Trapped (3 page)

I
blinked a couple of times. "He's tracking us? Even assuming he
really did survive somehow, how would he possibly be able to track
us? We're in a car doing seventy-something down the interstate. So
what, he's got us on satellite or something?"

"Something
like that. The hows are less important than the fact that he'll be
trying to find us, and he's got a decent chance of succeeding."

Whatever
Ash was about to say was cut off by a prodigious yawn, and I felt
myself fighting one of my own.

"Apologies,
I've been up for far too long, which leads me to the point of all of
this. In a few minutes we're going to get off of the interstate and
try to find a motel. I need to know whether or not you trust me
enough not to run while I get some sleep."

Now
I was regretting getting in his face about his delusions. It would be
easier to escape if he thought that I was going to do exactly what he
wanted me to do.

"I…believe
you. I don't know how, but I know you're telling me the truth."

Ash
slowed the car down slightly and turned the full force of his gray
eyes on me.

"Kristin,
I don't need to know whether you believe me or not. I just need to
know whether or not you'll behave and not do anything stupid which
would draw attention to us."

I
nodded once, not really trusting my voice to not give me away. He
looked at me for another couple of seconds and then returned his
attention to the road. It was odd how little in the way of social
cues he provided sometimes. I'd expected a nod, or an 'OK', but he
hadn't done any of that, he'd just made whatever decision he'd needed
to make and then went back to ignoring me.

Fifteen
minutes later we took an exit ramp. I was so busy staring at the
landscape that I missed the name of the town we were entering, but it
didn't look to be much of a prize. I had some vague thought
that the more helpful I was the more likely he was to trust me, so I
started pointing out hotels. He just shook his head and continued on
until he found a shabby motel on the far end of town.

It
was my turn to shake my head as Ash pulled into the parking lot.
Actually it made a lot of sense for him to choose this place. It was
shaped more or less like a 'U' with two-story buildings
making up all three sides. We'd just driven into the top of the
'U' and parking was in the center.

I
scanned the area, looking for a way out, but other than a small gap
between two of the buildings on the far end of the parking lot, there
was nothing, and even that gap was covered by a chain-link fence that
was nearly as tall as the building.

Ash
turned the car off and then looked over at me. "Are you going
to stay in the car while I go check us into a room?"

It
was an easy answer. He'd parked us twenty feet from the front
desk, which was at the top of the 'U'. Whichever
direction I ran, he'd easily catch me before I made it very
far. I could always hope to make enough of a scene that the police
got involved, but I hadn't forgotten about the gun hidden
inside his jacket.

"I
won't go anywhere."

Ash
considered my response, nodded and then exited the car. I craned
around so I could follow his progress. Checking in seemed to go
smoothly, and five minutes later Ash was back at the car.

Our
unit was all the way to the end at the base of the U on the ground
floor, and based on what I could see through the windows, it was just
as run-down as the exterior had suggested it would be.

Ash
popped the trunk, grabbed a duffle bag, and then escorted me inside.
If anything, it was worse than I'd expected from outside. Dark shag
carpet that had obviously seen better days, walls with
honest-to-goodness peeling wallpaper on them, and a bed that I was
almost positive was leaning slightly to one side.

"I
need to get some sleep. It's dangerous to stop, but it's
even more dangerous to be operating this tired. Can I trust you to
stay put?"

It
was hard to believe he was this stupid. Of course I wasn't
going to stay put. I'd let him nod off, wait for him to get
into a really deep sleep, and then I'd sneak out.

"Of
course. I'm not going anywhere considering that there's a
psychopath out there looking for us."

Ash
nodded as he started emptying the contents of the duffle bag onto the
bed. Clothes, knives, duct tape, another gun, extra ammunition, a
first-aid kit. Despite having slept for at least a few hours, I was
still feeling some of the effects of having been scared for my life
off and on for most of the last day. My knees wanted to buckle, so I
obliged them by dropping down onto the room's only chair, a
Spartan metal number, and putting my head in my hands.

