Out of Place (15 page)

Chapter 26

There was a time when
Emily loved this Mustang. The day Harry brought it home was something of a neighborhood spectacle. Just about every man on the block came over to inspect the perfectly restored classic. Now she hated every second of being in it. If she wasn’t cuffed to the door, she might throw herself out of it. It was another pair of those same cuffs he’d used on her before. Harry must have had a dozen pairs or something. She also knew they could be broken open easily if you could whack them on both sides with some big rocks. But she didn’t have any rocks.

She hoped
Zack got out of there, but the propane tanks exploded with such force she literally saw the cabin lift into the air off the stone foundation. But something told her he got out alive. He was too smart to get trapped in there.

They drove in silence for a while until Harry turned on the radio. He
started to change the stations constantly and didn’t stop. It was driving her crazy, it made her want to scream. But finally just a hair from her breaking point, he stopped and turned off the radio.

She sighed in relief.
“Where are we going?”

“Somewhere far away.”

She wanted to test the waters a little. “Somewhere nice?”

He looked at her, narrowed his eyes
, and didn’t quite appear to believe she was being sincere. Then he said, “You’ll like it.”

“Does it have a pool?”

“No, but there’s a lake.” He smiled. “Remember when we all went out to Lake Hopatcong a couple years ago?”

She nodded. “I remember
. It was so hot that weekend.”

“I’ll tell you what was hot. You
, in that orange bikini. That was the first time I really noticed what a beautiful woman you’d become.”

Emily didn’t know what to say now. She’d backed herself into this corner and now she had to play the cards. “I still have that bikini
, although it’s a little tight in the chest now.”

He smiled. “I bet it is.”

“I have a really sexy purple one now, you’d love it. Maybe I can model it for you sometime.” She gauged his response and it was more subdued then she’d hoped. He wasn’t going to be that easy to manipulate. That might have scared her more than anything else. After all the people he’d killed, and running around the woods chasing them, you’d think he’d be a little more unglued, or over the edge. But he seemed very calm and very cool, and that was scary beyond words.

She looked out the window into the extreme darkness of the winding country road. They hadn’t seen another car or a house in miles. Not even a streetlight as a
marker. She wasn’t good with the moon or stars, so she had no idea which direction they were heading.

The car started to buck and sputter. Harry looked down at the console
., “What the hell is this?” he said. “How is that possible?”

“What’s wrong?” Emily asked
, but he didn’t respond, he just kept swearing and hitting the steering wheel.

Finally
, the car died and Harry pulled off the side of the road. He looked over at her. “We’re out of gas.”

Emily didn’t know what to say. They were i
n the middle of nowhere, on a dark highway. “Is there a gas station nearby?”

He looked at her and slid his phone out of his pocket.
“There’s one about twenty-five miles from here.”

“Maybe we can just wait until another car drives by.”

He showed her his pistol. “If they do, we’ll be ready for them.”

“Why do you have to hurt them
? Can’t you just steal their car or something?”

Harry looked at her and
intensity flashed in his dark eyes. “This is an operation and it’s us against the world. No one will understand our love. You don’t even understand it yet.” He reached over and took hold of her hand. “But you will. I’d do anything for you, Emily, and no one is going to take you away from me again. Ever.”

She felt something in her bones, a chill from the core
of her marrow that exploded and sent goose bumps leaping off her skin. A quick shudder quaked through her. With every fiber of her being she tried not to let him read her true feelings. Instead she forced an uneasy smile. He held her hand for an uncomfortably long time, then he touched her knee and she had to work hard not to jump under his touch.

He finally let go and got out of the car. As he moved around to the trunk
, Emily tried to see if there was a way to get her handcuff off the door. She pulled it, yanking as hard as she could, but it didn’t budge.

The trunk slammed and she stopped pulling.
He yanked open the door and she had no choice but to follow the swing and step out. As he took hold of her arm he said, “You’re not going to run. Are you?”

She shook her head.

“Verbal response to all questions and commands, please. So I ask again, you’re not going to run are you?”

“No.”

“No, what?”

Emily thought for a second. “No
, sir.”

“That’s my girl.” He unlocked her cuff from the door. “We’re going to get along perfectly if you remember two key things
: Respect and obedience. Those are the two things every soldier learns and eventually lives by. It will make you a better person and eventually, a great wife. Because when you’re ready, we will marry.”

She was glad when he turned away and she didn’t have to fake a response or smile. It was going to take every bit of self-control she had to play along. But then he turned back to face her.

