Page 24 of Hello, Summer
“That’ll take forever. The fire station’s at least fifteen minutes away,” Conley called.
“Have you got a tire iron in your trunk?” Skelly asked.
“Yeah. Under the carpet in the cargo area.”
A moment later, he was back with a tire iron. “Get back,” he cautioned.
He aimed the tool squarely at the driver’s-side window and swung. The glass stayed intact. “Damn it,” he muttered. He took a step backward, poised to swing again, then stopped. Flames were licking from beneath the hood of the vehicle. “It’s on fire!” he yelled.
Conley stood rooted to the spot.
“Get away!” Skelly grabbed her arm and pulled her toward the shoulder of the road.
She stumbled, corrected, then slowly backed away from the SUV,watching helplessly as the flames rose higher, sending sparks shooting into the thick night air. The intense heat drove them backward, and they were both coughing and choking from the oily fumes.
She gave Skelly a pleading look. He shrugged and started back toward the SUV, but within seconds, it was engulfed in rolling waves of black smoke.
“Come on,” he urged, tugging her toward the Subaru. “These SUVs have huge gas tanks. This thing could explode.”
Choking and coughing from the noxious fumes, they backed farther away. Finally, in the distance, they heard the wail of a siren. Probably too late for the injured driver.
“Do you recognize the car?” Conley asked. “Anybody from around here?”
“It’s got a Griffin County license tag,” he said, pointing.
“There was some kind of parking decal on the front windshield, but upside down like that, I couldn’t make out what it said,” Conley added. “It was like a green sort of crest.”
“SBCC,” he said. “Silver Bay Country Club. I’ve got the same one on my truck.”
“Right. G’mama and Grayson have the same decal.”
Without thinking, she grabbed her cell phone and, standing beside the Subaru, began clicking the camera’s shutter. She was scrolling through the contacts on her phone, getting ready to call theAJC’s city desk to let them know she’d just witnessed a wreck with a possible fatality.
“What the hell are you doing?” Skelly asked.
Conley sighed and stopped scrolling. “I was trying to do my job. But it just occurred to me: I don’t have a job anymore.”
But she raised the phone anyway and began shooting video of the inferno, of the fire truck as it roared up as the first responders clambered down and began what would surely be a doomed rescue attempt.
She decided it didn’t matter that she didn’t actually have a job in Atlanta. Whoever was in that SUV tonight was surely dead. Pretty soon, somebody would get a phone call, and their lives would be changedforever. There was a story to tell here, and that’s what she did. It was who she was. She’d figure out the rest later.
“He’s dead, right?” Conley asked as the firefighters trained their hoses on the blazing Escalade. She stopped shooting and wearily leaned her head on Skelly’s shoulder.
“Oh yeah,” Skelly said, absentmindedly rubbing her arm. “Jesus, what a way to die.”
Conley looked up the road and pointed at the approaching vehicle, blue lights flashing. “Police. Better late than never, I guess.”
The Bronson County sheriff’s vehicle pulled behind the Subaru. Conley watched warily as the deputy approached. He was huge, with a thick neck and shoulders and a blocklike body. His right hand rested on his holstered gun, and he held a flashlight in his left, which he played over Conley.
“Ma’am? Are you the one that called this in?”
“That was me.” Skelly spoke up.
The cop stared at him. “Do I know you?”
“Don’t think so,” Skelly said.
The cop shone his flashlight on Skelly’s face. “I need some ID.”
