What started in Paris

Chapter 9 Part 2

Chapter Nine Part Two

Carter, My father's last name rings through the green house as the faintly familiar looking woman hisses out the name with such censure I'm afraid of what caused her ill feelings towards him, but with his reputation I shouldn't really be that surprised.

As she's walking past me she pauses for a brief moment, leaving me to stand there still as a weeping angle, my lungs burning and face flushed, heartbeat pounding until she finally moves on. That was far too close for comfort. I think to myself as she walks out the tall glass doors, her heels clinking against the interior hard wood floors.

That can't be good. Adam told me he was going to be up in his room if I needed him, the problem was the only way to reenter our part of the palace was through those same doors the woman had taken, and I was willing to take a wild guess that we were headed for the same place. That's what you get Adam, for not being down here with me. But now was not the time for blame, it was the time to get out of this godforsaken place.

Exhaling bitterly, I start to move from my, rather sad hiding place when I hear the doors open once again, and scramble to move back out of sight.

The faint sounds of a set of boots clinking against the grey concrete grow louder, and my throat tightens as I imagine one of those heavily armed men making his way towards me, can hardly fight against the reflex of thinking back to the night in Paris when I had a gun pointed at me, that sick feeling in the pit of my stomach coming back to me as I grip the journal in my hands tighter, prepared to use it as a rather pathetic weapon, but a weapon none the less. Once the shadow of a man starts rounding the corner of the plant display I'm hiding behind I'm wired for self defense as his face comes into view and I barely stop myself from hitting him as I see, much to my relief and shock that it's Adam.

    "It's just me!" He says quickly, holding up an arm to shield himself from my almost attack as I glare angrily at him for scaring me so.

    "What are you doing here?" I breathe out, shaking my head at myself. "Never mind, there was this woman and-"

    "I know." He says, cutting me off and hurriedly guiding me farther into the rather large green house, cutting in-between rows of flowerless winter plants. "She's exactly who I was hoping to avoid." He continues, his voice filled with almost as much contempt as hers had been. I bite my lip to keep myself from asking the questions I should no doubt be asking, but I can tell from Adam's expression that this is not the time.

As we continue to weave horridly in and out of the rows upon rows of plants of various types, the freezing wind sweeping in; causing the dated sprinklers hanging above out heads to sway from side to side, creaking eerily I can feel my stomach starting to churn from worry and being unable to stop looking over my shoulder.

I couldn't imagine why Adam would choose this kind of life, being constantly on the run, danger never pausing it's pursuit. What on Earth could have pushed him into this business of murder and vengeance?

    "Stay down." Adam whispers to me once we're crouching behind a few over grown ferns, leaving me, my mouth hanging open in pre-question, and begins to break off a few left over pieces of a  sea green window section that seemed to have been broken long ago.

What the heck are you going? I wanted to hiss at him, wondering for a moment if he knew how deranged he looked, picking away at shards of glass, cutting himself in the process, but I reminded myself to step back, to look at the bigger picture.

He was making the whole big enough for us to crawl out of, I could tell that much now, but even though I was filled with relief and gratitude I still couldn't quite shake the nervous feeling that was causing my throat to burn painfully. Disobeying his command I shuffle over to him, still in my hunched over position and motion for him to move over; begging to help him quietly break off the remaining glass.

    "I told you to stay put." He whispers to me, his tone harsh, a spark of anger in his green eyes, the green glass reflecting in his glasses lens.

   "I'm aware of that," I say, gritting my teeth as I finally break a portion of glass off, thankfully catching it before it hit the hard concrete floor but paying hard for it with a nasty, but shallow cut across my palm. "But we'll get out of a lot faster if you stop treating me like a glass doll and let me help you." I finish, glaring at him as another gust of wind pushes through the hole, flushing my already wind burnt cheeks.

He purses his chapped lips, but nods faintly, signaling for us to continue on with our silent work and in a shorter time than I expected we've cleared enough away for both of is to slip through without cutting ourselves.

As my hands hit the cold gravel surrounding the green house I feel a little bit more at ease, letting Adam pull me up and jog with him away from the creaking building and into the main garage, thankfully not running into away unwanted persons.  

   "What do we do about our belongings upstairs?" I ask quietly, still afraid to speak above a whisper.

He sighs mournfully, walking swiftly around the perimeter of the white walled room, clearly looking for something. "We leave them, there is nothing else we can do."

I bite my lip, feeling, as petty as it was, a little piece of me ache for the few personal belongs I had brought with me. But more importantly I was worried what we were going to do when and if we left the country, having no passport to allow us to do so. But as worried as I was I knew that going back there would no doubt lead to the beginning of unending horrors for both Adam and I.

   "What about your computer; the case files they sent you?" I ask, horrified at the thought of the wrong people getting their hands on something like that.

    "They are all encrypted," He says, taking a key off of a hook and striding towards me, his eyes calm. "No one can get to those files but me, don't worry."

I nod, letting my shoulders relax a bit and raise my eyebrow at the key in his hand. "Which one does that fit?" I ask, scanning the various cars parked in front of me.

 He smiles a bit too wide for my taste and strides over to one of the sleek, all black motorcycles built for racing. The large black wheels reminding me of Batman's bike, but far less awe inspiring.

    "Adam no."

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  It's safe to say that I haven't ridden a motorcycle before, especially not one like this, sleek and sporty; built for racing. But once necessity called for me to mount the thing I found that it was a lot different from what I thought it would be like, there was a sense of calm, of weightlessness, but also a feeling of impending death as we wind down curves leading to the castle, the fortress that we're leaving behind.

Once we were on the road the grey clouds circling above us finally gave way, pelting us with freezing rain, making me feel much too similar to a drowned cat for my liking. It was not pleasant, the rain hitting my helmet fast and hard, reverberating like a drumbeat, soaking through my jeans and making my knees feel thoroughly bruised from the endless pounding of water.

Even with me pressed up against him, deathly afraid of falling if I let go for only a moment, I could still feel Adam shiver now and then from the cold, but I had gone numb long before now, so I was trying to block that feeling out, too focused on being worried about us crashing on the slick road beneath us that had already made the tires slide far too many times.

    "You okay?" Adam asks, yelling over the wind to and rain to be heard but I still barely catch the words.

    "I will be." I yell back, tightening my grip on him. "Where are we going?"

   "According to the maps of this area there should be a nice town about an hours ride away from here, but we need to make it to the next town over." He yells back, and I stifle a  groan. That seemed like a lifetime away. His back muscles relax a bit as I give in and rest my head on the back of his jacket; closing my eyes and feeling the engine vibrating through me.  

"Okay." I say, but my voice is too soft and too tired to be able to be heard over the rain.

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