Four.
Fleeing the Scene
“Isn’t it common courtesy for the kidnapper to tell the kidnappee where he’s taking her?” I groused, trying to keep my fear hidden so he didn’t snatch that up too, and throw it over his shoulder like a caveman and then shove it into the backseat of a car. I kept a tight hold on my body with my left arm, leaving my right hand free so I could bite my fingernails.
“Shouldn’t the kidnappee be afraid I might slit her throat and dump her body in a river?” He looked in the rearview mirror to make sure I was behaving. I inched further into the corner of the stolen vehicle’s backseat. He shook his head in a somewhat contrite manner. “I was only kidding. I’m not going to kill you.”
“Love your sense of humor. I’m sure I’m the first to tell you that.”
“Second,” he corrected me, though I can’t imagine why. “Quit biting your nails. It makes me anxious.”
I banded both arms around my ribs. The beige leather of the Buick smelled like old people and too many pine-scented air fresheners, which did nothing to relax me. “You want to talk to me about what happened back there? Why we’re in a stolen Buick instead of calling the cops or animal control? Why there was a bear you conveniently happened to stumble across tonight?”
“Is this you thanking me for saving your tail?”
“I’ll thank you to keep your hands off my tail. I don’t appreciate being thrown around like a rag doll.” That was one of my pet peeves. After I passed the age of crawling, I did not relish being carried. By family, friends or bear-slaying strangers with face tattoos. “And I already said thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Man, you’re arrogant. When can I go home?”
“First off, we’re in a Buick because it’s an older person’s car. Less of a chance we’ll get pulled over.” He adjusted the mirror so he could look at me while he spoke. I let childish defiance take over and turned my head to stare out the window. “Would her majesty prefer something newer?”
“Shut your mouth. You don’t know the first thing about me.”
Jens chuckled, and the sound sent shivers down my spine. “I bet you’re asking yourself right now how I knew the family password, or about the green backpack. Maybe how I knew where you lived. I know you a lot better than you’d guess, Loos.”
I did my best to keep my tone clipped and not let him know I was shaking inside. If this would be my last night on earth, I wouldn’t spend it breaking down like a child. “Let’s start with that. How do you know my name?”
“I check in on your family from time to time.”
“How long have you been doing that?” I swallowed with great difficulty, not really wanting the answer.
“About five years.”
I gulped and debated jumping out of the car, even at the highway speed we were traveling. I took a few deep breaths and tried to come up with a better, less maiming plan. “Check in on us? What’s that supposed to mean?”
This was it. This is where he drops the bomb Linus and I always feared. Mob boss. Witness Protection. Government conspiracy.
Jens tapped his thumb on the steering wheel as if we were going for a midnight drive to an ice cream parlor. “Nothing shady. Your parents requested me specifically. I keep you safe.”
“Bang-up job you’re doing,” I grumbled before I could stop myself.
A moment of respect for my pain was permitted before he spoke. “Sorry for your loss.”
I rolled my eyes. If I had a dollar for every time I heard that asinine phrase, I would’ve been able to bury my family in gold caskets. “You don’t know anything about loss.” Yes, I was being bratty, but to be fair, I had just been kidnapped, and it was somewhere around one in the morning.
“You done sulking?” he asked. When I scoffed, he shifted in his seat and turned his attention back to the road. “I guess not. Take your time. We’ve got a long drive ahead of us.”
Through clenched teeth, I muttered, “I hate you so much.”
Jens laughed. It was a loud, bitter sound, which only made me more furious. “Aw! That’s cute, you thinking your big, bad feelings matter. Say it again.”
I bit my lip to keep from screaming at him, drawing in several long breaths. “Where are you taking me against my will?”
“To someone you’ll listen to. If I explain the way of the world to you, you’ll argue the whole time. If he does, there’s a chance you’ll hear it.”
“Where?”
Jens cracked his neck. The sound was horrible, like he’d been through about seven too many bear fights. “A few states south. The Werebears have been migrating closer to your area for a while, but none ever got this close. Now that one’s dead so near you, it’ll send the other Weres swarming for a nice juicy piece of Lucy Kincaid.”
“Don’t be gross,” I scolded him. “Werebears? Like werewolves but bears?”
“Sort of. Pesta’s bears. They’re really just vessels for…” He scratched at the cut on his shoulder, and then waved his hand to brush me off. “I’ll let him explain it all to you. Like I said, you’ll take it better from him.”
