The click of the lock cut through the rain.

The little girl screamed and threw both hands against the car window.

“Please! He’s just a baby!”

The truck driver didn’t hesitate.

He grabbed the metal tire iron from his truck bed and turned back toward the sedan.

The man inside shouted, “You’ll regret this!”

The truck driver looked at the little girl’s shaking face, then at the tiny blanket barely moving in the back seat.

“No,” he said. “You will.”

He smashed the window.

Glass fell onto the wet pavement.

The car alarm screamed as he reached inside, unlocked the door, and pulled the baby from the back seat. The child was limp, wrapped in a damp blanket, his tiny chest barely moving.

The little girl collapsed beside him, crying.

“Wake up,” she whispered. “Please wake up.”

The truck driver laid the baby under the gas station lights and started helping him breathe, hands steady, jaw tight, eyes wet.

One breath.

Nothing.

Another breath.

Then the baby coughed.

The little girl broke into sobs and grabbed his tiny hand.

Police lights flashed blue across the rain.

The man tried to run, but two gas station workers blocked him near the pumps.

The truck driver lifted the baby carefully and looked at the girl.

“Is he your brother?”

She nodded, shaking.

“He said if I told anyone, he’d drive away with him.”

The truck driver wrapped both children in his coat.

“You told the right person,” he whispered.