My Sweet Escape: A Touched by an Angel Novel

by Roselynn Reyes

  When I heard the clicking stop, I looked up. There were bodies on the floor all around us. I began to sob silently; so many people had to die. All of this just to save me? Violence has always been the answer for humans. Negotiation was never an option. This made me sad. Angel strapped the automatic on his back once he ran out of bullets, but pulled out a magnum from his thigh.

  We began to run around the campsite again, this time slower. There were a few small wooden houses with tin roofs around the campsite, and a tall watch house in the middle, empty. I assumed the guard had been assassinated without even knowing who the shooter was. There were dry shrubs here and there, but there weren’t any trees.

  We ran away from the bodies, away from the nightmare where I was kept for about two months. I can’t number the days exactly, because when you’re held captive, you don’t think of the days of the weeks. You think about when they are finally going to kill you. End the pain and suffering once and for all.

  Angel dropped me on the ground one more time, leaving me in a sitting position. My eyes were threatening to close, but I couldn’t let it happen. I looked up at him and saw him shooting again, more men coming everywhere as the alarm continued to sound, and more screaming in their unfamiliar language. He grabbed my arm and dragged me behind a tin house, while I screamed in agony from the pain. I plopped my head back just as Angel began to reload his magnum, doing it in a few seconds. He ran away from me towards the chaos as I closed my eyes, I couldn’t keep them open anymore. I heard more gunshots in the distance and people yelling. I was drifting away…

  I heard another gunshot right next to me that made me jump. I looked just as the man hit the floor. I was splattered in blood. Without a word, Angel picked me up and began to run again.

  We made it to the edge of the campsite without any more attacks, and began to walk towards the small patch of lonely desert right where the truck was burning from the explosion.

  “We’re going to walk this desert? Why can’t you call a chopper or something?” I said in a small whisper.

  He threw his head back to laugh and modeled his perfect white teeth again. His laugh was evil, dark. “Honey, we’re not the Army or the Navy. I’m not supposed to be here. If Afghanistan even suspects that there’s an American here on a secret mission, World War III would begin with America.”

  I just stared at him as our pace slowed and my bare feet buried themselves in the hot sand. Could this be possible? Could it even get any harder for us than it already was? “How are we getting home then?” I asked, expecting the worst.

  He turned me to face him. His eyes glowed so brightly with the sunlight. I followed a sweat trickle from the corner of his eyebrow, down his lips, and then down his jawline. Sweat had never looked so sexy to me. His buzz cut made him look super badass.

  He licked his pink lips before he said, “Honestly, I don’t know how we’re getting home. We thought you were dead. Nothing was known except the suspected location of your whereabouts. I was told to come here and get you out. Dead or alive, but preferably alive. I really didn’t have any hopes of finding you alive, but you proved me wrong.” I listened as my knees buckled and slowly gave up on me.

  My swollen mouth hung open because I didn’t know what to say. My undamaged eye was closing from exhaustion, but I kept fighting it. My body was swaying back and forth; I was slowly fainting. I just looked into his beautiful eyes and was lost in them. Lost in the pool of blues. So the only thing I could think of saying was, “My feet are burning.”

  He just laughed and began a slow walk towards the faraway city. I looked up at the sky and the sun blinded me. I closed my eyes and felt my sweaty hair sticking to my face. The city seemed unreachable in my view. We kept walking for what seemed like hours, but somewhere along the line, I fell asleep, or passed out from the heat. I don’t know which one it was. The last thing I remembered was feeling someone pick me up for the rest of the walk. I heard faraway gunshots in my sleep.

  I came back to consciousness when he sat me on a table. He was dripping with sweat and his usually bright eyes were dark and hollow. But I was his first priority. I was conscious, but I couldn’t snap out of a daze. I couldn’t function for myself and he saw it very well. He laid me down on a rough table and tore off the shirt I was wearing, leaving me completely naked. He turned me over and left me like that.

