“How?”
“Because you can fix anything.”
The words landed harder than Noah intended.
Luke touched the back of his son’s head.
“I can’t fix everything.”
Noah looked down.
Both thought about the same person.
Neither said her name.
Luke stood.
“Wish me luck.”
“You don’t need luck.”
“That is an unreasonable amount of confidence.”
“You’re my dad.”
As though that explained everything.
Maybe to Noah it did.
Luke left at 4:03.
Rain began twelve minutes later.
Not ordinary rain.
The kind that arrived almost sideways beneath a dark Midwestern sky and turned interstate lanes into mirrors within minutes.
Luke tightened both hands around the steering wheel.
His old sedan’s wipers moved at their fastest setting and still barely kept up.
Traffic slowed.
His navigation estimate changed.
4:42 arrival.
Then 4:47.
Then 4:51.
Luke felt pressure build behind his ribs.
“Come on.”
Brake lights appeared ahead.
Cars merged around a stalled delivery truck.
Luke checked the time.
4:28.
Still possible.
He had promised himself he would arrive ten minutes early.
Five would have to do.
The highway curved through a wooded stretch between Cedar Falls and the Carter industrial campus.
Rain hammered the roof.
A dark luxury SUV stood on the shoulder ahead with hazard lights flashing.
Luke barely noticed at first.
Then he saw the woman.
She stood beside the rear tire.
Alone.
One hand held a useless umbrella being twisted violently by the wind.
The other pressed a phone against her ear.
Even in the storm she looked impossibly composed.
Long brunette hair had been arranged into a sleek low bun, though wet strands had escaped around her face. She wore narrow black sunglasses despite the gray afternoon, an olive-green belted trench jacket over a black skirt, sheer tights, black gloves, and pointed heels that sank slightly into the soft shoulder every time she shifted her weight.
A small black handbag sat on the hood.
The SUV leaned noticeably toward the right rear.
Flat tire.
Luke drove past.
He made it perhaps two hundred feet.
Then checked the mirror.
The woman was still there.
A semi truck passed too close and threw a wall of water over the shoulder.
She jumped backward.
Luke looked at the dashboard.
4:32.
Interview at five.
Twenty-eight minutes.
He kept driving.
His stomach tightened.
He imagined Noah standing in the bathroom doorway.
Because you can fix anything.
Luke cursed.
Hard.
Then pulled toward the shoulder.
He reversed carefully until his sedan stopped behind the SUV.
The woman turned.
Even through the rain, surprise showed clearly.
Luke grabbed his jacket, then reconsidered and left it on the passenger seat.
No point destroying the only suit jacket he owned.
He stepped into the storm.
Within five seconds, his white shirt was soaked through.
The woman shouted over the rain.
“Are you okay?”
Luke almost laughed.
“My car works.”
She blinked.
“Oh.”
He pointed at the SUV.
“Yours doesn’t.”
“I called roadside assistance.”
“How long?”
“They said forty-five minutes.”
Luke looked toward traffic.
“That’s too long to stand here.”
“They told me to stay inside the vehicle.”
“Good advice.”
“I got out because I thought I could find the spare.”
Luke looked down at her heels.
“You were planning to change a tire in those?”
She followed his gaze.
“They’re normally more practical indoors.”