Keep My Baby Safe

by Bella Grant

  “They know we’ll duck.”

  “What if we didn’t?”

  He looked at her as if she were dense. “I’m assuming if they kill us, they die.”

  “Grace? You alive?” Anna called.

  “Don’t answer,” Tony said quickly. She couldn’t see him, so her nodding was useless, but she did it automatically. “Ready to drive? This is going to happen fast.”

  Grace closed her eyes for one second and inhaled deeply. On the exhale, she said, “I’m ready.”

  She heard him inhale and exhale, then grunt as he jumped up and fired a single shot. From the jeep, she heard a yell of pain before Tony yelled, “Now! Grace, now!”

  Grace twisted her body into the seat without exposing her head to the shooters, turning the keys in the ignition at the same time. The car started immediately, and she screamed with triumph as she threw the gear into drive and hit the gas pedal. The vehicle jolted forward with a scream of the engine, and they bounced through a small wooden fence and into the field behind the house. She didn’t look in the rearview mirror as she drove, but she heard the back window explode as Tony fired shot after shot at the jeep, hopefully holding their pursuers in place long enough for them to get far away.

  When the gunshots ceased, Tony yelled, “Grace, turn around! Make a big circle around the house and drive close to their car.”

  She jerked the wheel to the right, executing a nearly perfect one-eighty, never letting up on the gas. The car shuddered in reaction but continued forward at a rapid speed. Gunshots were fired from the jeep, but Tony began shooting at them again. Grace wondered when he’d reloaded, an insignificant thought as long as he had enough bullets to keep their pursuers at bay.

  When she rounded the house and approached their car, Grace chanced a glance towards the shooters just as Tony shot one of them in the face. Jerking her eyes forward again, she fought the panic as it tried to defeat her. She repeated “no, no, no,” without stopping as they passed the car. Tony fired several more times, but at what she didn’t know. She wouldn’t look again.

  Finally, the only sound was the car’s engine and the tires on the gravel. Grace’s main concern was putting as much distance between them and de Velazquez’s people. She didn’t slow down until Tony climbed awkwardly into the front seat and told her to.

  “We’ll crash on this gravel road, and we don’t have time for that,” he warned as he settled next to her in the passenger seat.

  She felt his eyes on her, but she wouldn’t look at him. Her panic would win if he asked her a question or tried to speak soothingly to her. When he inhaled to speak, she held up her hand, palm facing him. “Don’t talk right now. I have to calm down.”

  “All right,” he agreed, shifting so he looked forward again.

  They rode in silence for several minutes before she spoke again. “Are we going the right way?”

  “Yes. We’ll drive another fifteen miles and turn.” He waited a moment before asking, “Are you all right?”

  Grace scoffed, a derisive laugh escaping her mouth. “One thing’s for sure,” she commented drily as a single tear slipped down her cheek. “When this is all over, I’m gonna need some serious therapy.”

  Anna screamed curses after running to the car with the one man she still had with her. The other two lay bleeding on the ground, shot and killed by the fucking American who had rescued that puta. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

  The car had been shot several times. One tire was blown, and she’d bet money, since the rest of the bullet holes were in the side of the car, the engine was also ruined. The jeep was their only transportation now, and the keys were probably with Grace and the mystery man.

  “What the fuck,” she mused, her anger dissipating as she thought about who this man might be. He had to be ex-military or law enforcement or something of the sort. A bounty hunter, maybe, but she discarded that idea quickly. Bounty hunters didn’t rescue damsels in distress; they arrested bad guys and extradited them to their country of origin. So who was this man?

  “What now?” Carlos asked as he leaned carelessly against the car, watching her with interest.

  “Hot wire that fucking jeep and find them,” Anna answered, turning abruptly to walk back to the jeep.

  “I think our time would be better spent returning to the compound to get more men,” Carlos commented off-handedly.

  Anna jerked around to stare at him lolling lazily on the damaged car. “I’m dead if I go back without that woman.”