Emily stood next to the car. The nearly full moon stood over his shoulder and she focused on that as he stood close to her. He reached up and moved her hair behind her ear, touching her face. “My God, you’re beautiful.”

She hoped he didn’t kiss her
, but she prepared to fake it if he did. Thinking she could fake it and actually faking it, however, were probably two very different things. A huge relief hit her when a set of headlights popped up in the distance over the crest of the hill. “A car.” She motioned with her head.

He turned aroun
d. Taking hold of her wrist very hard, he walked around to the back of the car. Emily prayed the people didn’t stop. As much as she’d like the opportunity to get away, she knew he was going to kill them.

The car slowed as it approached them. The lights shined in Emily’s eyes and Harry pushed her behind him as the car
slowed and stopped near them. Harry leaned towards the car and waved. The passenger window rolled down.

An attractive
, young, dark-haired girl smiled at them as a young man leaned across the seat. “You guys okay?”

“We broke down
,” Harry said.

“You have help on the way?”
the man asked.

Harry pointed down the road. “Yeah, I called, they should be here.” He then pulled out his pistol and fired several shots into the car
, killing both occupants.

Emily tried not to make a sound but an involuntary moan escaped her as the tears streamed from her eyes.
“Oh God.”

Harry yanked her arm. “Stop blubbering like a baby. This is war, there’re going to be casualties.”

She tried to yank her arm away from him. “No, this is not a war, you psycho. What in the heck is wrong with you? You can’t just kill innocent people, you freaking psychopath.”

He pushed her against the car. “Hey, you watch your mouth. You’re disrespecting me and I told you I don’t stand for that in my house.”

She punched him in the chest. “We’re not in your house, we’re on the street in the middle of nowhere and you just murdered two innocent people for no reason.”

He slapped her in the face, twisted her around
, and pushed her face-first onto the hood of the car by the neck. “You’re in a lot of trouble, young lady. Speaking to me like that is going to get you hurt.”

Emily thought this was it
. He was going to rape her or kill her or both right here on the side of the road. But he didn’t. He just held her there. He was so caught up in the moment he didn’t see the lights bearing down on him.

The moment she had some space
, Emily jumped up onto the hood of the car and kicked him into the path of the ATV. It slammed into Harry, sending him flying through the air and sprawling onto the pavement.

With a loud screeching whir
, the machine skidded to a halt. Emily slid off the car and saw Zack looking back at her from the saddle of the ATV.

He swung the
quad around and stopped in front of her. “Get on!”

She swung her leg over the back, gripped around his waist
, and he tore off down the highway.

Emily had never been more happy to see someone get run over by a speeding ATV.
When she was a little girl, she always thought she wanted to be scooped up by a prince on a horse. This was close enough.

They zoomed along for several miles. She looked back a few times
, wondering how long it would be before Harry got after them again. She was way too cynical to think he was dead.

Zack
slowed a great deal and turned off the highway down a dirt road. “We’re almost out of gas.”

“That seems to be a common theme tonight.”

“We need to get off the highway.” Zack pulled up a hill, turned around, and stopped the engine. The darkness enveloped them. She could let go now, but she didn’t. Her arms remained locked around him. How thankful she was just to have this moment. It spoke to Zack’s understanding that he hadn’t asked her to let go.

After a few more moments
, she finally let her arms loose, he twisted around, and looked at her. “Sorry I took so long.”

She
grabbed the back of his head and kissed him, long and hard. There was a moment where she just felt like the world had gone away and there was nothing but his lips, his hands on her body, and her fingers on his muscles. A nuclear bomb could be dropping right now and she couldn’t have cared less.

Chapter 27

Zack
took a deep breath and tried not to let it look like he was just blown away. He’d never been kissed like that. Not even by the divorced thirty-year-old he dated briefly last year, and she had about ten years of pent-up frustration to take out on him. But amazing as it might have been, they were still far from being out of danger.

He slid off the machine and tried to hide the fact his legs were rubber. No doubt if Rick was looking down on this right now, he was making fun of
Zack for letting an eighteen year old chick make him feel all out of sorts.

A
s he stood on the crest of the hill looking out towards the roadway, he couldn’t help but wonder if he’d made a mistake by not jumping off that ATV, finding a gun, and killing that son of a bitch. But he just wanted to get Emily out of there as quickly as possible.

Emily came up behind him
and put her hand on his back. “You smell like fire. How’d you get out of there alive?”

Zack
shook his head slightly. “I’m hard to kill.” He smiled at her. “Actually, there were a few sketchy moments, but I just put my head down and ran through the flames. I knew that car would be running out of gas, so I had to get after you.”

