AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Lev speeds up. The van chases after us. Stitches opens fire. They retaliate. Lev swerves again in an attempt to trip them up. Instead, he clips the tail end of another car and our truck spins out of control.
We’re sent into the opposite side of traffic as the van continues spraying bullets. Several of which chink the truck’s armor. One cracks the glass. Another gets all the way through and nails Stitches in the side of his torso.
I’m still on the floor of the truck, wide-eyed and numb. Spinning along with the truck as Lev fights against the steering wheel to regain control.
He rights us and takes us in the opposite direction. We’re crashing over sidewalks and fire hydrants, trampling over the neat grass of the local park. Pedestrians jump out of the way. The van struggles to follow, not as equipped to deal with off-road type of terrain.
We come out on a different street with a considerable lead.
“Fuck yes,” Lev breathes, wiping sweat from his brow. He accelerates, the truck barreling for the highway entrance. “You okay, Stitches?”
“These fuckers got me good…” Stitches grits his teeth, his hand pressed into his bloody side. “Remember, if I don’t make it, get her to the airport.”
“No! Francis!”
I feel so… disconnected. Even as I call out to him and try to sit up, it’s like I’m muted. I’m submerged underwater and can’t make my way to the surface.
Numb. Breathless. I’m dead too.
A second van pops up and cuts Lev off from the highway entrance. He improvises with a sharp right at the next street corner and then swears again.
“Fuck, here’s the other one! Is there more than we thought?!”
Another turn, down another street. This one a smaller street.
The second van appears at the front end. The first from behind.
Lev hits the brakes, and we slam to a hard stop. We’re trapped. They’ve got us.
“Stitches?” he asks, grabbing both his guns from his holster. “Ready?”
“Ready as I’m gonna be bleeding like a leaky faucet.”
“No,” I say as they make to get out of the truck. I’m still reeling as if we’re still driving, dizzier by the second.
Nothing feels stable. The truck’s moving. I’m moving. They’re moving.
Fast and slow at the same time. When I rush to take hold of Stitches’s arm, I miss by several inches, and it feels like falling forward for an eternity.
My whole body jerks and my arm swipes, my equilibrium off.
Stitches interrupts my uncoordinated effort, grabbing my shoulder. “Delphine, see that side alley? While we’re handling them. You run in there. You disappear inside one of those buildings. You take this bag. Everything you need is in here. Passport, bank card, cell phone, even some weapons and ammo. Call yourself a taxi. Take it to the airport. It’s another hour away.”
I’m given no option or time to adjust. I’m still caught up in a tilting world of dizziness when I’m shoved out of the truck and the two sides blast each other.
Bullets fly at near invisible speeds, stinking up the air more than rotten eggs. Men dive for cover. Others collapse to the ground with eyes that have remained open in death. In the heat of battle between the two sides, Stitches was right—nobody notices me as I stumble on stilted legs toward the narrow alleyway.
The bag slung over my shoulder, I’m not sure where I’m going. If someone were to try to stop me right now, I’m not even sure I’d fight back.
He disappeared.
He’s gone, like he never existed.
I’d let them take me. I’d let them ki—
With a sobering blink, I realize I’ve wandered halfway down the alley.
And I’m not alone. Someone’s calling out to me from the open door of the building on my left.