  Carlos pushed himself off the car, his calm demeanor infuriating her. “Price you pay for making a mistake.”

  “Fuck you,” Anna answered. “Senor de Velazquez put me in charge. Do as I say,” she ordered imperiously, turning her back on him to continue to the jeep.

  “Anna.”

  His quiet voice was barely audible over the crunching of her boots on the gravel, but she halted and turned to look at him, ready with a quick retort. His gun was aimed at her heart, and before she could react and draw her own, he fired. The searing pain was like nothing she’d ever felt in her life, and when she hit the ground, her breath and blood whooshed out of her body. She stared up into the bright blue sky, her eyes shifting to look into Carlos’ as he stepped closer to her.

  “Sorry, Anna. Boss’s orders.” He shrugged and walked towards the jeep, leaving her to die in the middle of nowhere.

  Chapter 10

  At the fifteen-mile mark, Tony told Grace to turn left and drive for seven more miles. “At that point, we’ll have to hide the car in the trees and hike to the cabin.”

  “Swell,” she muttered, glancing at him. “How do you know how to get there?”

  “Pablo told me,” he answered, shrugging. “I memorized it.”

  “What if you’re wrong?”

  He looked at her, smirking. “I’m not.”

  She made a face meant to be rude, though she directed it out the front windshield. Tony wanted to laugh at her small moments of defiance. In normal circumstances, the woman would be stubborn and wouldn’t accept a man telling her what to do. Her pride was smarting, he was sure, because he was issuing orders like a drill sergeant, but not once had she argued or refused. She was smart, wouldn’t let pride take over, which would save her life. But she hated the submissive nature she’d had to adopt.

  Watching her while pretending to look for their turn, he was continuously astonished by her bravery. She had gathered her strength when she could have succumbed to the panic attack he’d seen hovering in her eyes. She’d blinked a few times, breathed slowly, and when she’d looked at him, she was herself again. When he’d shot the men, her fear nearly won the battle, but she hadn’t let it. She was probably the bravest woman he’d ever met.

  “I can’t focus on the road when you’re staring at me,” she said, startling him out of his thoughts.

  “Wasn’t looking at you,” he replied gruffly. “I’m watching for our turn.”

  “You can’t simply see it?” she asked, glancing at him.

  “See the jungle ahead?” he asked, waiting for her nod. “This road disappears into the trees, and the road we’re taking is barely visible. Purposefully hidden to avoid detection, according to Pablo. We’ll have to slow our pace.”

  “Hmph,” she mumbled, depressing the brake to slow the car further. “Well, we won’t have any trouble hiding the car, I guess.”

  “No,” he agreed gruffly. He heard the brusqueness of his tone and wondered why he felt the need to be a dick to this woman. Clearing his throat, he complimented her. “You did a good job back there.”

  Grace looked at him again and breathed out a short laugh. “Thanks.” Her answer sounded hollow.

  “I do mean it, Grace,” he affirmed, looking hard at her even though she wasn’t looking at him. “Most women who have been through what you’ve been through this week would be curled up in the backseat making sounds like a lost kitten.”

  “A lost kitten?” She laughed, her smile lifting his spirits. “How poetic. I’m surprised y
ou would make a comparison like that.”

  Tony, for the first time in a decade, felt a hint of embarrassment crawl up his neck. After he’d made the simile, he’d thought how ridiculous he sounded. And she’d called him on it, another rarity in his life. His size and battle-scarred face often prevented people from speaking their minds to him. Once again, he’d lost count of how many times his respect for her upped a notch. Before he could think better of it, he revealed his secret.

  “You know, I’ve thought about being a writer when I’m done with this job,” he told her, watching her closely for her reaction.

  “Really?” she asked, her eyes rounded with surprise when she glanced at him and quickly back at the road.

  With a chuckle, he said, “I used to write in school. Wild stories. Haven’t written much in years, but I think I’ve got some good stuff up here.” He tapped his head with his forefinger.

