The Escape Page 20

  (you’re sabotaging your relationship.)

  But she pushed the voice back. There was no time for thinking about that. No time to think about commitments she had never officially made, or about

  (sexual addiction)

  anything. Jenna didn’t want to think at all. She only wanted to feel.

  (you can stop now, go back to Barker.)

  . . . but she wouldn’t. Not tonight.

  They undressed in silence, blocking the world out as they embraced each other. Wrapped in Clarissa’s arms, Jenna let her body take over so her heart wouldn’t have a chance to.

  Because if she let herself think about what she was doing to Barker, by being with Clarissa . . .

  Don’t dwell. Barker’s own rule, and one to live by.

  At least for tonight.

  Grand Central Terminal, Colonel Lanche’s office

  EVAN

  Evan had spent the night in some sort of empty closet in the bowels of Grand Central. They’d given him a pail to piss in, and the tiny room reeked. There were no windows, no light, and both of his ankles were attached to a post in the floor, so he couldn’t reach the door.

  Not that there was any point in doing that. He’d heard the click of the lock after they’d chained him up.

  So this was where they kept prisoners.

  He still felt dirty, violated—being made to call that son of a bitch Colonel Lanche “Daddy” just to get a little water. That was so fucked up. Lanche was fucking with his head.

  The door opened and Evan squinted at the sudden influx of light. A male silhouette towered over him.

  “Get up. The Colonel wants to see you.”

  Sounded like that asshole soldier who’d beat the shit out of him the day before. Evan’s entire body felt bruised, his lips still crusted with his own blood.

  Evan scooted back so the guy had access to the chain on his ankles, watching him with undisguised hatred as the man released him.

  Could he take that chain and wrap it around the soldier’s neck?

  Whoa. Evan shook his head, wishing he could go back in time, back to high school—before the Pulse—before the time that he would ever even think such murderous insanity.

  Scar—that’s what they called the soldier, Evan was pretty sure—pulled him up roughly.

  “I can walk by myself,” Evan said. “Take your hands off me.”

  “Let’s get something straight, here, boy.” Scar looked down at him and grinned with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “You don’t have any say in anything. I can do whatever the fuck I want with you, the Colonel said so.”

  Evan looked away, as if Scar was a dominant dog that might back down if he didn’t feel threatened. He cringed when he felt Scar’s hand on his bruised face, caressing it like a lover might.

  “I’m sorry, sir,” Evan said. “I’ll walk with you. We should go now, okay?”

  “Oh, now the pretty boy apologizes. Rolls over like a bitch.” Scar moved his hand down to Evan’s throat, holding him in place.

  Every ounce of Evan’s being wanted to fight back, but he couldn’t win a fight with this guy. So he stilled himself, feeling his pulse beat faster against the soldier’s large hand on his neck.

  “I’m going to make you a promise, my friend,” Scar whispered, his breath foul against Evan’s cheek. “If you’re a good boy for the Colonel and tell him what he wants to know, then I’ll leave you alone. But if you don’t, I’m going to make a little visit to your cell tonight. And there’s nothing you can do about it.”

  To Evan’s dismay, tears of frustration filled his eyes. Fucking hell, they always made being quiet and strong look so easy in the movies. But it wasn’t fucking easy. Fear rushed through him at Scar’s threat. The way he’d touched him . . . What would he do?

  You know what he’d do.

  “Let’s go,” Scar said, and pulled him out of his cell.

  Evan kept his head down as they walked, tripping over his own shoes every time Scar gave him a shove to keep him moving.

  Just take it one minute at a time. He’d survived the last minute, now he just had to focus on the minute he was in. If he had to, Evan would focus on surviving by the second.

  Scar pulled him to a stop in front of the room they called the OCC.

  The soldier that had been there at the shoot-out, the one who’d killed Roy, opened the door to them, his shoulder and arm wrapped in a sling.

  “The Colonel is expecting you,” the man said.

