2. Chloe
2
CHLOE
I never thought I would return to my hometown, especially not on the run from masked men who burst into my workplace, guns blazing.
I couldn’t give myself a chance to think about any of it yet. Not the sight of my new bosses gunned down and bleeding out on the floor. Not the shattered windows and stink of smoke clinging in the air, that sulfur odor mixed with the tang of blood in a nauseating combination. As I clutched the steering wheel and sped away, still high on the adrenaline rush of facing a life-or-death scenario, I grimaced and willed my stomach to settle.
Just don’t think about it. Don’t think back. I wasn’t in a position to ward off thoughts when it was all so fresh on my mind, but I had to focus on hiding. I could embrace the freaking-out part later.
Hide and lie low. Freak out later. This wasn’t the first time I’d chanted that mantra to myself. Sadly, this wasn’t my first rodeo of escaping a shitty situation. The last time I’d been this scared, though, was when I ran away from Beckson. The irony wasn’t lost on me that I was hurrying toward it now.
My heart hammered faster as I desperately steered off the highway. The exit signs for Beckson were familiar, but it wasn’t a comfortable recognition. I wasn’t lured here out of any sense of belonging. Beckson was no safe haven, and I doubted I could rely on any one person or place to offer me shelter.
Yet, I had to plan on pulling off and trying to hide. To run on foot. To bunker down and keep my head low like I did at A&J’s deli when the shooters rushed through. In the back of the business, I tucked under a sink and curled up tight, fearing I’d be spotted and shot. Here, in Beckson, I’d need to hide even better. Small towns weren’t the best location to get lost in.
My options to survive were fading, and wasn’t that the damn truth. All my life, I'd felt like I operated on a low bar of standards—just to survive. To get through one day just so I could try to give the next one my best.
But my hand was forced. I had no other options to continue getting away because this van was nearly at empty. I hadn’t really considered the fuel when I climbed into the driver’s seat back in the city. From downtown to Beckson, I spent all the gas in my getaway.
What the hell else could I do? That pair of men showed up at A&J’s so suddenly that my new bosses, the managers, didn’t have a chance to duck from the gunfire. I heard it when I was in the back and hid, near the rear exit. The gruesome bloodbath I spotted through the window into the deli’s shop space had me panicked and fleeing as soon as the shooters turned their backs.
After hiding and waiting for the opportune moment, I sprinted out the back, but I didn’t get far. Another man was creeping in from the alley, and I just barely had the time to dive for the rusty old van that Manny and Suzie said they used for deliveries. He fired at me without pause, shouting at me to stop. I didn’t. So long as I could breathe, I’d fight to survive.
I didn’t know who these men were, why they’d shoot up a local deli shop, or what they could want. Moving on autopilot and driven with the instinct to flee, I got into the van and took off.
If the tank were full, I would’ve left the whole damn state. I would’ve driven faster and further to escape the SUV that chased after me out of New York. I’d lost them a little, weaving in and out of lanes, but they always seemed to catch up. My ignorance of the city aided me. I got lost, and that was how I couldn’t throw them off course—because I didn’t know any course.
On the highway, though, they got slightly behind with the traffic clogged up. Once we reached the open stretch of the expressway, they were able to stay on my tail.
“Okay. It’s now or never,” I whispered to myself, hoping that speaking the words out loud would infuse confidence into the air, into me.
I gritted my teeth and tried to breathe as steadily as possible as I white-knuckled the steering wheel. Keeping an eye on the SUV in the rearview mirror, I waited until the last second to swerve to the right and exit. Tires squealed. My shoulder ached from how hard I yanked the steering wheel to the side. Slammed up against the driver’s door, I held on the best I could to avoid rolling over.
Yes! The engine growled and protested with the rough maneuvering, but I was upright and still speeding along the ramp. I did it! I was still on the move.
I pressed harder on the gas, demanding that the van give me all it had in the reserves of its tank. It had to go. This had to work. Glancing into the mirror, I saw that I’d pulled it off. Not only did I get off the highway and not roll over, but I also lost them. The SUV didn’t have enough time to get off and stay on my tail. They’d need to get off at the next exit or do a U-turn.
I bought myself time by sneaking off the expressway, but as I sped into Beckson, I winced at the noises from the van. That arrow was below E after my daring escape. No gas remained in the tank. Running on fumes, I had to think fast. Really fast.
Frantic and still so on edge from trying to run, I scanned the barren stretch of the highway roadside. Tall weeds remained despite the winter coming and going. Brown grass covered the land, not growing green yet with the lazy start to spring. Litter clumped at taller stems between the guardrail posts, but past all of that, I spotted another familiar sight.
The Beckson Motel was a rundown dump. It was ugly from years of neglect ten years ago when I left town, and it sure didn’t look any better now.
It wasn’t a great option, but I was stuck. I had no choice. The van slowed and then puttered to a stop on the road leading to the driveway for the highway motel.
Pushing it into the lot wouldn’t make a difference. Besides, with the arrival of cold rain, I wasn’t sure I could push it to a parking spot.
If I leave it on the highway, maybe that’ll deter them.
I got out and hurried across the grassy field toward the motel, knowing that I was also running on fumes.
Of course, they’ll guess that I’m at the motel. No other building stood around here on the outskirts of Beckson. As soon as those men turned around and got off at this exit, they’d come to the motel and hunt me down. The tree line to the west wasn’t promising, not with those branches bare of leaves and coverage.
