and we promised

Chapter 38

OLIVIA

"Wallet", I say, looking over the unconscious Stefan and helping myself to his stuff. "Oh my Gosh, he has a Ferrari?"

"Do we know how to drive a Ferrari?", Aria asks me confused.

I immediately start nodding. "We for sure do know how to drive a Ferrari."

I snatch the keys and make my way outside, followed by my bestie. I stop at the locker room on the way, wanting to open the door. It doesn't work at first, only with a small push.

As expected, I find Landon and Brad there, both unconscious and non-responding.

"Are they dead?", Aria asks me, refusing to touch the bodies.

"Not dead", I answer after I check the pulse. "Only unconscious. Can you please call an ambulance?"

Aria nods, already taking out her phone to dial the number. We leave only as we were assured that the ambulance will be here as soon as possible.

Taking some tissues from a bathroom on our way to the exit, I start pressing on the wound, hoping to hurry up with closing it.

"A doctor should really check on that", Aria mutters.

I roll my eyes and make her a sign to follow me as I search for the Ferrari in the parking lot.

Bingo.

"Fucking jackpot", I say, waltzing my way to the car and opening the car with the keys. "I don't think Stefan is ever getting his car again."

"I don't get your fascination for cars", Aria says as she opens the car door to the passenger's seat. I go on the driver's one and close the door behind me.

"Have you ever been to a Grand Prix?", I ask her as I adjust the rearview mirror, then press on the break, the sound sounding like music to my ears.

"Well, no", she responds, her cheeks turning pink.

"You need to go to a Grand Prix", I continue convinced. "The cars...And the drivers...."

"Hello, earth to Livie. Road ahead", she teases. Although she does have a point, there is road ahead.

I only press harder on the pedal. Damn, I love this.

"Do you have any freaking clue where we're going?", she asks me.

That's the point my cheeks turn pink. "Ahm, no..."

"What the fuck do you mean by no? Where are we going?"

"Look, I don't know. I was busy bleeding, okay?"

She takes a deep breath, clearly not wanting the tension. She then turns the music louder, Taylor Swift is playing in the background, and puts her thinking face on.

"Take all the time you need", I tease her. "Someone is about the die and we have a coronation to stop, but..."

"Do you have Stefan's phone?", she asks me.

I have to smirk in the rearview mirror. That's my girl.

"Here you go", I say, handing her the phone. She gets her bag and takes out some blush powder from there, covering Stefan's screen with it.

"Sure, destroy our evidence", I mutter.

She throws me a glance as she brushes the powder away, only a few spots remaining colored, exactly on the numbers that are part of his password.

"Genius", I tell her. Aria smiles at me pleased as she tries on every possible combination with those numbers, until the phone is unlocked.

"Aria: 1, asshole: 0", she whispers.

It's then she opens the last opened apps and discovers the live footage camera app Stefan showed me earlier.

"That's Nathan", she whispers.

I look in the corner of the screen and see some small coordinates. Ones that give an address. "And that's where we're going."
~

Thirty minutes to go until the coronation officially begins and Aria and I are making our way inside a warehouse.

"You know those movies in which the main character dies at the end?", she asks me, holding the frying pan even tighter.

"No, what happens in them?", I ask her, the sound muffed by the drumming in my head.

"The main character dies at the end", Aria repeats, as if it were obvious. She then looks around once, the dark and creepy warehouse, then whispers: "Anyway, that's how those movies begin."

"Thanks, babe", I reply, now also taking the grip of the knife.

"Anytime", she answers.

I make her a sign to remain quiet as we both make our way through the creepy warehouse. If I am somehow fitting in with my blood-stained dress, Aria is for sure out of the picture with her glittery pink one and heels the same color.

For someone who spent so much time planning this little kidnap, Stefan did for sure not think the warehouse part through. Apart from one guard we snuck past at the entrance, there are only two guards guarding the door Nathan is being held behind.

"Should we just walk over there?", she whispers to me.

I rise my shoulders, since I am not really the vigilante type.

Aria slaps her face, showing again how delighted she is by the fact I have no fucking plan.

Before she can do anything, I throw my knife to wound the leg one of the bodyguards. He falls on the floor and the other one quickly comes after me, as he sees the direction the weapon came from.

"Oh no", I say, already wanting to run in the other direction.

Luckily, Aria steps again and as the guard comes closer to me, she emerges from where she was hiding and offers yet another man a rather heavy concussion.

"Rapunzel strikes again, bitches", she lets out.

I can't help but chuckle as I look at her. We both let out a short laughter, then open the door to the locked room.

"Nathan", I say, seeing him on that bed, breathless, his eyes closed.

"He is not breathing right", I let out, starting to sob. "Nathan", I say, trying to give him a shake to wake him up. "Nathan", I try again. "Nathan, please come back."

No response.

My heart seems to have given up, the only thing I'm hearing are the drums in my head and the last time Nathan told me he loves me.

"I'm calling an ambulance", Aria says, dialing the number.

"You promised you'd stay", I whisper in his ear, so that no one can hear me. "You promised you won't leave me." I shake him again, trying to hear that beautiful sound I call his breathing. "Nathan, please. Nathan, please, you promised me you'd stay. You promised you'd stay. You promised."

I'm repeating those two words as the paramedics arrive and start fussing around Nathan, carrying him to the ambulance outside.

You promised.