Teeth clacking like castanets, Katie threw her car into park and lurched out the driver’s side door, too preoccupied to close it. One minute she was cruising down Main Street looking for someplace, anyplace, that might serve lattes; the next Paul had run into her path and she was smashing down on the brake, bringing the car to a screeching halt. “Paul?” He was breathing. Hearing his name, his eyes fluttered open, straining to focus. His face was red from physical exertion. Sweat soaked his T-shirt, gluing it to his muscular upper torso like a second skin. Blood flowed from a cut to his scalp. Katie wondered if he’d been trying to commit suicide. If so, she sure wished he’d picked someone else’s car to hurl himself in front of. “I saw the whole thing!” a young woman pushing a stroller called breathlessly from the curb. “He wasn’t even looking where he was going!” Katie barely heard; her eyes remained riveted on Paul. He seemed intact, but you never knew. What if he was bleeding internally, his life slowly slipping away, the same way hers would when she was on trial for vehicular manslaughter?
