At this, neon pulled a black handgun from his waistband, finger on the trigger. Suddenly it was pressed against my temple, the coolness of it sent fear down my spine. Feeling myself pale even further as it stayed right there against my skin. I didn’t know what to say or do. How the hell was I going to get out of this?
Oh god, was this it?
Was I about to die?
Noah.
“Whoa, dude, put the gun down.” The stranger held both hands up, not giving me so much as a glance in the process. His eyes were firmly planted on the man who was holding a gun to my temple.
“You didn’t see shit, got it?” He spat, his British accent dripping in nothing but venom. The man, who gave me one short look before all but running backwards, almost falling over his own feet in the process.
Everyone else seemed to have backed away. Fear that they were about to be involved in a shooting if they stood too close. This was America, and the sad truth was this happened way to regularly. This is why guns were a bad idea.
“Get off me!” Finding my voice, I started to fight his grip one me. The need to get away from him overwhelmed me. I needed Noah. This was precisely why we should never have split up. This had been a massive mistake.
“Oh no, you don’t” he continued to hold the cold barrel of the gun against my skin, dragging it down towards my neck. My pulse felt like it was so loud he would be able to hear it.
“Let me go. I’m not who you want.” If he was going to shoot me anyway, there was no way in hell that I was not about to put up one hell of a fight.
“Oh, little silver, well not anymore,” he sniffed my hair, making me gag in the process. “Mr. H is going to be so happy to hear I have you.”
Police sirens began to sound in the distance, and he cursed before trying to drag me along the sidewalk. Realizing he couldn’t do it with one hand, he dropped the gun into his waistband, still cocked. Taking the opportunity and stepping down on his foot as hard as I could with my own. This only made him grab me tighter, though.
“GET OFF ME, ASSHOLE!!!!!” My feet kicked out and my hands tried to pry his clammy hands off of me.
One final kick and he finally loosened his grip just enough for me to free myself from his grasp. My feet dropped back onto the ground and I instantly began running for my life. Knowing that he would not be far behind me, and the fact he could have that gun trained on me, only made me move even faster.
Pulling the burner phone out of my pocket awkwardly, I pulled up the only number I had on the phone and hit call.
“What’s wrong.” He answered almost instantly, as if he had been holding the phone in his hand waiting for me to call.
Finding it hard to breathe and talk as I ran through the streets, I found myself lost. What direction was the truck we had left? Damn it! “They found us.”
“Shit! Where the fuck are you?”
“I don’t know he’s chasing me” unwilling to look behind me, I just carried on running through the people, knocking into some who only turned to give me a dirty look. I could hear his footsteps pounding behind me, and the wail of the sirens was getting closer too.
Suddenly a loud bang rang out, and I dropped to the floor on instinct as screams sounded around me. The echo of the gunshot ringing in my ears as everyone else started to scatter from the scene.
The sirens of the cruisers were almost deafening now, almost as if they were just about on top of us. Turning around to see my attacker with the gun aimed right at me, the last shot had been a warning. For me to stop.
They wanted to kill us, so why hadn’t he shot me with that bullet?
How could he expect me to go with him?
Was this it?
Was I about to die?
Would I ever see Noah again?
I was aware that I still had him on the phone, which was now in my hand hanging at my side. Where was he?
Looking into this man’s eyes, I knew my time was up and this was it. We had escaped and run away from them but no matter what, they were always going to find us.
Taking a deep breath in, I was about to close my eyes when three police cruisers came to a screeching halt around him. Blocking me from his view. Their own guns aimed at him as my eyes widened watching him drop down to his knees as a gunshot rung out, echoing down the street. Had they shot him, or had he shot at one of them?
Not waiting to find out what had happened, I turned pulling myself back onto my feet and ran back towards the grocery store where we had left the truck. If he were here, the others would be too. Picking the phone again and pressing it to my ear I could hear Noah breathing roughly, as if he was running too.
“Noah” trying to get his name out, I felt like I was not getting enough oxygen. Which had nothing to do with my inability to run.
Hearing his own harsh breaths, it sounded like he was running as well “Shit, you’re okay?”
“The car.” It was the only words I was able to get out. Seeing the large store, we had parked in front of towards my right, I let out a huff.
“I’m almost there.”
“Me too.”
Running into the lot, I could see him coming from the opposite direction and instead of running to the truck, I changed direction and ran straight to him. The need to touch him overwhelmed me.
His arms enveloped me, and I began to cry. His hold was all I needed and wanted in that moment.