“
You did something to the car?”

“I yanked the gas line loose. I couldn’t get it off
, but it was leaking. I just hoped he’d run out of gas before the ATV did.”

She kissed him on the cheek with a big smack. “You’re a genius.”

“I’m just the luckiest SOB on the planet. We’ve been very lucky. We’re going to run out of it eventually.” He motioned to the ATV. “I figure we only have about twenty miles left in that gas tank.”

Emily smiled. “Well
, I happen to know there’s a station about twenty miles away.”

“Yeah?

“Harry looked on his phone when we ran out.”

Zack
blew out an audible breath. “It would be a risk.”

“But better to risk it at night, right? At least then we can see the headlights coming.”

Zack nodded. “True. But there might be more traffic in the morning. I dunno, I have no idea how busy this road might be during the day.”

“I don’t think it’s very busy.”

“You’re probably right. Maybe we should go for it now, maybe while he’s still down and out.”

“Maybe he’s not down or out anymore.”

“And you’re sure that station is up ahead?”

“I’m almost positive. Unless he was lying for some reason.”

They could wait it out, maybe hide and hope he passed them by. But that would be another risky move. Zack again was upset he didn’t kill him. He should have.

“Hey
.” Emily touched his arm. “Don’t beat yourself up.”

She surprised him. His face didn’t usually give away his emotion, but she was so very perceptive that she’s surprised him over and over with the way she just got things. “I’m not
, too much.”

“You only had a sp
lit second to make the choices you made and we’re here, we’re alive to talk about them. So you’ve done great.”

“So’ve you.”

She shrugged. “I haven’t really done anything.”

“Are you kidding me?” He turned to face her. “Don’t sell yourself short.”

Zack looked back at the ATV. “Okay. Maybe we should get on the road now.” As he climbed on the machine, he wondered if he should have stopped at all. It would have been fine to just keep going until they ran out of gas.

He fired up the engine and waited for Emily to wrap her arms around him. Then he took
off down the trail, leaving the lights off to draw less attention.

The highway was still deserted.
Zack pushed the throttle about three-quarters to the stops and used almost all the speed the ATV had while still trying to use the least amount of gasoline. A good balance of speed and fuel economy was the prudent measure.

The machine didn’t have mirrors
, so he had to rely on Emily looking backwards periodically to make sure they weren’t being followed. Navigating just by moonlight was easier than he thought it would be. The speedometer said he was going fifty miles per hour. If Harry was in a car, he could go much faster. But if Emily saw him coming, they could pull off the highway undetected.

As they crested a slight hill
, Zack saw lights off in the distance. Hopefully, it was the gas station or another place they could find help. He looked down at the gas gauge on the top of the tank and it was on empty, but the ATV was still chugging and he hadn’t even switched the tank to reserve yet. But as he was thinking it, the machine started sinking into a fuel-starved sputter.

Zack
reached down to the left side of the gas tank on the Honda and switched the dial to reserve. The engine stumbled momentarily and caught up again, as it got a new burst of gas. He knew from experience that these reserve switches would give you several miles of fuel. And as the lights grew closer, he knew they were going to make it.

Zack
slowed and pulled into the parking lot of the small two-pump Gulf gas station. He was about to jump for joy, but realized the place was closed. He wasn’t happy. But he also knew he might be able to get a little bit of gas out of the pumps even though they were off.

Stopping the engine
, they got off and looked around. “Crap,” Emily said. “Can you believe this?”

Zack
pulled off the gas cap and plucked the hose off the pump. He was able to trickle a few ounces of gas out of the pump. The other hoses had a couple ounces in them as well. One of them had even more than he expected, but it wasn’t enough to get the gauge to move.

Emily walked up to the doors of the
auto shop, and cupped her hands to look inside the garage. “Pretty dark, looks abandoned.”

Zack
walked over to a large gravel area and picked up the biggest rock. He pushed Emily to the side and heaved it through the glass. He hoped it would sound an alarm, but nothing happened. “Great, we find the only place in America not guarded with security alarms.”

Emily used her elbow and knocked out enough glass to walk through,
Zack followed. It was your basic waiting room. A long desk spanned the rear of the room, a few old steel chairs sat against the glass of the opposite wall. Zack walked through the door into the shop, which had two empty bays. The place looked like it had been deserted for a while. He didn’t see a toolbox or any other current supplies.

Zack
went back into the office and looked around for a phone. He found one and picked it up, but there was no dial tone. With a slam, he threw the phone back down. It was another setback. But when he saw the lights of an approaching car turn into the station, he knew their good luck had run out again.