  I began to stare at the walls; the flames were making the walls dance involuntarily. I heard him shuffling somewhere in the corner. Finally, he came back to me. I felt him clean my calf and my back thoroughly, enough for it to sting a little. He concentrated on the calf for a few long hours as I stared at the walls. Once he was done with that, I saw him heat up a needle with one of the candles on the nearby tables. I felt him begin to sew up my calf, and that’s when I passed out.

  Chapter 2

  He took a hold of the electric wire and wrapped it around his hands, laughing. He said something to the other three men in their familiar language, and they all laughed. He came towards me while my head was down. He walked around me. The silence was eerie. The other two guys in front of me were completely still. The wire appeared in front of my face, then around my neck in a flash. My chair was pulled back, pulled towards the terrorist behind me. My neck stiffened and I closed my eyes. I couldn’t try to pull free because my hands were chained.

  The men around me began laughing and chanting weird things. I couldn’t hold my breath anymore, and it was stuck in my throat. I couldn’t breathe. I began convulsing. My body was shaking and the laughing grew louder. Then everything went black.

  When I came back to consciousness, I saw all their faces as I walked through the campsite, all alone. The siren alarm was still going off, but everything else was still, except for the calm wind. Their eyes were open, staring in my direction. Something was stinging on my right wrist; something was burning it. I looked down and one of the terrorists was holding a lighter to it, burning my skin, and laughing.

  I flinched my hand away, almost smacking the guy in the face. I looked around the small plain room lit with only a few candles. There were some on the small table to my right. Melted wax dripped away from the corner of the table and onto the cement floor. I looked at the guy in front of me. He was built with a buzz cut and piercing blue eyes, bright with the flame lights. I looked at his hands and he had a bottle of rubbing alcohol in one hand and a few cotton balls in the other one. His face was controlled, and I could see that he was trying not to make any sudden movements that would frighten me.

  My heart started racing and I feared for my life. I felt like I knew him, but I didn’t know if he was a good guy or a bad guy. Everyone was beginning to blend in by now. Everyone was my enemy. Without thinking too hard, I snatched the knife. At the same time, he grabbed the gun and automatically pointed it at my face. I stood with my feet apart, holding the knife with both hands. The guy looked at me quickly and pressed the release button for the ammo. As it clanged loudly on the floor he dropped the gun and put his hands in the air as surrender.

  I looked down at my right forearm and pulled the needle straight out, making me bleed all over. I covered it with a piece of cotton, still looking at his eyes. He still hadn’t moved from the position he was in a few seconds ago, steady as a rock. I looked at the knife one more time, then back at him.

  Finally acting fast, I threw the knife at him and turned to hide in a dark corner. I heard the knife clang on the floor as I pressed my body against the cold wall. I wrapped my arms around my body and tried to quiet my breathing. I collapsed onto the floor from the dizziness. The knife was on the floor and the man was trying to regain his composure. I saw him look down, and then put the gun on the table quietly before staring straight at me.

  I got scared. He didn’t move towards me yet; he just stared. I had nowhere to go because he was blocking the only way out that I could see. I began to cry quietly because I already knew that I was going to die. He began to walk towards me, and then knelt down in front of me. I hugged my body tighter.
He then sat down on the floor in front of me, just staring at me. I covered my face with my arms and began to sob.

  “Samantha,” he breathed quietly. He took a deep breath and released it. “Samantha, look at me.”

  When I didn’t look at him, he slowly unwrapped my arms from my body, his cool fingers calming my body of the fear. Slowly, I looked up at him from beneath my hair. He was sitting cross-legged in front of me, holding my forearm with his hands.

  And I stared at him. I stared into his eyes and felt familiarity. I felt complete calmness radiating through his cool fingers. He’d taken me out of that place. He was the only person who dared to save me when nobody else would. He was the only one who worried about me being safe.

