Chapter 26 Everly
EVERLY
After what seemed like an eternity, I finally burned through the ropes at my hands.
I wiggled my wrists free and the relief that flooded through my veins felt surreal.
Tears sprang to my eyes as the lighter went out, and I waved my hands around to get rid of the smoke around my face.
My wrists were red and angry, with dried blood coating areas that would need to be treated by a doctor.
Feeling flooded my hands and began to tingle, forcing more tears to my eyes as I bit down onto my tongue.
The shooting pains were blinding, and I had to stabilize myself against the chair.
I drew in deep breaths, trying to quell my emotions as best as I could.
I was one more step to being free and the guys outside were getting drunker.
Louder. Roudier by the second. That would play in my favor.
Having them tripping over themselves with booze flooding their veins would give me more time to get away.
Which I would need with my wounds.
Sucking up the pain, I bent over and loosened the ropes at my ankles.
But the second those fell from my skin, it felt like I was being placed into a meat grinder.
I could feel blood still soaking into my socks and I closed my eyes.
Swallowed my whimpers. Tried desperately to quell the raging anger within my chest. I sat there as I stretched out my legs, listening as my joints cracked.
The angle they’d been strapped at for hours robbed me of my breath.
As blood began to rush to my feet, the tingling sensation was almost unbearable.
My vision tunneled as my ankles throbbed.
Not an ounce of skin was left around the bony protrusions.
I was shaking in the chair. Close to vomiting into my lap as I tried to keep some sort of hold on myself.
I didn’t know if I’d be able to stand on my feet.
The pain of moving blood alone made it hard to breathe.
But once I found my strength, I stood.
I was unsteady, but on my feet. Standing didn’t hurt, but lifting my feet did. I placed my hand on the metal shelving to stabilize myself and a searing pain ricocheted up to my shoulder.
I needed a doctor, and quickly.
I reached for the doorknob and quietly tried it.
But it was locked. I fumbled with the knob to see if there was any way of unlocking it from the inside, and there wasn’t.
Fuck. All that work and all of that pain only for the damn door to be locked from the outside.
I squinted my eyes and reached for the lighter, then struck it on and panned it around the room.
Maybe there was a key, or something sharp I could use to try and pick the lock.
I scanned the metal shelves in the hopes that something would appear, but all I saw was bleach, some Comet, and dusty towels that didn’t look to have been used in years.
Suddenly, the laughing stopped. I stood in my spot and held my breath.
I heard a chair scrape along the floor and I began to panic.
Was someone headed my way? Were they coming to check on me?
Shit, the last time they did I convinced the guy I was still passed out.
What if they opened the door and saw me loose?
I had no way of defending myself. I didn’t have the wrist strength to fight them off and I was still unsteady on my feet.
Then, my eyes landed back onto the bleach.
“She awake yet?” someone asked.
“She better be. I’m ready to have some fun.”
I grabbed the bleach and released the lighter, then stuffed it into my pocket.
I stood with my knees bent as I uncapped the bleach.
This time, I needed that asshole to open the door.
I needed someone to unlock this thing long enough for me to choke them on bleach so I could run.
I tossed the cap down at my feet and grabbed it with both hands.
I watched as a shadow appeared underneath the door, the footfalls coming to a stop in front of it.
Then, I coughed.
“I think our playtoy’s awake,” the guy said.
“What?” someone asked.
“Speak louder!”
“I said, I think she’s awake!”
“The fuck did he say?”
This was my moment. I watched the doorknob turn as the door swung open, and before me stood someone I hadn’t seen before.
Yet another person I didn’t recognize despite my involvement with their stupid club.
His eyes widened and he opened his mouth, ready to call the guys to let them know I was loose.
Then I doused him in bleach, watching as it poured down his throat and splashed into his eyes.
He stumbled back, choking on the liquid as he clawed at his eyes.
I hovered over him and poured the rest of the bleach onto his skin, making sure he had plenty to keep him entertained.
My eyes rose down the hallway as I stepped over the man, gurgling and groaning on the ground.
Luckily, I’d been in their lodge enough times to know exactly where I was the second I got my bearings.
I was in the back room of the lodge. With the kitchen and a back exit.
The issue with the back exit was that it poured me into an alleyway, and I could easily be cornered.
And since speed was not on my side with the wounds I was dealing with, that wasn’t the ideal situation.
I crept down the hallway as the man behind me struggled on the ground, his throat sputtering.
Trying to talk. I peeked around the corner and saw the rest of the guys hanging out at a table with empty beer bottles littering the floor.
Some were slumped over and a couple were swaying in their seats.
Drunk as fuck and not even concerned about where the other guy was.
My eyes panned over to the exit at the other end of the bar and I smiled.
That was my way out. It dumped me onto a back road I could follow out to the highway that ran through Redding.
There was a neighborhood only half a mile away from the bar I could get myself lost in, and surely someone would help me.
Or at least allow me to use their bathroom to clean myself up.
I shoved my hand into my pocket to get my phone.
Now I could call Grave and let him know what happened.
But when I saw my phone was dead, tears filled my eyes.
Fuck.
I was alone in all this.
I had to get out of that exit somehow. I wouldn’t have the energy to run the extent of the alleyway if I used the back exit.
I crept around the corner and ducked down behind the bar, figuring I could stick to the shadows.
Press myself closely against the wall and literally slide out from underneath their noses.
It was the only plan I had, so it needed to work.
I crawled along the grimy bar floor, holding back my disgust as my knees sank into a slimy, wet substance.
I gagged. Heaved. Felt bile rising up the back of my throat.
This place was utterly disgusting and I couldn't believe I’d spent time in this place.
With these manipulative psychopaths who murdered for fun and didn’t give a shit who they hurt.
I crawled to the end of the bar and looked up, taking in the bathroom door in front of me before the bar stopped to allow people out from behind it.
I peeked around the corner and looked at the guys again, watching as one of them got up.
“You guys want another?”
“Where the hell did Fender go?”
“Probably having his fun. We told him he could.”
“Man hasn’t gotten his dick wet in months. Go him.”
“So, drinks? Then we go check?”
“Hell yeah, drinks. And maybe we’ll get to watch a bit.”
Their conversation was disgusting. Who the fuck had my brother-?
It didn’t matter any longer. The brother I’d grown up with was dead.
Didn’t exist any longer. As far as I was concerned, I had no family.
No brother to speak of. I buried him the day we buried Mom.
His heart fell into that woman’s coffin at her funeral and never came back.
I inched the bathroom door open quietly, hoping to the high heavens none of them would catch the movement.
One of the guys was coming back behind the bar and I had to get out of sight.
But before I could, gunshots rang out.
“What the fuck?”
Then, a bullet crashed through the window of the front doors.
“They’re fucking here! How the hell did they find us!?”
I ducked into the bathroom and closed the door, then curled up into a corner.
I gripped my knees as gunfire rang out around me and I closed my eyes.
I had to ride it out. Whatever was going on, I had to ride it out.
And in a way, this type of thing was good.
If the firefight drew them outside, then I could roam the bar freely and try to find another way out.
I didn’t know if any other exits, but there were plenty of windows.
I could crawl out one of them and make for the woods. Or run down the road.
Yes, the firefight was good. The bullets crashing through the lodge was good. The bullets buzzing around the bathroom were good.
If one of them didn’t kill me first.