Chapter 12
ASH
I extend the rifle and my arms through the bars to hook the assault rifle and pull it closer. After I turn it around, I raise it to familiarize myself, in case I need to fire it.
My legs cramp from holding the squatted position too long, so I’m forced to stand, which exposes more of my bare skin to the cold, damp air. Unable to help myself, I suck in a wincing breath as I start to shiver uncontrollably.
“It’s so freaking cold.” I announce this because I’m hoping War will crowd me to warm me up.
War leans against the bars casually. “Sixty-five or so. Not exactly drastic.” He glances around as if to clock a thermostat he failed to notice.
“Yeah, well, I’m not as big and hairy as a werewolf, so I’m less protected.”
His low laughter causes me to smirk a little, despite my chattering teeth.
A moment later, he rises and stalks over to the mattress.
Yanking the sheet off by the corner, he shakes it out.
With his teeth and bare hands, he rips a couple of holes in it and then carries it over to me.
Pulling each of my arms through a makeshift armhole, he turns the sheet into a robe he cinches shut with two knots.
“Thanks. I should’ve thought to wrap that around me sooner, but I?—”
War’s giant fist closes around one of the knots and tugs me forward so I fall up against him. “Hey, baby doll, what’ll you give me if I open a door in this cell?”
My gaze flicks to the door, which is still very much locked. Returning my eyes to his face, I cock a skeptical eyebrow at him. “How about as payment, I take out some gunmen who are trying to kill you? Oh wait…”
His lips twitch into a smile. “Right, you did. But like you said, I’m only in a position to get shot because I came to your fucking rescue. You think I’d have stormed them and given them a chance to shoot me in the back if they hadn’t been trying to take you? Not a chance.”
“What were you even doing there? And let go of me, I need to keep watch.” He allows me to push his hand away so I can turn and stand next to where the assault rifle rests.
With my eyes trained on the dark corridor, I repeat in a whisper, “What were you doing on the road? Did Jamie ask you to follow me or something? I know Trick didn’t. ”
War’s hand comes to rest on my hip as he stands behind me. “No one trusts me for that.” He pinches my side. “They think you’ll push me too far, and I’ll hurt you.”
I glance up over my shoulder, studying his profile. “Is that what Jamie said?”
“Nah. But he doesn’t need to. It’s there between the lines.” War exhales, narrowing his eyes on the darkness.
I like this “toasted on tranquilizers” version of War. The one where he answers questions and makes me toga robes from a sheet. I’m going to get as much information as I can before the drugs wear off. “So then why were you following me?”
“It’s a good question,” he muses, as though he’s got no idea himself. “Hey, you know what? The bars on the side of the cell go into the back wall, not the ground.”
I shift my attention to the short sidewall of bars. He’s right that there’s a flat piece of metal framing running the upper length of bars on the cell’s side. The frame ends in a plate that’s fastened to the stone wall.
“The old mortar’s going back to sand,” he says, inclining his head.
My brows rise as I study the mortar. It’s not obviously crumbling, but there is a scattering of sandy looking dust in the corner. Also, the plate that’s tacked to the wall looks rusty. “As an anchor, sand’s not very strong.”
“Nope, not particularly.” His right hand closes on the bolt-action rifle’s barrel and he stands. Without hesitation, he stalks to the back corner of the cell and slams the butt of the rifle against the stone, sending rock and mortar debris everywhere.
Then, he grabs the mattress and props it against the bars and rams them with the full weight of his body. The clatter and groan of the breaking bars is profound. The sidewall of the cell is loose at the top now. He reaches out and shakes it, noting where things are still anchored.
War backs up and hurls himself forward. The rock explodes as the end plate’s spikes pull free of it. The mattress folds into the v-shaped opening. With one meaty fist, he jerks it free and lets it drop to the floor.
He transfers the rifle to his left hand and beckons me with the right. “Come on, blondie. Let’s go.”
Rushing over, I watch as he widens the gap farther for me with a hard shove.
“Watch yourself, baby doll.”
I curve around the wickedly jagged spikes. When I’m outside the cell, I stand near the assault rifle, waiting for him.
He’s big, so he can’t fit through without cutting himself on the rusty metal. Two lines of blood bloom on his side as soon as he wrenches himself free .
“Jeeze.” I grimace, wiping the blood from him to make sure the wounds aren’t deep enough to have punctured his lung or abdomen. Fortunately, they’re only skin deep. “The first thing we’re gonna need to do when we’re free of this is get you a tetanus shot.”
