Lost & Bound (13 page)

I turn to Cruz who is not so subtly looking
at his watch. “Dude, thanks for your help.” I hold out my hand to him. He takes
it.

“Why don’t you head out? You can leave the
same way we came, through the woods. Once you reach the road, Eric will be
waiting.”

He nods his head before turning to Leila.
“It’s been a pleasure.” He ogles her one last time.

“Just leave. Eric will give you the money,”
I tell him.

Cruz ascends the stairs noisily. I wonder
if I should walk him out of the house to make sure he’s not tempted to grab a
souvenir or two on the way out, but when I hear the front door close, I breathe
a sigh of relief.

I look to Leila. “You wearing that?” I ask.

She wraps her arms around her middle and
looks at me shyly. “It’s not appropriate?”

“You’ll need a coat. It’s cold out.”

She looks toward her wardrobe. “I have no
winter coats.”

“It’s fine.” I rub my hand up and down her
arm. “I’ll find you something.”

She rubs her fingers over the flesh of her
wrist. “It feels weird,” she says.

I run my fingers along the skin. There’s a
small indentation on her wrist from where the bracelet has been pressing all
this time.

She clears her throat and then looks me in
the eye. “Thank you,” she whispers.

I run my thumb along the bow of her lip.
“You are so welcome.”

We share a moment where neither of us says
anything, we just stare at one another and it’s as if no words are needed. It’s
obvious we feel the same way.

“I’ll head upstairs and find you something
to wear,” I say. “And then we can get the hell out of here.”

She smiles, her teeth peeking through her
plump lips. The lips I want to kiss so badly.

My heart skips a beat when she inclines on
her tippy toes and presses a gentle kiss to my cheek. “Thank you,” she says
once more.

I don’t tell her the truth. That she’s the
one who’s saved me and I’m the one who should be thanking her.

Leila

The air is cold, cooler than I expected, but
I breathe it in, welcoming it into my lungs. I am free. I repeat the word in my
mind a few times just to make sure it’s not a dream.

Free. Free. Free.

 
This is real. The day I fantasized about
since my arrival. My cheeks hurt from smiling so wide. This feels good. Freedom
feels amazing with Callum by my side.

Callum finishes locking up the house, the
same house that had been my prison for the past three years. I take one final
look at the brick veneer before turning my back on it. I’m ready to leave.

“We’ll walk through the woods.” Callum is
at my side. He presses his hand to the small of my back causing my body to
tingle.

We make our way to the mass of overhanging
trees and woodlands and start the trek toward Callum’s car. He holds my hand,
both of our fingers are cold to touch, but the simple gesture warms my insides.

We walk hand in hand surrounded by the
darkness of the night. It’s pitch black, the moon offering only a sliver of
light through the canopy of trees.

“I can’t see a thing,” I whisper.

“Just follow behind me,” Callum says,
tightening his grip on my hand.

We walk fast. The twigs and sticks cracking
beneath our weight, the only noise other than our heavy breathing.

Callum picks up the pace eager to make
progress. We’re almost at the same point where I was caught the last time I
tried to escape. That night I was captured within minutes. The guard came out
of nowhere and wrapped his arms around me. I struggled against him, my arms hitting
him in the face, trying desperately to break free, but it didn’t work. I was
captive once again.

We reach the narrow creek that lines the
second fence line. I knew the creek existed, but I’ve never seen it before. The
gentle movement of the water flows through to my ears.

“Watch out,” Callum tells me as he jumps
over the water. I follow suit, less gracefully of course, but I manage not to
fall down.

I watch Callum’s face turn into a smile,
the moonlight offering the slightest glow between the branches of overgrown
trees.

“What?” I ask, letting out a puff of air.

He squeezes my hand, his touch barely
registering in my numb fingers.

His lip quirks up, his gaze studying my
face. “Freedom looks good on you,” he says as he tugs on my arm for us to keep
walking.

I can’t help it. I smile too.

I smile for how far I’ve come when I
thought it was impossible. Life is waiting and this time I promise not to take
it for granted.

“We’re almost half way,” I hear Callum say.

I take my eyes off the ground to look at my
surroundings, but my foot gets caught on a stray branch. I fall to the ground,
my hands and knees hit the debris of autumn along with the icy evidence of a
cold winters night.

“Are you okay?” Callum bends down to help
me to my feet.

I brush the dirt from my pants and shake my
head. Luckily, in the darkness of the night he can’t see that my cheeks are
glowing red.

“I’m sorry,” I say.

And that’s when I hear it, a pair of
footsteps that are neither Callum’s nor my own.

Everything stops as still as the night itself.
I can hear my heart whooshing in my ears. I want it to stop so I can listen for
the footsteps, but it only intensifies.

I hear the crunch of leaves and Callum’s
eyes shoot to mine. Despite the darkness I can see fear in their depths.

It could
be an animal. It has to be an animal.

The fear doesn’t register until I hear
Callum’s panicked voice fill my ears. “Ruuunnnn!”

I feel Callum’s hand on my back and then
he’s pushing me forward. For the first time in years, I run.

I’m surprised that my legs hold me up. They
keep moving even though my body is tired. My ankle gives way beneath me, my
body lurching forward, but I don’t fall to the ground completely. I save myself
and keep running, but it’s then I realize that there are no longer footsteps
behind me. I whip my head around, peering over my shoulder as my feet continue
to carry me.

Callum has fallen, his body is on the
ground and I can see the figure of a man behind him.

