Page 131 of Fractured Ties

“There’s not enough time to get—”

“Then jump out a fucking window!” Kolya snarled.

The man in the doorway didn’t need to be told again. He spun on his heel and bolted away. Kolya worked fast, then, too. Maya didn’t even get the chance to see where he pulled a knife from before he was bending down and dragging the blade through the binds at her ankles. A rough hand turned her around before he did the same thing to her wrists.

She felt how close he was to her back when he murmured in her ear, “Can you run, dushka?”

Maya’s gaze drifted to the bomb again. One minute, thirty seconds left.

She nodded.

“Run straight, hit the stairs. Go.”

His hand hit her back and Maya ran. She didn’t know where she was going. In her panic at being dragged inside this place, she hadn’t thought she would need to memorize the layout. All she remembered was that it was full of hallways, and rooms. Like a goddamn maze. She simply did what Kolya said.

Run straight. Hit the stairs.

Though she wanted to look behind her and make sure Kolya was coming, she didn’t. She could hear his heavy steps echoing behind her anyway.

Maya was halfway down the stairwell when Kolya’s voice shouted out behind her, “Keep going down!”

Maya tried to remember how many fucking stairs she had climbed before they dragged her down that last hallway. Three, maybe?

It didn’t matter.

She flew down the stairs, and almost stumbled on the way. A strong hand was there to catch her by the back of her shirt and set her back to her feet again with another shove for her to keep going.

Maya pushed open the heavy metal door at the very bottom of the stairs and came to a sight she did remember. A large, open section of the bottom floor that still wasn’t anywhere near the front of the warehouse. Maybe the middle? It was full of junk and shit. Like someone had used this space as their own personal dumping grounds for everything over the years. Everything from taped up boxes, to leftover furniture. There were even metal and plastic barrels in one corner, and an iron claw foot tub resting against another wall.

“Oh, my God,” she mumbled at the sight.

How long did they have, now?

Thirty seconds?

Less?

It was impossible. They were never going to get out in time.

“There’s no way—”

Maya didn’t even get to finish her sentence before Kolya’s arm wrapped around her middle, and her feet left the cold cement floor. Her vision swam from how fast he moved, then.

“You stay down,” he uttered.

“What—”

“Stay down—stay under me. You stay like that no matter what, yeah?”

Maya blinked through the curtain of her hair covering her face. She couldn’t ask him what in the hell he was talking about because he set her to the floor again. Maya turned in just enough time to see Kolya grab the edge of that iron claw foot tub and flip it over with a bang that echoed through the warehouse. He lifted it up and jerked his head toward the tub.

“Get under there, now.”

This man was crazy.

Maybe it was her that made him like this—totally unbidden, and willing to do the more insane shit because it was her, and he was willing to take that chance. Who knew?

Maya stared at him. “Kolya …”