Deluge (The Best Thrillers Book 2) by James Best (top romance novels txt) 📗

just before his front wheels dropped off curb, he jumped out of the cab and ran around to the bumper to release the winch. He pulled the cable out until he snagged the sedan’s undercarriage with the hook.

“Bob!” Evarts yelled to Prentice, “tell the other drivers to keep it down to five miles per hour. I’ll get these stalled ones out of the street.” He looked baffled, so Evarts pointed at the line of cars behind the stalled vehicles. “Now! Go tell them.”

Just then an old Chevy Blazer pulled onto a side yard further down the street, evidently intending to drive around the blocked traffic. Soon mud spattered in every direction as the rear end bucked up and down and slid side to side. The Blazer buried itself in a trench of its own making and now effectively blocked an exit path that might have worked for true off-road vehicles. Evarts didn’t have time to think about it. By this time, the technician they had picked up at the dam had taken the driver position in the Raptor. Evarts signaled him to back up as far as he could. He stopped when the back bumper butted up against a block wall. Evarts dashed over to the winch and switched it on. It slowly pulled the sedan toward the side of the road. The car and truck had been perpendicular, so the sedan’s front end winched around as it was pulled. Suddenly, the driver tried to get out, yelling to leave his car alone. He tripped and fell flat in the shallow water. Evarts hit stop on the winch to keep the sedan from rotating right over the top of him.

“What the hell are you doing?” Evarts yelled.

“Leave my car alone!” the driver yelled back.

Evarts flashed his badge, using his elbow to nudge his raincoat aside so the driver could see his gun. An immediate display of authority often helped control a volatile situation, especially when someone had already displayed symptoms of panic. The man appeared taken aback, but not dissuaded.

“Unhook my car,” he ordered. “I’ve done nothing wrong.”

“If you can get it to move under its own power, I’ll unhook it. Otherwise, allow me to pull you out of the water. Then you can get it started again.”

The man appeared confused.

Evarts tried to appear sympathetic. “Trust me. Let me help you save your family.”

The man reluctantly got back into the driver’s seat. Evarts turned the winch on, and the car finished its rotation and bumped over the curb onto the lawn. Evarts hurriedly unhooked the sedan. The dam technician jiggled the truck back and forth until the sedan no longer stood in the way of pulling out a second car. Once a new position had been established, Evarts started pulling the cable to the next stalled car.

As he pulled on the cable, he yelled to the sedan driver, “Don’t try to start it, or you’ll fry the electronics.”

The man nodded understanding. The panic seemed to have subsided. Perhaps the arrival of officials had a calming effect. Evarts spotted Lopez and Prentice going car to car, telling people to drive very slowly.

Then all hell broke loose. The Chevy Blazer woke up and began to spin its wheels again, an old pickup with an even older shell camper tipped over and slid into the river, and a 1958 Buick tried to punch through the hole Evarts had just opened, jumping the curb and gunning right at him. Evarts leaped out of the way. His entire vision was filled with a huge polished chrome bumper heading straight for him. With a leaping roll through soggy grass, he barely escaped being crushed to death. As he rose to his feet, he had his hand on his gun. He wanted to put a few bullets into the Buick. Fortunately, he gained control and never pulled his weapon, allowing the vintage car to speed away. He ran across the street to where the camper had tumbled into the Santa Ynez River.

The water had overflowed the banks to the street, but the shallow slope of the ground held the camper and kept it from washing away. At least, for the moment. Evarts waded into rushing water and climbed up the undercarriage until he knelt on the side of the truck bed. He saw the driver’s door rising and falling back down. He reached down, waited until the person tried again, and then pulled hard. Together, they opened the door, and Evarts saw an old man, probably a septuagenarian, struggling against gravity. With his right arm, he tried to keep his overweight wife afloat.

“Let go of your wife a moment,” Evarts ordered.

“Never,” the man said through gritted teeth.

Damn. He doubted he could lift two people at once. He tried. With an enormous grunt, he lifted the man enough for him to get his forearm over the door jam, then the man squeezed against the seat back, pulling his wife’s arm until Evarts could grab it. With another grunt, he pulled her free, past her husband. He had her sit with her feet dangling over the truck frame as he extracted the old man. Evarts sat on the edge of the overturned truck a moment to catch his breath. Suddenly, the front end made a horrible screech and swung further into the river. No time to rest.

“Jump!” he yelled, but they had both already leaped from the shifting truck.

When Evarts splashed down, he grabbed their hands and helped pull them up the watery incline to the street. Another humongous screech. Now safe, they turned to watch the truck float away half submerged.

The wife hugged her husband and said, “You’re a wonderful man.”

But a lousy driver, Evarts thought.

Evarts led them to the far side of the street and helped them into the backseat of his Raptor. If they had been younger, he would have instructed them to walk out, but after their ordeal, he doubted that they could make it to the corner.

He looked up at the Blazer. Lopez seemed