  “I bet you have a lot of interesting stories to tell,” she commented, her eyes staring into the jungle to their left for any signs of a road. “I was actually thinking about writing this story, though I’m not much of a writer. Trevor was the writer.” She smiled sadly and looked at him again. “Maybe we could collaborate on this story.”

  “That’s a thought.”

  “If we survive,” she said pointedly.

  “We’ll survive.” He said it with such rigid belief that she looked at him. He nodded, and she gifted him with a smile that stunned him, though his face remained impassive.

  “Yes, we will.”

  The road was another mile up, and though Grace proceeded at a crawl, she nearly missed it. When she turned, the car bottomed out on the rough terrain, and as they continued, the condition worsened. She couldn’t avoid the deep divots, and after the seventh or eighth time of bottoming out, the car was making a strange puttering sound.

  “We may have injured the car,” she joked humorlessly. “How far are we supposed to go on this road?”

  “At least four more miles,” he answered, frowning deeply as a loud clunk was followed by a bounce that caused him to hit his head on the ceiling. He put his hand on the top of his head and growled, “Shit, that hurt.”

  “Yeah, well, I think something large and important fell off the underside of the car,” she quipped, looking in the rearview mirror.

  He didn’t bother to look, not knowing or caring whether she was joking. “I think the best bet is to go ahead and pull over, hide the car, and hike the rest of the way.”

  “It’s getting dark,” she complained. “What types of animals live in this jungle?”

  “Nothing a bullet can’t stop,” he replied drily, and she sneered at the windshield. “Can you hike for that long?”

  “Four miles?” She tilted her head side to side. “I think I can manage. Trevor and I hiked nearly that when we were in Bosnia.”

  “Bosnia?” Tony asked, surprised. “I was there.”

  “Terrible place,” she said without elaborating, and he understood why. The horrors he’d witnessed, and that she probably photographed, had haunted him for months.

  “Yes, it is.” He pointed to a small break in the trees. “Pull in there and drive until a tree stops you. There’s plenty of brush around to cover the car.”

  Grace pulled the car in about twelve feet off the road, then they spent nearly thirty minutes covering the vehicle. Tony watched her out of the corner of his eye, fascinated by her simple movements and graceful body. The clothes, which belonged to the bitch guard, were too big, but her body was unmistakably well-formed and athletic under them. He remembered her nudity, and rather than focusing on what he should have been, he hardened painfully and stopped moving.

  Grace noticed and looked over at him. She straightened, a confused expression on her face when she caught him staring. “Something wrong?”

  He saw no hint of fear, only defensiveness in her face, her voice, and her body. He smiled a small smile. “I think the car is well hidden. Let’s get started before it’s fully dark.”

  Her posture relaxed, and she returned the smile. When she turned away to return to the road, he grunted at himself under his breath as he watched her ass, barely visible in the large pants. The woman was affecting him more than any other had in his life, and rather than worry him, he was enjoying it. A poet indeed, he thought with a smirk as he followed her, the backpack of food, water, and ammo on his back.

  Over her shoulder, she called, “Will we have time to rest at this cabin?”

  “Not sure,” he answered. “Depends on the condition of the place. The cartel will figure out where we’re going eventually.”

  “How’s that?” she asked, stopping to look at him.

  He skirted past her so she could follow him down the trail that Pablo had claimed was a road. “There’s only one airport anywhere nearby. Unless de Velazquez has lost his mind completely, he or one of his men will figure that out soon enough.”

  Grace groaned behind him. “I’m so tired…” Her voice wasn’t quite a whine.

  “We’ll stay until sunrise if we can,” he told her, “as long as the cabin is in decent shape.”

  The ‘cabin’ was actually a school bus that had been converted into a living space. When Tony opened the doors, several small creatures skittered into hiding spots inside the engine compartment. Grace jerked back from the door, appalled, almost wishing for her basement cell, where nothing had been alive but her. Tony grumbled under his breath as he stepped inside to inspect the space they would invade. Grace remained outside until he had disposed of any varmints.

  “Is there poop?” she asked before stepping inside.

