I was turned around and pushed toward the open SUV door so I could get inside.
“Frankie.”
I spat on his face again. “You’re dead to me. Dead and buried and gone a hundred years.”
“I’m sorry?—”
“How dare you say that to me? Look at Dad and say it to his lifeless eyes.” I spat on him again. “If I had a gun, I’d shoot you right between the fucking eyes.” I felt smoke rising out of my ears as I stared at my little brother, the man I’d defended from people who were unkind to him. We didn’t always agree on everything and we didn’t always get along, but I’d trusted him with my life. And now, I felt so fucking foolish.
He grabbed me by both arms. “Frankie?—”
“Don’t you fucking touch me.” I jerked my body to get him off me. “I’d rather go wherever the hell they’re taking me?—”
Leo somehow slipped and crashed into me, and in that quick instant, a knife was forced into my hand at my back, hidden, as I was forced into the car under his weight. “I didn’t know this would happen. I swear to you.” When he righted himself, his eyes were soaked with tears. “I would never want this?—”
“Fuck. Off.” I played it off like nothing had happened and got into the car while he continued to block me. I sat with my back to the seat, the knife hidden underneath my body. I stared straight ahead and ignored my brother.
The door shut. No one helped me put on a safety belt.
I could see Leo in my periphery out the window, but I refused to look at him. I didn’t care that he’d given me a knife to cut myself free. I wouldn’t be in this position if he weren’t the biggest moron alive.
If I made it out of this, I would hunt him down and kill him myself.
Two guys got into the car, sitting in the driver’s and passenger’s seats, and then we slowly rolled forward and approached the busted gate.
I gripped the knife tightly but didn’t move otherwise, knowing I should wait until we were a safe distance away before I tried anything.
My phone was somehow still in my back pocket, so if Wolfe was alive and tracking me, he would know I was on the move. But I couldn’t sit there and wait for him to save me. I had to cut myself free and kill both of these assholes.
We started down the dirt road until we made it to the paved street. The car sped up, and I could hear the sound of the wheelsagainst the asphalt. We didn’t see another car on the road. The radio was off, so it was silent inside. The men didn’t talk to each other, to my misfortune. I needed them to be distracted and have the silence drowned out by their conversation.
“How long is the drive?” I asked with a wet throat.
“Shut up,” the driver said without glancing at me in the rearview mirror.
“How can you possibly work for a monster like that?”
“I told you to shut up.”
While the conversation progressed, I turned the knife in my grasp and sawed at the rope, knowing there was a good chance I would cut my own wrist because I couldn’t shift forward to give my hands space, not when that would look suspicious. “My father was a good man who paid generous salaries, and he didn’t do this shit to people.”
He slammed on the brakes, and I flew forward into the seat in front of me.
I gripped my knife tightly and didn’t let it fall.
The passenger chuckled. “That’ll shut her up.”
I pretended to struggle against the seat to right myself, but in that time, I was cutting the bonds that held me. By the time I shifted backward and returned to the seat, I’d cut the last cord free and felt the rope loosen around me. I could tell I’d cut myself a little bit, but I would live.
I stared ahead and saw a car in the distance, so far away I couldn’t identify what kind it was, whether it was a sedan or an SUV. I glanced in the rearview mirror to get a view of theroad behind us to see if there were other cars following us, but I couldn’t really tell.
I had to go for it.
If I could take them out and commandeer the vehicle, I might be able to get away.
I had to do this quickly. Kill one and then the other instantly before I could be shot.
I studied the driver and then the passenger before I changed my grip on the knife. I could see the carotid artery on each of them. I just had to jab the knife in the right spot before I did the same to the other man.
