3 Days (10 page)

With Jared up ahead, Blaine and I followed suit. Halfway down the driveway, next to the dirt bike, Jared stopped mid-stride. “Kara, you rode here on this?” Turning toward me, he waited for an answer.

“Among other things,” I replied, feeling a jolt of pride at his reaction.

Jared, looking slightly impressed, asked, “What other things?”

I told him about the car troubles and added, “But mostly I ran on foot.”

“RAN?!” he screeched, “Damn girl, you’re like Forrest Gump on steroids!” He then turned back toward the truck and attempted to throw his pack into the bed.

Blaine and I followed behind, snickering at Jared as we watched him struggle to get the pack up over the side of the truck bed. It resembled a turtle on its back trying to correct itself. Blaine sneaked up behind him and used one hand to support the bottom of the pack while giving it a big shove just as Jared pulled it up and over. Then Blaine jumped back over to my side, an act that left Jared to think he had lifted the pack himself.

Chapter 26

Sitting between Blaine and Jared in the truck left me with an intense feeling of nostalgia. Of all my fondest memories of the past, there wasn’t one that didn’t involve them. Being with the pair seemed so effortless, uncomplicated. Even with our current situation, the atmosphere was no different.

As the truck carried on down the road, the guys informed me of some things that I had missed in the time I had been gone. Blaine explained to me the contents of his brief visions and everything he knew about the Intruders. He spoke of their vulnerability in the daylight, and how it frightened them. He told me of how they head out at night in packs, rummaging for food, killing any living things in their path. And when I explained that I had not seen what they looked like, he gave me a description. They had thin skin and an almost human body structure with bat-like facial features. I shivered as I remembered that night in the shed, only feet away from the Intruders.

Blaine and Jared answered my questions to the best of their ability, as well as pacifying my concerns of the scarce gasoline supply. Apparently, Jared had a method of extracting gasoline from the tanks of the stations without the use of the electrically operated pumps. The guys managed to collect a supply of full gas cans for our journey ahead.

They had just finished updating me on the events leading up to when they had found me, when I noticed we were pulling into a large parking lot. Peering through the window, I examined the monstrous building straight in front of us. The lot was empty, deserted. Broken glass stretched across the path in front of the outdoor hobby warehouse.

“Why are we here?”

“We need ammunition,” Blaine replied softly, anxiety in his tone.

Staring at the nearly demolished structure, I exclaimed, “How is there anything left?”

Jared interjected, “There’s no way of knowing if it has been cleaned out, but we know that the
Intruders…
” he motioned with air quotes, mockingly, “…don’t use guns of their own, so it’s not likely they have managed to strip the store of all their ammunition. We also need some other stuff too.” He opened his door and hopped out onto the pavement.

Chapter 27

Blaine offered his hand to help me out of the truck, and my eyes locked onto the waistband of his jeans. Tucked into his pants, just near his hip, was a gun. My thoughts must have been obvious because he cleared his throat and said, “Can’t be too careful,” and finished helping me out of the truck’s cab.

We made our way toward the huge building, and I felt my chest getting tighter. Something wasn’t right about this place. The condition it was in had no affect on my concern; a majority of buildings were left this way from the Intruders. Maybe it was residual tension from seeing the gun on Blaine’s hip, but my anxiety was growing with every step we took through the parking area.

Crossing the threshold, covered in shattered glass, and into the store, the feeling of unease became stronger. Blaine sensed my hesitation and gave my hand a gentle squeeze, as if reassuring me that it was safe. It didn’t help.

Once in the lobby area, we got a better look at the layout of the store. It was huge, broken up into two warehouse sized sections, divided in the middle by a lobby. In the lobby, directly across from the entrance, was a grand staircase leading up to a museum. There was a huge tarp at the top of the stairs and a sign informing that it was closed due to construction. Although the entire store was a mess, it was easy to see that the décor was based on a cabin in the woods. Taxidermy animals hung in various positions throughout the building.

