the voice said.Kara spun with the wrench in her hand, crying out in surprise. The man standing above her took two long steps back. He held up his hands. “Whoa! I come in peace!”The rain had let up the slightest bit, but she still had to squint to see him through the gray mist. Night was falling fast, and here she was, out in the middle of nowhere with a car that might be a lost cause. And now she also had to worry about dealing with a complete stranger.She stared at him for another moment before she realized what she must look like. She lowered the wrench. “I’m sorry.”The man nodded toward her car. “You banged her up pretty bad. You okay?”Kara dropped the wrench to the wet ground and braced herself on the car. She stood up slowly, her knees smarting and her head pounding. She looked at the front of the car, at the way the nose edged into the ditch, only a few feet away from the massive tree that had fallen over the road. She had been driving home through the downpour, easily taking the curves on this road she had known all her life, but then she came around one of them and there was the tree.She remembered braking hard and swerving even harder, but after that things were a little fuzzy.
