AllFreeNovel
Share Us
In the factory’s outside lot, three tractor-trailers were waiting, their engines idling, headlights super bright in the night. We hid behind a large stack of empty wooden pallets and watched as those amazing cars were loaded, one by one. Each trailer held ten cars, five on the upper deck and five below. Some were backed on, some were loaded frontways. I peered through my binoculars to see how each car was fastened down by straps through its wheels. There were four straps total, and a worker ratcheted the webbed cables tight.
Two of the trailers loaded up and drove off—it had taken more than an hour. When the third trailer was almost full, I turned to my squad.
“Okay,” I whispered. “We split into two groups, each flanking the trailer, out of sight. When the last car is loaded, the factory workers will go back inside. The truck driver will get into the cab. As soon as his door closes, get yourself up on the trailer. We’ll reconnect once we’re on the road. Got it?” I looked at Jolie’s face, and she nodded firmly. Nate, Ansel, and Bunny went to one side, and Mills, Jolie, and I took the other.
The truck driver signed some paperwork, the factory person went inside, and best of all, she shut off the outside lights. The second the driver’s cab door closed, I ran over and leaped up onto the trailer. It had no real floor—just the two tracks for the car wheels and a support structure underneath. I slid beneath a car and found some good handholds to cling to. Peering around, I checked to make sure everyone else was on board.
“There’s no freaking bottom,” Mills whispered, working his way through the supports to me.
“Yeah,” I said. “Don’t fall.”
When the truck lurched into gear, it shook all of us and I clung to my car chassis. The truck driver drove through the cell gates and out onto the unlit highway—not knowing that there were six kids flattened beneath the bellies of five luxury cars.
65
AS SOON AS WE WERE out of sight of the cell, I climbed out of my hiding place and made my way to the first car, the one closest to the road. Or was it the last car? Anyway, I was thrilled to see its key fob in the cup holder, and I climbed in and pushed the Start button.
Mills had climbed up next to me and pointed to what I had already seen: the battery showed almost no charge. I got out and the six of us had an almost soundless meeting, using a lot of hand gestures.
We could just jump off and walk the rest of the way to the city.
We could push that first/last car off the trailer and use the next one in line.
Jolie shook her head and pointed upward, and for a second I thought she was saying that God didn’t want us to do that.
She wasn’t. She was saying, “Use the first car on the upper level.”
Huh. I climbed up and checked it out. Its battery was full, its
key fob in the glove compartment. I’d never pushed a car off a twelve-foot height and didn’t know if it would just fall apart or its engine drop out or what.
I’d driven Pa’s truck, of course, but had never driven a car, much less a fancy car. Nate at least had driven a Movolo. We climbed to the top level and sat in the last car. Nate examined the control panel.
“Can you do this?” I asked him. He definitely looked as if he’d pulled one foot out of the grave, but the walk and the wait and the climb had taken their toll. He was pale and pasty beneath his tan.
“Of course,” he said smoothly, but his hand trembled as he adjusted the mirrors. I pressed my lips together tensely. His future was in no way certain. Which meant mine wasn’t, either. No one’s was—not even Ansel’s. If rabies didn’t get him, something else probably would.
I took a deep breath, then got out of the car and looked at the team.
“Okay, here’s the plan,” I said over the road noise.
“There’s a plan?” Mills asked, and I made a “screw you” face at him.
“Jolie, Ansel, and Mills will get in the backseat,” I said. “Bunny will get in the passenger seat. Nate will drive.”
W-H-A-T-A-B-O-U-T-U-? Jolie spelled into my hand.
“Someone has to sever the straps, pretty much at the last second,” I explained. I’d thought about this while we’d waited back at the factory, and that sentence didn’t begin to cover all the certain- or near-death possibilities facing us, and especially me. “So everyone get in now, and for God’s sake, fasten as many seat belts as you can find.”
“But where will you be?” Bunny asked.
“In the trunk,” I said briefly. “Everyone ready? Nate?”
“Wait,” Ansel said, taking a deep breath. “You guys rescued me—the United guys killed the rest of my squad and definitely would have killed me. But you don’t need to keep saving me. I can head off on my own. You have your hands full.”
I thought about it—did I need him?
“Do you know how to get into the city?” I asked abruptly.
