AllFreeNovel
Share Us
29
MIA
“Where are you taking me?”I ask the woman who currently has a gun to my back and a finger digging into my shoulder.
It’s a stupid question to ask. It’s not exactly like the woman who has me firmly in her grasp is going to reveal all her plans. And if she does, then it’s almost certainly because she doesn’t plan on me making this out alive.
So, I guess I’m a little relieved when she doesn’t answer. Then again, she has been tight-lipped during this whole endeavor. Apart from telling me to walk, she doesn't say much. All my questions have gone unanswered.
I think I'm handling being kidnapped particularly well, though. Mostly because part of it hasn't sunk in yet. It all happened so fast. After Billy went to the bathroom, I sat by myself with my thoughts for a few seconds, before the anxiety started to get to me. I decided to make myself useful by picking up some of the mail on the porch. Because we went in through the garage, I hadn’t grabbed it on the way in.
I opened the door and took three steps out, bending to pick up the mail. Three steps. That was all it took.
I didn't hear her coming. Didn't smell the lilacs, this time.
Cold metal pressed against the back of my head.
I jerked, and instinctively opened my mouth to scream, but she whispered, in a surprisingly calm voice, "You say a word and you’ll never say any words ever again. Understand?"
The scream instantly got trapped in my throat.
"Good girl," she said. "Now don't move."
I obeyed, partially because I was frozen in fear. I heard her shut the door silently and then another quiet order, "Get up."
I straightened, leaving the mail still on the ground.
"Walk," she said next, and again, I obeyed. That was the last word she said to me. We've been walking for what feels like an hour but has probably only been a few minutes. Silence has been her only response to my questions or pleas.
However, sometimes when I annoy her, she digs her hand in my shoulder and it touches a nerve that makes me wince. Then she chuckles a little, clearly enjoying my pain.
She shoves me forward, into the dark, thicketed woods, leading out of the cul de sac. We passed by my house a couple houses ago, and I can still see my garden in the distance. For a second, I thought we were going there, or at least I hoped we were. Maybe then I could’ve managed to figure out an escape route, since I know the area more than she does.
How laughable.My mind mocks.You think you know the area? She's managed to avoid detection for months, broke into your house, and left no evidence. She's a trained assassin. You probably don’t have any chance of making it out of this alive.
Hope flags, but determination still thumps through me. I have a child to take care of. Two, because right now I consider Mikey my son, too. I have a family who love and care about me. I have a thriving business. And I have Luke.
I love Luke.
I can’t die, now that I just gotten everything I've ever wanted.
“Keep moving,” the woman, ‘Tea’, says suddenly. Her voice shocks me out of my fantasy. We take a few steps forward, before she talks again. “You should thank me you know.”
“Thank you for what?"
“I could’ve killed you at any point before this,” she says in that same conversational tone. Her voice is light and breathy, which completely belies her tall, muscular frame. “You know, for someone who was under threat, you really don’t watch your back. Like zero situational awareness or sixth sense or whatever people want to call it. At any point, I could’ve pulled the trigger. But I gave you time. I wanted to see what kind of person you were. Curiosity, I guess."
Oh God. Terror clenches tight in my stomach. So, she's been following me all this time. All this time I didn't know. I thought Luke was overreacting with his overprotectiveness, thought I knew better than him.
Turns out I know nothing,
“Please,” I tell her, my voice cracking. It should be humiliating but I don't care. I'm ready to beg on my knees if that's what it takes. “Look, I don’t know what's going on between you and Billy but trust me I’m not a threat to you. At all. I’ve barely even spoken to him in the past few years and when we dated… let’s just say it wasn’t the whirlwind romance of the century. We weren't in love with each other, but since we were good enough friends, we figured it would be ok to try dating and then we just got used to being together."
She says nothing for a while. I keep going.
“And my son isn’t his," I say, in case she watched Billy and Chase interact. "That was a lie."
“Oh, I know that,” she says, while continuing her dogged push forward. “They look nothing alike."
