Chapter Eight #2
Is he insane? Of course I’m driving recklessly ! I would like to live! “We were just being shot at! Of course I’m fucking driving recklessly!”
“Felix,” he says, completely calm. His voice is steadier than it usually is. Like this whole thing has calmed him down. Like he’s meditating and has just found his happy place. “You’re just drawing attention to yourself. So, take a deep breath and slow the car down.”
Praying Lane hasn’t lost his mind and actually knows what he is doing, I nod and slow the car from eighty-two to sixty-five. Which is still fast when the speed limit is forty-five.
“Good,” he says. “Now, just head out of town but keep an eye out if anyone is following. You’ll be able to tell better once we’re on the highway.”
“Okay.” I start focusing on road signs, following the ones pointing me toward the highway.
“Do you have your phone?” he asks.
I’d left mine in the hotel room. I hadn’t even thought of grabbing it after Lane shot that man. “No, should I stop somewhere?”
“No, just drive.”
I reach the southbound lane first, so I take it. The tires squeal as I descend the ramp far too quickly, but we make it out onto the highway where it is at least logical for me to be running over seventy.
“Are you okay? Did he hurt you?” he asks.
“I’m fine,” I say.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, I’m fine,” I say, but honestly my head is aching again from that man hitting me with the gun. “Did you kill him?”
“I don’t know,” he says.
“Oh…why is he after you?”
“For confidential reasons.”
I almost look away from the road to stare at him like he’s an idiot. “I’m pretty sure I deserve to be told,” I snap.
“I should not share information from my work.”
“ Seriously? Who am I going to tell? I don’t have a family.” That’s when it dawns on me. “Oh my God! Is that why I was hired? If I was killed off or something happened to me there’s no one that would notice! No one to care. Right?”
He hesitates, but I’m not sure why when I already know. “Yeah…pretty much.”
I stare at him for a moment then laugh. I’m not sure why I’m laughing. Maybe I have brain damage. Maybe I’ve finally lost it. “Seriously?”
“Seriously,” he says with a grimace. “Sorry.”
“I hate you and the people you work with. I was excited that I got a good job and it was all just because I am expendable!”
“Well…I mean, if you think about it, would it be better for someone who doesn’t have anyone to be murdered or a woman with three children, a loving husband, and parents who still have her over for supper every Sunday?”
“I’m so glad my life means less because I didn’t get knocked up in high school and marry a man I despise,” I reply snidely.
“Felix, that is not what I’m saying, and you know it. I’m not trying to be mean. And don’t forget, I didn’t ask you to put your life in danger.”
I look in the rearview mirror. “Hey…well…I’m sorry to ruin you bashing my life, but I think we’re being followed.”
“What kind of car?”
I look in the rearview mirror. “A black and white one with sirens on top.”
He sighs. “I told you that you were driving erratically.”
“You don’t think perchance it was because you shot two people and I hijacked a car? ” I ask as I look back again. The lights aren’t on yet, so I try to keep to the speed limit without losing my mind.
“Yeah, but they probably found you quicker because you were driving like a maniac.”
“Aren’t you a cop? Isn’t this like…no big deal, right?”
“Sure,” he says as I see the lights flash on and the sirens start.
For a split second, I want to push the car faster, just get away from all of this, but I know that won’t help the situation. So, I take a deep breath and pull the car over onto the side of the road. I glance at Lane, hoping for some type of support. “Lane?”
“Yes?” he asks like none of this is a big deal at all. Like he does this every day. Maybe he does. Maybe he gets off on this shit and thinks I’ll be interested in this bizarre fetish of his. God, I’m going to die today, aren’t I?
“Are we going to be shot to death by a police officer?” I ask as I look over at him.
“It’s not real likely,” he says as he pulls his gun out and tosses it onto the floor.
“Great. I love when things are just ‘not likely.’ And…just in case you forgot, we are still in our underwear.”
“Then if you’re as hot as you claim you are, they definitely won’t want to shoot you,” he says.
He thinks now is a good time to joke? Of course he does. “I never claimed that I am hot!” I say. “We’re going to die.”
Another police car pulls up in front of the other, kind of boxing us in, but neither are coming up to our car.
“GET OUT OF THE CAR WITH YOUR HANDS UP!” the man says through a speaker.
“Yup, we’re going to die,” I say as I turn the car off.
“Just get out, tell them nothing. If they ask what happened, you say you don’t know. You don’t know anything, understood?”
“I’m supposed to lie?”
“Anything they ask say, ‘I don’t know.’”
“Okay,” I say as I push the car door open and step out with my hands up. There are blinding lights on me, making me cringe back.
“Come around to this side of the vehicle and keep your hands where we can see them!” a man shouts, gun trained on us. And I realize that within the past hour I’ve had three guns pointed at my head.
I don’t get paid enough for this shit.
Lane slowly walks around to my side of the vehicle, his hands in the air. He walks with his hip touching the car, so he can easily find his way around.
“Get on your knees, hands behind your head!” someone shouts.
Stones dig into my bare knees when I drop down to them and slowly put my hands behind my head. Lane does the same as I see two more cop cars pull up. The police officers then rush us; one of them grabs my arm and yanks it behind my back.
“Ow, that hurts!” I cry, but they don’t seem to mind nor care as they snap the handcuffs in place.
The officer holding onto me begins stating my rights as I’m pulled up to my feet.
They shout in my face while I wonder when Lane is going to come forth with the information that he is a man of the law, so we can just walk out of this place.
As I’m taken over to the police car, I start to wonder not when but if Lane is going to say anything at all.
The man sets a hand on my head as he pushes me through the open door.
I slide in as I look back to see if Lane is doing anything to get us out of this mess, but the officer just slams the door shut in my face.
They drag Lane off to another car, and I am taken for a ride in a police car for the third time in my life.