  “How’s the shoulder, Dobson?” Scar asked, but didn’t wait for a reply before pushing Evan into the OCC.

  The Colonel stood in front of the large table.

  “How’d you sleep, son?” Lanche asked.

  “On the floor, in the dark,” Evan said, opting to answer him literally, and to ignore the Colonel’s obnoxious use of the word son. “In a closet. With chains around my ankles.”

  “That’s a pity. I bet we could find some better accommodations for you, if you’re willing to be cooperative today.”

  Fuck you. But then Scar’s threat to visit him in the night—and do God knows what to him—flashed through his mind. If he wasn’t cooperative. Fuck.

  It wasn’t fair, it wasn’t right.

  The Colonel laughed at his silence. “But I think you will be very cooperative today, won’t you? Did Scar here tell you what will happen if you aren’t?”

  Evan looked up at him in surprise. The Colonel know about that? Did he . . . Did the Colonel tell Scar to threaten him?

  What the hell kind of leader was this?

  “That’s not right,” Evan muttered. “It’s fucked up.”

  “Oh please,” Lanche said, smiling. “You act like you never watched the news before the Pulse hit.”

  What did that mean?

  “We have many ways to interrogate prisoners of war, people who hold back secrets that are a direct threat to national security,” Lanche continued. “Surely you’ve heard of waterboarding? Yes? Because we can do that, if we have to. But from the look on your face, getting a late-night visit from Scar here might be all the motivation you need.”

  The Colonel pushed Evan down to his knees, making him stifle a cry of pain as his kneecaps hit the cement floor.

  “Or maybe,” Lanche whispered, “you’d like a visit from Daddy instead?”

  “Please, sir, I don’t know anything,” Evan said, hating the way he sounded. Like he was begging.

  “I’ll be the judge of that. All you need to do is answer questions. It’s easy.”

  Lanche looked down at him and smiled, like they were just having a friendly discussion. Dobson and Scar stood by, watching silently.

  “We’ll start with an easy question. Who was the man who was killed in the confrontation?” Lanche asked.

  Evan kept his eyes on the floor, his muscles tense, ready for Scar to hit him again, like he did yesterday.

  “He’s dead, so what does it matter?” Lanche asked. “You can tell me, or you can be made to tell me.”

  Survive this minute. Just worry about living through this one minute.

  “Strip him.”

  The Colonel’s order took Evan’s breath away, made him gasp as if he were drowning.

  “Wait—” Evan pleaded, but they ignored him.

  Scar pulled Evan’s T-shirt off, pushed him fully on the ground, and removed his sneakers and jeans, and then, his boxers.

  Evan pulled his legs up against himself and tried to sit up, to cover as much of himself as he could. Without his clothes on, he could see the black-and-blue marks already forming in various places on his skin from yesterday’s interrogation.

  Don’t cry. Be a man. Survive this second.

  “Let’s try this again,” Lanche said. “Who was that man Dobson shot?”

  The air in the OCC felt cold on his nak
ed flesh, the cement against his skin. Evan wasn’t meant to be here. He was supposed to be getting ready to graduate high school. To move out, to be on his own.

  How had it ended up like this?

  The Colonel took his belt off, slowly. He wasn’t smiling this time. The very real threat of getting raped crossed Evan’s mind, but he brushed it aside. This was a government official. The leader. There were witnesses.

  This couldn’t be happening.

  Lanche wrapped the belt around his fist and whipped Evan’s shoulder with the leather, making him cry out in surprise and pain. He ducked his head, tucking his chin to his chest to protect his face as more blows whipped down onto his back.

  Evan scrambled across the floor, naked, trying to get away, but the Colonel was on his feet, and stronger, and faster.

  Each whip of the belt stung like fire.

  “Please, sir, please stop.” Evan didn’t want to beg. He wanted to be the hero he’d always imagined he would be in a situation like this. Fuck.

  “Spare the rod, spoil the child,” Lanche said, but he stopped. His hand dropped, the belt limp in his fist. “Answer the fucking question. Who was that man?”

