Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 94716 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 474(@200wpm)___ 379(@250wpm)___ 316(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 94716 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 474(@200wpm)___ 379(@250wpm)___ 316(@300wpm)
A cough sounded from the room beyond ours. One after the other. Cough. Cough. Cough. Three, four, five, six. What the hell?
Jack dragged Edward’s body unceremoniously to the chain, and, with deft movements, had him chained much the same was I was. Only this time he forewent the leather coverings and went straight for the metal on skin.
“Get behind me.” He snapped.
“Don’t get pissy with me, Jackopa!” I hissed, but did as I was told anyway.
The man didn’t have to take his unhappiness out on me, no matter what the situation.
“Please.” He said with a hint of a smile in his voice.
A bird called.
What the hell was that? Was that a bird? “Are there birds in here?” I whispered.
A loud exhale followed my question. “No, but you can breathe now. It’s just Sam.”
“Was Sam a bird in his former life?” I asked with a little too much smartass in my voice.
“No, but we’ve worked with each other for a long time. We know the calls each of us uses to announce ourselves.”
“Was that him coughing out there?” I asked curiously, as the tension released from my body.
My head found his back, and I leaned into him, wrapping my arms around his body from behind. He stiffened slightly, and I felt a little knot of fear settle deep in my belly.
“Probably. But it wasn’t coughing ‘per say.’ That was silenced gun fire.”
My eyes widened. “What?”
“Yeah, they always have my back.”
The way he said that made me feel like, at times, I didn’t have his. Besides, I guess there was some partial truth to that. I’d been clingy and needy over the past four months, never helping him out. I was the one who needed help, not the other way around.
Jack answered Sam’s call with one of his own. Only he used English this time instead of Angry Bird language. “Clear.”
His deep voice echoed in the room, and I spared a glance down to study my father.
He was conscious and staring daggers at Jack. He did look like he’d seen better days. Both eyes were swelled mostly shut. His lip was split. His nose was most definitely broken from the whip of the chain across his face. Teeth were missing all over the front of his mouth, and I couldn’t scrounge up one iota of sympathy for the man.
“I’m going to end you.” He said.
I startled when I realized he was looking at me now.
“I highly doubt that. You’ll be lucky to breathe using a machine once we get done with you.” Jack rumbled.
I felt the vibration of it against my cheek as he spoke and smiled down at the man. “My man knows how to hold on to something. If it means something to him, he’ll never let it go. Your death means something to him, so I know he’ll never let it go. Even if you make it out of here today, you won’t stay free for long. You’re done.”
The tension in Jack disappeared at my statement. He squeezed me tight and pulled me in front of him. Sam and James, with Gabe a little further behind, entered the room, stepping unceremoniously over the dead body of Peter.
“No one left. Can y’all wipe the system?” Sam asked.
Jack nodded and dropped back down to one knee. Glancing down, I noticed he had some sort of box with an antenna and a blinking red light on it. “What’s that?” I asked.
Jack ignored me and waved the box in front of Edward’s beaten face. “What’s this wired to?”
He gurgled something and then smiled. Or at least tried to. It looked more like a grimace of pain with the split lips, broken nose, and toothless smile.
“We need to get out. He has the place wired.”
Evil laughter followed his announcement. “You’ll never make it out in time. If I don’t type in the pass code every fifteen minutes, it blows.”
It sounded more like a gurgle, but most of what he said I could make out.
Fear settled low in my gut, but I didn’t have the time to process it in the slightest. Jack had me over his shoulder within seconds, and we were all running. Jack was following the others, and I had a wonderful view of his backside.
Which is why I saw the man step out from a door we just passed with a gun raised in his grasp.
Helpless, I watched as he gave me a wink before pulling the trigger.
Blood splattered my face as the bullet tore through Jack’s chest.
“Fuck!” He wheezed and stumbled before catching his stride again. “Someone’s at our six.”
Two quick shot successions fired from somewhere, and the man went down.
Jack kept running, only slowing down once to reposition me as we turned the corner. Sunlight filled the white hallway with brilliant beams, and I’ve never been so happy to see the light of day before, even if it was upside down and backwards.
We made it just past the threshold and out into the cool sunny day when the world exploded. The last thing I heard was Jack’s voice.
“Catch!”
Then I was airborne.
Chapter 21
There isn’t a day that goes by that, at some point, I don’t think of you.
-A note written by jack
Winter
Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.
I peeled my eyes open, thinking that whatever was fucking beeping needed to die. It needed to die soon. My head hurt. My body hurt. My stomach hurt. I was cramping, and I thought it was the cruelest thing Mother Nature could ever do to give me my period when I felt so bad.
But these were worse than I’d ever felt before. So much worse that I started thinking that something was seriously wrong with me. It wasn’t normal for me to be cramping this bad.
“Jack.” I moaned.
Nothing.
Just the damned beeping.
“Jack.” I cried again.
Still nothing.
Making my eyes open proved to be a chore. They felt like they were glued shut. My eyes finally did open, but it felt like I broke through a layer of glue to do so.
My vision was bleary, and I didn’t know if it was because of the pain I was experiencing, or the fact that I’d obviously went on a bender last night and didn’t mean to.