  “All clear,” Tony announced with a sour expression, stepping down from the bus and gesturing for her to go inside. “Your new home.”

  “Terrific.”

  She climbed up the three steps into the bus. She had expected an odor to pervade the entire area, but apparently, the little creatures who wanted to make this bus their home had been stopped by an inner door that separated the driver’s area and door from the actual living quarters. She pushed the second door open and smiled in surprise at the interior of what she’d expected to be a hunter’s hideaway filled with animal skulls and blood stains on the floor.

  Three lanterns hung from the ceiling, about five feet apart, lighted by Tony as he’d checked for animals. Next to the door was a miniature kitchen with a hotplate and a makeshift sink. No running water, as far as she could tell, but a prepared camper would have brought gallons with him. The numerous bench seats had been removed and replaced with two recliners with a table between them for eating. A small, modern couch was across from the table and recliners and could be moved closer to the table. At the back was a purple curtain hanging from a rod that she assumed separated a bed from the rest of the living quarters.

  Glancing over her shoulder, she wondered if she’d get the bed. Wouldn’t mind sharing it, she thought with a snort. The man was gruff and seemed short on words for someone who wanted to be a writer, but she was monumentally attracted to him. She snorted again as she pushed the curtain back to reveal a double bed with a pretty quilt covering it. They could definitely both fit easily, and her need for sleep was banished by her need to get laid. Surprised by the directions of her thoughts, she frowned as she glanced at him as he turned off two of the lanterns.

  “Why are you turning them off?” she asked as only the one closest to her remained lit. He dropped the backpack on the table and turned to her.

  “Too bright. Could draw attention,” he commented.

  “You think they’re still looking for us? I mean, you killed two of their men,” Grace said, watching his face. He hadn’t lied to her, nor had he been kind with his words, and she didn’t expect him to be now.

  “Did it bother you that I killed those men?” he asked, watching her.

  “Um,” she stammered, looking anywhere but at him. “I haven’t really thought about it. On one hand, I’m freaking out because you killed two people. On the other, I understand thos
e men wanted to kill us.”

  “Not kill us, Grace,” Tony corrected, staring hard at her. “They were going to take us to de Velazquez, who would have tortured me and made you watch until I died. The things he would have done to you…I don’t want to say out loud.”

  Grace stared at him, her mind running wild with horrible thoughts. “Have you see what he’s done?”

  “I’ve researched, seen pictures of the aftermath, if there was even a body to find. Heard rumors too,” he replied simply, shrugging. “The DEA and CIA have a lot of info on him. Details aren’t important, but you’d rather be dead that be taken to de Velazquez.”

  “You’ll shoot me first, right?” she asked after a moment of thought. When he didn’t answer immediately, she reminded him. “You said you would.”

  His face was unreadable when he lifted his eyes to hers. “I won’t let them take you alive.”

  Grace wanted to feel a measure of comfort, but instead, her fear escalated. “I’d rather survive and make it back to the US.”

  Tony laughed, a deep, loud laugh that made her feel better rather than as if she were being made fun of. “That is, of course, my first goal. Death is only if we’re caught.”

  Smirking, she asked, “Do you have those capsules they give to spies in the movies? You know, filled with cyanide or whatever?”

  “’fraid not,” he answered, shaking his head. “I’ll just have to shoot you. But don’t worry. I’ll hit you in a certain spot and you won’t even know what happened.”

  “Oh,” she said, nodding her head with an expression of false thanks on her face. “Appreciate that. And will you kill yourself after?”

  “Probably won’t have to,” he told her, explaining when she furrowed her brows at him. “They’ll kill me when they lose you. I’m not important.”

  “Well, I think you’re important,” she said, smiling at him.

  His eyes narrowed, but he didn’t respond. Grace felt embarrassment creep up her neck, but she didn’t speak either. Their eyes connected them, holding them frozen in a moment more important than either of them knew. Mutual lust and attraction was apparent, and the still air in the school bus crackled between them.