Hold On! - Season 1

by Peter Darley

  The stranger knelt down beside her and she trembled. “Who . . . are you?” she said.

  “Your only way out of here.”

  “Where are we?”

  “We’re on the roof. We can’t go back down. The place is a torch.”

  Belinda couldn’t place his tone, but there was a masculine depth to it that was genuine and sincere.

  “Please, trust me,” he said. “Can you stand up?”

  “Yes, I think so,” she replied, but her coughing resumed.

  He waited for the attack to abate before speaking again. “I’m going to get you out of here. There’s only one way.”

  As he helped her to her feet, she realized how high up they were with the skyscrapers all around them.

  “I need you to listen to me,” he said. “What’s your name?”

  “B-Belinda. Belinda Reese.” She quivered, and hugged herself tightly against the chilling effects of shock and the brutal February wind.

  “All right Belinda, I need you to come over here with me.” He motioned toward the edge of the roof. “There’s nothing to worry about, trust me.”

  He walked toward the edge before her. Once he was standing on the ledge, he reached out and beckoned her to join him.

  She placed one foot in front of the other, but froze when she saw him taking a gun-like device from his tool belt.

  “It’s OK,” he said in a reassuring tone. “This isn’t what you think it is. I swear to you on my life, I’m not going to hurt you.”

  With trepidation, she resumed her steps toward him.

  “That’s it,” he said reassuringly. “Just a little closer.”

  Belinda stopped inches away from him at the ledge. He aimed the device toward a skyscraper opposite and brought a small targeting sight to eye-level. Although it bore a resemblance to a gun, it didn’t have a barrel, but rather a tennis ball-sized bulb held fast by his palm.

  He depressed a button on the top of the metallic casing and a thin, high-tensile, steel cable jettisoned from the nozzle toward the building opposite. The cable reached the other side and a small steel claw at the end of line clasped a maintenance rail in the center of the roof. Pulling on the cable, he ensured it was secure, and stepped away from the edge.

  He hurried across to a maintenance stairwell next to the entrance and climbed three steps. Once he was in position, he wrapped the wire around an iron step above him repeatedly. From the height of the roof’s ledge, Belinda estimated the step was approximately twelve inches above his own height. Reaching height.

  With a flick of a switch, the cable was locked inside the bulb casing.

  Belinda watched him, bewildered. “What are you doing?”

  He didn’t reply, clearly focused on his task.

  Returning to her, he took a black metal tube from his belt, approximately fourteen inches in length, from which pulled out two hand-grips from either side.

  Belinda noticed a small pulley wheel on the underside of the tube, which he clipped onto the wire. He’d created a zip-line between the two buildings.

  Upon that realization, she panicked, believing he intended for her to hang from the hand grips and glide across to the adjacent building. “I can’t do this. Please, I’m begging you. I can’t do it.”

  He stepped back up onto the ledge. “You don’t have to. I do. Now, take it steady and join me here.”

  She raised her right leg so slowly she thought she’d never put it down. Eventually, the tip of her shoe settled onto the ledge.

  He gently placed his hand upon her shoulder. “All right. I’ve got it from here.”

  He grasped her under her armpits and lifted her onto the ledge. She trembled with vulnerability and vertigo. “Oh, God, please don’t let me fall.”

  “You’re not going to fall.”

  As he carefully placed her arms around him, she detected the solid base underneath his black, bullet-resistant attire. It was clear that, beyond the Kevlar, he was muscular, which heightened her sense of safety with him. With shaking hands, she held onto him for dear life.

  He gripped the pulley with his left hand and lifted the visor with his right. Belinda looked into his deep green eyes. He looked exactly the same as his voice sounded—strong, but kind.

  The moment ended and he pulled the visor back down into place.

  Holding the right hand grip, he looked at her again and gave her the most unnecessary piece of advice she’d ever heard: “Hold on!”

