Chapter 8 - Hot Wire
All Lucy could hear was the beat of her palpitating heart. She watched as Defoe wandered around the room, trying to find his clothes. A lot of terrifying things had taken place in the space of five short minutes, but Defoe’s calmness, even now as he searched for his clothes, was the most unsettling.
“Didn’t you hear me?” Defoe questioned, stopping to speak to her. “Get your damn stuff, we need to leave.”
“Where will we go?” Lucy managed to ask, her eyes still fixed on the body of an unconscious man. “This man…”
“Lucy!” Defoe yelled. “I don’t have time for a mental breakdown right about now, okay? We’ll be dead in like five minutes if we’re still here. Let’s go!”
“But… but it was self-defense,” Lucy stuttered, instinctively carrying her bag from the ground. “I’m sure that if we explained it to the police, they will listen to us. He broke in, we did nothing.”
“Christ,” he muttered. “You cannot be that naive.”
“Well, I am naïve. What about it?” Lucy retorted in a quaking voice. “I am not part of anything. I only helped you because he was about to murder you. What do you mean I’m a part of this now?”
Defoe groaned, roughly zipping up his jacket. He stormed over to Lucy, got a firm grip on her shoulders, and pulled her to him. Lucy held her breath, equally mesmerized and intimidated by the sudden closeness.
“Listen to me carefully…” he rasped. “I feel you don’t understand the severity of the situation that you are in.”
“What situation?” Lucy whispered, staring Defoe dead in the eyes.
“They found me, which means they found you. Which also means, you would probably have been captured by security cameras in this neighborhood. Cameras, they would most definitely have access to. So, if they go through the footage, and happen to find you… Lucy, with me, what do you think is going to happen if you leave here and go back home?”
“They’ll come for me?” Lucy asked on the verge of tears.
“They will come for you, hoping for answers. They’ll ask you where they can find me, Lucy, and you would not have the answer they need. But that won’t matter at all. Do you know why?”
“Because they won’t care?” Lucy whispered again, her heart shattering more with every passing minute.
“They will not give a rat’s ass. You will be tortured and discarded. Now, it’s unfortunate that you got yourself into the mess that is my life, but you have no choice right now. So, suck it up, buttercup.”
Lucy felt a rush of cold air all over her body. Her brain was swamped with questions, but all of that did not matter at the moment. Defoe wasn’t kidding and all Lucy wanted was to survive, even though it meant running from something that should not even concern her. She nodded, and Defoe’s hand dropped from her shoulder to her wrist. He grabbed it and slowly walked them out to the room entrance.
Defoe paused at the open door, scanning the narrow, dark hallway before stepping out. “Follow closely behind me and you’ll be fine,” he said quietly, letting go of her hand.
Lucy reached for his hand, grabbing it again.
“Don’t let go of my hand,” she rasped.
“Lucy, I need to walk in front of you so I can scout the hallway first,” Defoe retorted.
“Well, you can do that while holding my hand.”
“No, I cannot. What if someone jumps out of the corner and instead of letting me go, you tighten your grip? They’ll knock me to the floor before I have time to react.”
“We’ll figure that out,” Lucy whispered, holding on to his hand tightly. “For now, let’s go. We need to hurry.”
Defoe sighed and quickly scanned the hallway again before turning back to Lucy. “Lucy, let go of my hand.”
“No.”
“Let go, right now,” he said through clenched teeth.
“Oh, come on! I’m scared,” Lucy rasped. “You want me to say it? There, I said it. Now, let’s go before that man inside wakes up and decides to murder us both.”
Defoe muttered something inaudible and proceeded. They scurried quietly through the motel, making sure to check the turns before they took them. Finally, they reached the parking lot. Defoe started in the direction opposite where his car was.
“Wait, Defoe. The car is this way,” Lucy said, pointing to the other direction.
Defoe turned briefly, and shook his head. “No, we can’t use the car anymore. If they found me, it’s probably because of it. We need to ditch it.”
“What?” Lucy shrieked. “We can’t go that far on foot. They’ll catch us in minutes.”
Defoe looked around. “We’ll go to that apartment building over that hedge. I can get us a car there.”