The warehouse section to our right was for boating and fishing supplies. The floor was covered with rows and rows of fishing pole displays, in complete disarray, and other fishing supplies. Just past that area was a huge showroom full of fishing and speed boats. The showroom walls were basically made of glass, and I found it odd that this was the only area that had windows untouched by the Intruders. Very much like the shop I had stolen the motor bike from.

The warehouse area to the left had outdoor clothing items, weapons, and camping gear. This was the direction Blaine and Jared were headed. We stopped at the camping gear first, watching our step as the contents of every shelf were strewn across the floor of the isles. Jared knew exactly what he was looking for and grabbed an overturned shopping cart, turning it upright, and loading it with items off of the floor.

Blaine took my hand and led me to the weapon area. “We’ll get the ammo,” he said to Jared without so much as turning his head in Jared’s direction.

“Sure,” I heard Jared reply from behind a shelving unit.

When we got to the weapons area, I noticed it was in better shape than the rest of the store. Every glass case on the gun displays were shattered, and a few guns were missing, but the ammunition shelves only seemed partially disjointed.

I watched Blaine, his back turned toward me, busy pulling boxes of bullets off of the shelves and placing them in a half broken shopping cart. He moved so gracefully, running his finger along a row searching for the right caliber of ammunition and slipping several boxes out at one time. He then looked up, above his head to the weapons hanging from the rafters by display line. Realizing it was too high for him to reach alone, he boosted himself up on the shelving in front of him and snatched a crossbow down. It was as smooth as if he was plucking a feather from the air. I continued to watch as he searched the row of corresponding arrows for the bow, reading each box carefully.

He continued this for at least the next five minutes, his back always to me. At that moment I felt something come up behind me and a hand clamp down onto my mouth, dragging me backward around the corner and out of sight from Blaine. Taking in a breath, I was about to scream, knowing any sound would get Blaine’s attention. Then a man’s whisper exploded in my left ear, “Make one sound and I will slit your throat.” I could see the knife as he raised it to my throat. I noticed the prison orange sleeve of his shirt and felt the coarseness of his hands. His breath reeked of cigarettes and booze, only getting worse when his breathing became heavier from exertion.

Blaine must have turned around and realized I wasn’t there anymore because I could hear him calling my name two rows over, his tone turning to panic every second. The foul smelling man pulled me farther away from Blaine into the ammunition counter’s storage room. I continued to think of ways to get out of his grasp, but nothing came to mind. Still covering my mouth, he used the hand grasping the knife to smooth back my hair from the side of my face. I felt a shiver run up my spine as he breathed in my scent deeply. “My, my. You are a pretty little thing aren’t you?”

Now I could hear the muffled sounds of both Blaine and Jared, calling out to me throughout the store. I wanted so desperately to reply with a scream, but the knife was back at my throat again.

“I bet you have pretty lips too,” he said, sniffling. “It’s been a long time since I have seen pretty lips.”

Oh my God
! I thought.
What does he want with me
?

“Do you have pretty lips?” he asked, as if wanting an answer. I needed to find a way to get out of his grasp and doing that would require him to let go of me so I could run. But I could tell he had no intentions of letting go, not when I posed a threat to escape. The only way I was going to make him believe I was no threat was to get on his good side. I nodded “yes” in reply.

His body went stiff in surprise to my answer. I took a deep breath to calm myself. I had to make this more believable. I nodded again. He lowered the knife slowly, cautiously. I began to turn my body around, hoping that he would loosen his grip. When he felt me moving, he tightened his grip on my mouth and pulled my back harder into his side. “Tut, tut. You wouldn’t be trying something stupid, now would you? You don’t strike me as a stupid girl. Are you a stupid girl?” he asked, now gritting his teeth, breathing becoming shallower. I shook my head “no” in response.

“Well then, that would mean you are a smart girl, a good girl. And a good girl wouldn’t try to pull a fast one on Rocky, would she?”

I shook my head. He loosened his grip on me and said, “If I let go of your pretty mouth, you will be a good girl and keep quiet. Isn’t that right, sweetie?”
I am not your SWEETIE
! This guy was seriously pissing me off. I nodded my head. He had my back pressed against him while his back leaned on the wall to the left of the door. He slowly lowered his hand from my mouth and, when he saw that I wasn’t going to put up a fight, he turned me around to face him.

