Page 112 of A Captive Situation

She kept driving and as I felt that crack splintering down the entire length inside of me, she was right. He lowered the gun after a few seconds. He ran to his truck, his phone to his mouth.

She sighed, switching lanes and turning. “He’ll be calling in his associates. Whoever they are.” Her eyes slid sideways to me, a questionin them. “He was a cop? Did I get that right? Will he use those resources to find us? Because if so, we need to move a whole lot faster.”

I shook my head, pushing the hurt aside. I needed to be numb. I couldn’t let myself feel anything. “No. He’s probably calling his Mafia friends. I think Ashton—”

“Walden?” she asked, sharply.

I frowned. “Yeah. And the other guy.”

“Tristian West. Your boyfriend is connected to them?”

I was bitter as I said, “He’s not my boyfriend, but yes. It’s confusing. He doesn’t like the West guy. I know that much.”

She sucked in some air, cursing. “West is the more logical one of them. Walden is a loose cannon.”

“I think Walden’s the one guarding my family.” I eyed her as she kept turning onto different roads. “How do you know about them?”

Her eyes went flat. “I’ve known Creighton for fourteen years. I grew up in this world. Trust me. When I decided to come to New York, I did my research. If Creighton found me, he wouldn’t be able to take over so easily. I started planning to come here two years ago.”

Fourteen years? “How old are you?”

I didn’t remember Jake telling me, but the bar we’d gone to was a college bar. She looked young then. She didn’t look young now. She looked as if we’d switched ages. She was the thirty-six-year-old adult, all capable and shit, and I was the floundering college student, all wide-eyed and gaping mouth on the floor, one thought away from falling into a sobbing paralysis.

“I’m twenty-two.”

I sucked in some air. “You’re still a baby. Cut off four years and you could’ve been my baby.”

Her mouth tightened and her gaze grew haunted, an emptiness coming over her face at the same time.

I stopped asking questions. She had survived this world, and I wouldn’t.

I didn’t know why my comments gave her that look, but I felt bad about it.

My phone beeped ten minutes later, and I cried out when I read the text. Finally something good had happened. “Graham got back to me. They got away.”

She laughed, surprised. “How? But—no. Never mind. We need to get to them. Ask them where they are.”

We were able to get away from Jake. My family got away, too, and that was another lucky break.

I had a feeling it wouldn’t last, though. Our luck was going to run out, because I felt it.

We were two dead girls driving in this car.

Death was coming for us.

I looked back, as if I could see it behind me.

A shiver pooled in the small of my back.

It was there. Taunting. Mocking. Promising.

So be it.

If death was coming for me, it would have to wait in line.

My family came first.

Chapter Forty

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