Lucy followed Defoe as they crossed to the other side of the road and ran towards the hedge. There was a charging force in her as she ran, a cackling energy that buzzed through her entirety. It was something she had never felt before, not even when John was being John.
When they reached the hedge, Lucy let go of Defoe. They were going to jump, and they couldn’t possibly do that holding hands.
“You can jump this, can’t you?” Defoe asked, throwing his bag over the hedge.
“Of course I can.” Lucy swallowed hard, rubbing her palm on her jeans. “I just feel a bit weak in the knees right now, so uh… that would be difficult. If you would be kind enough to help me up, I’d appreciate it.”
“Lucy, it’s not even that tall,” Defoe retorted. “Didn’t you take gym classes in high school?”
“Just help me up, okay?” Lucy asked, already panicking.
Defoe clenched his teeth and grabbed Lucy by the waist. He lifted her like it was nothing and sat her down on the wobbling overgrown shrub. Lucy managed to slide down from it, barely landing on her feet. With a jump Lucy could only describe as a flip-skip hybrid, Defoe sailed over the hedge and landed solidly on his feet.
“Come on,” he said.
Lucy followed him as they walked quickly through the apartment complex. They reached the other side, and Defoe navigated through the parking lot, his eyes searching for something. They reached a car parked in the shadows, and Defoe dropped to the ground, letting his bag fall to the ground. He unzipped it, and took out strange looking tools.
“Do you always carry these with you?” Lucy asked him, squatting by his side.
“Break-in equipment,” he replied, pulling a long, thin metal out of the bag. “They always come in handy.”
Lucy watched Defoe jam the metal into the space between the window and the driver’s seat door. At first it didn’t seem like he knew what he was doing, but he kept at it for a few seconds and with a soft click, the door popped open.
“Oh gosh, we are stealing cars now,” Lucy muttered.
“What are you still doing on the ground?” he asked. “Get in.”
Lucy hopped up and rounded the car. Before she could get in, Defoe had already ripped open the lower panel of the car’s dashboard and hotwired the car. Lucy threw her bag to the backseat and put on her seatbelt, feeling a tiny bit relieved that they were out of the motel.
Defoe casually pulled out of the parking lot, casually, so they didn’t draw attention to themselves. Lucy held her breath and fought the urge to ask Defoe to drive faster. She understood that it was important that they acted normal, like a regular couple, but then again… they were technically running for their lives.
Lucy bit her lower lip and turned to Defoe. They were out of the compound, why was he still driving so slowly?
“If you’re about to ask me to drive any faster…” Defoe said before she could get a word in. “Don’t. It’s late, and speeding is a bad idea.”
Lucy let out a frustrated sigh and stared forward. She crossed her arms and shut her eyes, trying to calm herself down.
“You’re a big baby, do you know that?” Defoe said.
“No, I’m not,” Lucy argued, opening her eyes again.
“Yes, you are.”
“I’m not,” she countered. “I just don’t find it comfortable being in this kind of situation.”
“Didn’t you recently send your stepfather to the hospital?”
“Yes. But I didn’t kill him. I’m not comfortable with killing a man,” Lucy answered.
“That’s obvious. But when you’ve faced dangers like I’ve faced, combated men who wouldn’t stop until you’re dead, you’ll realize that sometimes killing a man is simply the only way to survive.”
“I don’t ever want to come to that realization,” Lucy stated firmly.
“That’s obvious. You’re the only reason I didn’t kill that man,” Defoe replied.
“I kept you from committing a homicide. You should be grateful,” Lucy said.
Defoe glanced at her, a hint of a sneer on his face.
“Not killing him might have been book smart, but it’s not street smart,” Defoe said after a few quiet seconds.
“As far as I’m one kind of smart, I’m fine.”
“No, you’re not,” Defoe replied. “Okay, let me ask you this. You’re walking alone in the night. You don’t have your phone, nothing. A man is following you. What do you do?”
Lucy scoffed. “Well, I would definitely not be walking alone at night, especially without my phone.”
Defoe looked at her with a piercing gaze. Lucy lost the smirk. She swallowed hard, holding his stare.
