CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Ilse pointed out the window as traffic slowed to a crawl on the highway. The wind against her cheeks faded as their speed declined.
The source of the embargo was clear enough: a curling offramp with a thin shoulder had a line of cars backed up. One by one, occasionally leaning on their horns, they maneuvered around a large truck, with a towing hook on the back. The truck was about half the size of a cargo vehicle. Three rusted, dilapidated vehicles sat on a flat metal bed. But a fourth vehicle, mostly rust and neglect, looked to have fallen half in the road.
A man with a scraggly beard, a baseball cap, and a grease-stained shirt was hastily trying to hook this rusted jalopy to a winch and crank it back onto his flatbed.
But as he did, he blocked half the second lane of
