Time Out (18 page)

Not playing around this time, the man shoved me forward into the trunk. I dove in head first and barely had the time to break my fall. Before I knew it, he rolled me over until my arms and legs were completely enclosed. My limp head fell back, giving me a straight view of the man as he went to shut the trunk. As I slowly started to lose consciousness, I thought, ‘
God, please not like this. Please don’t let me die…like…this
.’

When I came around again, my whole mind and body felt sluggish, like waking up after having a major surgery. I started to notice the simplest of things like I couldn’t lift my head up very far and that something was digging into my wrists behind me. As my vision came back to me I took in my surroundings. I was in a large dingy room that looked like it used to be a warehouse for something. The floor was stained where large equipment had once
laid
. The walls were made of steel with windows toward the ceiling allowing me to see that it was night time so I must have been unconscious for a few hours. My mouth was dry and my hair had fallen across my face. I couldn’t move the strands because my hands were tied behind the chair I was strapped into. A massive migraine was building the more and more I came around until my head felt like it was going to explode. When I finally realized that I was only dressed in my bra and underwear, I flinched, jerking my head back.

“Time to wake up,” I heard a spine-chilling voice sing as my eyes rolled open again. I stared up at the balding man with the beer gut from the grocery store and realized he was a professional at this since he was able to change his persona so easily. His bulky figure moved in and I realized he wasn’t as tall as he was wide when he suddenly slapped my face with the back of his hand, knocking my head to the side. Tears stung my eyes from the painful blow as I quickly started to regain some of my initial fear from the parking lot.

“Why are you doing
th
…
”
I said drunkenly, but I couldn’t seem to form the words to form the rest of the sentence.

“When I say it’s time to wake up, it’s time to wake up!” the man said harshly, and the next thing I knew he smothered a cloth like material over my face making my stomach suddenly drop and my veins suddenly race with fear. What was he doing?

He grabbed a fistful of my hair, yanking my head back and poured what felt like an endless stream of water over my face. I inhaled a mouthful of the cold liquid, causing me to gag as I struggled to free myself from the grip he had on the back of my hair. When the pouring finally stopped, I hacked and coughed uncontrollably until he yanked the rag off my face, making it easier for me to gasp for air. 

“Where’s the microchip?” he asked, but the feeling of hacking up water and gasping for air at the same time made it hard for me to focus on him. I couldn’t even speak at first; the fear was too overwhelming as tears streamed down my face. He let me sob for what seemed like a minute before he grabbed onto my hair again.

“What…microchip?” My wide eyes looked from the thicker man to the older one with white hair and cool blue eyes that I also remembered seeing at the grocery store earlier. There was a third man that was much younger than even the bald creepy man. He was tall and had a lanky military build. He was holding a large gun and seemed to be in charge of watching the door. I caught his eye and the dead stare he was displaying changed to reveal a more sinister look that caused me to wish I could cover my mostly naked body. I couldn’t believe I would rather drown by the big beefy man then be tortured by the young man who I doubt would use water. I began to wonder how this had anything to do with my relationship to Hawkins and the band.

“I know that you have it,” the thicker one muttered in between gritted teeth. “She told me that you did!”

He slapped the wet towel over my mouth again, but I couldn’t stop my instinctual reaction to scream as another endless stream of water washed over my face, causing me to ingest even more than I had before. I gagged and coughed as I tried to spit the water back out of my mouth, but the suffocating rag over my mouth made it impossible to do. No matter how hard I tried there was nowhere for the water to go but down. My windpipe felt like a steal pipe that was quickly closing shut. I fought against the chair that bound me to the spot; noticing that I was slowly loosening the wet rope around my wrists.

He ripped off the towel and continued to gruel me, “Where’s the microchip?”

With his hand off my head, I leaned forward as much as the restraints would allow me and threw up the water that I had been choking on. I knew I wouldn’t have time to fully catch my breath so as soon as I could, I tried to speak. “Microchip for…” I gasped and then coughed, “what?”

“She doesn’t know what you’re talking about,” the other older man, who if the larger one was the brawn than this man must be the brains, quickly came to the conclusion.

“She knows!” The thicker one roared over his shoulder as he threw the soaked cloth over my mouth again. This time I took a deep breath and closed my mouth, hoping in vain that it would stop the drowning feeling, but the water poured down my nostrils, forcing me to open my mouth and to gag all over again. The man let me squirm and struggle under the water longer than before. When he finally ripped the cloth off my face again, I snorted and twitched until I was overcome with emotion and began to gasp through my tears.

I didn’t know what they were talking about or what they wanted from me. And the thought of dying in this cold warehouse all alone without Hawkins made the tears flood out of my eyes like the water being shoved down my throat.

The older man had wisdom in his eyes and I could tell that he had once been like the brut in front of me but the thrill of the chase had long passed him as he slowly came forward; making both my attacker and I snap our eyes over in his direction.

“Why don’t you give me a minute to talk to the girl?” he offered to the other man, who looked like he wanted to put me through another round of torture. The gruff one shrugged and moved out of the way as the other man pulled up a chair across from me.

“Joie, is it?” The man’s eyes were kinder than the other one I noticed. “Something was taken from us,” he continued to explain, “Information…very valuable information that in the wrong hands would be catastrophic for us. That’s what was on the microchip were looking for. It’s a very small chip that can be easily concealed in another object. If we don’t get it back, we will be left with no other choice than to retaliate accordingly.” He paused to examine my reaction before he added, “She never gave you the microchip, did she?”

  Who was she? I almost asked when I realized my life depended on me having that microchip because without it, I wasn’t valuable to them anymore.

“I didn’t know…what I had,” I tried to say surer than I felt.

The man didn’t look totally convinced I was telling the truth, but before he could say anything more the other, more passionate one suddenly dragged me back by the chair.

