Astor
“Cheese and rice! No! No, no, no, no, no!” I stare through the windshield at the fog-like steam billowing out from beneath the hood of my old Toyota Echo. The country road is deserted at this time of night, and all I see around me is total darkness. I ease the car over to the shoulder and turn on the hazard lights, my stomach sinking with dread.
This. This is why I’ve been begging my mother to allow me to have a cell phone. Of course, she’d said no, but why did I listen? I’m an eighteen-year-old woman who drives in the city—or, in tonight’s case, far from the city. I should have a darn cell phone. I’ve told my mother so a million times, but she has a thing against technology and the evil it brings to young minds.
The car comes to a stop as the engine goes dead. The only illumination around me comes from my blinking hazard lights and the bright orange ‘check engine’ light that might as well be laughing at me. “Crap.”
I check my watch and note that it’s already after midnight, which means it’s officially my birthday. I wasn’t supposed to be out this late, but I’d been babysitting for the Carlito’s, whose dinner party ran longer than expected. Now I’m here, stuck in the dark with a dead car and no way to call for help. Mother is going to lose her mind.
I drop my head forward and rest it on the steering wheel, trying to come up with a solution to my problem. But there isn’t one. I can’t walk anywhere for help because there’s nowhere to walk to. The nearest house is way too far to walk in the dark to, and I’ll just end up lost. Besides, Lord only knows what kind of creatures are living out here in these woods that would consider a small woman like me a delightful midnight snack.
The steam continues to billow out from under the hood, rising into the darkness. This is going to cost me a fortune. I reach down and pull the lever, popping the hood. As the gap widens and the fog thickens, I start to worry that it’s not steam, but smoke.
My eyes dart around the dark road as I step outside of the vehicle and walk around to the front. Everything is eerily quiet, except for the sounds coming from the hot car and the pinging of the slowly cooling metal. I touch the hood with my fingertips and recoil as the hot steel burns my flesh.
The sound of a branch breaking in the woods to my left echoes through the night, sending my imagination running wild. It could be a bear, or a wolf…or a sasquatch. Or maybe a serial killer. Taking a step back, I scurry to the driver’s side door and close myself inside, hitting the locks. Forget the hood. If I can’t figure something else out, I’ll take a look in the morning.
It feels like hours pass as I sit in the dark, quiet car, my ears straining to hear any sound at all from outside. But when I check my watch again, only twenty minutes have passed; only seven more hours until the sun comes up. The only problem with that is, I think I might go crazy if I have to sit here for that long.
The sound of an owl screeching somewhere deep in the woods makes my hair stand on end. “Oh, God, please get me out of here,” I pray, clasping my hands together and bowing my head.
Not one single car passes over the next hour and a half. I hear the blood rushing through my ears as I scan the treeline outside, jumping at each and every little sound I hear. I’ve never been one to shy away from the outdoors, but I’ve also never been stranded in the woods in the middle of the night either.
When the sound of a motorcycle approaching pulls me from my sentry duty, I watch its headlight grow larger in the rearview mirror. I consider getting out and waving down the driver, but quickly shove that idea aside. Lord only knows who’s driving that machine, and even though I’m desperate to get out of here, being abducted by a psycho biker would be even worse.
Shaking, I press my face against the glass and watch as the motorcycle whizzes past my car. I can vaguely make out the shape of the rider in the darkness, but they’ve passed and are over the hill before I see much. I hold my breath as I wait for the sound of the engine to disappear into the night, but it never does. It gets quieter for a moment before I hear it getting louder.
A lone headlight appears in front of me, popping up over the hill. I can’t breathe as the motorcycle draws closer, pulling up right in front of my car. The light blinds me, but I force myself to stay alert, desperately trying to think of a way to hide inside my tiny car. I watch in horror as the rider’s feet land on the ground, and the light dies along with the roar of the engine, leaving my vision splotchy with phantom blobs of color.
I hear his heavy boots hitting the pavement as he approaches, but my eyesight is still struggling to recover itself. I blink rapidly, cursing my sudden blindness when there’s a knock on my window.
My head whips to the side, and there, just on the other side of the glass is the most gorgeous man I’ve ever seen. Shaggy blond hair falls into his eyes as he kneels down.
“Hey. You okay?” I blink back at him, my voice frozen in fear and awe. “Do you need help?” he asks when I don’t answer him.
My head is nodding before I can get out any words. All I can do is stare at him. He doesn’t look like a psycho, serial-killing biker. He looks…delicious. A delicious biker, complete in a leather vest and skin-tight jeans. My cheeks heat at the direction of where my own thoughts are heading. He’s offering to help you, Astor, not take your virginity.
“Car trouble?” he prompts gently, his voice soft, as if speaking to a wild, cornered animal.
I nod again. Come on, Astor. Speak.
“Maybe I can help,” he offers through the closed window. “What seems to be the problem?”
My mouth opens to answer, but all that I manage to get out is, “Smoke.”
