Rearview mirror shows a white pickup with rust eating through the paint. Two men in the cab, faces I don't recognize but expressions I do. Predator smiles. Hunter eyes.
New York streets taught me plenty. Rule number one: never stop for an accident that feels wrong.
I floor it.
The clinic van wasn't built for speed, but terror makes up for what horsepower lacks. I take the next turn onto a side road too fast, tires shrieking against asphalt. They follow, engine roaring as they close the distance like wolves scenting blood.
Another hit, harder this time. The van fishtails, and I fight the wheel with everything I've got, barely keeping us on the road. My mind races through options while my hands shake on the wheel.
I yank right onto a forestry road I've never seen before. Gravel sprays like bullets, dust clouds billowing behind us. The truck follows, gaining ground on terrain they obviously know better than I do.
Think, Lucy. Think like you're still that street-smart kid from NY.
But thinking time evaporates when they ram me again, sending the van careening off the narrow road. Trees rush at me through the windshield.
I have just enough time to thinkthis is really going to hurtbeforethe world explodes.
The airbag hits me like a fist to the face, white and suffocating. My ears ring like church bells. Copper floods my mouth. Everything hurts, but I'm conscious, which has to count for something.
Rough hands drag me from the wreckage before I can orient myself, shaking me like a rag doll. The man's face swims in my vision, hollow cheeks, meth-rotted teeth, eyes like black holes.
"Where is it?" His breath reeks of cigarettes and chemicals, pupils blown wide as dinner plates. "I know you got it!"
"I don't—" His hand cracks across my face, snapping my head sideways. Stars explode behind my eyelids.
"Don't fucking lie to me! Check the van!" This to his partner, who's already tearing through the cab like a rabid animal. "It's gotta be here. He said it would be in the vet's van."
My brain struggles to process through the pain.The vet's van.They were waiting for it. This isn't random road rage, it's planned.
"What are you looking for?" I manage through split lips. "The antibiotics? Is someone sick?"
His laugh sounds like breaking glass. "You stupid bitch. Can't get high off antibiotics." His fist drives into my stomach, folding me in half. I hit the ground gasping, and he follows up with a kick to my ribs that sends fire through my chest.
Dirt and pine needles grind against my cheek. Blood pools in my mouth. This is bad. This is uncle Richard bad, Rosewood bad, the kind of bad where girls disappear and nobody asks questions.
"Nothing here!" The partner emerges from the van, face twisted with junkie rage. "Tore the whole fucking thing apart. No hidden stash, no secret compartments, nothing!"
"Check again. She's gotta know where it's hidden."
They turn back to the van with renewed fury, ripping out seats and tearing off panels like they're dismantling my life piece by piece.
I force myself to breathe through the agony. To think past the voice screaming that I'm caught, trapped, about to be caged again. But this isn't Rosewood. These aren't orderlies with clipboards and fake smiles. I'm not helpless.
Slowly, fighting every screaming muscle, I push myself up. The world tilts sickeningly, but they're distracted, cursing at each other as they destroy Colt's van looking for drugs that were never there.
I run.
Not gracefully. Not fast. But I run like my life depends on it, because it absolutely does. Into the trees, branches clawing at my clothes, stumbling over roots and rocks that might as well be landmines. Behind me, a roar of rage.
"The bitch is running! Get her!"
Footsteps crash through the underbrush. They're faster, stronger, not bleeding from multiple head wounds. But I'm smaller, more desperate, and I know exactly what cages feel like. I won't go back to one. Ever.
The ground vanishes.
One second I'm running, the next I'm falling into empty air. The ravine opens like a hungry mouth, swallowing me whole. I tumble down the steep slope, world spinning in a kaleidoscope of pain and terror. Rocks tear at my skin. Branches snap against my ribs. Something in my wrist gives with a wetpopthat sends lightning up my arm.
I hit bottom hard, momentum carrying me forward into the creek with a splash that knocks what little breath I have left from my lungs. My head connects with something solid and the world explodes into white-hot agony.
