Aftermath(67)

The guy swings behind a half-constructed house. I’m about ten paces behind. I turn to follow and —

My target is gone.

“Skye!”

Jesse’s voice trails off in a hiss of pain. I don’t hear his footsteps. I haven’t heard them since that grunt when he misjudged the pile.

“Skye!” The thump of a step then. A slow thump, followed by a drag. He’s hurt.

I look around. My target has vanished. I’ve lost him.

“Skye, please!”

I turn toward Jesse. A hand grabs my jacket. I try to clasp his wrist, but he’s behind me, out of reach.

“Skye?” Jesse shouts.

A hand claps over my mouth. Jesse’s footfalls are moving faster now, but he’s heading the other way. He’s heard or seen something that sends him in the wrong direction.

I try to bite the hand over my mouth, but I can’t get a grip. My captor adjusts and locks his arm over my throat instead. His forearm pushes against my windpipe. I can’t breathe, and I fight harder, trying to kick, punch, no longer caring about getting a proper hold.

I smell something chemical. Metallic.

The guy reaches around me, holding a cloth soaked with that chemical stink.

I grab him by the wrist. He’s wearing a jacket and gloves, but I clamp down as tight as I can, and then try swinging him into a hold. It’s not perfect, and that sleeve is nylon, slipping under my fingers. He drops the cloth, though. Drops his arm off my throat, too. That gives me room to move, yanking his arm —

There’s something in his other hand. The reason he let go of my throat. To take a knife from his belt. A blade slices toward my arm.

I don’t let go. I can’t let go. If I do, I’m lost.

I see that blade coming, and I grit my teeth and keep twisting his arm, keep trying to throw him. The blade slashes through my jacket. Slashes through skin and into flesh.

I barely feel it. Everything is focused on what I’m doing.

This attack is no prank. No game. If I let go, he’ll put that stinking cloth over my mouth and nose, and I have no idea what will happen then.

I’m still holding his arm, but there’s blood, and then there’s pain, and my muscles will not do what I need them to do. I can’t throw him. I can’t get the leverage, and there’s blood on his nylon jacket, and my hands slide.

He backhands me across the face. I reel. He shoves me. I see him coming. I see his face for the first time.

And there’s no face to see. He’s wearing a balaclava: a tight black hood over his head, with only holes for eyes and mouth. He’s moving so fast I can’t even see the color of his eyes. All this, and I get nothing.

He shoves me, and I come back swinging, but I’m already falling.

I keep falling, and when I finally hit the ground, the crash is hard enough to knock the air from my lungs. I lie there, struggling to breathe.

Then I look up. Way up. To see the guy standing at least eight feet overhead, on the edge of a hole.

“Skye!”

It’s Jesse. He’s heard the thud of me falling, and he’s running this way. My attacker hesitates for a split second. Then he takes off.

Skye

Jesse’s still calling. He’s heard me fall but can’t pinpoint the noise, and he’s frantically shouting, his voice moving deeper into the subdivision.

I stay silent, as terrible as I feel about it. If I yell, Jesse might run right into my armed attacker. So I wait until I’m sure my attacker is far enough away. Then I rise and say, “Jesse?”

He comes running. As he does, I realize I’ve fallen into the basement of a partly constructed home. I’m trying to find a way out – with one hand gripping my bleeding arm – when Jesse appears.

He scrambles down before I can stop him. He jogs to me, limping slightly.

“I screwed up,” I say. “I – I just wanted to see him, to end this, to get proof —”

My voice cracks, and Jesse’s there, and I collapse against him, still apologizing, as the shock passes and I realize exactly how much danger I’ve been in – how much danger I ran straight into.

When tears well, I pull away, apologizing harder, but he hugs me and says, “It’s okay,” and rubs my back.

I get it under control, and I’m about to straighten when he tenses and says, “Do I smell blood?”

His gaze shoots to my arm. “You’re – Oh, hell. Sit. Just sit.” He doesn’t give me a chance to obey as he propels me to the dirt floor and strips off my jacket.

“You’re cut, Skye. You’re really badly cut.”

“He had a knife. I – I – I was stupid. I never thought – I didn’t expect —”

I swallow. “He had a cloth, too, that smelled like chemicals. He tried to put it over my face. I – I don’t know what he planned to do. I don’t want to know.”

“Neither do I,” he says grimly as he clamps a hand over my bleeding arm. “But you’re not the only one who didn’t expect anything like that. I’d never have brought us here if I did.”

He wraps my jacket sleeves around my arm, and then tugs off his belt and fastens it over the top. It’s a bulky, awkward tourniquet, and he gives a grunt of dissatisfaction but only says, “Let’s get out of here before he comes back.”