“What happened, Sneaks?” The warmth of his hands on both sides of my face as he looked down at me, eyes bluer than I had ever seen before began to calm me. My arms held around his back tightly as I attempted to catch my breath.
“The cops surrounded him, I heard a shot, but I just ran.”
“We need to get the hell out of here.”
“Yeah,” hiccupping through a sob, “I think you’re right, about me needing to learn how to shoot.”
“Come on, let’s go.” He had to physically move me to the truck. It was as though my body had gone into shock and was unable to do anything, apart from cry and hold onto him.
“Did you get any money?” I asked before he closed the door on my side of the truck. A truck we thought we would never be in again.
“Yeah” he nodded before slamming it shut and running around to the driver’s side and slipping into his seat.
“How much?”
Not bothering to put his seat belt on, he just started the truck, revving the engine angrily “Enough that we could hide for a couple of years and still have some leftover.”
“Now what?” I had only seen him, but there was every chance that the others were here too.
“Now, we need to hide.”
“The woods?”
“Yeah, the woods.” Nodding his head in agreement, he pressed down on the gas and sped out of the lot.
Falling into silence, all I could do was think about every detail of what had just happened. How had they found us again? It’s like they knew exactly what we were doing, knew every step we made. Maybe doing all of this running was not going to work. Perhaps we needed to hide in the fire itself?
Unable to keep my idea to myself, I found my voice, “Noah?”
“Yeah”
“What if, look, I know this might sound kind of crazy, but what if we go back to New York to hide?”
“Absolutely not Sneaks.”
“No, hear me out. Your father has got people looking everywhere for us. There is no way that they would expect us to go back to the city. It’s kind of the perfect place to hide. In plain sight.”
“I think the woods sound a lot better.”
“We need to think about it. We can’t run forever.”
“We can and we will. And for what it’s worth, there is no way we are ever going solo again after what just happened”
I agreed with him on that but stayed silent, trying to get my heart rate to drop to a regular pace.
Chapter Fifteen
Valentina
Four days later and we were finally driving through a thick forest, in Mon
tana. We had spent so many hours in the black truck zig zagging across the country before I commandeered us the current car we were in, in an attempt to make sure they couldn’t find us again. The trees were so dense in this forest that Noah had to drive so slowly it would have been quicker to walk. Not that I dared to tell him that, again.
The backseat of the car was filled to the brim with camping equipment. Camping equipment that I had no idea how to use or put together. That was going to be very interesting, and I was ninety-nine percent sure that It was going to end up with me wanting to kill him in the process. What was new there? He was a pain in my ass, but I kind of liked it. Not that I was going to tell him that, of course.
"How much further?" Aware that I was sounding like one of those annoying teenagers in the back of the car in a film I groaned internally.
"The map shows a lake another mile or so."
“Yay, mosquitos.” Fake enthusiasm was clear in my voice.
“We need to be close to the water, we’re going to have to wash in it and our clothes. We can even boil the water to drink, probably” probably?
Well, when he put it like that, how could I not be excited about it?
“You know, I’ve never actually camped before.” I was a city girl, and my parents had only ever taken us on one vacation when I was a kid, and that was to Florida. I don’t think the Borroni’s were camping people. Although I was not about to tell him that.
“You’re joking?” He gasped in shock, and I wasn’t sure if he was being sarcastic or not.
“No, you have?” No way in hell, he was a weekend-camper. Next, he was going to tell me he went hiking for fun.
“All of the time.”
Unable to stop the scoff that left my mouth “As if”
“I’m serious. Usually, Jack and I get a load of beer and food and go for a couple of night out to upstate somewhere”
“I’m sorry, but there is no way in hell that the asshole I met in the elevator goes camping on the weekends.”
“You’re very judgmental” he tutted, “and I never said it was on the weekends.”
“Please”
“Come on, Sneaks,” he poked his tongue out at me. “I’m not that bad.”
“No, sometimes you’re even worse.” Although that was really not that true. I don’t know who that man was that I met in the elevator weeks ago. The Noah Hartman I knew was kind and protective. I was in trouble, that was for sure.
“Okay, so I probably deserve that”
As the woods became impossibly denser, I risked asking the one question that I hadn’t even thought of before “Errr Noah, what are we going to do about the toilet?”
“You’re looking at it.” He pointed out to the woods.
“So, we’re just going to go native?”
“Yeah, unless you want to go in a bag?”
He was not serious, was he? One look at his face, and I knew without a doubt that he was indeed very serious. Well, I am not going to the toilet in a freaking bag.
