Lumberjacked (A Holiday Lumberjack Mountain Man Romance) - K.C. Crowne Page 0,69
I felt less trapped, but I also felt incredibly small.
Being between the trees felt ominous for some reason. I felt like I was being watched. There could be a million eyes around me, looking at me. I shivered at the thought. It was strange; when I’d been with Viktor, I’d felt safe in the woods. It hadn’t been scary or daunting or eerie. Now that I was without him, even when the driver was with me, I felt lost and out of place. And vulnerable.
Ironic, since Viktor was the person I was running from now. Well, in a way. I had to go home anyway. But I hadn’t left with a sweet goodbye.
“Ah, here they are now,” the driver said, getting out, too.
A truck approached us from the front. It pulled up about a car length in front of us, and the driver climbed out. He was tall and thin with dark hair and sunken eyes. “Trouble, Yakov?”
The name was decidedly Russian, and I realized he hadn’t told me his name during all his ramblings.
Yakov, the driver, laughed. He walked to the man, clapped his hand into his. They looked like they knew each other pretty well. They opened the hood and muttered for a short while. I stood close by, rubbing my arms against the sudden chill in the air.
Finally, Yakov emerged. He looked at me, apologetic. “It doesn’t look like we’re going to be able to fix this,” he said. “Aleks doesn’t know what’s wrong, either.”
“Let me take you into town,” Aleks offered, closing the hood of the car. “I’m headed back anyway.”
“Really?” I asked, skeptical. “Are you sure?”
Aleks nodded. Yakov retrieved my clothes and the other roll I hadn’t eaten out of the car. “I’ll wait here for a towing service to arrive.”
I wanted to get out of the forest and back home where I could put everything that had happened behind me and focus on the new life I was going to create for myself when I left for Chicago.
“Okay,” I said, taking my things from Yakov.
“Good luck,” he said.
“Thanks,” I answered and walked with Aleks to his truck. He opened the door for me and closed it behind me. The truck smelled like tobacco. It had a hula girl hanging from the rear-view mirror and the leather seats were cracked.
Aleks put the car in gear and turned around, facing the way he’d come before accelerating down the road. I looked in the side mirror and saw Yakov climb back into the car as he shrank. The headlights came, and the car around began to make a U-turn.
“Hey!” I cried, pointing at the mirror. “The car. He’s driving away.”
“No, he’ll wait until someone helps him,” Aleks said.
I twisted in my seat to look out of the small window behind us. Yakov was definitely driving away. What was going on here?
Aleks took a sharp turn on the bumpy dirt road, throwing me against the side of the door. I jerked my head around to look at him. “Where are you going?” I asked. “What’s going on here?”
“Don’t worry, Angela,” Aleks said.
My blood ran cold. “How do you know my name?”
“Everything’s going to be okay. You just need to stay calm.”
I put all the loose ends together. The cab hadn’t broken down. Yakov probably wasn’t even a cab driver. And how many Russians had I met in Grizzly Falls before this week? None. How could I have been so stupid?
“Is this about Viktor?” I asked. My voice was small. “I don’t know anything, I swear.”
Aleks didn’t answer me, he just shook his head and whistled through his teeth.
“Please, whatever this is about, I’m not a part of it. Or are you taking me to him? I don’t want to go back there.”
Aleks shook his head. “Be quiet, Angela.”
“Let me out!” I screeched.
Aleks ignored me. I tried the truck door, but it was locked. I wound down the window, but I couldn’t climb out without killing myself on the bumpy terrain. I looked at him again, fearful.
“Where are you taking me?” I asked softly.
“Don’t you worry about that,” he said. “As long as you behave, you’ll be fine.”
As if I wouldn’t worry about the fact that I’d just been kidnapped. Things were just getting worse and worse. My throat started to tighten, and panic kicked in. I struggled to breathe, my breaths coming fast and shallow, erratic.
“I can’t do this,” I gasped. I was going to suffocate right here. “Let me out, I need air.”