“Rapido… Corre, corre,” I shout, my English
failing me in my haste.

Callum doesn’t move, the man behind him
sprawling forward and grabbing hold of his leg. I stop running as I stare at
Callum’s motionless body on nature’s floor.

I feel the freedom slipping away from me, the
fleeting moment being ripped from my grasp as easily as it found me. And once
again, I’m trapped.

Callum

She was free. This was the night she would
reclaim her life. How did this go so horribly wrong?

We were running, the person behind us was
making ground, but I was certain we could out run him. That was when he lunged
forward and caught my foot with his hands. I struggled to stand again, but it
was no use. He overpowered me. I don’t know who
he
is, I’m yet to see
his face, but the force behind his movements tells me it’s not my father.

I lie on the ground and notice Leila has
stopped moving.

“Leila, run!”

She looks
at me, her eyes
wide and her body
motionless.

“Keep running.”

She doesn’t move.
Why isn’t she moving?

She takes one step closer and then another.
“Leila, damn it, keep running.”

The words don’t register. She just stares
at me, the look on her face one of defeat.
 
She’s given up.

The guy behind me presses a knee to the
small of my back.

“Don’t even think about running,
sweetheart,” he lets out. His voice is deep, gruff and definitely not my father’s.

“Who the
fuck are
you?” I ask.

He reaches forward and slams my head into
the ground. Dirt and ice hit my face with such force that my cheek is instantly
numb. Leila gasps, her breath causing clouds of smoke to come gushing from her
lungs.

The man grabs me by the scruff of my neck
and pushes my face into the ground once more. The taste of dirt registers in my
brain together with the metallic tinge of blood. My blood.

He ties my hands together with something,
rope perhaps, my shoulders pinned behind me, the coarse fibers digging into my
skin. Even if I tried, I couldn’t run like this. I don’t have it in me, my mind
is too groggy and my body too tired.

“Get up,” he instructs, keeping his hand
wrapped around my upper arm. My own strength isn’t enough to match his. When I
turn to look at him I understand why. This guy is a beast. The hulk himself
would be intimidated. He’s well over six feet tall with the build of a freight
train.

I hear Leila’s footsteps close in on us.
The crunch of dead leaves announcing her.

She offers herself to the man, holding her
hands out for him to tie her up.

“Leila, what the fuck are you doing?”

The hulk yanks on my arm, telling me to
shut up.

“Do I need to tie you up, sweetheart?” he
directs toward Leila.

She shakes her head no and he lets out a
gruff laugh.

He takes hold of her sleeve and tugs on it
hard. “Come on then, follow me.”

“Fuck, Leila, you should have kept
running,” I say as we follow the hulk in the opposite direction of freedom.

Leila shakes her head. “I won’t go without
you.”

The hulk chuckles again, his gruff laugh
echoing in the woods. “Smart girl. You wouldn’t have made it much further,
trust me.”

I can’t wrap my head around what went
wrong. How our plan could have failed. I saw the bracelet. It was still live, as
if it was still attached to Leila’s wrist. And yet, here we are, straight back
to square one. Only this time, I am captive too and no one is coming to save
us.

Leila

Fist meets flesh, again and again. The sound
of Callum’s face being beaten by a man twice his size causes me to flinch with
every blow.

“Stop. Please, stop,” I shout, tugging at
the sleeve of the giant man.

In one fluid movement, he elbows me in the
stomach, propelling me backwards. I fall to the floor. My ass hits the cold concrete
as pain reverberates up my spine.

I don’t let the pain stop me. I stand
almost instantly.

“Please, stop,” I yell again, this time a
safe distance away.

Callum raises his face and locks his gaze
with mine before the giant lays another punch into his stomach. Callum falls
forward, the sound of his body slapping against the concrete echoing throughout
the basement.

His skin is stained red. Both fresh and dry
blood cover
his face and his skin is swollen beyond
recognition. It breaks my heart to think this is happening because of me.

He
remains still.
I fear he’s dead, his body lifeless, his eyes closed. That’s when I hear his
voice, a familiar voice that I hoped I would never hear again. “Enough.”

The giant turns to face Osborne. He rubs
his knuckles, the flesh bloodied from meeting Callum’s face so many times.

“Go upstairs,” Osborne instructs. “Now.”

The man does as he’s told and that’s when
Osborne’s attention turns to me.

“You’ve been a bad girl, Emmy.” He closes
the distance between us, his hands hanging in his pockets casually as if this
were any other day.

“Look what you’ve made me do.” He gestures
toward Callum’s body. “To my own son too.”

His lips turn up at the sides, his face
fighting the smirk that wins in the end.

“What I’ve got in store for the two of
you,” he says, showing me his teeth, the air whistling as he draws in a breath.
“You have no idea.”

He walks over to Callum’s form that remains
unmoving on the floor. He kicks his stomach once. I let out a gasp, but Callum
doesn’t react. He has passed out.

“You disobeyed me my child.” He stands with
his hands on his hips, looking down at his son, his words dripping with
contempt. “And for that you will pay.”

He takes one final look at me and I don’t
dare move. “You better get some sleep, Emmy.” He turns on his heel. “You’re
going to need it.”

Moments later the door slams shut and I
know it’s safe to breathe again. I rush to Callum’s side, propping his head up
on my knee as I dry some of the blood away from his face.

“Tudo certo,” I say. “You’re all right.”

I run my fingers over his forehead as I
silently pray
for him
to wake up.