“There’s a good girl. Now, that wasn’t so hard.” His condescending tone was like nails on a chalkboard. He kept the knife in his left hand, blocking the door with his arm. With his now free hand, he began to stroke my cheek with the tips of his fingers. I could feel the little bit I had for breakfast rise to my throat. I was dangerously close to puking, but blowing chunks in his face would most likely get me killed. I worked my hardest to hold it down. I had to get him to put down the knife if I was going to get a chance to run. I could hear Jared and Blaine calling out to me. It was getting louder, meaning they were closer to the storage room.

I knew what this “Rocky” wanted, and he wasn’t going to get it. But I had to make him believe the opposite to keep myself alive.

“Rocky, is it?” I whispered, now face to face with the man. His breath smelled like a brewery, and the sound of my voice saying his name made him grin just enough for me to see that his teeth were half rotten. This was going to be harder than I anticipated.

“Yes,” he answered his breath hot on my face. I swallowed down the urge to vomit.

As calmly as I could muster, I asked, “What is it you want from me?”

His breathing became faster, and his only reply was a half smile and slightly raised eyebrows.
Ew
!

I forced a smile in return, and leaned into him, my mouth only a half inch from his crusty ear. “I would feel way more comfortable if you would put the knife away.”

His hand caught my throat, and I felt my chest tighten, closing off as quickly as my throat was about to. Through a choked reply, I forced out, “pretty please.” He loosened his grip on my throat, his fingers trailing to my collarbone. His eyes were full of a horrible fire. In that moment I felt as if I were lucky to have lived this long. His gaze traveled my body from my toes to my forehead, and the sick pain in my stomach worsened. He began to pull back the collar to my shirt. “Rocky?”

“Hmm,” was his gravelly reply.

“The knife?”

He carefully placed the knife on a waist level shelf to his left of the door. Grasping a handful of the shoulder of my shirt with his right hand, and a handful of my hair in his left, he yanked me into him at full force placing his mouth to my ear, and whispered, “Let’s just see how much of a good girl you really are.”

Chapter 28

That was my opportunity. Every girl dreads encounters like this, they haunt our nightmares after fears are placed inside our heads by our overprotective parents. And just like every girl is afraid of a situation like this, we are also trained…well. Shifting my weight back, leading him to believe I was enthusiastic for the moment, I reared up and rammed my knee into his groin with a force that could have wedged my thigh into the wall behind him. He immediately let go of me to grab this sensitive area and fell to the floor of the storage closet. As soon as he hit the floor I screamed, “Blaine!”

Untangling the escapee from my legs, I leaped out the opening of the door. After about five running strides toward Blaine, something snagged my hair. The force sent my legs upward and I fell hard on my ass. Rocky was pulling me across the carpeted cement floor by a fist full of hair. Kicking and punching at his hand, I managed to get to my feet. Blaine was running toward us, Jared a few feet behind him. He pulled the gun from his waistband as Rocky wrapped his arm around my neck from behind. He was fumbling with something else I couldn’t see, while using me as a human shield.

“Let her go!” Blaine shouted. His hand was surprisingly steady with the weapon.

Still busy with something behind me, Rocky replied, “No, fancy pants. I’m not done with these pretty lips yet.”

“I mean it. I will shoot you if you don’t let her go now!”

And then I heard it, what he was messing with out of my line of sight. There was a loud click and then the end of a shotgun barrel out of the corner of my eye. He was pointing it right at Blaine.

“BLAINE, don’t!” I screamed. I was terrified now, for myself, for Blaine. I don’t know what I would do if anything happened to him.

Rocky began to laugh maniacally. “Ho, ho! Fancy pants has a fancy name too! Blaine. Ha!”

Just then, I could see Jared coming up from our left side. Rocky saw him too and aimed the shotgun in his direction. At that moment I slammed my eyes shut and used all the force I could to drop my weight on his right side and fell to his feet.