Chapter 45
Chapter Forty-Five
Ayda
“Dogs like the chase, but you should know the Emps crave the kill. I can smell your fear, bitch.”
I pushed my hand over my mouth to hide the whimper of terror. The guy was huge. Even if I hadn’t known it from being under his boot, I could hear it in every measured step he took as he chased me through the room.
We’d been playing cat and mouse for what felt like hours.
Every time he got close to where I was hiding, I moved as quickly and quietly as I could into the heart of the warehouse and hid anywhere I could find.
It was like one of those horror movies Tate was always watching.
The taunting going on only served to create more fear the longer it was drawn out.
There was only so long I could run until I started to believe I was the proverbial mouse.
What was worse, there was no exit other than the door I’d come through; the one fire exit was locked shut.
All I had was what I was doing, running and hiding for my life as I prayed and wished with everything I had that Drew was holding his own in the other room.
I had no chance against this monster if he caught me, and even as I scurried around the place like a rat in a maze, I had no idea how to tell whether the gun I had was loaded or not.
Running. It was all I had, and something I’d taken for granted when Tate had asked me to go with him almost every day for the past year. It reminded me of something Deeks had said once, when I complained about being a slow runner as an excuse not to run with Tate.
“You don’t have to be fast, Ayda. Just faster than the ones around you.”
I tried to ignore the ache in my chest at the thought of not seeing him, Tate, or any of the guys again.
My fate right then was a pair of combat boots zigzagging through the dirt and broken glass of a dilapidated warehouse.
My salvation was a gun that may or may not have been loaded in my hand, but I had to at least believe I was faster than him. Smarter.
I listened to him move around the place, stopping and starting as he searched for me.
The footfalls grew more distant and closer in little waves of sound.
I followed him around the place, dashing off in the opposite direction for as long as I could until I was faced with a wall and forced to turn back around to the side.
I was trying to stay lost and it worked for a while… Then there was nothing but silence.
My only source of reference had stopped.
The only reason I could imagine to explain why was that he’d figured it out.
With no idea where he was, my heart was racing in my chest with a ferocity I hadn’t thought it capable of.
I was crouched on my bent legs, my head swiveling and my eyes squinting to try and see the exit in the darkness, but the walls were closing in on me, making the blindness so oppressive I was struggling to breathe.
One wrong move and I was hopeless against him.
I sat panting as quietly as I could, the air burning as I inhaled and exhaled.
I had been running around on the balls of my feet to avoid the heels of my pumps hitting the floor and giving away my position.
As much as I wanted to rip them off, I knew that the glass would tear my feet to shreds and leave a path of blood that led him right to me.
So I dealt with the cramps that were settling in my toes and the arches of my feet in exchange for another breath pulled into my lungs.
The sudden scraping of glass behind me was so close, I instantly panicked.
Standing and spinning forced my legs to twist under me, which wasn’t a good idea.
I felt the instability of bad weight distribution as I swung the gun around and aimed directly at his chest. It all happened so fast, but I wasn’t fast enough.
I hadn’t thought it through whatsoever. One swipe of the asshole’s arm and the gun was falling to the floor and sliding under a huge piece of machinery that looked as intimidating as he was.
“Now you’re fucked.” He growled with humor, his hand grabbing at my throat and forcing me against an exposed mechanism that seemed more fit for torture than creating something of use.
If Cortez’s breath had been rank, it had nothing on that guy’s.
All I could smell was stale cigarette smoke, stale beer and tuna.
It made my stomach turn more than it already was until the bile rose with urgency.
Unaware, and probably not caring about my predicament, he slammed me against the metal machine violently with the hand around my neck while the other gripped my breast with brute force.
It had been hard enough to breathe without the sudden thought of where this could be going flashing in my mind, and for a whole minute, I was certain I’d given up all hope.
It was only when I allowed the darkness in that I heard my subconscious screaming in protest. Giving up wasn’t who I was, and it never had been.
Before my parents died and even after, I fought tooth and nail, never once losing sight of that.
Not just for me but for Tate and the people around me who I loved.
I couldn’t give up now. No matter what horrors laid ahead, I had to fight the good fight and survive.
“Fuck. You,” I spat out, sounding much braver than I felt.
The insult pissed him off, forcing him to release my breast so he could drag my body forward and slam it back against the machine until every ounce of oxygen I had in my lungs was brutally forced out.
I couldn’t breathe, and my spine felt as though it was in a vise, but at least I could focus on something other than the position of his hands against my skin.
“Oh, I plan on it, little hound whore. So does every other fucker in this place.”