  “Angel,” I whispered. He sighed and let go of me. I jumped on him and began to cry on his shoulder. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”

  He didn’t hold me at first. I rested my head on his shoulder and closed my eyes as the tears flowed down on their own. He took a deep breath and held me close to his body. This act made me cry harder, and so I cried like a child as he caressed my hair and murmured things in my ear. I needed this affection from someone. Being tied up and tortured for so long makes you think that you don’t deserve to be alive. You feel like you’re back in high school and nobody loves you. You’re all alone.

  “I don’t want to hear you apologizing for anything that’s happening.” He slipped his hand in mine. “Come, sit back on the table. Let me clean you up.”

  I nodded as I looked down. He shuffled through a couple of duffel bags on the floor. He came up with a pair of shorts and a plain shirt that looked like they belonged to him. I looked down at myself and realized that I was the cleanest I’d been in a long time. My skin was a little red, and I was wearing a white shirt covered with fresh blood. I assumed it was his because it was extremely big. But my body was really clean and smelled like baby lotion. Even my fingernails were dirt-free. I’d never thought I would be clean again. My hair also smelled like baby shampoo, and it was damp. This meant that he’d undressed me at some point and bathed me. At that thought, a blush attacked my face.

  I sat back down on the uncomfortable table, trying to keep my body covered. I realized that I was wearing one of his briefs as underwear. I tried to keep my face from burning with embarrassment again. He sat on the chair with his long legs outside of mine, pouring rubbing alcohol on my wrists and ankles. I flinched, trying to avoid screaming. I squeezed my eyes shut for a while until I became numb to the pain.

  I looked down at him, coolness radiated through his skin, his hand over my wrist felt comfortable. His heartbeat was loud and slow in the quiet space. He placed gauze and tape over where I’d pulled out the needle so it could stop the bleeding. I looked at his face and saw that I’d smeared my blood on his right cheek. I took the rubbing alcohol and wet a cotton ball. I went for his face but he pulled away quickly, giving me an angry glare for even thinking about touching him.

  I looked at the cotton ball and sat back. “I put blood on your face.”

  He looked up at me and I tried again. This time he didn’t pull away. He kept an intimidating stare at me, making me regret cleaning him. I rubbed the cotton ball on his cheek gently, feeling how smooth and baby-like his skin was before I pulled away, dropping the cotton ball on the floor and looking at my thighs.

  “You washed me?”

  He answered as he continued to look up at me. “You have a few infections, and you’ve been sitting in your own feces and blood for a while. Plus, you had your menstrual cycle.”

  My face went completely red at this point. I had my period and he was cleaning it? “Oh my God,” I said, covering my face once again with my hands.

  “I’ve seen worse things, believe me. But you smelled pretty bad so I couldn’t ignore it. I gave you a sponge bath,” he said with a little hint of sarcasm in his voice. His lip lifted just a little. I couldn’t tell if he was joking or not. He continued what he was doing while I tried to think about something else, but it didn’t work. Just the image of this guy bathing me freaked me out, especially someone as good looking as him.

  He began to clean my hands and arms gently with a clean washcloth. He was gentle with me, sweet even. He did the same to my face, making me feel like a child. He didn’t try to make small talk; he looked comfortable with the quietness in the room. His eyes traced every single part of my face while his fingers rested on my chin for stillness.

  I realized that my right calf was covered with a long bandage and I asked him, “What happened to my leg?”

  He looked as if he didn’t want to answer, but he did. “You have a really bad cut on the back of your calf. It is pretty deep. There were maggots inside. It took me a few hours the night we got here to completely clear them out, then I sanitized the area and sewed it up.”

  I felt completely disgusted and embarrassed. “Oh God…”

  “Actually, you were lucky. The maggots were keeping the area from becoming infected, even though it is gross.”

  “What about the rest of my body?” I asked, afraid that they were lurking around in my insides. Gross.

  He was checking my pulse and talking at the same time, “I did my assessment and I didn’t see any more on the rest of your body. But we need to get you home and to a hospital ASAP.”