This motel was my only hope. Without a look back at the A&J van, I barreled through the door, startling the front desk clerk.
Oh, my God. “Winonna?” I asked, stunned that the crotchety old woman who ran the motel ten years ago was still manning this front desk.
She raised her brows, expressing the same disbelief that I felt. “Is that you, Chloe Dawson?” With a nasty cackle, she cracked up. “Oh, Lordy. Talk about the garbage the cat dragged in. Look at you.” She laughed some more, taking glee in my soaked, disheveled appearance. Chills cut through me as I waited for her reaction to fizzle, but I’d be damned if she was waiting for an explanation.
“You bust outta town right after graduation, acting like you’re all superior and better than the rest of us. And now look at you! Running back with your tail between your legs, eh?”
I exhaled a shaky breath, too cold, too scared, and too annoyed to deal with her. Facing this sort of judgment was precisely why I never thought to return, but I was out of luck.
“I need a room.”
She laughed some more. “A room.” Slapping the counter, she shook her head and wiped her tears. “ Here ? Oh, how the mighty have fallen.” Then she narrowed her eyes and lifted her chin. “For you , I’ll give you a special rate. Three hundred a night.”
My jaw dropped. That was insane. This one-start dump of a lodging wasn’t worth half that price. We both knew she was price-gouging, likely out of spite and nothing else, but I didn’t have time to haggle. I didn’t have the freedom to drive somewhere else.
“Take it or leave it.” She crossed her beefy arms and grinned.
You… I exhaled a sharp breath, wishing I could shout at her, but she was my only means of hiding. I had nowhere to hide outside. No other buildings were within walking distance, not with how quickly those men might come back. “Fine.” I dug out the cash from my first paycheck—all cash and under the table at A&J’s, not that I’d complain. After I crammed the remaining couple of bills back into my pocket, leaving me with two hundred dollars to live on for the rest of the night, I smacked the bills to the counter. “Quickly, please.”
She stared at me, suspicious and probably wondering how she could get the rest of my money. “Don’t you start nagging me to hurry, young lady.” Taking her time, she got off the tall stool she was seated on and grabbed a card key for room four.
I didn’t bother to ask for details about checking in or anything. As soon as I had the key, I’d bunker in for the night and pray that she wouldn’t give away my details should those men come back.
Regardless, once I was in the room, I closed and locked the door. Barricading it for extra security wouldn’t help. The small chair I pushed under the doorknob wouldn’t hold up to those tall, muscled men, but it was all I had. All I could do.
Using all the thin, threadbare towels, I dried myself off the best I could and paced. Thunder shook and boomed outside, rattling the junky motel walls with such force that I feared the whole place would collapse. Between the pounding rain and hail, it was so loud that I still couldn’t freak out or slow down to think at all. The soundtrack of the storm kept my senses heightened until I broke down due to sheer exhaustion.
As I fell asleep, I cried into the pillow, wondering how this could be my life. How I could never, ever win? I’d just moved to the city and started at A&J, hoping for a new start on life at twenty-seven. Now this. Killers chasing me down. My workplace shot up. The litany of woes and worries, the overwhelming sense of fear and dread, depleted my energy, and I fell asleep to the sounds of the storms.
The absence of the thunderous noise was my alarm clock all too soon. All night and into the morning, I woke at intervals throughout fitful sleep, but now, I was instantly alert.
They’re back.
“Maybe she’s in this one,” a man said outside the thin walls of my room. The motel was nothing but a one-story, long length of crappy rooms, probably all the same, with nasty carpet and moldy ceilings. And it sounded like the men who’d shot up the deli were stomping right down the path, banging on all the doors.
“Open up,” one shouted. A meaty fist banged on the door. It sounded so close, it had to be the room next to mine, number three. “Open up!” he repeated.
“Housekeeping,” another man shouted, then laughed roughly at his joke.
“The whole fucking motel is empty,” the first man said, then pounded his fist again. “Ain’t no one in the office. No one in the rooms.”
“But that van’s out front,” the second man argued.
I held my breath, knowing this was it. If they burst in here, I’d be caught. Without a second door to exit through, not even a single window to break out of, I was trapped.
“Well, two room keys are missing,” the first man said. “If she’s here, we’ll find her.”
I tensed, curling into a tight ball and wishing feebly that I could be invisible under the covers. Suspended in terror, every second fell too quickly. Time was running out. My life would be over, and in stark clarity, I regretted each and every one of my mistakes.
I’d never have time to correct any of them. I would never have a chance to make anything right again.
Especially not with him .
Shaking and silently crying in fear, I tuned out the fists banging on my door and the shouts of the two men trying to find me. Zoning out from their demands to open the door, I fervently wished that I could rectify the situation with my first love. The one person who’d truly loved me. The one man who’d ever cared. Reverting to the desperate thoughts in my mind, I numbed myself from reality, from the very real threat that I was trapped and cornered.
Franco wouldn’t ever forgive me, but as I accepted that I was at death’s door, that my life would be over as soon as those strong men broke into my room, I clung to the fantasy of fixing it all with him. Of apologizing for what I did. Of telling him that I loved him so badly that it ached.
I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Franco. For all I’ve done. I love ? —
The door burst open, and I screamed at the blasts of gunfire.