He exhales a noncommittal sound as he leads me around the front of the cell to the battery-powered lantern. After hanging the assault rifle over his shoulder, so it rests along his spine, he hands me the lantern.
Checking the bodies for ammunition, he shakes his head. In a whisper, he says, “No clips for the Glock. Stay behind me but angle the light so we can see where we’re going.”
My voice is barely a whisper. “Maybe I should go first with the gun? I’m better with a pistol, but?—”
“Nah. I go first.” He starts walking, and I stay directly behind him, holding the light up until my arm starts to burn.
“Slow down,” I hiss.
“No. Keep up.”
After several minutes, he reaches a fork. There’s blue paint splashed on one side, but what it means is anyone’s guess.
War studies the ground a moment and then heads to the right.
We’ve only traveled a few feet before we reach a metal door. He shoves against it and shakes his head when it doesn’t budge. “I’ll break before that door does. Go back,” he says.
I turn and hurry down the narrow corridor to the fork. Once I reach it, War moves me into the wider area we came from, so he can take the lead again.
After walking for a while, I grow disoriented. It feels like we’re going downhill, farther into the earth. Then, the light flickers and dims.
“Fuck,” I mumble, feeling shaky and claustrophobic as the corridor grows narrower and the darkness deeper.
Where the hell are we? Is he even going to fit through whatever opening we manage to find? Because at the moment, he’s having to duck and twist to make it through.
The light fades to nearly nothing. Panic twists inside me. “ Fuck.”
“Shh.”
“I think the guys went the other way to get out.”
“Yeah. To the locked metal door.”
Coming to a sharp stop, I exhale a stuttering breath. “We’re running out of light, and I feel like this way is just leading us deeper. What if we go back to the door and wait for them to open it when they come back through. You could?—”
“What if they’ve decided to cut their losses?”
“What?”
“Cask of Amontillado.”
“What?” Then, I remember the Edgar Allan Poe story where one guy entombs another in an underground catacomb. “You think they’re not coming back?”
“Maybe. Maybe not.” His hand reaches back and catches my arm. Once his fingers close around my wrist, he starts walking, tugging me forward.
When we reach another fork, we don’t see it until his hand bumps the wall. I’m trying to keep it together, but my heart is pounding so hard I can barely breathe.
Straining my eyes, I say, “It looks a little wider to the right.”
“Stand right here and don’t move.” He walks to the right, then stops and backs up until he bumps into me. Turning his shoulders, he inches into the left corridor. “Yeah.” He reaches back and grabs my arm. “This way.”
My hand rubs against the rough rock. It’s so tight.
After a moment, he pauses and then shoves himself forward, barely moving an inch.
“Wait,” I say as the light goes out, plunging us into pitch black. “Fuck. Stop!”
“Why would we stop?” he demands.
“Because you won’t fit. Can’t you feel it getting narrower? You’re going to wedge yourself in so tight that you’ll get stuck. And then what will we do?”
“This passage is going uphill. The way out from here is up.”
“But it won’t do us any good if it’s too narrow for you to get through.”
“True.”
“If you get stuck, I won’t be able to pull you out. You’re too heavy.”
He exhales a small laugh. “You sure? ‘Cuz I was really counting on you to carry me when I got tired.”
“Fuck off, War. Seriously.” I’m really scared now, but my tone is dead steady from fury.
The sound of flesh rubbing against rock begins again. And then I don’t feel him in front of me. “Where are you?”
“It’s a corner.” His voice is ahead and somewhere to the left. “Feel your way around it.”
Biting down on my lower lip, I use my hands to maneuver until I bump into the reassuring bulk of him.
From the distance of my hands to the walls, I can tell the space is slightly wider again. War goes forward, and for someone so big, he doesn’t make much noice. After a bit, I can’t hear him at all.
“Hey,” I snap.
“What?” His voice is somewhere in front of me, but I can’t tell how far.
“Don’t go so fast. What if there’s a fork? We could get separated.”
I shuffle, running my hand against the dirt wall. It’s getting wide, but loose rocks scatter the ground now. It would be easy to trip and fall.
“War?”
“Yeah?” His voice is distant.
“Where are you?” Jesus Christ. What is he doing? We’re lost in a pitch black fucking underground maze.
From the debris, I’m betting the risk of cave-ins is high, which means any one of these corridors might end in a pile of rock. If one does, I don’t even think we could find our way back.
When he doesn’t answer, I curse.
Hurrying forward, I slam right into him while rushing and almost fall. A strong hand catches me around the waist somehow and drags me against his body, so I don’t crash to my knees.