Taken By Surprise (Taken Trilogy Book 1)

by Jessica Frances

  “It’s fine.” He shrugs like it’s no big deal.

  “I really didn’t mean to hurt you yesterday, it was a complete fluke.”

  “I know. Next time I won’t make it so easy for you to get me.” He smiles at me.

  “I caught you off guard which is the reason I was able to hit you,” I reason.

  “I made you think that. In reality, I saw your punch coming and felt bad for you.” He winks at me and I know he’s trying to stir me up.

  “Who knows, maybe I’ll be able to give you a matching bruise on the other side of your chin tomorrow.” I smile back at him cockily.

  “You mean, if I allow you the chance to get near enough to me to do it.” He smirks at me.

  “Tough talk for someone who has now lost to two women so far. Maybe Martha can beat you next time?”

  Instead of replying to that like I expect, he reaches out with both hands and grabs my shoulders. Moments later, I’m flat on my back and he is looming over me.

  “Think you can beat me now?”

  “Depends.” I can’t stop smiling and I know I should probably feel awkward, having our bodies so close, however after everything that has happened between us, I feel safe around him.

  “Depends on what?” He, too, smiles and my heart rate increases just seeing it.

  “On whether you’re ticklish.”

  Since his hands are still on my shoulders, his sides are completely open to attack, so I reach out and take my advantage. I don’t expect the reaction I get.

  Charlie starts laughing uncontrollably and after losing his balance he falls off the side of the bed and hits the ground hard. I roll over to look at him and he is still half laughing and half grabbing his ass.

  “So that’s two for two so far.” I laugh at him.

  “Shut up and help me up.”

  I get up and hold my hand out to him and he gingerly rises up off the ground.

  “So I get the feeling that the bruise from this round will not be something I’ll be showing you.”

  “Thanks.” I smile and roll my eyes at him.

  “Thanks for getting my ass kicked again?” he asks.

  “No, thanks for making me laugh and putting up with me.” I smile at him and again we both get into bed. I feel a little calmer this time and close my eyes, hopeful I might get some sleep.

  “Zoe…” Charlie whispers.

  “Yeah?”

  “Best out of five?” he asks hopefully.

  I laugh again and push his shoulder lightly.

  “You want to lose some more?”

  “Overconfidence will be how I’ll win.”

  “Fine, you’re on.” I laugh again, picturing Charlie falling over the bed, and pull the covers up to my chin.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight – The Match

  Sunday, April 15th

  Training is tense that next morning and Stan seems especially testy with us. We’re all on edge, given our task of trying to get to the laptop, and Stan’s mood does little to set us at ease. We do our warm up around the circuit and start stretching, which is when we catch a big break. Stan announces that as long as the rain holds off outside we’re allowed to spend the afternoon out there under supervision. We’re all ecstatically pleased with that news and Stan gives us looks like we’re not all there. I know we’re all relieved; getting to the laptop will hopefully be easier than any of us thought, but I probably would be this happy either way. We can get some fresh air again and this time I won’t get hit over the head.

  Stan takes us the same way Will and I had gone and, while our door had been immediately fixed, the other two Will smashed through haven’t been.

  When we walk past the second desk, I signal the laptop to Rose who winks at me and smiles. We walk further along to an actual proper door where Stan types in a code and we’re allowed out. The part of the window Will smashed through has tarps over it, which makes loud noises as the wind beats down on it. The broken glass has been cleared away.

  Outside, Stan gives Charlie a basketball and his face lights up. He immediately bounces the ball through his legs and around himself. They have set up a portable basketball ring in the middle of the car park and while it looks sturdy enough, I doubt it will hold if someone decides to hang off it like I’ve seen on TV.

  Outside watching us are six guards, all with guns on their belts. A cold shiver runs over my body having all their eyes on us, although I try my best to ignore them.