“Where’s it?!” he hissed in my face.

“Why don’t we take a break for now?” the other older man offered. “Let the girl recover while we have a talk.”

I didn’t like the way he said ‘talk’, when I was pretty sure they were going to talk about how I didn’t have the microchip and how someone lied by saying that I did. The heavier set man sighed before slowly nodding in agreement, and both of the men turned to walk out of the room; leaving behind the younger guy armed with a gun at the door.

I didn’t know what was happening; all I knew was that I needed to get out of there if I had any chance of living. I tried to free my wrists from the wet rope as nonchalantly as I possibly could.

The younger guy quietly approached from the door, causing my eyes to snap up to him. He had short cropped dark hair and blue eyes that looked cold. When his beady little eyes looked me up and down, I was eerily reminded that I was only dressed in my light pink Victoria’s Secret bra and underwear.

“The infamous Joie Hall,” he whispered as he pushed back a strand of my wet damp hair with the end of his gun, causing me to flinch with fear.

“I bet your boyfriend would be really upset to see you like this,” he looked just as thrilled by the mention of Hawkins, the famous rock star, as Maria Rey had been earlier the grocery store. He leaned his head down to level with mine as if he were slowly studying my face and it made me extremely uncomfortable, maybe even more uncomfortable than the thought of being put through another drowning torture session.

And just when I thought my life couldn’t get any worse he stuck out his tongue and licked the side of my cheek, causing me to squirm with disgust. I tried to move my head out of the way, but he continued up to the crown of my head, causing me to flinch and twitch in my seat. Tears suddenly welled up in my eyes; first Cyrus and now this? Why was this happening to me again?

“Don’t cry,” he cooed as he leaned in again in to smell my hair. I was so revolted by the whole experience that at first my goal was to just get him to stop. Even if that meant butting him in the head with all my might like how I would have done to a soccer ball in the middle of a game. The sheer force sent him staggering back in pain as his hands came up to brace his head.

“You bitch,” he swore as I frantically went to work at loosening the wet ropes around my wrists. If I didn’t get out of here, I didn’t know what this guy would do to me. My eyes widened in horror as I watched him come toward me again with a sickly grin on his face.

“You got some spunk, I like that in a girl,” he said as he closed in, and I felt my heart pounding inside my chest at the thought of what he might do, but before he could lean in again I kicked out my leg, aiming for above my head as if getting ready to chuck a soccer ball midway across the field, but instead connected halfway with his nuts, causing him to drop to his knees in agony and his gun to scatter across the floor.

At first I was just shocked - that my small hands had actually slipped through the rope freeing me from the chair -
that
I paused for a second in astonishment. I willed my tired body to move into gear when I saw him staggering to get up again, but then he stumbled over once more. My legs were a bit shaky, from sitting in that chair for who knows how long, but that didn’t stop me from using another valuable soccer skill by quickly butting the end of my knee into the bottom of his chin; knocking his head back with a half groan until he was limp on the floor.

I just stared down at him, surprised at what I had done, before my mind finally caught up with my body. I quickly looked around the floor for the gun and grabbed it up. I honestly didn’t know what the hell I thought I was going to do with it. I’m not even sure I knew where the safety was on this thing as I tip toed my way over to the only door in and out of the place.

I pulled back the door a crack and looked out into the empty hallway. After a moment of silence, I stepped out into the quiet corridor with my arms outstretched and the gun securely in my hands like how they do it in the movies. I may not know how to use a gun properly, but I knew how deceivingly powerful it looked by just being in my hands.

When I didn’t see anyone I took off down the deserted hallway as fast as I possibly could. As I neared the end of the passageway, I slowed my approach and held out the gun again. I was a pretty damn good soccer player, but nothing in my repertoire of skills was going to help me with the thick beast of a man who was heavily armed in the next hallway.

I turned to lean my back flat against the wall while concentrating on my breathing to help calm myself again. This was exactly what I was afraid of I realized. I wasn’t going to win a standoff with
this
guy, so I had to think a bit more creatively. I listened to the sound of his combat boots closing in the distance between us as he continued to pace the hallway. Tightening my grip on the gun, I waited for the exact moment because I had to time it perfectly if I wanted to go unnoticed.

Just as his body lined up with mine, I quickly turned and whacked his head with the butt of the gun, but this wasn’t the same tall lanky guy back in the torture room, and my shaky hands merely succeeded at getting the guy to drop to the floor, but not enough force to knock him out completely.      

So I took off for the end of the hallway, where I could see the night sky through the window on top of the door. Thankfully, no one seemed to be patrolling what looked like a loading dock with a few semi-trucks parked outside. I quickly pushed back the door; determined to run to the edge of the cool concrete dock and jump down. A small scream almost escaped my lips when my bare feet landed on bits of broken gravel below. I didn’t have much time to agonize over the sharp pain when the voice of man quickly approached from up above. I swiftly ducked under the semi-truck beside me for cover. 

“Mason, what’s wrong?”

“She took off.”

“What—where did she go?”

“If I knew, I wouldn’t be standing here with you.”

“She’s probably out in the woods by now.”

“I’ll drive down the street to look for her,” Mason offered.

I planned to make a break for the nearby forest when the man’s combat boots suddenly dropped down next to me, causing me to flinch. I heard him grunt as he got in behind the wheel of the truck and then slammed the door shut.

The diesel engine suddenly roared to life over top of me and cranked into gear. Having nowhere to go, I dropped the gun and quickly grabbed onto whatever cables that I could find overtop of me and pulled myself up against the belly of the truck. I didn’t know what the hell I was thinking when I decided to do this, but after the truck made it safely threw the closing gates to the warehouse, I knew the decision had saved my life.