After a few seconds, he put his focus back on the road. “Did I ask you a trick question, Lucy? Who answers a question like that? Are you trying to be cute?”
Lucy felt her face tighten into a frown. Defoe glanced at her, and his lips quivered as if he was tempted to laugh. She didn’t appreciate his tone, and if she wasn’t going to tell him outright, she certainly wasn’t going to encourage him to continue using it.
“I’m not trying to be cute. But I always carry my phone with me everywhere, especially at night. Your question wasn’t really practical,” she finally stated.
“You’d be surprised what is practical and what isn’t,” Defoe replied. “But ignore practicality. You are walking alone at night. You don’t have a phone, what do you do when someone is following you?”
“I’ll run,” Lucy said, unable to think off any other response.
“You’ll run?”
“I’ll run home,” Lucy said. “As fast as my legs could take me.”
Defoe chuckled, shaking his head. He had increased the speed, and they were flying down the road.
“What?” Lucy asked. “Why are you laughing?”
“You’re book smart, alright. Is that what they taught you in school? What you saw in the textbooks? Your option is to run?”
“Well… no. But what else can I do?”
“You have family at your house, right? People you love?” Defoe asked.
“Yes…”
“And your option would be to run home?”
Lucy scratched the back of her head.
“What if this guy was a serial killer or an armed assailant? You just gave him your home address. And that’s if you’re quick enough to outrun him, which I highly doubt because you have weak knees. You couldn’t even jump over a hedge. He could come back anytime he wants, since he already knows where you live. Heck, you saw how easy it was for me to open this car. Imagine someone trying to break into your house.”
“Well, what am I supposed to do then?”
“I don’t know, make a detour? Pretend to know someone? Yell? Stand your ground and look them in the eye? Anything but run, because running makes you a weak, easy prey. He sees you gasp and run, and he knows that he can easily subdue you. It is better to calmly try to lose him, than to run.”
“Well, I guarantee that anyone in my shoes would run too,” Lucy argued.
“Right,” Defoe answered. “You’re book smart, but you ain’t street smart, my dear.”
“Okay, Judge Judy. I’m eighteen, I have ample time to learn and unlearn, alright? There are things that I know that you don’t. For instance, I can speak Spanish, can you?”
“Yes.” Defoe stated.
“Oh…” Lucy bit the inside of her cheek.
“I can fight, can you fight?” Defoe asked.
Lucy took a moment to think. “I can swing a bat pretty well.”
“That is not an achievement. And you used that just once.”
They glanced at each other and Lucy saw crinkles in his eyes. She smiled first and he burst out with soft chuckling. Lucy started laughing too. It was the first time that the air between them wasn’t tense and Lucy didn’t feel the chill she was feeling before. She turned to stare out the window, enjoying the view of the streets as they drove by.
The events of that night were still very vivid in her memory. Lucy wanted to know why Defoe was running, who that man was, and what they were running from, but she couldn’t ask. It wasn’t the time. She figured when they were safe, she would bring it up, and all she could do was hope and pray that they get somewhere safe. Lucy took in another deep breath to calm her nerves.
“Lucy, get in the back,” Defoe rasped, sending her nerves through the roof again.
They made a sharp turn at a corner and eased into the highway. Defoe sped up and his eyes constantly flitted to the rearview mirror.
What?” Lucy asked, turning swiftly.
“Get in the back seat now.”
Lucy obeyed. She took off her seatbelts and crawled through the gap between their seats to the backseat. She looked behind and spotted two black SUVs on their tail. In the murky night, only the reflection of the street lights on their paint gave them away. Even their headlamps were off.
Lucy’s heart leapt with every beat till it was in her throat. She sank low into the seat and swallowed hard. Even in movies, only villains used black SUVs. She felt like she was stuck in a bad action flick. She didn’t mind watching them, but acting in action flicks wasn’t her thing. She wanted to quit but didn’t know how.
“Defoe, please don’t tell me those black SUVs are following us,” Lucy asked, trembling.
“They aren’t following us, Lucy,” Defoe answered. “They are chasing us.”