  There are only a handful of cars parked close to the building. Looking around us, I notice cameras set up on the outside of The Windmill, but they don’t appear to move. The Windmill is a secluded place. There looks to be only one narrow road into here and it’s over a hundred yards to the fenced off gate at the end. Through that, I see part of a road that looks just like any other road in America. On either side of the gate is thick shrubbery that carries far enough into the distance that I don’t see an ending. It hides this place from any eyes and I think if you’re going fast enough along the road you’d probably easily miss the gate. There are no real signs of life around here. The air gives the feel of being too quiet. It all feels incredibly unnatural.

  All of us are taking in our surroundings, except Charlie who is slightly distracted by bouncing the ball complicatedly around himself. Stan is speaking with one of the guards sternly and I imagine we’ll be watched very carefully. I begin to feel doubts Rose will be able to get to the laptop. My eyes don’t leave Stan until he goes back into The Windmill and even though there are six other pairs of eyes on us, I feel better knowing Stan’s aren’t one of them.

  We all stand around the basketball ring and randomly take turns throwing it to attempt a basket. Rose and Charlie are the only ones that actually get any in. I’m sad to realize Will doesn’t really know how to play with a ball. His life has been so deprived and Stan just let it happen. It’s so heartless. As soon as Will went on the street, Stan should have intervened and found him proper living conditions. A kid does not belong on the street.

  Soon Rose and I grow bored of standing aimlessly throwing a ball around so we leave Will with Charlie, who begins excitedly teaching him how to play basketball. I sit over on the damp grass with Rose and look up at the sky. The day is overcast, however so far, it doesn’t look like it’ll rain.

  “Did you see the laptop?” I ask nervously, feeling like I should be whispering even though no one could possibly overhear us.

  “Yeah, I almost missed it hiding under the newspapers; good catch.”

  “Do you think you can get to it?” My nerves break through my voice and I study Rose’s face for signs of worry or doubt.

  “I think I have a good chance. I’ll ask to go to the bathroom or something. They’ll want most of the guards out here with you guys. So, I’ll only have to slip past one or two.” Rose shrugs and appears completely stress free.

  “It sounds dangerous.”

  “I’ll be fine.”

  “There are a lot of guards out here, more than I thought there would be,” I complain.

  “I know, I wonder if this is everyone or if there are still more inside?”

  “I think that Stan is trying to make a show here, scare us into thinking there is no way to escape. I mean, all the guards out here, this is overkill,” I point out. Six trained guards on us four who are untrained and, in my case, completely hopeless in a fight. Plus, they all have weapons. Definitely overkill.

  I look away from the guards and the sick feeling that comes with seeing a gun on each of their sides. My eyes find Charlie who looks like a natural as he jumps in the air and the ball just miraculously finds itself falling into the basket each time.

  “See something you like?” Rose elbows me teasingly.

  “Shut up.” I look away, yet with nothing else all that interesting around us I find myself looking back over at him. He’s now helping Will shoot. Poor Will still appears to be about as good as I am.

  “It’s so obvious he likes you.”

  “Don’t be absurd.”
I roll my eyes at Rose. Charlie is a good actor and, while I don’t think he dislikes me, he knows we now have to keep up appearances.

  “Come on, the guy has to think of a reason for the blackouts and he could have said he was just feeling really homesick, that his emotions were jumbled while he tried to process what had been said at lunch. He could have jumped on his bed and pretended he was having a nightmare since he did just have some freaky things happen to him. Hell, he could have pretended to be getting freaky with himself on his bed—”

  “Rose!”

  “My point is, out of every option he had, the only one he thought of was kissing you.”

  “It isn’t like he had minutes to think of something, he only had seconds.”

  “Well, why kiss you then? I was there… I mean, I would have had to pour bleach down my throat afterwards, but the truth is, he’s only ever had eyes for you.”

  “We were in my room; it would look a bit weird for him to be kissing you in my room.”

  “Don’t try and explain this away, Zoe. I know these things, trust me. I mean, come on, you guys share a bed now?”

