AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She shrugs as if to give me the point while pushing the ignition button. Peeling out of the lot, she weaves into traffic with an ease I’ve never seen any driver pull off—driving better than even I can, which is irritating to say the very least.
I’d never tell her, though—she’d have to torture it out of me first.
The wail of sirens start just as we reach the third block out, and four squad cars followed by a SWAT bus scream past us in a blur of speed. It’s not like in the movies. No one looks at us. No one suspects we had anything to do with the carnage those poor fellows will walk into.
From what I can feel and see, I know she is uninjured, but I need to know she is all right, though.
“We’re going to be fine, you know that, right?” I say, trying to reassure her.
Her face is a blank mask, her thoughts and emotions expertly hidden from me. Her only tell is the grayish-white cast to her knuckles as they grip the wheel.
“I know we will. It’s the next part that worries me.”
“What’s that?” I ask, on edge because knowing Aurelia, it could be anything.
“We have to be in the same car. Together. And driver picks the music,” she quips with an evil smile.
Fates, please not?—
Of course. Taylor Swift comes out of the speakers just to torture me. Aurelia shimmies in her seat as she punches the beautiful beast into fifth gear.
“You’re the Devil,” I grouse, crossing my arms, doing my damnedest not to stare at her boobs as she laughs in her seat. The brief glimpse of joy on her face is everything to me, though.
“Well, I can’t kill you or inflict any wounds without hurting myself, so Tay-Tay is what you get. Suck it up, buttercup.” She smiles as she pops the “P” with her lips.
I feel like she’s probably going to torture me forever. I hate that she hates me—that she can’t see my side of things.
“You could have just left me there, you know,” I murmur, the sting of her rejection twisting the knife in my chest.
“I know I could have. But if they caught you, they’d kill you to kill me. It’s a no-brainer, really. I’m helping you to save my own ass. And as soon as I figure out how to remove our binding, I’ll never see your face again. Sound like a plan?”
She glances my way, but I school my features long enough to nod. That little quip twists the knife again, and I have to grit my teeth against the ache. Removing the binding, even as hard as it is to bear, would be like cutting off a limb—like cutting out my heart.
“Sounds like you’ve got it all worked out,” I croak, staring out the window at the passing traffic, as we head north on I-25 out of town.
I know this for certain: I am going to get this girl to forgive me if it’s the last thing I do.
Chapter Four
AURELIA
After five and a half hours of driving, one fuel stop, and a circuitous route, we’ve made it to the safe house in Grand Lake, or the “cabin mountain on steroids” as Evan calls it. The safe house is more her father’s vacation cabin than anything else. I’ve only seen pictures of it, but they didn’t do it justice.
The exterior can only be described as a log cabin’s hotter, older, manlier brother. Thick logs run the perimeter of the four-story house, only broken up by large picture windows lit up in the gloom of the night sky. Craggy stone columns bookend the porch, solidly constructed of immense limestone slabs and broad vertical logs. The very top floor seems much smaller than the ones below, possibly serving as a loft or crow’s nest for surveillance.
Security doesn’t appear to be a concern here. The house is alone on the top of a large foothill surrounded on three sides by the Rocky Mountain National Park, with the closest neighbor half a mile out in any direction. The hundred-acre property is solidly enclosed by a rough stone wall tall enough to classify the place as a fortress.
Getting through the gate is easier than I expected, especially since the security panel at the eight-foot, iron entry gate requires my thumbprint. I’m going to have to talk to Evan about her lack-of-privacy shtick.
My thumbprint? Really?
Several cars and trucks dot the cabin’s half-mile driveway: a shiny Jaguar interspersed with late model Fords, and a new Audi mixed with a rusted-out Chevy. I park in the only open spot, incidentally only twenty feet from the front door, and roughly punch the button to turn off the ignition after shifting my baby into park.
Man, I miss the days when you could turn a key. Simply pressing a button just doesn’t have the same air of purpose.
Groaning, I open the car door and pull my body to standing. I rub my eyes, so happy I ditched the contacts and shake out my legs before going to the trunk to pull out my go-bag. Every vehicle I own has a small duffel bag stashed somewhere inside them. They contain cash, clothes, one day of rations (beef jerky and a flask of Jameson—don’t give me too much credit), and a shiny new identity.
The identity I probably won’t need just yet, but I will need the set of clothes—my suit jacket lost to poor George, my pants and shirt ruined by Thad’s interrogation.
