Protected by the HERO (4 page)

“It’s seven forty-five,” Mike said moving to the kitchen. “Where do you keep the cups?”

“There’s two on the top shelf,” I answered, still feeling slightly dazed. Now that the feelings of fear had passed, I felt decidedly awkward.

I didn’t know if or when we were going to talk about last night.

“You should probably get dressed,” Mike called from the cupboard. “You’ve got a class at nine thirty, don’t you?”

“Yeah,” I said remembering, “yeah, I do.”

It was my final for history. It was my best class, so I wasn’t too worried. All the same, it wouldn’t do to be late.

I went to the bathroom and dressed quickly. When I came back out, Mike was sitting at the table, laptop opened with two steaming mugs waiting.

“I know you don’t drink coffee,” he said still staring at his laptop, “but there were some tea bags. So, I made that instead.”

“That’s perfect,” I said.

“I put one cream in yours,” he said finally looking up at me, “that’s still the way you like it, right?”

I smiled at him and nodded, my heart was now pounding in my chest for an entirely different reason. The thought that Mike remembered how I took my tea gave me a warm feeling all over. That idea alone made the silence less awkward as we sat at the table. Mike looking at his Laptop, obviously still looking for information on McBride and me simply watching him.

But, when our tea was finished and we had left the apartment building for the subway stop down the street, we still hadn’t said a word about last night.

The thrill of having tea made for me was beginning to wear off and I felt increasingly as though I should say something. Anything to break the tension.

It took me the entire silent uptown subway ride for me to work up the courage. We were one block away from my school building when I finally spoke.

“So, are we going to talk about what happened last night?” I asked. “Or would you rather we maintain an awkward silence until we both forget it happened.”

“That depends,” he said. “Do you want to forget that it happened?”

I didn’t like the ball being in my court like that; I’d never liked it. So, I threw it back.

“I guess
that
depends,” I answered. “Do you want to forget it happened?”

There was silence for a moment.

“I’m not sure it’s as simple as that,” Mike said, as we reached my school building. I stopped at the doorway. I knew I wasn’t going to let him leave it like that.

“What’s making it complicated?” I asked.

“Besides the obvious?” he answered.

“Mike,” I said with an eye roll, “it’s not like we’re related. We met when we were teenagers. We even have different last names!”

“I know that,” he answered. He moved his hand across his face the way he always did when he either felt nervous or guilty. “Look, let’s talk about this tonight. When you get out of school. Would that be okay?”

I wanted to press the issue. I wanted to tell him that I wasn’t moving until we’d worked this whole thing out here and now. But, my history final was calling and I knew there would be no time to work things out properly.

“Okay,” I answered, “but, promise me. After I’m all finish here, we’ll talk.”

“I promise,” he said. I was glad when a smile finally crossed his lips.

“Now go on and play nice with the other kids,” he said.

“I’ll be through at five,” I answered. “Pick me up here?”

“I’ll be here,” he said.

Mike made good on his promise to pick me up but, as I learned when he met me at the front of the school building at five pm that evening, circumstances beyond his control had forced us to postpone our little relationship chat.

“I’m really sorry,” he said, “just, Zach from my unit wanted a bunch of us to meet up for drinks. It’ll probably be the last chance we have to see each other before we ship out again.”

“But, when you do ship out you’ll be with those guys non-stop for six weeks!” I said. I knew I sounded like a cloying kid, but I couldn’t help but be a bit frustrated. Here I was needing to have an important conversation with my possible boyfriend and this “Zach” (whom I immediately decided I disliked) wanted to hang out and couldn’t be bothered to give more than a few hours’ notice.

“It’s different,” he answered, “when we ship out, we’ll be on a mission. That means stress and long meetings and a whole bunch of other stuff. This is our last chance to just...hang out normally.”

I looked at him and felt guilty when he looked entirely sincere. He was looking back at me as though waiting for my permission.

“All right,” I said, “we can have a few drinks with your buddies. But, you’ve got to promise me that we’ll talk afterward.”

“I promise,” he said.

When we got to the bar, there wasn’t much time for talking or much ability. A live band was playing music so loud that I could hardly hear the people Mike was introducing me to. One, a tall guy with freckles and bleached blonde hair was the untimely Zach.

He greeted me warmly and his enthusiastic smile made me begrudgingly re-think my animosity towards him.

There were two slightly older men; one with black hair named Tom, and another with graying hair named Greg. The last of the bunch was a guy named Dave who was tall with light red hair, glasses, and blue eyes.

Zach led us all to a table near the bar with high-backed chairs that I had to climb to get into.

Even amid the loud music and my desperate desire to talk with Mike alone, the welcoming laughs and hugs shared between Mike and these men made me think that the evening might not be so bad. It was almost like being pulled into a family reunion.

I even found myself smiling after I’d been introduced. My smile faded however when I heard Mike say it.

“Yeah, Sabrina’s my little stepsister,” he told the men around him, “I’m just looking after her until we get back to Mom and Fred’s place for Christmas.”

And then, as though out of habit, he reached out and ruffled my hair.

The guys around me were laughing and I felt my face grow red. I ducked out from under his hand and slapped him lightly in the chest. I hopped it came off to the others as playful and good-natured. When I looked at Mike’s friends, they were still smiling and talking as though nothing was amiss.

Mike too had started a completely different conversation with Zach, without so much as a glance towards me.

So, I’d been right. Mike thought that last night was a mistake. A moment of weakness. He wanted to forget it ever happened and go back to the way things were.