Ash
continued to rattle around on the other side of the room. It sounded
like he was repacking, but I just couldn't bring myself to care
much. When the movement stopped, I finally picked my head back up
enough to see that he had indeed re-packed his duffle of everything
but one of the knives, a couple of magazines, and a box of
ammunition.

He
left all of that on the bed, turned on the TV, and then walked over
to me. I half-expected him to go into the bathroom. Instead he moved
with some of the unnatural speed both he and Anton had demonstrated
the night before. Before I realized his intention he dropped onto my
lap, immobilized my arms with his legs, and pulled the roll of duct
tape out from behind his back.

I
had a moment to scream, but he'd surprised me so completely
that I was gagged before I could really react. Working with an
unhurried efficiency, Ash proceeded to tape me to the chair, first my
torso and arms, and then my legs. When he finished, I was able to
move my hands from the wrist down and nothing else.

"Sorry,
Kristin. I wish I hadn't had to do that, but you were lying to
me just now. Believe it or not, it's for your own protection."

I
couldn't say anything, so I cursed him under my breath and
glared, but it didn't seem to bother him. He casually picked me
up, chair and all, and placed me in front of the window. With the
blinds mostly closed, I could look out, but there wasn't much
chance anyone would see me. As he moved back to my side, I realized
just how impressive his casual feat of strength had been. Plenty of
guys could pick me up, but not many could do it without huffing and
puffing. I'd known he was strong, but I hadn't realized
he was quite that strong.

"OK,
here's what you need to do. I want you to watch very carefully
out that window. Every time you see a car pull into the parking lot,
every time you see someone walk in off the street, you need to make
sure you're positive it isn't Anton. If it's Anton
then wake me up by tapping these against the chair."

He
slipped his keys into my right hand.

"Don't
wake me up unless you see either him or something suspicious, but
when in doubt wake me up. I only need a couple of hours, but the
sooner I can get them out of the way, the sooner we can be back on
the road and putting distance between him and us."

I
sat there fuming for several minutes after Ash lay down on the bed,
but eventually started paying attention to the comings and goings
outside the window just to combat the boredom.

It
didn't help much. It was early enough in the day that there
wasn't much in the way of activity. A cleaning lady was slowly
working her way down the line of units on my right, headed towards
the front desk. As it got nearer to checkout time, a few people
exited various rooms and started packing up their cars, but that was
it, and by the time I'd been at it for what I figured was an
hour, I wanted to just close my own eyes and go to sleep.

I'd
nearly given into the urge when a familiar-looking car pulled into
the parking lot. It was the bullet holes that finally jarred me out
of my daze, and I started slamming Ash's keys against the chair
frame before I'd even processed the fact that Ash had been telling
the truth.

Ash
grabbed my hands, stilling them and then he whipped out the knife
he'd unpacked earlier and sliced through the duct tape.

"Believe
me now?"

Ash
waited for me to nod before ripping the tape off of my mouth.

Anton
was out of his car now, walking towards us with an unhurried stride.

Ash
was staring at Anton, but I didn't get the feeling that he'd frozen.
It was more like he was calculating odds.

"You
know how to use one of these?"

I
took the proffered handgun with one hand while the other was still
absently pulling tape off of my chest.

"Not
really."

"Pull
the slide back, it's ready to go now, just point it at your target
and pull the trigger. It probably won't matter, as fast as he moves
you're unlikely to actually hit him."

We
were back in the corner of the room. It meant we'd lost sight of
Anton through the window, but we were as far away from the door as we
could get. My hand was getting clammy, so I started to transfer the
gun to my other hand and then a hand reached through the wall behind
me in an explosion of plaster and pulled Ash through the wall.

Things
were happening so quickly that I had a hard time processing who was
doing what. I was pretty sure that Ash got his knife into Anton, but
Anton had a knife too, and blood seemed to be sprouting all over
Ash's chest.

