the familiar gives me a modicum of calm.
“Juliette—?”
“I need to cut you down—”
“Jesus, Juliette—how did you find me?” He coughs. Wheezes. Takes a tight breath.
“Later.” I reach up to touch his face. “I’ll tell you everything later. First, I need to find a knife.”
“My pants—”
“What?”
“In”—he swallows—“in my pants—”
I reach for his pocket and he shakes his head. I look up.
“Where—”
“There’s an inside pocket in my pants—”
I practically rip his clothes off. There’s a small pocket sewn into the lining of his cargo pants. I slip my hand inside and retrieve a compact pocketknife. A butterfly knife. I’ve seen these before.
They’re illegal.
I start stacking boxes on the conveyor belt. Climb my way up and hope to God I know what I’m doing. The knife is extremely sharp, and it works quickly to undo the bindings. I realize a little belatedly that the rope holding him together is the same cord we used to escape.
Adam is cut free. I’m climbing down, refolding the knife and tucking it into my pocket. I don’t know how I’m going to get Adam out of here. His wrists are rubbed raw, bleeding, his body pounded into one piece of pain, his leg bloodied through with a bullet.
He nearly falls over.
I try to hold on as tenderly as possible, try to hold him close as best I can without hurting him. He doesn’t say a word about the pain, tries so hard to hide the fact that he’s having trouble breathing. He’s wincing against the torture of it all, but doesn’t whisper a word of complaint. “I can’t believe you found me,” is all he says.
And I know I shouldn’t. I know now isn’t the time. I know it’s impractical. But I kiss him anyway.
“You are not going to die,” I tell him. “We are going to get out of here. We are going to steal a car. We are going to find James and Kenji. And then we’re going to get safe.”
He stares at me. “Kiss me again,” he says.
And I do.
It takes a lifetime to make it back to the door. Adam had been buried deep in the recesses of this building, and finding our way to the front is even more difficult than I expected. Adam is trying so hard, moving as fast as he can, but he still isn’t fast at all. “They said Warner wanted to kill me himself,” he explains. “That he shot me in the leg on purpose, just to disable me. It gave him a chance to drag you away and come back for me later. Apparently his plan was to torture me to death.” He winces. “He said he wanted to enjoy it. Didn’t want to rush through killing me.” A hard laugh. A short cough.
His hands on my body his hands on my body his hands on my body
“So they just tied you up and abandoned you here?”
“They said no one would ever find me. They said the building is made entirely of concrete and reinforced steel and no one can break in. Warner was supposed to come back for me when he was ready.” He stops. Looks at me. “God, I’m so happy you’re okay.”
I offer him a smile. Try to keep my organs from falling out. Hope the holes in my head aren’t showing.
He pauses when we reach the door. The metal is a mangled mess. It looks like a wild animal attacked it and lost. “How did you—”
“I don’t know,” I admit. Try to shrug, be indifferent. “I just punched it.”
“You just punched it.”
“And kicked it a little.”
He’s smiling and I want to sob into his arms. I have to focus on his face. I can’t let my eyes digest the travesty of his body.
“Come on,” I tell him. “Let’s go do something illegal.”
I leave Adam in the shadows and dart up to the edge of the main road, searching for abandoned vehicles. We have to travel up 3 different side streets until we finally find one.
“How are you holding up?” I ask him, afraid to hear the answer.
He presses his lips together. Does something that looks like a nod. “Okay.”
That’s not good.
“Wait here.”
It’s pitch-black, not a single street lamp in sight. This is good. Also bad. It gives me an extra edge, but makes me extra vulnerable to attack. I have to be careful. I tiptoe up to the car.
I’m fully prepared to smash the glass open, but check the handle first. Just in case.
The door is unlocked.
The keys are in the ignition.
There’s