Back to me as the annoying little sister and him as the protective big brother.

I felt my heart constrict in my chest. Suddenly, I knew I couldn’t be near him. I had to get away.

“Sorry, do any of you know where the restrooms are?” I asked the table at large, afraid to look Mike in the eye.

“Yeah,” Zach answered, “they’re straight back and to the left.”

He pointed me in the direction.

“Thanks,” I said, hopping down from my seat and moving in that direction. I felt a hand touch my arm as I passed Mike’s seat.

“Hey,” he said, “are you ok?”

I forced a smile as I turned back to him.

“I’m fine,” I answered.

“Ok,” he said still looking cautious.

I gave him a small half-smile again before hurrying off to the restroom. I found it exactly where Zach said it would be. As I moved to open the door, I suddenly gasped as I felt someone step immediately behind me.

“Don’t move,” a low quiet voice that I could barely make out told me. I fought back a scream as I felt something blunt and decidedly gun-like push into my back.

“Sabrina,” the voice I did not recognize said, “there’s a loaded pistol at your back. You scream I shoot. And don’t test me, because I won’t hesitate. Do you understand?”

I swallowed hard and nodded. My eyes flicked around my surroundings as my brain raced to think about what to do next.

“Good,” the low voice said. “Now, you’re going to do exactly as I say…”

*****

The man with the low voice forced me out a back door marked emergency exit only. We walked out into a freezing dark alley. It was only then that I remembered I didn’t have my coat. I wrapped my arms tightly around myself moving my hands up and down trying to keep the goosebumps off my skin.

“Don’t worry ‘Brina,” he said, “our ride is right over there.”

I saw him point towards a large white van just across the alley. The van looked ominous, but even so it was neither that nor the cold that made me shiver the most.

“H-how do you know my name?” I asked in a small voice.

I heard the low laugh of the man with the low voice before he spoke.

“Mike was always going on and on about his stepsister ‘Brina,” he said as he pulled the side door to the van open. This only confirmed what I had been sure of from the first moment he had come up to me in the bar. The man walking behind me was McBride. It had to be.

“Get in,” McBride said, prodding me with the gun still hidden inside his jacket pocket.

Still not able to fathom a way out of this mess, I crawled into the dark van that was, honestly, every bit as cold as the wind outside.

McBride crawled in after me. That was when I saw him for the first time since I had glimpsed the picture on Mike’s laptop.

McBride was thinner than he had been then, his face was more lined. Those eyes were the same. Dark and beetle black.

They stayed fixed on me while he finally released his hold on the gun in his jacket pocket. I spotted a flash of silver metal that disappeared as he reached behind him and, with one hand, pulled the door closed.

The dim light from the alleyway disappeared.

I panicked for a moment in the darkness. I couldn’t see anything, not even my own hands.

The panic receded momentarily when a light shone from McBride’s direction. He shone the bright light in my eyes. I squinted and turned away from him. As I did, I could just make out the rope he held in his hands and the yellow-toothed smile on his face.

He had not been smiling in the picture. His smile now did nothing to soften his image. In fact, it made him look more menacing.

"Mike’s right inside the bar," I told him trying to sound much braver than I felt, "him and a bunch of his SEAL friends. He’s going to notice that I’m gone."

"That’s why we won’t be here for long," McBride said with a slight chuckle that sent a shiver down my spine. He moved behind me and I felt the rough rope being moved to my wrist. He was going to tie me up.

As he continued to push behind me, grabbing my hands to put them together behind my back, I had a sudden thought. Maybe if I elbowed him in the ribs right now, while he was so close I could feel his hot, stinking breath on my neck, I could rush to the door and get out fast enough to yell for help.

"Now, don’t think about doing anything stupid, Sabrina," he said as though he had read my thoughts, "Gun’s still in my pocket. I’m going to kill you either way. I’d rather wait but, if you force me, I will shoot. Got it?"

I nodded again, wincing as he finished tying my hands together. He pulled on the rope so that it cut into the flesh at my wrists. I gasped in pain. He chuckled, reached an arm around to my middle and forcefully pulled me closer to him.

"This’ll teach that bitch ass brother of yours a lesson, won’t it ‘Brina?" he whispered in my ear. "When he finds you thoroughly fucked with your brains blown out in an alleyway. He’ll think twice about ratting on one of his buddies again, won’t he?"

I pressed my eyes closed fighting back tears of helplessness and disgust as I felt his tongue lick the side of my neck. His hands moved from my middle up to my breasts and squeezed painfully.

I couldn’t just stay silent. I had to say something.

"He’ll be here," I said quietly, "any moment he’ll come looking for me."

"Sure he will," McBride answered, "but, we’ll be long gone by then."

I was relieved for half a moment when he released me from his hold and began to crawl towards the driver’s seat at the front of the van.

"Don’t go anywhere," he said with another chuckle as he looked back at me.

I kept thinking about what to do as I heard McBride start up the van. I could kick off my shoes and try to open the side door with my feet.

I almost laughed at the absurdity of that thought.

It might be better to try and get the ropes undone. If I tried, I found that I could move the fingers of my left hand just slightly. Just as I began to wriggle my fingers, I shot forward as the van pulled out of its parking space.

Now lying on my side, I took a breath, found my bearings and, once again, tried to wriggle my fingers.

That was when I heard the first shot fire. I felt the back of the van drop as though one of the tires had been shot out.

I knew, at that moment, that it was Mike.

The van careened and I felt myself being bounced around as McBride sped up, trying to drive on only three good tires.