Sweet Collateral

I’m pouring out a glass of orange juice when I sense someone watching me. Turning around, I startle when I spot the unknown man standing in the doorway. The counter bumps against my back barring my exit.

“Anna.” He moves slowly towards me. Shoulder length dark hair is pulled into a low ponytail and a metal ring loops through his bottom lip. I definitely don’t recognize him.

“How do you know me?” I edge along the breakfast bar, keeping it between us as he rounds it.

“I’m here to help you.” He holds his hands up, continuing to try and get closer to me. “I work for Rafael.”

“I’ve never seen you.”

He smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “You’ve met all the people who work for him?”

“I’m just going to go back to my room.” I haven’t survived this long by being a poor judge. My gut is telling me not to trust this man.

“Rafael sent me to pick you up. I’m going to take you to him.” Rafael has made it very clear that it’s not safe outside his walls, so why would he want me brought to him?

“Oh, that’s okay. I’ll wait here for him.” I make a dash toward the door and make it halfway down the hall before I’m dragged back by my hair. A shocked cry slips from my lips as an arm wraps around my throat.

“This will be easier if you’re quiet,” he breathes over my neck. I fight the urge to just shut down and block it all out. Instead, I find a flicker of fight that I thought long extinguished, and stamp on his foot. He shouts a curse before squeezing my neck harder. I struggle desperately for air. Blackness licks at the edges of my vision, and I fight it like a rabid animal, the voice in my head screaming at me that I’m about to die. My head spins, and then everything goes dark.

I’m jolted awake by a loud bang, followed by the sound of crunching metal as my body goes completely weightless. A strange silence reigns for a moment before everything comes rushing back in at once. I’m flung against something hard, and pain radiates across my forehead as my chest is squeezed tight. And then it all stops. I open my eyes and blink as liquid drips onto my eyelashes. The scent of gasoline invades my senses, and when I glance around, I realize I’m in a car, except I’m half sprawled against the window, hanging by my seat belt in the over-turned vehicle. Fumbling around, I unplug the seat belt and fall fully onto the window. Bits of broken glass cut into my skin, and I cough at the dust swirling around me. The pop, pop, pop of gunfire sounds somewhere nearby and through blurred vision, I see heavy red droplets fall onto the cracked glass beneath my hands. The other people in the car are all hanging limply in their seats, either unconscious or dead. There’s another round of gunfire and I know I need to move, but I can’t get my vision to stop doubling.

The scent of gas… The gunfire. All it will take is one bullet and this car could explode. I don’t want to die.

11

Rafael

“Motherfuckers. Need. To. Die,” Carlos growls, pushing to his feet and firing off a round of shots with a semi-auto.

I listen for the return fire, but it never comes. “Think that might have done it. Find Anna.”

Carlos moves away from our position behind the SUV and starts ordering men around. I glance around the back of the SUV and find no one left standing. I jog over to the upturned SUV sprawled on its side. It was in the middle of the three cars that were coming up the road from my house. If Lucas hadn’t rung me, we would have missed them, and Anna would be halfway to fuck knows where by now. My blown up warehouse was just a distraction. I was pissed that the kid let them take her, but judging by how many armed men we just took down, he only would have gotten himself killed, and then we definitely would have lost her.

A figure emerges from the back of the car, crawling through the smashed back window on hands and knees. I instinctively lift my gun before I see the mass of blonde hair, streaked with red.

“Anna,” I call her name as she falls to her back on the hard ground. I drop to my knees beside her. She’s bleeding. Cuts litter her arms and the exposed skin of her chest, as well as a deep gash in her forehead.

“Rafael?” Her dazed eyes focus on me, fingers brushing over my jaw as though she’s not sure I’m real.

“I’ve got you.” I scoop her into my arms and stand.