A
gun went off, once and then again, but it was Ash who was reeling
away rather than Anton. I held my gun up and pulled the trigger. The
recoil almost tore the weapon out of my hand, but Anton stumbled
backwards, moving with only a fraction of his normal speed.

Ash
was suddenly at my side and he pumped three more shots in Anton's
direction as the bigger man disappeared around the corner of the
building.

I
had only a moment to consider the massive hole that had been torn out
of the wall before Ash was pulling me out the door and towards his
car.

"We
have to get out of here."

He
was panting now, and his hand on my arm was suddenly doing more to
support him than it was to hurry me along. I put a shoulder under his
arm and half dragged him to his car. He fumbled with his keys, but
then he was falling into his car. He managed to drag himself over to
the passenger side and I slipped behind the wheel.

"Just
drive! No more than five over the speed limit, back the way we came."

Ash
had his phone out now, dialing a number with fingers that even out of
the corner of my eye I could see were shaking.

"We're
in Kearney. Just had a run-in. I need you to distract the cops, feed
them information that the perpetrator was in a dark-colored BMW. It's
mostly true so it shouldn't be hard."

Ash
hung up and dialed a second number.

"It's
me. I know. I wouldn't have called if it wasn't important
though. Look, there's a stray cat in Kearney right now. No, I
don't know how he made it past the border packs, but he's
strong. Maybe strong enough to have just carved his way through one
of the smaller groups."

We
were back to the interstate. For a second I debated which onramp to
take and then I shrugged and got on the eastbound one. We were
obviously in the Midwest, so it only made sense to keep going in
the direction Ash had chosen for us previously. I merged into traffic and
returned to eavesdropping on his call.

"…I'll
be fine. I just wanted to let you know about him so you can alert the
packs. No, I don't have any ideas, I just know that this guy
needs taken out before he sets up shop somewhere. I don't know.
Give Shawn a call. He's about the only person who has a hope of
managing his dad and if there's any pack that has a chance of
taking this guy down without piling up a lot of bodies it's the
Chicago group. Right. Guy's been driving a dark BMW that's
sporting a number of bullet holes. Goes by the name of Anton. OK,
thanks."

Ash
slowly unrolled his window, threw his phone outside the car and then
rolled the window back up.

"Ash,
what just happened? How did he survive all those bullets earlier and
how did he rip a hole in the motel wall like that?"

"I'm
sorry, Kristin. There's no time. I need you to listen to me.
Are you listening?"

Now
that I wasn't focused on where I was going or on trying to
listen to his phone conversation I was starting to shake, but I
nodded, which seemed to satisfy him. He'd reached into the
jockey box and pulled out a bunch of gauze and medical tape while
waiting for me to respond.

"You
did a good job just now. I need you to keep driving east on I80 until
you get to I29. Go south on I29 until you get to Kansas City. There's
a used car lot there, Casey's Car Center. He's expecting
us. We need to change vehicles so that Anton loses our scent trail. I
don't care how bad it seems like I am once we get there; you
need to wake me up before you get out of the car."

He'd
wrapped the gauze around his stomach while talking. I turned my head
to get a better look at what he was doing and nearly lost the
breakfast I hadn't actually had.

"Promise
me! No matter how bad it seems like I am, you can't stop, you
can't get the police involved, you can't go to a
hospital."

My
nod was jerky, but it seemed to satisfy him and he closed his eyes.

We
started running low on gas a bit before we crossed into Kansas. Ash's
demand that we not stop until we made it to the car lot kept playing
through my mind, but I was pretty sure his classic muscle car wasn't
going to make it there without a refill.

I
pulled off at the next exit and started praying that I'd be
able to fill up without anyone realizing I had a stabbing victim in
the passenger seat. I pulled his jacket closed and then fished his
wallet out of his front pocket. He started trying to get up, but I
pushed him back down, alternately relieved and concerned that he was
too weak now to stop me.