I bit at my thumbnail. “Wait, you said one’s dead. You killed that bear?”
Jens scoffed, as if any other outcome was a joke. “Of course. Do you think I’d really just leave the job undone?”
“Being that I don’t know what the job is? Sure. And I think you can probably guess how high my opinion is of you.”
He snorted, as if I was joking. “You know, I always knew you were funny, but I wondered if you’d be like that around me. You do that quiet blending in thing whenever you’re the new kid. Always going from moxie to mouse inside a minute.”
“Glad I could amuse you, Jack.”
“Jens.”
I threw my arms out in exasperation. “How about Jackass?” I snapped my fingers as brilliance came to me. “No, Jens the Lumberjackass!”
I rock so hard at nicknames. Being dubbed “Lucy Goosy” until the second grade brings about a desperation that tends to make a girl get creative.
He let out a full-bodied laugh that would have been endearing, were it not directed at me. “Sure. You can call me your Lumberjackass. I’m decent with an axe. Already got the boots for the job.” He stomped his heavy black boot to the floor of the car. “Plus, I like pancakes.”
“Huh?”
He glanced at me in the rearview mirror. “Don’t lumberjacks eat pancakes?”
“That’s not a thing. Lumberjacks eat whatever they feel like.”
“Does the same rule apply for the jackass variety? That’s my main concern. I’m not switching vocations unless I get pancakes.” His green eyes danced with the joy of a good tease in the dimly lit rearview mirror.
Despite myself, I cracked a smile at the pleasure he took in my insult. “Maybe you could have flapjackasses.”
Jens pumped his fist in the air that the joke had come full-circle. “That was awesome.”
“If you like that so much, I got a million more.”
“Let it rip. We’ve got hours ahead of us.”
“Who’s got two thumbs and likes to…” Then my eye caught on the stitches I’d given him across his cheekbone when I saw bits of him reflected in the rearview mirror. My brain skipped a beat and I lost my momentum, frowning. “Forget it. I’m not playing with you. Don’t want to get Stockholm syndrome.”
He peered at me with skepticism. “Whatever. You’ve got nothing.”
“Nothing but a headache from your mouth.”
“That was weak. You can do better. I saw you tear that boy from Jersey a new one when he messed up your science project.”
I blushed, embarrassed that the little-known debasement had been witnessed. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Poor Kenny. He had a little thing for you, you know.”
“He did not. It doesn’t matter. I’m not engaging.” I looked out the window and tried to guess how long we had been driving. Probably somewhere between twe
nty minutes and a billion hours.
He took one hand off the steering wheel to gesture about the car with it. “I personally don’t see it, but to each his own. You two would’ve been so cute together, safety glasses bumping as you reach for the microscope. The scent of formaldehyde in the air while something geeky plays in the background.”
“When do I get to go home?” I asked, switching tracks. I didn’t want to spend my time talking about a tenth grade science project.
Jens sobered, sitting up straighter. “You can’t go back there, Loos.”
“When do I get to go home?” I repeated. He did not answer this time, and my heart began to sink. “Jens? Why can’t I go home?”
“I told you. We burned it to the ground. Same as every time you and your family had to move. I was assigned to watch you. Tucker’s in charge of cleanup.”
I mouthed something, but I don’t know what. Were there words for this? My childhood. My adolescence. The pink stuffed bunny my parents got me that one Christmas had been left behind at one of the houses in the chaos of a fly-by-night move. I stupidly thought it might magically reappear someday. All of it. Gone.
The air became unbearably thick, impossible to breathe in. The stale scent of old people soaked into my skin and threatened to take me under. I was being chauffeured by an arsonist with a superhero complex who apparently stalked me.
I would not die in this car.
My brain went into planning mode to keep a panic attack at bay. I flipped through my mental Rolodex, trying to recall all the rental cars and clunkers we’d gone through, cataloging where exactly the buttons near my headrest were. I looked out the window and stretched my arms behind my head, fumbling around for the right spot. I used the window’s reflection as my spyglass, making sure Jens saw nothing suspicious. There wouldn’t be much time once I found the button, and even after that, there was no telling it would actually work. Either way, I was done dealing with the fire-happy lumberjack kidnapper.
