Page 7 of Little Dove

That is not something I’m about to share with the giant in front of me.

“What is it?” I ask instead.

“It looks like some sort of bunker,” he finally answers. “I’m going to check it out. Stay here.” Yeah, I don’t need to be told twice.

He descends down the steep steel steps, and I distantly hear him touch the floor. Damn, that thing is deep. The sound of another door opening echoes up the stairwell, old hinges squealing their protest. Again, I should be running the hell away, but I’m too invested to move. After a few more indistinguishable sounds, a loud whirring noise has me instinctively stepping back.

Shit. What was that? If Lazaro is dead, there is no way I can get his big body back up here.

“Um, are you still alive down there?” I call cautiously.

I don’t get a verbal response, but I hear movement and then footsteps on the stairs. Within seconds, Lazaro’s head is visible and he looks like a kid in a candy store. “It’s an old military bunker,” he says. “And it’s still operational. Water, power, and even an old camera system that looks out on this room. It’s a place to hide out if we need it. It’s perfect.”

Perfect? Yeah, no way in hell. I am not going down there.

I open my mouth to tell him that, but that’s when I hear it. Shouted orders, followed by the sounds of dogs barking. Lazaro hears it too, and he moves quickly around me to get to the window before he curses. “Fuck. Time’s up. We need to get down there now.”

“I’m not going in there!” I yelp. “It’s a metal coffin if we can’t get out. And I still don’t know what the hell is going on. Or if I should trust you. Hell, you?—”

“Amara,” he barks, interrupting my panicked rambling. “We can get out, I promise. There’s another button on the other side of the wall that will open this door again. But in there, we have the upper hand. There’s a door at the bottom that we can close to keep them from getting to us if they somehow manage to figure this one out, and I can defend us better down there than I can out here. Now, I need you to trust me. You’re safe with me.”

Safe?Safe? Are there some kind of weird gases down there affecting his brain, because safe is not the word I would use right now. The shouts and barking get louder and closer. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. I need to figure out what the hell I’m going to do.

Trust the giant of a man who got me into this mess, or the men out there who probably want to kill me, or do worse things to me? Hell, even if it’s not those guys and it’s the people in town, it’ll still be a witch hunt. They’ll probably try to throw me in jail or something.

Damn it. Looks like I don’t have a choice.

I turn and walk for the open door. As I step inside, I hear Lazaro move quickly behind me. I try to calm my pounding heart and the panic creeping up my throat as he steps onto the small platform, closing the door behind him. The lock clicks loudly into place.

Oh, God, what have I done?

“This way,” Lazaro says, moving to the steep steps.

I force myself forward, and when I peer around him and down the stairs, I thank all that is holy that he found another light switch down there. Alright, I can save my freakout for later. I follow him down, careful to take the steps slowly, because I don’t need to fall and break my neck. For a giant, Lazaro sure is nimble on his feet, as he goes down them with ease.

When he reaches the bottom, he ducks to get inside the lower bunker, and I carefully walk, stopping to peer in. My eyes widen as I take in the sight.

Wow. This place is far bigger than I expected.

The ceiling has to be at least eight feet high, and if I’m eyeballing it right, it spans a good forty feet. At the far end of the room are desks, each one containing a typewriter, scraps of paper and a few broken pencils and pens. Other machines and what looks like some kind of circuit board line the other side, covering the entire wall. Along the right side of the room are a dozen military bunk beds, still crisply made, even with all the dust covering them. To my immediate right, I see another door that leads to a bathroom, and though I don’t smell anything coming from it, I’m not setting foot in there just yet.

Gross.

I look to my left and see Lazaro standing along the wall where a large cabinet sits in the corner, the doors now open as he looks inside. The rest of the wall to his left is bare, the old plaster missing some chips. To his right is the kitchen area and a door marked Pantry. In the middle sits a large boardroom tablelittered with old papers, newspapers, and empty files. Whatever branch of the military was in here, they left in a hurry.

“They’ve entered the shop,” Lazaro announces, pulling me from my thoughts. I move to stand next to him and stare at the old surveillance system. The video is grainy, with thick lines moving through the screen every couple of seconds. Still, I can see the people coming into the shop. Leading the pack is the sheriff, who looks around the place with a hard gaze.

I’ve always hated him. He beats his wife and daughter all the time, and yet neither of them say a thing. His son is free to go out and do whatever the hell he likes. He orders his men to search, the dogs putting their noses to the ground when they enter. I recognize the old bloodhound that he loves more than his own family. Shit.

“The dogs are going to alert them,” I predict worriedly, looking up at Lazaro. He doesn’t reply, just continues to watch the screen. I turn back, my mind already spiraling to figure out what to do next.

Amazingly, the dogs sniff the bookcase a little longer than normal, but then move into the other room before coming back out and going over to the door that adjoins the other building. Everyone clears out, save for a couple of men that stay behind, huddled together and talking.

They aren’t cops. Everything about them screams something else. They’re wearing suits similar to Lazaro’s, but one of them is hunched over a little, like he’s injured and trying to hide it. “Are there more men after you?” I ask.

“They’re not after me,” he says absently as he continues to watch the screen. “But yes, that’s them. The injured one was in the SUV when it crashed, he must have gotten out before it went up in flames. The other one, I haven’t seen him, so he’s new. Which means there are more of them.”

“Wait, what? What do you mean they’re not after you? Who the hell are they after? If you’ve been dragging me all over the fucking desert for no reason, I’m going to kill you.” I don’t care about any of the other stuff.

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