The Vampire Hunter's Daughter: Complete Collection(54)

Nope, they would never guess. I felt victorious already.

As quickly as I could, I got into the shower and shut the door. I tied one end of the clothes rope into a loop, securing the knot by tugging it as tight as possible.

I took a deep breath. “I can do this,” I whispered and then hung the loop on the faucet. I was worried about going out feet first, because I didn’t want anyone to see me before I could see them, but I had no other choice. I dumped the entire clothes rope through the hole, letting it fall all the way down. I stuck one leg through and followed with the other, sliding myself underneath the siding and wiggling my body out of the hole. Finally, I was hanging all the way down with my hands still gripping the hole and my head still underneath the siding.

The fresh air hit me. I hadn’t smelled the outside for so long! It was amazing. I breathed in deeply through my nose and exhaled through my mouth. The daylight was another story. The fall sunshine felt like daggers in my eyes. I hadn’t seen actual sunlight in over a month. As for the air, I couldn’t get over how wonderful it smelled and tasted. Unfortunately, I didn’t have time to hang around breathing air. I needed to get moving. It was time to grab the rope and climb down.

Slowly, I forced my fingers to release their death grip on the edges of the hole and grabbed the rope with one hand, then the other. Finally, I was within feet of my freedom.

My feet flailed for a minute until they found the wall and I was able to start slow walking down, holding tight to the top of the clothes rope. It was a darned good thing I’d kept to working out, even after I got locked in, or else I wouldn’t have had the strength to hold on. It was slow going, a lot slower than I would have liked. I had only gone about four feet when the rope suddenly dropped about three inches, causing me to almost lose my grip, I did lose my footing.

I swung back and forth, trying to catch the wall and steady myself. Not much luck. When I finally slowed enough to get my feet up against the wall again, the unthinkable happened, something I didn’t think over or anticipate: The faucet came loose, freeing my homemade clothes rope from its safety.

I don’t remember falling.

I opened my eyes to see a vision I was sure was a hallucination from the pain in my head and back. Through a fuzzy cloud that was reminiscent of a heat off the sidewalks in the summer, I watched Drew drop over the wall and sprint toward me in a full-out run. He drew his guns while he ran.

I closed my eyes again. The pain was horrendous. Throbbing and scorching in my head and back.

“Chloe!”

I opened my eyes again to see him there, bent down in front of me. His eyes were scaling over my body, and so were his hands.

“What are you doing?” I muttered.

“Checking you for breaks.”

I sighed and realized that I could actually feel his hands on me. “You’re real.”

“Yes, now let’s go. You have to get up.” He sounded just like Drew, always ordering me around.

“I’ve escaped,” I told him in a whisper.

“Chloe, you haven’t escaped yet. We have to get out of here, now!” He reached down, lifted me up and ran back toward the wall. I bounced around painfully in his arms while he ran. I wrapped my arms around him and clung to him.

“I have a six pack now,” I told him.

That was when the best sound I’d heard in almost a year rang out through the air: his laughter.

We made it to the wall and he set me down on my feet. “You have to stand. I’m going to climb over, then I’m going to reach down for you. Okay?”

I think I nodded because he began his ascent. I moved over and leaned against the wall where he was climbing and looked toward the house. I saw my clothes rope in a pile on the lawn. The sunlight reflected off the silver faucet, which was sitting on top of the clothes pile like a cherry topping on a hot fudge sundae.

Suddenly, Drew made some kind of gurgling sound and fell over the wall on the other side.

“Drew!” I screamed. Finally, the haze was lifting. Something was wrong. “Drew!”

I heard a strange voice say, “Over there.”

There was shuffling and pain pierced my shoulder. I looked down to see what had caused the pain and saw a dart sticking out of my bicep.

“What the…?” I lifted my hand to pull it out but never made it. Everything faded to black within seconds.



I woke slowly. The first thing I realized was that I was lying on a cold stone floor. I reached out and felt the floor. It was rough and damp. The darkness was thick and the air was musty. It smelled like dirty socks.

“Drew,” I whispered.

I heard him shift and crawl toward me. “I’m here.”

“What happened?”

“I tried to save you, but you met me half way.” He laughed a little. “I was just climbing over the wall when I saw a rope drop out through the siding followed by you climbing down. I thought I’d see if you got to the bottom before I ran over there. Then you fell, and I had to cross out into the open.” His voice lost its excitement. “They got us before we could get back over the wall.”

I felt myself nodding, remembering, “The dart.”

I sat up and felt around for him.

“Yeah, they tranquilized us.” He scooted toward me until we were sitting close together. “Any idea how to get out of here?”