I found the lever, but it was old and would not budge without coercion. “Could you turn on the radio, Lumberjackass?” I requested as politely as I could. Really, really didn’t want him to hear the click and put it together.
“There’s that moxie again,” he grinned, turning on an earful of static. “You went all quiet for a minute. I was worried you ran out of ways to make this car ride even longer.” Jens fished around until he found a hard rock station.
I clicked the button, but held the seat in place, scooting over to give myself room for the final move. I waited until the singer with issues he could only scream about hit a particularly high note. Then I slammed the right side backseat forward and scrambled into the trunk, wrestling my way past a tarp, a bunch of plastic grocery bags, and who knows what else. I rolled myself into position as the car swerved and began to slow. I tried to find the latch to pop the trunk, but I couldn’t locate it. My heart pounded, and I kicked as hard as I could at the taillight, praying it would actually work. Linus had taught me this trick when he went through his I-want-to-be-a-mechanic phase. If he was getting his information from the Dukes of Hazard or something equally unrealistic, I was going to be in a tough spot as soon as Jens stopped the car.
Three more kicks, and the light pushed out onto the road, shattering as the car slowed on the shoulder. Turns out the Dukes were right. I scrambled away from the damage, knowing I could not fight my way past him, but hoping he might keep driving and not notice the hole in the back carriage once he yelled at me. In my sparking and fizzing imagination, a cop would pull him over for having a taillight out. Then I could escape for real.
This would work. TV would never lie to me.
The trunk flew open, and Jens grabbed at me, dragging my flailing body out and dumping me on the pavement. “What’s the plan, Loos? Huh? Give me a heart attack? Cause a car wreck that’d kill us both? Brilliant idea!” He glanced at the car and saw the missing taillight. He threw his head back in frustration. “Great! Now I’ve gotta steal another car. Do you think I like screwing unsuspecting people over?” He looked around toward the road. “We don’t have time to switch cars. You’d better cross your fingers we don’t get pulled over for this. You have no idea the kind of danger you’re in.”
Sweat began to bead on my forehead, and for the life of me, I couldn’t swallow. My chest started to feel tight, and I knew I wouldn’t last long in the land of sanity. “I… can’t! Let me go!”
His tone calmed, but it did nothing to soothe me. “Breathe, Lucy. It won’t do for me to save your life, and then you do something stupid like this.” He leaned over and patted me awkwardly on the back, which was so patronizing; I wished I’d taken weightlifting more seriously so I could’ve made my opinion on his close proximity perfectly clear.
“Get away from me!” I wheezed, clambering to my feet and stumbling for the road like a drunken sorority girl. I waved my hands in the air to catch the attention of anyone on the freeway, but at this late hour, we were the only ones on the road. “Help! Somebody! Anybody?”
He stood next to me, arms crossed over his chest, his expression a mixture of irritation and amusement. Finally he joined in, adding to my shouts for the abandoned freeway to enjoy. “Help!” Then he turned to me, speaking as if I was an idiot. “Humans don’t stop to help each other. Give me a break.”
Humans?
When I did not back down, he continued making fun of me. “Help her! She’s being ‘taken against her will’ from wild Werebears who were trying to kill her! Life’s so unfair! She’s blonde and beautiful, so her loud mouth must be right.”
“You shut up!” I yelled, unconcerned that I sounded like a child. My breath was shallow, but my fury was unswerving. “You set my life on fire! There’s no trace of me anywhere but where I stand right now!”
He turned to face me, using his height to appear much older and wiser, though he only looked to be about mid to late twenties. “Better that than you disappear altogether.”
I sneered at his calm calculation of such a hurtful thing. “Like you care what happens to me. So you get demoted or whatever happens to you if, God forbid, I get to stay in one place longer than a year and die happy.”
He squinted his left eye at me, sizing me up. “People would care if you died. Your Uncle Alrik is the one who recommended me to your parents.”
My mouth hung open until Jens reached out and moved my chin upward to shut it. I batted his hand away, which for some reason made him smile in that charming punch-me-in-the-face kind of way. “How do you know Uncle Rick?”
The corner of his mouth twitched. “That’s who I’m taking you to.” He motioned to the car in a sweeping gesture made to mock me. “Are you ready to get going, your highness?”
I showed him a choice finger and snarled, “Don’t you talk to me.” Then I stomped to the Buick and shut myself inside, staring resolutely out the window.
Undraland Page 4