  Two

  Night Flight

  Belinda closed her eyes tightly as she held onto the stranger. The secure footing of the ledge disappeared. Her feet instinctively scurried in mid-air, hungry for the security of solid ground. She dared not open her eyes as she soared five hundred feet above ground with him. He hung from the grips of the pulley as a motor system within it rapidly launched them across to the adjacent skyscraper.

  Sheer terror gripped Belinda’s heart again as they reached the halfway mark. “Don’t let me fall!” she screamed.

  In a rugged whisper, he repeated, “You’re not going to fall.”

  Within seconds they reached the rooftop. He raised his legs, gliding them over the ledge to land gracefully on the surface. Belinda squealed as her heels lightly clipped the edge.

  “Are you all right?” he said.

  Slowly, she settled her feet onto the roof, looked up at him and tried to speak, but no words formed. She simply nodded.

  Satisfied she was unharmed, he let go of her and made his way across to a maintenance entrance door. He quickly discovered it was locked with a security code. There was no conventional method of entry without the code.

  Getting into the Carringby building had been so much easier. The time he’d spent committing the architecture to memory had been invaluable. Breaking in through the rear entrance and taking the service elevator had been a sound plan. However, halfway to Barton Carringby’s office, he’d heard the gunfire and the explosions and realized his information on the timing of the attack was wrong. He’d had no choice but to continue to the roof. From there, he’d made his way back down the maintenance stairwell in search of survivors.

  This time, he got lucky.

  He took a small chrome projector a little larger than a pen from his belt. With the push of a button, a slender orange beam was emitted onto the door. As he twisted a dial back and forth around the projector, the beam increased in intensity.

  Despite shivering with the freezing cold, Belinda watched, awestruck, as the laser rapidly burn through the steel door lock. The stranger casually drew the projector around in a circle until the two ends of the incision met.

  He switched off the device, stepped forward, and kicked the circle in with his right heel. The lock mechanism shattered and the door came open to the shrill wailing of alarm sirens.

  Belinda clasped her hands over her ears, barely muffling the ear-shattering sound.

  Urgently, he said, “Come on. There’s not much time.”

  She followed him through the open door and along a dark corridor.

  They came to a fire exit stairwell. Fueled by adrenaline and nervous energy, she managed to keep up with him, although everything seemed to be happening in slow motion.

  They faced forty stories before they would reach the ground. On each floor, they hid as security guards ran past the windows of the fire exit doors.

  After an exhausting descent, they arrived at the bottom. Belinda fought for breath, resting for a moment as her rescuer pushed open the rear fire exit.

  “I think this is it, if I calculated it right,” he said. Ahead, in the alleyway, was a white van. “It is.”

  “What is?”

  “Our way out.”

  He took her hand and ran into the alley toward the van. Immediately, they were startled by a barrage of police sirens coming toward them.

  “Get in the van,” he said.

  She ran around to the passenger’s side and climbed in.

  He started up the engine and raced away as the police cars
reached them.

  “What are you doing?” Belinda said. “They’re the police. They can help us.”

  “What gives you that idea?”

  Frustrated, the pitch of her voice rose to a screech. “We’ve just been involved in a terrorist attack. Who better to go to than the authorities?”

  “You don’t get it, do you?” he said.

  “Get what?”

  He turned his shielded face to her again. “Those killers were the authorities.”

  Just the sound of that comment caused Belinda to shiver, though she didn’t understand it.

  The chase continued. Pedestrians stopped to watch the convoy of police cars, blue lights flashing, and the ear-piercing squall of the sirens.

  The van turned a corner and was immediately halted by a police roadblock. The police cars behind them screeched to a stop, blocking them in.

  Officers in front and behind them emerged from their vehicles, firearms trained on the van.

  The stranger turned to Belinda. “Get in the back of the van.”

  “What?”

  “Get. In. The. Back. Of. The. Van.”

