Page 140 of Two Sides of Sin

A dark sedan suddenly pulled up to the curb beside me, the tires splashing through the puddles. The passenger window rolled down, revealing a scruffy middle aged man behind the wheel.

“Hey! You need a ride?” he called out over the sound of the rain. “I’m an off-duty cab driver. Got a five-star rating if you want to check my app.”

He offered a casual, mocking little laugh.

I hesitated, taking a step back from the curb, my heart hammering against my ribs.

“Look, you’re lucky I caught you,” he added, gesturing to the empty, rain-slicked street. “I was actually just heading home for the night. You’ll be lucky to get anything around here at this time on a weekday. Come on, get in before you catch pneumonia.”

Another deafening crack of thunder shook the pavement, drowning out my common sense. My panic spiked, overriding every instinct I had. I was stranded, freezing, terrified of the storm, and running from a literal nightmare.

“Thank you,” I breathed, pulling the heavy door open and sliding into the dry, warm interior of the backseat.

I pulled the door shut behind me.

Click.

The heavy, mechanical sound of the child locks engaging echoed loudly in the quiet cab.

My stomach instantly plummeted. A freezing spike of adrenaline shot up my spine, making me sit rigidly upright. I told myself it was just standard procedure for a cab driver in the city, but every single nerve ending in my body was screaming that I had just made a terrible mistake.

The driver adjusted his rearview mirror, his dark eyes locking onto mine in the reflection.

“So,” he asked, his voice too casual. “Where are we off to?”

I swallowed the heavy lump of terror in my throat, wrapping my arms tightly around my chest as another flash of lightning lit up the car, and gave him the address to the high-rise penthouse. The car pulled away from the curb, merging into the dark, carrying me further and further away from Julian.

The thrum of the tires against the rain-slicked pavement became a hypnotic, suffocating drone.

I was zoned out, my head resting against the cold glass of the passenger window. My mind was trapped in a vicious, repetitive loop, replaying the horrific events of the night over and over again. The terrifying realisation that the stalkers face was identical to the man I loved. The heartbreaking reality of it all.

I don’t know how long I sat there, immersed in my own thoughts, before the icy chill in the cab finally snapped me back to reality.

I blinked, wiping a patch of condensation from the window to look outside.

My brow furrowed. The towering, illuminated skyscrapers of the city were gone. Instead, we were driving down a dark, desolate industrial road lined with chain-link fences and abandoned, graffiti-covered warehouses. There were no streetlights. No other cars.

I leaned forward slightly, peering through the gap between the front seats.

The dashboard was completely dark. There was no phone mount. No glowing GPS screen mapping out the route to Julian’s high-rise.

“Excuse me,” I said, my voice trembling slightly as I tried to keep the rising panic out of my throat. “Do you know where you’re going?”

The driver didn’t answer. He didn’t even glance at the rearview mirror. He just kept his hands locked at ten and two, his face a dead, expressionless mask staring straight ahead into the rain.

My stomach dropped. The freezing spike of adrenaline I had felt when the doors locked returned, multiplying into a suffocating panic. Every survival instinct I had was suddenly screaming at me.

“You can just pull over here,” I said, my voice rising in pitch. “It’s fine. I can walk the rest of the way.”

Silence. The engine just continued to hum, pushing us further into the desolate dark.

“Hey!” I shouted, dropping all politeness left in my voice. I scrambled across the leather seat. “You’re starting to freak me out! I just want to go home, please! I’ve already had a really bad night, just let me out of the fucking car!”

Suddenly, the driver’s arm jerked.

The sedan swerved. The tires shrieked against the wet asphalt as the car slammed hard up over the concrete gutter, throwing me painfully hard against the door. The car jolted to a harsh, aggressive halt in the shadow of a massive, decaying brick building.

“Let me out!” I screamed.