I cringed, and he must have seen the disgust on my face.
It took only one shove and I was on my hands and knees under him.
I wheezed in a breath now that the obstruction around my neck was gone and tried to crawl away as the sound of his buckle loosening sent my head spiraling into another vortex of fear and panic.
The word no played deafeningly loud over and over in my head as I tried to find my balance to crawl and run, but my fingers found purchase in nothing as they grazed the concrete, forcing the nails to bend back painfully as I dug deep for the fight I knew I had.
No matter what I tried, the push of my knees, the awkward twist of my feet, nothing seemed to work.
I was in such a panic that I hadn’t realized the asshole was holding me back by the belt loop on my jeans.
The moment I did, I slowed, giving him the opportunity to flip me over like I weighed nothing at all, forcing my shoe to slip from my foot and drop to the floor.
I didn’t know why it hadn’t occurred to me earlier. Maybe it was the threat of what was to come or the absolute blinding need to escape, but I suddenly realized that without a gun, I still had a weapon I could use.
I just had to get to it.
My feet slid over the dust and tiny shards, making my legs scissor under me.
I was annoying him with my squirming, but he seemed oblivious to my intent.
Whether it was a good thing or not, I managed to move at least a foot in the right direction before his fist found my gut and my body froze in agony.
My aching fingers didn’t give up the fight even when he straddled my hips and pinned me down while I coughed and flopped under his weight.
Stretching out my arm, I tried to get close enough, my body struggling against the renewed grip of his hand against my throat and the winding of his weight over mine.
I knew the shoes couldn’t be far. I just had to believe my luck wasn’t that bad.
I was twisting and writhing in his grip when I finally found one.
My fingers slid over the thin heel first, and if I could have, I would have cried out in relief.
The bear of a man was already squeezing my neck in an attempt to gain my submission, forcing me to pat around in the dirt so I could get a decent grip.
The hand that had found the shoe was, unfortunately, the one that was housing the broken finger.
By some divine intervention—or rush of adrenaline—I was able to ignore the pain as I got a good grip on the thing, which was exactly when I struck.
My arm launched and swung up through the air as though it was spring loaded.
My finger was screaming in protest, but it only steeled my determination all the more.
This was life and death and my fear was being caged by my urgency to survive.
When I made contact, the jolt of it sent white hot embers of pain through my finger and down my arm to my chest. I knew I’d hit something, but it was impossible to tell what until the grip on my neck released, oxygen burned a path down my neck, and the grunt of pain had the bastard rolling away from me.
I hadn’t won, not by a long shot, but as I rolled to try and escape, I barely managed to put a few feet between us when his hand clamped on my ankle and pulled me back.
It was there, in my twisting, writhing struggle, that I saw the gun that was, with a little work, within my reach.
Kicking out with my free leg, I caught the soft flesh of his gut, which gave me enough leverage to shoot forward and half crawl and squeeze under the mechanics to reach the gun.
I felt the rips in my flesh as the sharp corners ate into the bare skin of my shoulders and back.
The space was much smaller than I originally thought, but hooking my arm around an anchored support in the center of the machine finally gave me something to work with.
The pounding of the guy’s fists came in flurries along my legs, his arms circling my calves as he pulled and attempted to drag me free.
I wasn’t going easily, though. I could see my freedom less than three inches from the tips of my fingers, and as I kicked and wriggled for my life, I finally touched the butt of it.
I was just about to wrap my fingers around it. I’d loosened my grip on the anchor piece to make it, my body stretching to its limits, when I felt everything suddenly move around me.
His thick hands clamped down with everything he had and gave one last, almighty pull with every ounce of his strength.
Unfortunately, I was pliable now that I wasn’t holding on, and the sharp edges and corners tore and shredded my skin as he dragged me out.
The mess of glass and discarded machine parts on the floor made the skin on my stomach burn almost as intensely as my back.
When I was out from under the damn thing, he twisted me to my back yet again, his body moving in to lock down my kicking legs.
There was just one thing he hadn’t counted on…
I had the gun in my hand, and in one tiny adjustment, had my finger on the trigger.
He saw it the same time I did and dived forward, his body almost crushing mine.
His knee pulled up, the scrape of his boot louder than the grunts of our struggle.
I fought as well as I could, but his knee landed on my chest as his hands closed around mine, twisting the gun and my fingers painfully.
We fought for control for a while, my adrenaline giving me the extra burst of strength I needed as I pulled the trigger.
My ears rang, my breath caught, and the warmth of blood against my skin was immediate. So was the deafening scream that fell from my lips and wouldn’t stop.