  “I can’t sleep on mine; not after Drew…”

  “Okay, that I understand, but why did you choose Charlie? You could have asked me?”

  I can’t really remember why I felt Charlie’s bed was the only option. At the time, that had felt right and reasonable.

  “What about the couch? Or you could have put down a bunch of your clothes along the ground and used them to make sleeping on the floor more comfortable.”

  “What’s your point?” I ask her, getting annoyed.

  “My point is that you guys like each other. Why not admit it?” Rose shrugs like admitting that wouldn’t be a big deal.

  “This is not the time or the place for that.”

  “This is actually the perfect time and place. You guys like each other and who cares where you are. If anything, at least this will make being here less hard.”

  “It’ll just make things messy. It’ll make us distracted. We need our full attention on getting out of here.”

  “And if we’re stuck here forever, what will you do then?”

  “I don’t know. We don’t get that option.” I can’t let Drew down. We have to get out of here.

  “I wish we could all just go home, that this never happened.” Rose shows her first signs of stress and it makes me feel worse. When Rose appears untouchable, I wonder if she’s human. When she’s scared, I wish she could go back to being that strong, unstoppable woman I see so often.

  “Do you have someone at home? Your own version of a Charlie?”

  Rose snorts. “No, I have a Dean. If I had a Charlie, then I would simply have twiddled my thumbs and ignored it like you guys.”

  “Shut up.” I lightly shove her, but I don’t feel any anger at her words. I’m beginning to understand that Rose just likes to say it how it is, whether it’s correct or not. “So, Dean, what’s he like?”

  “I don’t know. He’s nice. I only met him a couple weeks ago. Technically, he’s investigating a theft at my bank, but we officially met out at a club.”

  “I didn’t think you were twenty-one yet?” Not that I can talk, when have Dana and I followed that rule?

  “I’m not.” Rose smirks at me.

  “So you met a cop out at a club, underage?”

  “Yeah, well, I admit it wasn’t the smartest move I’ve made. He was pretty upset when he found out. Luckily a bomb going off distracted him.” Rose doesn’t even flinch as she blurts out about a bomb.

  “No one can say your life isn’t exciting.” I roll my eyes.

  “True. If that bomb had never happened, I predict I would have managed to get him to forgive me by now and we would have had our third date.” Rose’s eyes drift away to somewhere else and a small smile graces her lips. A smile for Rose is rare and I take as much of it in as I can. Even though this one is only small, it makes her look even more beautiful. I can imagine many guys falling for that smile. She must be inundated with attention from the opposite sex, maybe even the same sex.

  “So he’s third date material?” I question, wondering what type of guy would hold Rose’s attention.

  “I think he might be many dates material. Guess now I’ll never know how many.” The smile goes away.

  “Maybe we can end this like Drew said and we’ll get to go home?”

  “We’re four people against a government run, rogue agency. We’ll be lucky to get out of here when I get to the laptop. After that, we have to disappear. Even if we manage that and decide we want to try and bring them down, that will take a lot of planning and a lot of time.”

  “Yeah, I admit bringing them down is going be a long shot. I don’t have the faintest clue where to start with that.”

  “So what about you? Was there a Charlie in your life already?” Rose watches me carefully.

  I look over at the boys wrestling each other for the ball while laughing. Will looks like a kid again and I take my time to relish his smile, too.

  “Zoe?” Rose questions again and I grudgingly let my mind drift to thoughts of Joel. Do I want to talk about him to Rose?

  “There was sort of someone. His name’s Joel. I liked him, but there was something about him that scared me. I didn’t know why. I just always had this urge to run when I was around him.”

  “Bad boys, say no more.”

  “He’s the guy that killed my best friend, tried to kill me. Drew told me that in his timeline, Joel and I had gotten married. My old future had me marrying Dana’s killer. I can’t wrap my head around that.”

