"There are two of them," I gasp, my voice coming out high and thin. "Lev, there are two cars?—"
"I see them." He cuts the wheel again and we careen down a narrow side road, the bare trees on either side blurring into gray streaks as we accelerate. I don't think I've ever ridden this fast in a car before. The speedometer climbs past one hundred and keeps going as Lev pushes the car to its limits.
One of the cars chasing us pulls alongside us on the left, and the man in the passenger seat raises his weapon and aims directly at me. Time seems to slow down as I watch his finger tighten on the trigger, and then Lev swerves hard to the right and the shot goes wide, punching through empty air where my head was a moment before.
"I need you to drive," Lev says, and his voice is terrifyingly calm given the circumstances. I'm so shocked I can't even speak. He wants me to do what? "Vivika, I need you to take the wheel."
"What? I can't?—"
"You can and you will." He reaches over and grabs my hand, pulling it toward the steering wheel. "Keep us on the road and don't slow down. I'm going to deal with them."
The next few seconds are a blur of motion and terror as Lev lays the seat back flat and sets the cruise. When he starts climbing to the back seat, I whimper, but his look of concentration tells me maybe I need to focus.
"Got it," he growls as he leans over the seat and grips the wheel, and it's my turn to slide across the center console while he steadies the car. Then I'm in the driver's seat with my hands gripping the wheel and Lev is rolling down the back window and pulling a gun from somewhere inside his jacket.
"Drive," he commands, and then he's leaning out the window with his upper body exposed to the gunfire behind us.
I don't have any choice but to punch the accelerator and floor it. The road seems to narrow the faster I go, and I can hear gunshots exploding behind me in rapid succession as Lev returns fire on our pursuers. The car that was alongside us falls back after a burst from Lev's weapon, and I catch a glimpse in the rearview mirror of it swerving off the road and crashing into a ditch with a spray of mud and debris and a cloud of smoke.
"One down," Lev shouts over the cacophony of wind and the scream of the engine. "Keep going, don't stop."
The second car is still behind us, gaining now that its partner is out of the chase, and I push the pedal all the way to the floor even though my legs are shaking so badly I can barely feel the pedal beneath my foot. I've never been so terrified in my entire life. I'm bumping over back roads, running stop signs, and thank fuck there aren't any other drivers out here or we'd be causing accidents and getting people killed. And it's even harder with this seat laid all the way back and no seatbelt on.
A sign appears ahead of me, warning of a dead end, but by the time I process what it means, I've already turned down the road it's marking and there's nowhere left to go. The pavement ends in a wall of crumbling concrete and rusted chain-link fence, some kind of abandoned industrial site that offers no exit and no escape.
"Shit," I breathe, slamming on the brakes so hard the car fishtails and nearly spins out before coming to a stop just meters from the concrete barrier. "Lev, I'm sorry, I didn't see?—"
"Stay in the car." He's already out the door, racing around the other side for cover where he reaches back in and presses something cold and heavy into my hands. I look down to find myself holding a gun.
"If anyone comes to the car, you point this at them and you pull the trigger," he says, glaring at me. "Don't think about it, just point and shoot. Can you do that?"
I nod even though I'm shaking so hard, the gun trembles in my grip. I've never held a weapon in my life and it feels wrong. I'm not a killer. But Lev holds my gaze for one more second and then he's gone, disappearing as the sedan screeches to a stop behind us and men start pouring out of it with weapons raised.
The sounds that follow are the most frightening things I've ever heard in my life.
Gunshots crack through the air in rapid bursts, punctuated by shouts and the heavy thuds of bodies hitting the ground. I huddle in the driver's seat with the gun clutched to my chest and my eyes squeezed shut, too terrified to look at what's happening outside. And I'm scrunched down, too paralyzed to do anything except sit there and pray that Lev survives this and can protect me. Every shot makes me flinch.
The windows in this car have been reduced to shards of glass that litter everything. They bounce off my shoulders and back, puddle on my lap, and I feel hot tears streaming down my cheeks as I shake with sobs.
Then the shooting stops.
A shadow falls across the driver's side window and I react without thinking, bringing the gun up and pointing it directly at the figure standing outside the car. My finger finds the trigger, and I'm a fraction of a second from pulling it when I feel a firm grip twist the weapon away from my grasp and my eyes meet Lev's.
"It's me," he says softly, reaching through the window to take my shaking hand and calm me. "It's just me, Vivika."
He opens the door, and I collapse against his chest the moment my feet touch the ground, burying my face in his shirt as sobs I can't control tear through my body. He holds me without speaking, one arm wrapped around my waist and the other hand cradling the back of my head, and I cry into his chest until I have nothing left.
The fear has touched every single cell in my body. Not a hair on my head is unaffected as I whimper and cling to him. His hands stay a steady pressure on me to ground me. He has no idea the amount of comfort I'm drawing from him right now. I don't understand it at all except that he's here and I'm scared, and he's the only person I can reach for. But I'm not mad it's him. If it were anyone else, I wouldn’t feel safe.
When I finally lift my head and open my eyes, the scene around me makes my stomach lurch toward my throat. Bodies are scattered across the pavement like broken dolls, four of them at least, their blood pooling beneath them in spreading dark stains. The sedan sits empty with its doors hanging open, engine still running, and the men who climbed out of it with their weapons raised are never going to climb into anything again.
Lev did this. He killed all of these people to protect me. I don’t even know what to say about that. I'm not just a pawn in his game. If so, he'd have just let them take me, right?
Then I notice the blood on his shirt.
"You're hurt," I gasp, pulling back from his chest to get a better look. The fabric on his left side is soaked through and crimson continues to spread even as I watch. "Lev, you're bleeding?—"
"It's just a graze." He tries to wave me off, but I'm already pulling at his shirt, trying to see the wound beneath. "Vivika, I'm fine?—"