  Moving as though she was on autopilot, not in control of her own choices, she was clueless as to what she was doing. Nevertheless, she climbed over the seat.

  Captain Lewis Jordan, the Denver Police Department’s Chief of Police, studied the scene. With twenty years’ experience in crisis situations, he knew the suspects before him were cornered with no opportunity for flight.

  He smiled smugly, wiped his graying moustache with his right forefinger, and raised the bullhorn to his mouth. “You are surrounded. You have no chance of escape. Come out with your hands raised over your heads.”

  Jordan waited for sixty seconds and issued the order again. No response came, prompting him to take the initiative. “On my mark, gentlemen—”

  The van exploded. Police and onlookers recoiled instinctively with the shock of the blast. Momentarily blinded by the brightness of the fire, they cautiously turned back to the sight of the blaze.

  “Terrorists!” somebody yelled.

  Suddenly—something— emerged from the flames so fast their eyes didn’t have the chance to fully register it. At first glance, it appeared to be a type of low-flying aircraft that bore a passing resemblance to a metallic-blue sports car.

  Transfixed onlookers clicked on their mobile phone cameras as the craft launched itself across the police barricade. In the blink of an eye, it disappeared in the direction of Highway 70.

  Inside the aircraft, Belinda found herself sitting in a reclining position with a crisscross safety harness secured around her chest and torso. Screens and digital readouts on the inside of the roof were spread out before her. The city became an indecipherable blur through the small tinted door window.

  Piloting the craft from her left, the stranger typed something into a touch-sensitive panel built into the dashboard.

  “All right, all right.” She tapped the palm of her right hand on the fingertips of her left. “Time out, please.”

  He adjusted the throttle and the craft turned onto its side, maneuvering around a line of traffic on the highway, flying vertically between them. “Hang in there. Everything’s under control.” He straightened the vehicle and the jets launched them forward at astonishing speed.

  Belinda yelled, “Stop it, please! We’re gonna crash.”

  “No, we’re not. I’ve typed in our coordinates. It has a satellite link to all traffic between here and where we’re going so it’ll maneuver around every vehicle.”

  Questioning her own sanity, she said, “What is this thing?”

  “It’s a test aircraft. A radar-invisible one-of-a-kind. We’re safe. Nobody’s going to find us.”

  “Why did you blow up the van?”

  “I had to destroy it to erase as much forensic evidence as possible. It could have led them to where I bought it from, and that was pretty close to where we’re headed.”

  “Where are we headed?”

  “Not far from Aspen. We should be there in about twenty-five minutes.”

  Her mind in turmoil, Belinda dared not imagine what speed they were flying at if they could reach Aspen in that time. But there was another bewildering question she felt compelled to ask. “Why didn’t we blow up with the van?”

  “Oh, the shell on this is made from an experimental, concussion-resistant alloy. The detonation of two grenades is its limit.”

  “That’s pretty amazing.”

  “How about a little music?” he said. “Do you like rock?”

  She barely heard him and didn’t respond. It wasn’t long before snow became visible through the side window. She lay back in stunned silence.

  Three

  The Cabin

  The aircraft landed outside a wooden cabin deep within the snow-covered mountains.

  Belinda’s safety harness automatically detached itself and retracted into the seat. The side door slid upward and she noticed they’d landed directly against the porch of the cabin.

  “I didn’t want you to be knee-deep in snow,” he said.

  Shaking, she reached out and eased herself onto the porch.

  “It’s dryer this way.” The stranger climbed across the passenger’s side to join her. She assumed he was trying to put her at ease by acting nonchalant.

  He walked across the porch and inserted a key into the cabin door. Belinda considered the sight somewhat bizarre—a tall, muscular man in black combat fatigues, and a sleek helmet with a reflective visor, acting so normal.

  She was instantly drawn to the vision before her. The moonlight shone down onto a valley of snow, creating a calming, hypnotic, purple-blue effect. It was a contender for the most beautiful sight she had ever seen, and such a dramatic contrast to that which had led her to it.