Thinking about those days we spent when we first were taken, we hadn’t even had the luxury to go anywhere, and that perspective was enough for me to not argue about it any further.
“Native it is” mumbling a reply, my eyes widened as we came to a stop beside a large, dark green and extremely murky lake. It looked like a place people had not been for a long time. On the one hand, that was a good thing, I think.
“That’s what I thought, home sweet home,” he tried to smile, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes.
“And you’re sure we will be safe here.” These woods were so dense that we would not be able to make a quick getaway if they did, by some miracle, find us out here.
“It is the best bet we have, plus this was your idea, so if they find us, it’s your fault.”
“Thanks,” I deadpanned.
“You’re welcome”.
“Asshole”
“I thought I was Diablo, the devil? You know you do confuse me with that, I mean, isn’t Diablo Mexican?”
“And?”
“Well, aren’t you Italian?”
“I’m American” throwing an empty oatmeal bar packet at his head, missing by several inches, I explained, “Diablo sounds better than Diavolo.”
“Sounds like a car.”
Nodding my head, I agreed, “Exactly, plus, I watch a lot of Spanish shows on Netflix.”
Exiting the car, anxiety crept back in. This would be where we would call home for however long we could stay here. It may have been a densely wooded area, but at the same time, we were literally out in the open. What if they found us out here? What would we do?
“What was the last show you watched?” Noah asked, pulling out the tent he had bought from Walmart three days ago.
Pulling the baseball hat off and freeing my hair, I sighed, “Spanish show or just the last thing I watched?”
“Just answer the question, Sneaks”
Giving him the side-eye, I mumbled my answer, expecting some sarcastic comment about being a nerd who watched graphic novel adaptations “Umbrella Academy,” but blow me down, he actually smiled.
“That’s good.” Nodding his head, he rolled his eyes at my expression.
“You like it?”
“Dude, you wound me with these thoughts you have about me.”
“So, let me get this right you go camping with your brother, you watch superhero graphic novel shows on Netflix. What else are you hiding about yourself over there, Diablo? Maybe you aren’t even the slightest bit the asshole you make yourself out to be. If I didn’t know any better, I would think that it was all some facade to keep people away from you”
When he just got turned his back to me and began to put the tent up, with no sarcastic comment, or even a ‘Thank you’ thrown back at me. I knew I had hit the nail on the head. Could it be that little mister cocky overconfident was just using that as some kind of a shield against other people? He was protecting himself from getting close to anyone. But why?
Was it because of his parents? He had a mother who warned him never to marry without being in love after doing just that, a father who had a lump of coal for a heart. Really, he was just a frightened little boy in a man’s body playing everyone around him.
Deciding to keep my revelation to myself we worked in silence, putting our tent up and setting our new home base for however long that we called call it that.
How long we would be here was anyone’s guess, but right now there was no one around and after the altercation I’d had the other day with Neon, I was the calmest than I had been in days.
Getting away from people was the best decision we’d taken. I wasn’t stupid, I knew that we would have to go into town soon enough to get some more supplies. We had enough food for a couple of weeks or so, maybe a bit longer if we were careful, but it was not going to last forever. And then we would have to go back out there, around people.
When we would be at our most venerable.
Chapter Sixteen
Valentina
“I miss music.” Sighing as my fingers tried to untangle a knot on one side of my hair “And Netflix,” what I would give to sit in front of the flat screen to watch an episode of any one of those trashy reality shows on there right now. You know, the ones that are just so bad that you get addicted and find yourself excited every time a new series is out?
“If you could pick something to listen to right now, what would it be?” He asked over the orange flames dancing in front of us. The sky had darkened hours ago, and in this dense forest it felt even darker than I’d thought possible. Our little fire and the one lantern inside of the tent were our only form of light. Thick clouds covered the moon that should have lit the sky, leaving it in complete and utter darkness.
“Something happy, whenever I feel sad or down, happy music makes me feel better.” Anytime I needed happy music I would put my cheesy pop playlist on Spotify, blasting it as loud as possible.
Poking the fire with a long stick, he kept those stormy gray
eyes on the flames as they danced in the slight breeze, “And you feel sad?”
Blowing out a breath, “I’m terrified, I miss my family and friends” Every time we sat in silence, my mind always wandered back to those I loved from home. There was nothing I wouldn’t do just to be able to be with them again. Apart from putting them in danger by going home to them, that was something I was not willing to do, ever. There is no way that until it was safe, however long that would take, I would be going back to them.
Devil In The Elevator: A Hartman Romance Page 14