  Evan took in a deep, shuddering breath. “His name was Roy.”

  “Roy what?”

  “I don’t know.” Evan winced in expectation of another strike, but Lanche didn’t hit him.

  “Okay, that’s a good start. How did Roy get in with Barker and the girls?”

  “I don’t know,” Evan said. “Roy was already with them when they found me.”

  Lanche looked at him and cocked his head. “Oh really? Where did they find you?”

  Shit. He shouldn’t be giving more information than he was asked. Now it opened up a whole new can of worms. That Wen soldier had already told the Colonel that Evan had escaped the FEMA camp to dodge the draft. But Lanche didn’t know much more about him. If he told him where he lived, that could change.

  “Stand up, Evan,” Lanche said.

  No no no no.

  Lanche nodded to Scar, who lifted him off the floor by his ear.

  Standing naked before them, Evan had never felt so vulnerable in his life. Not even when they were shooting at them on the road, not even then. He covered his private parts with his hands and stared at the floor.

  “Drop your hands.”

  “Please, sir, I’ll tell you,” Evan said, not moving his hands. “I can tell you.”

  Lanche paused. “Go ahead.”

  “They found me at my house in Greenwich. I was staying there and they came in looking for a place to sleep.”

  “That must have been frightening for you,” Lanche said.

  Hah. As if this weren’t a million times worse.

  “They were nice to me.”

  Lanche balked. “Nice? They broke into your home, probably held you at gunpoint, am I right?”

  Evan nodded. He wanted to sit down. He hated being so exposed standing there. And he could feel Scar’s eyes on his body, staring at him.

  “I want my clothes back.”

  Lanche ignored him. “Did they kidnap you, boy?”

  “No. I asked them to take me with them.”

  “You picked the wrong gang to be associated with, are you starting to realize that yet? Tell me about Barker,” Lanche said.

  “I don’t know anything.” Evan didn’t want to give Lanche any more than he needed to.

  “Bullshit!” Lanche yelled. “You know more about these terrorists than you even realize, you moron. How many weapons did they have? What was their schedule? Where were they going? How did they eat? Drink? Who else have they murdered in the name of their fucking jihad? What are they planning? What do they want?”

  The questions seemed to overlap in Evan’s brain, the answers to each coming to him quickly, but he kept his mouth shut and his eyes on the floor, his hands covering his genitals protectively.

  “Please, sir, may I sit down?”

  “Drop your hands.”

  “No,” Evan whispered.

  Fuck Colonel Lanche. Fuck everything. Evan would rather be tortured than betray his friends. Because that’s what they were—friends. Not terrorists.

  Scar grabbed his wrists and pulled them behind his back, wrenching his shoulders till the muscles screamed in protest.

  “Hold him up,” Lanche said, and he swung his belt in the air, slashing the leather down over Evan’s cock and balls.

  The pain exploded through him, a wave of nausea making his legs fall out from under him. He would have fallen if Scar hadn’t been holding him up.

  Evan gagged, would have thrown up if his stomach wasn’t completely empty. Sour bile burned his esophagus.

  “Every minute you pussyfoot around, boy, they are getting farther and farther away. These are dangerous terrorists.” Lanche got in his face, holding Evan by the chin until he was forced to look at him. “I think they’re going to attack our camp. Many people will die if they do. Innocent lives will be lost. And their blood will be on your hands.”

  Evan closed his eyes, trying to breathe through the pain that still seared his body.

  Survive this second.

  The worst part was that Evan was pretty sure the Colonel, for once, wasn’t lying. He’d heard Jenna and Barker talking about revenge, and about freeing the people. But how would they do that, without a battle?

  They really are terrorists, Evan realized. A threat to the government, to the camp at Grand Central. And the crazy thing was . . . he was on their side.

  “Get him out of my sight,” Lanche said. “Oh, and Scar, have fun with pretty boy here tonight.”