  He pushed the door open and stepped inside. “You’d better come in or you’re gonna freeze.”

  She turned around and cautiously followed him into the living room, but nothing about the interior of the cabin registered with her. “Excuse me?”

  “Yes?”

  “Do you think you could take that helmet off now, please?”

  “I’m sorry. I forgot about that.”

  He removed the helmet and she gazed upon him fully for the first time. He looked to be in his mid-twenties. He was dashingly attractive, with mid-brown hair falling to the base of his neck, and a square jaw. She had already seen his striking green eyes on the rooftop.

  She couldn’t quite place his looks. They seemed to be a combination of rugged, yet wholesome. Despite a small, star-shaped scar in the middle of his forehead, he didn’t appear villainous or dishonest in any way. He placed the helmet down on a black leather sofa beside him.

  “Why’d you wear that?” she said.

  “The helmet?”

  “Yes.”

  “Because a bullet to the head can be fatal. It’s made of a bullet-resistant alloy, and has a built-in gas and smoke filter. That’s how I got to you without choking on the smoke.”

  “I see.” Belinda finally looked around her and noticed how cozy the cabin was. It was obviously being lived in. The small kitchen through a door at the end of the living room prompted a smile. He clearly wasn’t partial to washing dishes. Typical guy. Looking down, she saw a thick beige carpet. That looks expensive.

  As she surveyed the room she noticed a stereo system, a high definition television, and what appeared to be three DVD, or possibly Blu-ray players. There was also a fine-quality leather sofa and recliner set, a mahogany drinks cabinet, and two paintings on the wall. One showed a lavish Caribbean coastline in the sunset, and the other, a sailboat on a lake or maybe an ocean. It wasn’t clear. Nevertheless, it was apparent that whoever her mysterious rescuer was, he was doing quite well for himself.

  “I’d better get the fire started. It’s going to be a cold one tonight,” he said.

  Despite having just been through the most terrifying and utterly remarkable experience of her life, there was some
thing about him that made her feel safe. She tried to speak, but the shock of the night finally took its toll. “W-what is . . . ? What . . . ?” Her lips quivered and she broke down.

  He hurried across to her and held her tightly. “It’s all right. Just let it go.”

  She quivered as she tried to get her words out. “What is y . . . ?”

  “Excuse me?”

  She looked up at him again. As he wiped the tears from her eyes, she held his gaze for a painfully uncomfortable moment. She felt drawn to him, even though he was a stranger, and she had no reason to trust him. Her hands were still trembling with residual fear, and her heart ached for the comfort of an embrace.

  Caution was no longer a factor. She took the initiative, grasped the back of his head, and touched her lips to his. But he was unexpectedly hesitant. Surprised by how surprised he was, she slowly drew away.

  She was momentarily caught in an ambivalence of disappointment and relief. The way he drew away caused her to feel more secure with him than ever. His resistance did, at least, prove he wasn’t a sexual predator or an opportunist. “What is your name?” she finally managed, realizing she’d been too rattled to ask him earlier.

  He smiled warmly. “Brandon. Brandon Drake.”

  “But . . . who are you?”

  “There’ll be time for all that tomorrow. For now, I just want . . . no, I need you to know you’re going to be safe here. Please, trust me.”

  She nodded. The last time he’d said those words to her, he’d followed by saving her life. Why wouldn’t he have just left her on the roof, or even pushed her off if she couldn’t trust him?

  He made his way over to the liquor cabinet, took out a bottle of vodka and a crystal-cut glass, and handed her the glass. It was as though he was doing everything he could to make her feel comfortable.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  After unscrewing the bottle, he poured her a shot. “Would you like some tonic with that?”

  “No, but I wouldn’t mind another shot. Or two.”

  He gave her a rather generous splash. The glass was almost half full by the time he’d finished. She consumed the entire contents in one mouthful.