do.”

I did get it, I did. And the shame of it boiled into something darker. Before my brain could catch up, I jerked the wheel and turned the car off the road, sending us rattling toward the trees.

“Alice!” Finch lunged across and grabbed at the wheel, but I held it fast. The world narrowed to an oak trunk looming in my sight. Till panic clawed its way over the tide of rage, making me yank the wheel hard to the left and swerve back onto the road. We rolled over something that made the body of the car jounce hard. My head smacked the roof, and the anger burned away.

Itchy regret took its place. I’d let myself drift too close to the dark continent at the core of me, a lawless place I tried never to visit. It had been a while, but it was as familiar as the taste of medicine.

Finch sat frozen in the passenger seat. I could feel his eyes on me. I drove faster, like I could leave what I did behind.

“What. The hell. Was that?”