  “That’s beyond bad boy. No wonder you’re so standoffish with Charlie. So he’s the one they have locked up?”

  “Yeah, I spoke to him after they arrested him. I hate him so much for what he did, for what he took. Then I hear that I married him, I loved him.”

  “That timeline doesn’t exist, though, and in it, he never killed your best friend. He wasn’t a murderer there.”

  “I know, but because a bunch of our family and friends decided to go back in time and change the past, they screwed up so much more. Will lost a friend, I lost Dana, Charlie lost a date. Three lives gone. Joel’s life is now forever changed. He’ll probably spend it behind bars. He had a chance of living a normal life and having a wife and who knows what else. Now he’s a prisoner. Everything is just so messed up.”

  “I know. I hate that this had to happen, but I guess if I think about it, I was able to save a boy because of the bomb.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, after the bomb went off, I needed some time away from everything. I went to this park and saw a boy being kidnapped. I helped get him back to his mom and I even got them some cash to start their lives fresh. Who knows, maybe I changed a lot by doing that. A boy lived, a mom got her son back and they get to have a life somewhere else.”

  “That was really brave of you.” I don’t feel surprised by Rose’s story. She has a strength and stubbornness about her that makes me believe she’ll do anything to help someone.

  “Or stupid. Dean seemed to think I was being stupid. Since I never made it back to him, he’ll definitely think I was stupid and now he thinks my stupidity caused my death.”

  “Death?”

  “Yeah, something Martha said to me. She told me that they’re currently under the impression that the drug dealer I crossed managed to find and kill me. They think by now my body is buried somewhere they’ll never be able to find. It’s not official because he won’t admit to killing me because obviously he didn’t. It took them two days to catch him so they have no idea where I could be. I’ll just be an unsolved case, I guess.” Rose looks away from me, but I see the hurt that knowledge causes her.

  “That’s horrible.”

  “I know, that’s why I want to call home so bad. Martha and I merely fight about it every time she wants to talk to me. I don’t see why my parents have to think I was horribly murdered. They don’t have to know where I am, just that
I’m alive.”

  I let her words soak in, feeling awful for her.

  “Martha told me my Mom thinks I’ve run away. They’ve opened a missing person’s case on me, but the general consensus is that I’m a runaway. I might have wanted to run away, but I would have never left Drew behind to deal with this on his own. I hate that I can’t be there for him and I hate knowing how much me leaving will have hurt him,” I admit, feeling a stabbing pain in my chest.

  “Funny how so much can change in just a week.”

  “Well, what can we do? We’re stuck now,” I say, resigned to our fate.

  “I can tell you what you should do. Go jump Charlie’s bones.”

  “Rose!” My cheeks go red and I hope Rose keeps her mouth shut when Charlie approaches, holding the ball in his hands.

  “You ladies up for a little two-on-two?”

  “Sure you don’t want to play a little one-on-one with Zoe?” Rose sneers at Charlie.

  I elbow her hard and she smiles sweetly at me.

  “You’ve seen how horrible I am,” I dismiss Charlie’s offer, not wanting to make more of an idiot of myself than I already did earlier when I missed every shot I threw at the basket.

  “Come on, we’ve got a best out of five bet going here. You’ve got to give me a chance to win it back.”

  “Best out of five?” Rose asks us.

  “I’ve sort of beaten Charlie twice now,” I explain.

  “Beaten him at what? Or is this something I don’t want to know.”

  “Rose,” I groan. “No, it’s just the other day we made a bet that I couldn’t hit him and I obviously did.”

  “Good shot, by the way.” Rose smiles happily at me. “And the other?”

  “He thought he had me beat and he didn’t.” I feel too embarrassed to mention I won by tickling him so I hold that part back.

  “You had an unfair advantage,” Charlie complains half-heartedly.

  “You’re bigger, stronger and have had more training sessions than her, what advantage did she possibly have over you?” Rose questions.

  “When you put it that way, sure, I sound like an idiot.”