Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 86177 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 86177 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 431(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
Tears streamed down Jordyn’s face. “I thought they’d hur-hurt you.”
“I know, JorJor, I’m fine.” The Gladiator roared to life, the wheel rumbling beneath my palms. The engine gave a deep growl as I gunned the gas pedal. I slammed the truck over a shopping cart and tore past an abandoned hatchback. Sirens screamed behind me. All units tried to keep up after returning to their vehicles. I twisted into a U-turn on the wide boulevard. The Gladiator leaped over the center divider, tires screaming as they hit asphalt.
18
LOS ANGELES
Jordyn
Days free: 151
The truck’s lifted suspension bounced over the center divider. Jamie’s vibrant energy in this moment boosted my confidence, a stark contrast to the doubt I felt when the police accused him of stealing his car.
“What are we gonna do?” I asked.
“Try to get somewhere safe before they get eyes in the sky. Then figure out how Chelomey had the connection to have my vehicle flagged as stolen. I promise we’ll sort out this mess.” He reached over and squeezed my hand, muttering, “Along with everything else.”
Two LAPD cruisers boxed us in tight, sirens whooping. The sun burned over Los Angeles, casting everything in molten gold.
Jamie ripped through the streets, cut through alleys, and blew through a stop sign. “There goes my impeccable driving record,” he growled.
I curled low and shielded my head, adrenaline pouring off me. “Jamie.”
“Don’t be afraid. I’ll shake them in a second.” The truck shuttered, eating potholes.
I lifted my head just enough to peek out the window. Jamie was navigating through an industrial zone. Abandoned warehouses and chain-linked fences whizzed by.
As I looked toward the back, poor Rebel shielded her eyes with her paws.
Jamie smashed through a chain-link fence, tires shrieking.
My wide eyes ate up the scene as the truck flew downward and into a concrete channel. We weren’t on the streets of Los Angeles anymore. A small current flowed within the concrete basin’s center: a man-made stream or a desert creek in the summer and a real river in the winter. “Is this the Los Angeles River?”
“Yeah,” Jamie replied as the Gladiator darted beneath a street bridge, graffiti everywhere. “How’d you know?”
“I watched a lot of action movies.” For some reason, I thought of how the LA River ran through a concrete channel for over fifty miles and how it served as the backdrop for the CGI movies that were the only constant in my life. “I should note that they were all cheesy and super Hollywood.”
Behind us, the large tires kicked up mists of water from the stream. While the cruisers backed out, the SUV smoothed down the path.
“That’s why you finally agreed to Die Hard instead of Pretty Woman.” Jamie flashed me a grin, then returned his focus to navigating a way out of the cement structure. “You love action movies. So, I didn’t have to set the table for dinner to get you to agree to watch Die Hard?”
“Yep. Also, I didn’t want to sully your mind with a few scenes from Pretty Woman, Saint Jamie.” I grinned.
Jamie rolled his eyes.
The smile tumbled from my face when I heard a whirl above us. Helicopter blades.
“Aerial support, crap,” Jamie muttered. “I’m about ready to ditch Bluey.”
“Bluey?” Oh, yeah. The truck. “You know, that’s a cartoon character’s name.”
He lifted a brow as if unaware, then returned his attention to the road. Ah. Got it. More pressing matters than my love of television. “Where? How?”
He tipped his chin toward one of the runoff tunnels half concealed by a wrecked van—nearly a fossil with missing doors. Just when I thought he’d bypass it, Jamie cut a hard right and hit the brakes.
“Ahhh!” I screamed as the vehicle spun sideways, but the impact against the Gladiator and the embankment never came. The truck stopped two feet away. Jamie came around my side of the vehicle as a police SUV stopped thirty feet away. As someone yelled again for us to get out and get down, my trembling hand fell into his outstretched one.
Shaking the daze from my eyes, my vision came into focus. Rebel was in his arms. He wore his backpack and handed me the other. “Sorry. I can’t hold your backpack. I have to hold Reb.”
We ducked into the tunnel just as the LAPD SUV doors opened, and darkness swallowed us up. Jamie flicked on his phone light. To our right, putrid water flowed in a storm catch. To the left, a maintenance area. Jamie pounded the pavement, going left.
Behind us, officers shouted into radios, but no one followed us. Not yet.
I wasn’t sure how long we stayed underground after hiding out. We emerged from an old overpass many hours later. The homeless encampment smelled better than the passageway we’d just run through. Almost. I blinked my eyes to the light, although the sun was nearly gone, and the sky bled orange.