Page 21 of Silent Comrade
If they caught her … no. She couldn’t thinkof that. Wasn’t going to happen on her watch. If she could get aweapon, she’d at least make them reconsider killing her … or doingother things. She gulped again, her mouth dry.
A tiny, bizarre corner of her brain notedthe irony of someone with severe anxiety thrust into such aterrifying situation. No amount of medication or breathingtechniques would make these men leave her alone. She reached forthe grounding exercise from therapy, anchoring her feet to theground and then identifying something she could touch, smell, andsee.
She could touch a cold mannequin leg, smellthe light scent of her sweaty fear, and see two men working theirway through the racks in her direction.
Exercise failure. Once the men moved away,she slid out of the niche and wove toward the shoe section. She hadto scamper from the petite section across an open aisle, and thenhide again. How long could she evade these men in a lockeddepartment store?
Shoe section might have been a bad decision.Her legs shook as she stayed low. Shorter displays. More openspace. She forced her lungs to slowly inflate and deflate. Anythingto stay calm. For a split-second she detected a hint of pine andaftershave.
I wish.
No knight on a white horse or even a weirdex-military dude in mismatched sustainable clothing was going tomagically show up. No, like so many things in her life, Britt wouldhave to take care of this on her own.
A desperate will to survive was the onlytool she had to work with as she duckwalked behind a sales rack,careful not to bump against any shoeboxes. Easing behind theregister, she used her cell phone light to find the Brannockdevice. The metal width slides were tucked in, making it an oblongmetal instrument. She clutched the weighted device. Note to self:metal heel cup side up if she had to swing at someone.
Murmurs and rustles of clothing filteredback to her location behind the counter. This hiding spot couldwork for a while—she could cram her bodyin the space under the register. But it didn’t lead to an exit.What about the door behind the register? It likely led to adead-end storage room. No time for dead ends. Only exits.
She tried to text Tachi. An error messageflashed. Next, she dialed 911. Nothing. She checked the phone. Nobars. No Wi-fi signal. Crap.
Time to move.
Silencing her nonfunctional phone, sheslipped it in her pink shift and buttoned the pocket. Other thanhouse and car keys, a maxed credit card, nine dollars, and adriver’s license, all secured in the other pocket, she had nothingelse to work with. At least the police would know her identity andterrible credit score. So, yay.
God, this was bad.
Sidling through the shoes to the moredensely stocked sales racks in the center of the store, she frozeas Gravelly Voice piped up less than ten feet from her.
“We’re not getting anywhere. Get theinfrared. I’m tired of this game.”
Infrared. Heat. She could melt an igloo withthe BTUs pouring off her. She whipped her head from side to side,mind whirling. How to disguise heat in a department store?
Under a register? That would probably be oneof the first places they’d look. She peeked up over a rack for asplit-second. No checkout counters, no nearby dressing rooms. Onlycircular racks of—her eyeswidened—insulated winter coats. On finalsale. End of the season. Hey, these might be 50% off. It mightwork.
Heavy treads grew louder as thehigher-pitched man said, “It’s on.”
The infrared device.
She eased toward the racks. Last season’sdiscounted outerwear loomed in front of her. She slithered underthe coat hems. Nylon whistled too loud as she swept against thefabric. She froze. Didn’t dare breathe.
“What was that?” Gravelly voice said.
“No idea,” the other guy whined. From abrief glimpse, this man was taller and thinner, with a shock ofdark hair.
“Scan over there, where I heard it.”
Oh, no.She bumped her shin againstthe inner metal supports that made an X at the bottom of thedisplay. Biting her lower lip against the pain, she looked up. Thetop of the rack was covered in glass, supporting a price stand.
Open. Visible.
“Is that a signal over there?”
She clung to the central vertical metal beamand stepped up on the metal X. Sweat tickled her temple but sherefused to move.
The center of the rack got stuffy in a hurrywith polyfill jackets and no air circulation. She’d stay here aslong as necessary to evade those guys.
A clank and a clatter sounded in the farrecesses of the store, like a display had crashed down. The men’sheavy footsteps faded away. She sagged but remained upright,keeping a death grip around the central pole.
A hand snaked around her face and cut offher gurgled scream.