  The rest stop on Interstate 95 in Connecticut

  BARKER

  Barker woke early to discover Jenna had indeed spent the entire night in the other room. He felt an uncomfortable sense of déjà vu. It reminded him of his first night with Jenna, when he’d woken up to find she’d stolen his gun and supplies and hit the road.

  He dressed quickly and stepped into the room where she and Clarissa slept.

  They were naked, asleep, still wrapped in each other’s arms.

  Images of what they must have been doing while he slept flooded his mind, pouring over him like a storm.

  Barker took a step back, banging into the door. At the noise, Jenna’s eyes fluttered open.

  “Jenna?” Barker didn’t know what to say. “What . . . Why?”

  Jenna sat up, pulling the sleeping bag over her bare breasts, as if he’d never seen her naked, as if she hadn’t slept by his side—in his arms—every night on the road.

  For some reason he expected a smart-ass answer. He thought Jenna would be angry at him for questioning what she’d done. After all, she wasn’t his, now, was she?

  Was she?

  Apparently not.

  But instead, she looked ashamed.

  “I’m sorry, Barker,” she whispered.

  Clarissa stirred, opening her eyes when Jenna spoke. “Oh, Barker,” she said sadly, as if he shouldn’t have been there. Shouldn’t have seen what they’d done.

  “It’s my fault,” Clarissa said. “I was so hurt last night, I just needed some comfort.”

  “Clarissa,” Barker interrupted. “Can I talk to Jenna in private? I’ll go back to the other room so you can get dressed.”

  As calm as he was on the outside, inside, everything hurt. The betrayal—God, was it even a betrayal, really?

  He turned and closed the door.

  Jenna came in a moment later, wearing the clothing she’d taken from Evan’s house, and leaned against the wall.

  “We need to talk,” she said.

  “Maybe we don’t,” Barker said. “Maybe I have no right to feel hurt. I don’t own you.”

  “No, you don’t own me,” she agreed, “but you have a right to feel however you feel.
And I’m sorry I hurt you.”

  “Not sorry enough to not do it in the first place, though.”

  “No.” Jenna frowned. “But I feel sorry now. Not just that I hurt you. But that I did it in the first place. Clarissa needed comfort, yes, but I should have been able to provide that for her without . . . without jeopardizing our relationship.”

  “What exactly is our relationship?” Barker asked. “I’m not trying to fight here. I’m actually asking you, because I thought I knew, and I must have been wrong.”

  “I care about you a lot.”

  Jenna stepped away from the wall, came toward him, but he took a step back. Having her arms around him now would be too much.

  “Then why? Why sleep with someone else?”

  “Maybe you were wrong about me, Barker. Maybe I really am just a whore.” She said the words without malice. Only sadness.

  “I think you’re wrong about yourself. You think you’re a whore, so you only relate to people sexually. But have you ever considered,” he asked, “just for a moment, that maybe I’m right about you, and you’re wrong?”

  “What do you think I am, then?”

  “A woman who doesn’t know how to share her feelings without sex.”

  Jenna nodded, and wiped briskly at her eyes. “It’s a problem.”

  “Do you think you can learn to be someone’s friend, without . . .”

  “Without fucking them?” Jenna laughed dryly. “Don’t know. Never tried. Well . . . never succeeded.”

  “I’m going to make this very clear, because I wasn’t clear before,” Barker said. This time, he moved in closer to her, and took her hands. “I want to be the only person you’re having sex with. And if you can’t do that, then . . . I don’t want to have sex with you anymore.”

  “Barker—”

  “Listen. Please, just listen,” he said. “You can have as many friends as you want, and me to sleep with, or you can have me as your friend, and everyone else to sleep with. It’s your choice, but I won’t be just one more friend you fuck. I won’t.”

  “I don’t know if I can just be your friend, Barker,” she whispered. “Every time I see you—”

  “You want to have sex. I get it.”

  “No. I mean, yes, but—I was going to say that I feel differently around you. And it scares the fuck out of me. I don’t know what to do with those feelings.”