Chapter 33 Alexandria
ALEXANDRIA
Icame round, lying on the ground in the woods. My head throbbed. My wrists were zip-tied. There was a van beside me, I had been transported somewhere, where the heck was I?
Had I been time-trafficked already?
The time of day felt the same. It smelled like North Carolina, the hum of the bugs was familiar. There was already a mosquito on my arm. My head pounded from being knocked out, but I had to think, I had to get away.
The men were looking down on something.
Shit, it was a vessel. They were about to jump us somewhere.
My backpack was right in front of my face.
Barely moving, without a sound, I got my hand inside it.
I kept my breathing slow. I concentrated on the men, while my fingers found the Glock that Ryan had given me, still in my bag buried under almost a hundred tampons. If they had looked in there they had decided not to bother. And they had left my bag right beside me, idiots.
Of course, I was not practiced in shooting. Had never done it before and not while my wrists were bound.
But I had to move, I had to kill these men. Now, right now. Shooting one would make the others come at me, probably. I had to be ready to fight and shoot, kill and get away.
Maybe I could play confused, distract them.
I decided that was the way to go, so I sat up, gun in my hand, “What’s going on?”
One of the men growled, “Nothing, bitch”
With my bound hands I raised that gun and put two rounds through his chest. A second man jumped toward me.
I shot him, knocking him back. Another man lunged at me and I fired at him as he clawed at my joggers.
I was screaming, crazed, firing again and again, on my back, shooting at anything and anyone that moved toward me.
Then there was silence except for my pulse and the tick of cooling metal.
I dropped the gun in a panic — the gunshots had scared the hell out of me. I was covered in blood, and it was as if someone else had done it. My ears rang; I was confused. There were dead men on me, around me.
I tried to cover my ears but my bound wrists made it impossible, I stared at the dark scene. Ugh.
I was surrounded by death. Where was I?
I had to get away from this crime scene.
It was too dark to see, but there was a flashlight lying on the ground, its light dimmed in high grass. I shoved men off my legs, stumbled up, and grabbed it, shining it around. I found a promising bag and dug through it for a knife.
Gotcha.
I placed the blade between the soles of my boots and cut the zip-ties, freeing my wrists.
I grabbed the gun, the knife, the vessel and two of the bags, including mine and walked away from the nightmare using the flashlight to lead my way to the road.
I needed to figure out where I was.