AllFreeNovel
Share Us
But I can’t hold it against her when she doesn’t even know who I am.
If that part of her story is even true. For all I know, she could be a very good liar.
Maybe that’s why Johan chose her.
“I think I’m within my liberties to ask you a couple of questions before I do anything like that. That’s reasonable enough, I’d say,” I reply, turning off the highway down a winding country road.
Her head whips to the side, her expression wild and aggressive. “What kinds of questions could you possibly have for me?! I’m a college student that you met at the fair an hour ago!”
I admire her commitment to the role, especially now that she’s injured in a way that impedes her performance.
Taking one hand off the wheel for a moment, I reach into my coat pocket and pull out a pack of cigarettes. “I just think it’s interesting that you happened to find me at the same time I was expecting to meet with someone else. Then, of course, a shooting breaks out in the exact vicinity of where we’re walking together. It seems a bit suspicious to me.”
I pull a cigarette out of the pack and offer her one as well.
She sneers at me, pushing the pack away from her as she holds her head in her lap again.
“Why the hell would I take something from you if you don’t even trust me? You thinkIcaused that fucking shooting?” she says, muffled by the fabric from her sweatshirt covering her face.
I sigh, realizing that she’s going to become even less cooperative if I come across too disingenuous.
“I’m just trying to be friendly. That must not be something you’re familiar with in this town,” I say with a hint of spite in my voice.
She’s silent for a few moments, long enough for me to figure that I’ve struck a nerve.
I shake my head. “Whatever, it doesn’t matter. I’m going to figure out what I need to know whether you like it or not. I have means, and you shouldn’t challenge someone when you’re in such a compromising position.”
To my surprise, she hasn’t started to cry or beg for mercy at all. Usually, it doesn’t take long for hostages to spill their guts, especially since I’m rather imposing and tend to tower over them.
This girl is playing hardball and she doesn’t even know it.
Just as I’m about to continue goading her into releasing her name, she sits up and stares directly at me again. “No, maybe I’m not familiar with friendliness in this fucking backwater town. Friendliness here is nothing but a cover for people who want to make a fool out of you.”
Now we might be getting somewhere.
I smirk as I loosen my grip on the steering wheel.
Our destination is still a good twenty minutes away, and I figure that I can ease my way back into her good graces by feigning empathy.
It’s not like I know how she feels – I was never ostracized by anyone growing up. I was the onedoingthe ostracizing. People have feared me since I was sixteen years old.
This might be a learning moment for me.
“I thought you were with your friends at the fair,” I say, trying to poke holes in her story while appearing interested in her woes as the resident campus loser.
She sighs audibly. “I was hoping that I was. But that’s none of your business either. You’re not helping me look for them anymore. I have no idea what you’re up to at this point, but I don’t like it.”
I’ve backed myself into a corner of sorts here. I’ve never had to live in the brain of a young woman, but I’m certain that the unfamiliar backroads have set her on edge.
She might know better than to run away screaming once I stop the car, especially during this time of year. It’s going to get cold way too fast for her to find her way back to the city before she freezes.
“If I answer a question, you need to as well,” she says, her voice transitioning from notes of fear to a resolute, cunning tone.
If this is the only way to get her to talk, I might have to cave. Somehow, she’s managed to outlast eighty percent of the hostages I’ve taken in the past fifteen years.
Maybe that’s just because I’m hesitant to kill someone who intrigues me.
Sure, she’s preventing her own release by playing games with me. However, she’s still the only person who stuck out to me in the sea of people at the fair. There’s a part of me that needs to know more, even if she ends up being unrelated to my mission.
