Up to Me - By M. Leighton Page 0,57

brings just enough adrenaline with it to clear my head of the fog that muddles it. At least a little.

I think back to the parking lot at school. I remember rolling down my window. I remember the cloth over my face. But then there's a blank until I was being carried. Disjointed images from the underside of a bridge flash through my mind and I remember waking up as the two guys were transferring me into another vehicle. I remember kicking and screaming, clawing and biting until the one holding my upper body dropped me. I screamed and kicked harder with my feet until something dense and heavy hit me upside the head. And then there's nothing again until I woke up tied to a bed in an otherwise empty room. I raised my head and started to look around just as the same young guy lunged at me with a rag in his hand. He smothered my face with it until blackness swallowed me again.

That's the last thing I remember until now.

"We're not supposed to kill her yet. Maybe just give her a little bit more, in case we need to wake her up and let someone talk to her or whatever."

"Yeah, let's do that."

I feel tears running down my cheeks, but it's an oddly detached sensation, like I'm feeling the warm streaks through a layer of fabric stretched over my skin. I try to open my eyes to see what's going on, but they won't cooperate. It's a struggle just to draw one breath after another. My chest feels so heavy, the urge to sleep so very strong.

The strength to fight eludes me when I feel the rag come across my face. I try to turn my head away, but the hand is persistent and I'm too weak. Vaguely, like smoke drifting through a room, it occurs to me that they might be giving me enough of whatever they're using to cause permanent brain damage. I think of Dad and how heartbroken he'll be. I think of Mom and how smug she'll be. But most of all, I think of Cash. Of what his lips feel like, what his smile looks like. Of all the things I didn't say, of all the things I'll never get the chance to say now. Of how cowardly I was about telling him I love him. More tears course down my cheeks, fading, fading, fading until I feel them no more.

And then all thought is gone.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR - Cash
I know that, on top of the twenty or so traffic laws I've broken, I've also just been plain dumb. I don't think I've ever made it across Atlanta faster, and during a busy time of the day, too. Weaving in and out of the flow, taking to the shoulder and emergency lane dozens of times to get around clogged spots, squeezing between cars to get through a slow place - none of it has been advisable. Getting myself killed trying to get to Olivia won't do anybody any good. But still... that doesn't seem to matter. All I can think of is what they might to do her, what they might've already done to her.

I grit my teeth against the rage that floods my blood stream. If they've laid a hand on her... If they've harmed so much as one hair on her beautiful head... God forbid, if they've done things to her...

Just the thought of the twisted things men like this do to women makes me feel both sick and furious. I comfort myself with the thought that they haven't had her very long. By the time I get there, it should be a couple of hours at the most. But to Olivia, the captive, that could feel like a lifetime.

And it's all your fault for dragging her into your mess to begin with.

I twist the handlebar and throttle up even more, as though it's possible to outrun my mistakes if I drive fast enough. It's not, of course. There's nothing I can do to reverse the damage. My only hope now is to fix it for the future. To make it so that she's never in danger again. Even if it means becoming a criminal to do it.

It goes against everything I am now, everything I believe