  Once he finished cleaning my wounds, I said, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to do any of this, or pull that thing out.” I pointed at the bag on the wall.

  He took a pair of tweezers and began to work on my eye. “I don’t blame you. You have gone through so much for a girl your age. Besides, the IV was just there for a few days to restore your health, since you haven’t really eaten or drunk anything in a long time.”

  He poured something in my eye and I flinched. “A few days?”

  He soaked a new cotton ball in another liquid and dabbed that on my lip. “Yeah, you’ve been out of it for four days now. You passed out on our way here and were unconscious until now.”

  I stared at his flawless face; trying to figure out why a person like him with such a violent job didn’t have any scars or marks anywhere on his face. He just had mesmerizing blue eyes and adorable pink lips. Heck, I mentally shook my head. I hadn’t seen an attractive guy in a while. I was just being over-observant.

  “Hey, when this nightmare is over, I’ll give you my combat knife to keep. I see you got a thing for it.” He laughed as I smiled and looked away from his face. “You have no sun damage and your skin looks pretty healthy. Look left and then right,” he said, holding my right eye open. “Good. Your right eye will be fine. It’s functioning normally and your pupil is still dilating. The swelling has gone down in the last few days. You don’t need to worry about it; but it will take days for it to look normal again.”

  “Thanks,” I said as we both got up, my body screaming with pain. He helped me until I was steady and my dizzy spell was over.

  “Here are some things for you to change in to.” He pointed at the shorts and tee on the chair. “I’ll meet you in the front room,” he said and walked out of the room.

  I threw the soiled shirt on the floor and inspected my body. I was clean and smelled like I’d been in a hospital. My body looked like I’d suffered a severe case of chicken pox or something. The bite marks all over my body were purple and my feet were extremely swollen as if I was pregnant. My back felt raw for a reason I couldn’t remember. My breasts felt heavy and sore. I slipped on the shorts and tee shirt and saw a rubber band hanging on a nail. I grabbed it and wrapped it around my wrist where it wouldn’t hurt my open wounds.

  I looked out a tiny window but it was no use. Most of the houses didn’t have electricity. All I was able to see were small portions of houses, and the stars and moon. I assumed that I was still in the Middle East. I sighed with sadness. I thought I would be away from here. But then again, his truck was destroyed back at the campsite and he’d carried me for hours. I wonder if anyone had noticed… I walked cautiously down a narrow hallway until I made it to
the front room. The hallway was small and uneven, the cement was cracking in certain places, and it was extremely dark. There was an empty room with a few mattresses thrown on the floor, and nothing more. There was a deck of cards scattered all over the floor. The walls were completely bare. In a small kitchen by the front entrance Angel was stirring something on a small electric stove. The evenings must be cool out here because I was a little cold in my shorts and tee.

  Angel crept up behind me and handed me a warm bowl of what looked like soup. I hadn’t heard him coming, which creeped me out a little. But I guess that is the way military men walk. They sneak up on people like cats. I sat down on one of the mattresses and set the bowl on the cement floor, staring at it, not knowing what to do with it.

  Angel came and sat next to me, with a bowl for himself in his hands. “You have to eat. When was the last time you ate something?”

  I thought about his question. I don’t think he was putting dirt in that category. My face had been smashed on the floor one too many times. You would think that with all those weeks without eating, I would be starving right now. But I felt empty; hollow. I felt like every memory that I had inside me had been stripped out, and all that was left was this girl. An empty girl.

  “I don’t know.”

  I needed to put all this aside. I didn’t need to be a burden for Angel. I’d worry about my issues later. I picked up the bowl again and looked into it. It smelled good. I closed my eyes and let the steam warm up my face. I opened them again and lifted the spoon to my mouth. It was packaged chicken noodle soup, my favorite thing to eat back at the dorm when I was feeling sick. I swallowed a couple more spoonfuls, liking the way it was warming up my throat and stomach for the first time in weeks. I ate it way too fast, without enjoying the taste. Before I knew it, I was finished with the bowl.