Chapter 8 - The Secret Safe House
I ran down eighty flights of concrete stairs in complete darkness, my lungs burning like they were filled with crushed glass.
I could hear the chaotic shouts of heavily armed SWAT officers echoing from the lower levels.
I bypassed the main lobby entirely, slipping out through a rusted loading dock door that smelled heavily of garbage.
I sprinted back to the stolen sedan, threw myself into the driver’s seat, and sped out of the alley just as the police barricades went up.
I was completely out of options, out of money, and rapidly running out of time.
I had only one place left to go, a place so deeply hidden that even my powerful parents didn't know it existed.
Julian had once drunkenly mentioned an old, off-the-grid hunting cabin hidden deep in the remote northern mountains.
He claimed it was the only place in the world where the ghosts of his violent past couldn't find him.
I drove fiercely for six exhausting hours, navigating treacherous, unpaved mountain roads through a blinding rainstorm.
The stolen car sputtered and completely died just as I reached the overgrown dirt driveway of the isolated cabin.
I grabbed Elliot and trudged through the freezing, ankle-deep mud toward the dark wooden structure.
The cabin looked entirely abandoned, with thick moss growing heavily over the rotting roof shingles.
I pushed the heavy front door open, fully expecting to find a dark, dusty room filled with forgotten cobwebs.
Instead, the large stone fireplace was blazing with a roaring, perfectly constructed fire.
Sitting in a worn leather armchair by the warm fire was a figure cloaked in heavy shadows.
I froze in pure terror, fully expecting Julian to stand up and finally claim his horrible victory.
The figure slowly stood up and stepped into the bright, flickering orange light of the fire.
It wasn't Julian.
It was my mother, wearing her ruined designer clothes and gripping a massive silver hunting rifle.
May you like
She pointed the heavy barrel of the gun directly at my chest, her hands completely steady.
“You always were far too predictable, Clara,” my mother said coldly.