His eyes drift to the hood of the car, then back to me. “Okay,” he says, standing slowly. “I’m going to check it out, okay?”
I stare into his intense eyes through the glass and nod. I don’t really know what the heck I just agreed to. All I can think about are his eyes, and what color they would be if it wasn’t so dark outside.
From my spot in the driver’s seat, I watch as he rounds the front of the car and disappears behind the hood, opening it before propping it up with the little arm thing. I watch through the crack underneath as a light shines onto the engine—likely from his cell phone—and his hand fiddles with a few things just out of view.
“Can you start it up?” he calls out.
I turn the key, suddenly wondering if I’m a complete fool, thinking I should have just done this in the first place, but nothing happens. The engine whirs and clanks, but doesn’t turn over.
The hood drops and I watch as he rounds the car once more, squatting down beside my door. “Looks like your radiator’s gone,” he says through the glass. “You’re gonna need to get a tow.”
Lovely. A fantastic birthday present. There goes what little money I’d made babysitting tonight, along with a good chunk of my savings to get it fixed.
The man watches me through the window as I process the information. “It’s pretty late,” he says. “Too late to be sitting out here for hours waiting on a tow truck.”
I gape at him for a second before gathering my courage. “I’ll be fine,” I huff. “I’m a big girl.”
The man gives me a handsome smirk. “Well, I’ve only seen you through this window, but I don’t think that’s true.”
My mouth drops open in surprise. How rude! But he’s right. I’m not very big. I’m not even five feet tall, and I still have to shop in the children’s section for most of my clothes, but he doesn’t need to point that out, does he? “I’ll be fine,” I say again.
His shoulders rise and fall in a noncommittal shrug. “All right. I’ll leave you to it then.” He stands and flicks his hand out in a wave that is surprisingly sexy. “Good luck, little Thumbelina.”
If it were physically possible for smoke to come out of a person’s ears, it would be streaming out of mine in angry, volcano-like plumes. I may be a tiny person, but I don’t like being teased about it—especially from a complete stranger.
I glare at him as he strolls back to his motorcycle. Pulling his helmet down onto his head and swinging a leg over his bike, I remember one crucial detail. Frantic, I fumble with the door handle and manage to get the door open, stumbling out onto the road.
“Wait!” I cry out, just as his motorcycle roars to life. He’s looking down and doesn’t hear me. Practically tripping over my own feet, I break out into a run as I see him rock the huge machine off of its stand. “Please! Wait!” The last word comes out in a desperate shriek, and this time, he hears me.
His head lifts in my direction and his body goes tight as I get closer. With a gloved hand, he tips up the visor on his helmet, and I see the shine of his eyes through the darkness.
“Phone,” I gasp as I come to a stop beside him. “I don’t have a phone.”
His brow furrows and he reaches down, shutting off the engine and plunging us into silence. “Come again?”
“I need to borrow your phone,” I say, my hand to my chest as my racing heart slows. “I don’t have one.”
“You got a death wish, woman?” he asks, the growl in his voice enough to match the one his motorcycle is no longer making.
That makes me frown. “Pardon?”
“A woman, alone at night, driving a country road, has no business not carrying a cell phone with her. Hell, a woman should have a cell phone with her anywhere at any time. That’s just common sense.”
This guy is a piece of work. I roll my eyes and ask again, “Can I borrow your phone?”
He digs his phone out of his pocket and holds it up. “Depends.”
“It depends?” Who the heck does this guy think he is?
“Depends on who you’re going to call.”
That’s when I pause. Who am I going to call? I can’t call Mother. She doesn’t have a car to come and get me, and it would just get her all riled up. I don’t know the number to any towing companies offhand, and I don’t have any friends who can come to my rescue.
Cocky guy just nods his head. “That’s what I thought. How about this? I’ll call my buddy. He owns a garage, has a tow truck, and can send a man out to get your car. You ride with me and I’ll take you home so you don’t have to sit here in the dead of night, waiting. Sound good?”
I want to say no. This guy hasn’t done much to make me want to spend any more time with him than I have to. But on the other hand, he also hasn’t done much to make me fear him. After that little speech about women and cell phones, I think that maybe, in his own way, he might even be a good guy. I don’t have any better options.
Grudgingly, I nod my head. “Sounds good.”
I make quick work of grabbing my purse and locking up my car, then hurry over to the waiting man. Right then, I realize that I don’t even know his name. I accept the helmet he offers me after removing it from his own head and say, “I don’t usually make it a habit to catch rides with complete strangers.”
He grins down at me and fiddles with the strap at my chin. “My name’s Cory,” he murmurs. “Cory O’Neill.”
I feel my face heat as I take in the dimples on his cheeks. “Astor,” I say quietly. “Astor Bloom.”
His grin grows wider as he steps back to admire me in my fancy new headgear. “Well, Astor, it’s nice to meet you. Now that we’re no longer strangers, I figure you’re safe jumping on the back of my bike.”