The Escape

Chapter 2

JACE

It was 4:15 AM, and I had just left the office after much paperwork. Usually, my secretary took care of it all, but she quit and moved to Europe to travel with her idiotic fiancé, who was cheating on her.

I conduct background checks on all my employees at Dawson Enterprises, including their significant others. I have my reasons. Plus, my secretary constantly blabbed about him. Since my secretary left, work has been hell.

Riverbed Street, which I drive on almost daily, was dimly lit as I sped down it. I saw a dark figure move across the street and slammed on my brakes to find a woman in the street.

I stepped out of the car and yelled. "Damn, woman, watch out!"

The woman, undoubtedly underweight and small, seemed startled by my voice, maybe even by my appearance. She was holding a child who was clinging to her for dear life. The young woman's eye was swollen and bruised.

My blood boiled. She'd been hurt, and I would not tolerate it.

"Get in," I said.

"W-What?" She stuttered, clearly alarmed by me. Maybe I said it too harshly. Perhaps she thought I would harm her. Her trembling hands thought I would. I shouldn't have yelled at first sight, but I didn't know a young woman with a child would be crossing the street at four in the morning.

"Please get in."

I climbed into my black Lamborghini and shut my door. Then I opened the passenger door and waited for the woman to enter. Seeing as I was a stranger, I could tell she was skeptical, but she got in.

It was forty degrees outside, and I knew this woman was cold. She was too young to have a child in her arms. I could see her shivering. She had no coat, but the child did. I turned on the heated seat and the vents.

"I'm sorry if I scared you. That was not my intention."

Silence.

"Are you warm enough?" I asked.

Silence again. I turned up the heat to make sure.

"I promise I won't harm you or her. I'm not like that."

The woman moved and rubbed the child's back as she shifted her to her other shoulder. "T-Thank you."

"I'm Jace, by the way. You don't have to tell me who you are if you don't want to. I'm taking you to my penthouse in Miami." I glanced over to the woman and saw her eyes widen. "I come up here to Fort Lauderdale for work."

"I-I can't leave here. I-I have work in less than three hours," she said, her voice as soft as a whisper.

"May I ask where you planned to go at this time of night? And might I add, with a child in this weather?"

I didn't receive an answer. The woman was silent again.

"Look, I meant what I said. I'm not going to harm you. I'm only trying to help you. If I knew what was going on, it would help, but I don't."

More silence. "I only want safety for you and the girl."

"Y-You don't even know me," she stuttered.

"You're right. I don't, yet you're the one who got in my car, and you don't know me."

"You told me to get in the car, so I did," she said.

"I didn't force you. I said to get in the car twice. It's cold out, and there is no reason for a woman your size with hardly any warm clothes on and a child clinging to her to be out in this weather."