Downburst Read Online Free Page B

out of the bushes, I blink away the haze and try to get my bearings. The diner is west of here, so I’ll need to cross the street.
    I turn to leave the lot, but as I walk past the cars, I catch sight of something that makes me stop. Parked between a faded blue pickup and a gold sedan is a red BMW.
    Her red BMW.
    The vertigo returns, and I steady myself on the bumper of the car next to me. What was Aura doing here? Had she actually come to meet those men?
    A blur of movement is the only warning I get before something dark whips over my head, blocking out the air and light. I scream and strike out with my fists, but a hand clamps over my mouth. “Shut up, or I’ll kill you,” a man says in a deep voice. I feel something sharp jab into my back.
    I stop struggling. The man grabs my arms and pulls them behind me, lashing my wrists together with a zip tie then pushing me forward. I’m dumped onto a back seat of a car, buckled in, and then the car’s starting and we’re backing out of the parking stall, moving out of the lot.
    Rivers of cold sweat flow down the back of my neck. In my mind, I see the enormous black-haired men with their awful tattoos, see the flash of the knife before it drives into Aura’s throat, and my heart thunders in my ears. Is that who abducted me, one of those men? Do they know I saw them—did they see me run with her wallet? It’s so hard to breathe inside this bag.
    Suddenly, the radio roars to life at full volume, overpowering the noise of the road, suffocating me even further. I press my hands against the seat, but it doesn’t help. I’m completely disconnected from the world—I can’t hear anything except the music. At any moment he might attack me, and I’d have no warning. My stomach is cramping itself into stone, and pellets of salty water drip into my eyes. I rub my face against the seat, but the bag just drives the sweat in further, making my eyes sting more.
    I have no idea how long we’ve been driving when a bump in the road jolts me to the side, and I feel something in my right pocket dig into my leg. My switchblade. I hold perfectly still. Would it be possible for me to get it? I deliberate for several minutes. I have no way of knowing if the man is watching me or not, and if he sees me get my knife, he’ll take it away. But if I wait, I might not get another chance. I’ll just have to hope he’s focusing on the road.
    Moving as slowly as possible, I shift my arms so that they’re resting on my right hip. And then, slowly, slowly, I dig my fingers into my pocket. The knife is shoved down deep, and it takes some concerted twisting to reach it. I try to keep my body still, but soon my back is twitching, my arms shaking.
    Finally, my fingers latch onto the metal. I slide the blade up my pocket and slip it into my palm. Readjusting my arms so that they’re behind my back again, I aim the knife away from my body and push the button. I feel rather than hear the quiet swish as the blade pops out. I wait for ten seconds, but there’s no sign that the man heard anything.
    Very carefully, I rotate the knife in my fingers and place the sharp edge on the plastic tie, moving the blade in a sawing motion, exerting as much pressure as I can. The loud music has turned out to be a blessing—even I can’t hear the sound of the knife. But it’s taking a long time, and it’s getting hard to hold the blade in my increasingly sweaty hands.
    Abruptly, the zip tie snaps, and I feel the blade nick the back of the seat. I freeze, hold my breath. But the music continues to blare, and the car keeps moving. I quietly exhale then wriggle my wrists out of the broken plastic and shut the knife.
    The sweat is still in my eyes, and I want more than anything to tear the bag from my head, but I can’t give myself away. So I wait, heart thumping, back dripping, fingers twitching on the blade.
    After an eternity, the car slows down, and we turn off the road and come to a stop. The radio dies, but the