Expecting to Die

Don’t think like that!
Don’t give up. Do not.
Run, run, run!
She had no idea where she was, but she kept moving down the hillside. The
truck had climbed from the main road. She’d felt it heading ever upward so the
road had to be downhill. Had it been a mile? More? Less? Oh, God, she had no
idea.
Just keep moving!
She couldn’t run flat-out. The terrain was too steep, and it was inky dark
beneath the branches of the trees. She had to be careful, keeping her balance
while her bad ankle began to throb.
Ignore it. Keep running. She hit a root or rock and fell, sliding and tumbling,
her fall increasing. She thought of sliding over the rim of a canyon and scrabbled
in the dirt and rocks, with her fingers, trying to break her fall, desperate to right
herself. Clawing, fingernails breaking, her little knife flying from her hands, she

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tumbled until she was stopped, her body slamming against the hard trunk of a
pine tree.
“Oof!” Her entire body jangled. Dust and dirt filled her nostrils. For a second,
she didn’t know up from down.
“That little bitch!” Tophman cried, but his voice was more distant now.
She blinked, saw light. The truck. Up the hillside.
“And you, you dumb fuck,” Tophman roared. “You let her get away? What’s
wrong with you? How the hell do you think we’ll ever get paid, huh?”
Paid? Someone was going to pay them for abducting her? Killing her? What
in the world was that all about?
“Get the shotgun.” Bell’s voice.
Oh, crap!
“She ain’t gettin’ away. No way!” Bell again. “She needs to die.”
“I should shoot you for being such a dumb ass!” Tophman said.
She started moving, ever downward, her entire body aching. Surely she’d run
into a path or a road or something. Or someone. Please. Oh, God.
“I’d love to kill her, but that wasn’t the deal. The old man, he doesn’t want her
dead.”
The old man? What old man?
She heard the click of the shotgun being readied, a shell now in its chamber,
and her heart stilled. She couldn’t do this. Though she heard Kywin moaning and
knew that he was out of commission, Tophman was still coming after her, his
footsteps crunching on leaves and debris. He had a flashlight, or the light from
his iPhone, was shining it through the forest, the garish white-blue light
swinging in a wide arc over the ground.
“You can’t get away from me,” he yelled. And he was right. God, he was
right. Now, her weapon, reduced to a screwdriver, seemed pathetic. “Come out,
come out wherever you are, cop kid,” he singsonged while Kywin groaned
pathetically.
Tophman didn’t care about his friend, no way. He was on the hunt. Prowling
through the night, searching out his prey, determined to catch her.
Screw that!
As long as he used the flashlight, she could see him and hopefully avoid the
swath of light it produced. She was farther down the hill from him, and she
moved to the side out of the swinging beam.
When he pointed the flashlight down the hill, she saw nothing but more forest,
and rocks and brush. He paused. Listening. She froze, didn’t move a muscle.
And then he started turning, rotating, swinging the beam of his flashlight in an
arc. She pressed herself up against the bole of a tree and prayed that it was wide

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enough to hide her body.
Don’t let him see me. Don’t let him see me, she silently prayed as the light
swept over the tree, pausing, the beams stretching out on either side, the tree
itself making a shadow in the fake bluish light. She barely breathed.
“Where the hell are you?” Tophman said.
Sweat drizzled down her forehead and neck. Her heart pounded so loudly she
was certain he could hear it.
“Bi-AN-ca!” Again the chilling singsong voice.
She licked her lips. Heard him call her name again and then the beam rotated,
turned back down the hillside.
“Bitch,” he muttered and started down again.
Swallowing back fear, she reached into her shirt and bra, located the
screwdriver, and slowly, noiselessly withdrew it. Her palms were slick with
sweat and she nearly dropped it, but managed to hold on to it. For now.
Bianca waited. Let him go ahead of her and, once he was twenty yards lower
on the hillside, begin to creep up to the truck, her one chance at escape. If she
could just get past the wounded Kywin Bell and Tophman didn’t get wise to her
plan.
Holding her breath, one eye on the flashlight heading ever downward, she
inched upward toward the truck and, she hoped, freedom. Her heart was a
jackhammer, her bad leg aching, every nerve end tight. But she was close.
She saw the truck, headlights burning, and kept moving, faster and faster.
Twenty yards. Fifteen. Ten.
“Hey!” Tophman’s voice. Nearer than she expected. Had he turned around and
seen her? Was he even now running up the hill toward her, pointing his gun,
ready to blow her to smithereens?
Crap!
Throwing caution to the wind, she began to sprint the last five yards up the
hill, through the leaves and sticks, upward, ever upward to the truck—
She let out her breath and kept in the shadows. What if there were no keys in
the ignition? If she couldn’t get the truck started. If—
Nearly at the truck, she froze.