Terrifying Love: A Halloween Anthology Read online

  “What happened?” Evan asks again.

  It stays silent, the only sounds filling the car are the sounds of tires on the pavement and the humming of the engine. I glance at Evan who’s looking at the girl between us. “We were camping,” she finally says, and her voice is back to the tight string. I let out a breath, calming myself down because I’m not sure I want to hear what she’s going to tell. “My parents and I…”

  Evan interrupts her as he asks. “Who are you parents? What are their names?”

  Paula looks at him as she answers, “Marie and Jackson Hunter.” I can’t hide the surprise on my face, as my mouth opens slightly when I glance at Evan. I’m not the only one who recognized her parents' names. They are the CEOs of a tech company, one of the largest in the country. And if I’m not wrong, they are billionaires as well. I know Evan thinks the same as he glances at the girl, that taking Paula was all planned. That there might be more behind this all. Paula continues talking, oblivious to our shock, “We were camping near…”

  “Wellingware,” I fill in for her as I look back at the road.

  “Yes, and one night these men came, they took me out of my tent… They…” I look at her again, placing my free hand on her arm.

  “It’s alright, take your time.”

  I feel her shiver under my arm, making me glance back at her. The tears are slowly moving down her cheeks. “They took me away. They threatened my parents with guns, they put one to my head, too. Said if I didn’t listen, they would shoot them, kill them in front of me and make me watch as they bled to death before they kill me. They placed this horrible smelling sack over my head.” Another shiver runs down her body and I glance at her and then Evan before I look back at the road. He’s looking at her and I could see his brow furrow as his gaze is intensely on her. “They kept yelling at me. They threw me into something, I think a car, as we started moving and the engine… I heard…” I feel her shattering with shivers, and I tighten my hand on her arm.

  “It’s alright, sweetie, you’re safe now. It’s alright,” I say to her, trying to calm her down.

  “I heard my mom screaming for me when we drove away,” she says on a whisper, the sound mingled with a hiccup as she starts to cry. “I don’t know why…”

  “What don’t you know?” Evan asks, and I could feel her leaning away from him, toward me and I pull her closer against me.

  “Evan,” I say his name, harsh and clipped.

  “Why they took me,” Paula says before I have a chance to tell Evan to bugger off or risk being thrown out of the car.

  “Did you hear something, anything that we can use? How they looked, where they have taken you, how you got away?” Evan fires off questions to her and I feel her shaking as she keeps on crying. She doesn’t even make a sound while the tears stream over her face. I don’t know what’s worse, someone who cries and makes so much noise that the whole world knows they feel terrible, or someone who cries silently. I think it's the latter, someone who went through something so traumatizing that they don’t know which sound to use to show their anguish to the world, so they cry silently, in hiding and alone.

  “Evan,” I say through clenched teeth as I look at him. “Enough.” He stares at me and then gives me a slight nod. “We’ll stop here and get some food. I can imagine you being hungry?” I ask Paula.

  She doesn’t say anything. Still, I turn off the road and drive toward a restaurant. Stopping the car, I look down at the girl next to me. “I need to get inside, are you alright to stay with Evan in the car?” I ask her, and she looks at me, her eyes puffed out from all the crying. She nods and I give her a small smile. “He’ll protect you. He might be a huge douche right now, but he’ll keep you safe while I get us some food. I’ll be right back,” I say to her and glance at Evan, silently telling him not to ask anything else for now. He nods again with a quick movement of his head. I close the door and walk to the restaurant.

  Chapter Two

  “Good afternoon, how can I help you?” the woman behind the counter in the small diner greets me and I walk toward her.

  “I would like to order takeaway?” I ask her, and she smiles at me while she hands me the menu. I look over it as she takes hold of a pot of coffee, walking away to serve someone else. I find hamburgers on the menu, deciding that they will be the easiest to eat in the car. I hope Paula likes my choice. The woman turns back and I order, asking to get three cokes as well. “Do you have a toilet I can use?” I ask as I look around. I don’t have to go, but I really need a second to myself to get that feeling of eyes on me away.

  “In the back, around the corner. Your order will be done in a few minutes.” I nod at her and look around. Seeing my car and Evan still in it, I quickly go to the toilet to put some cold water on my face. I stare into the mirror, noticing that my long blond hair is still in the ponytail I had done this morning. There’s a smudge of sand on my face and I proceed to wash it off. I realize that my sapphire blue eyes are as almost as big as Paula’s chocolate brown ones. I take a deep breath, closing my eyes to calm down and get myself under control as I settle my racing heart by using some breathing techniques I learned when I went to self-defense classes a year ago. I had moved on to kick boxing last year, just for the training aspects of it. “You can do this,” I say to myself as I open my eyes and have my body back under control. I hadn’t noticed how much adrenaline had been coursing through it and now that it settled, I feel tired. I push off from the sink and walk out of the toilet.

  A yelp leaves me as I’m pushed against the wall of the small hallway. “Give me the girl,” a man growls at me, and I stare into his face. The same face I had seen this morning. His dark brown eyes hold mine, his face close, that I can almost feel his unkept beard on my skin. I notice his hair is short and spiky as he stares at me.

  “I… what?” I stutter as I’m too jumbled to even think.

  “I know you have her, give her to me,” he says again and leans in even closer, putting more pressure with the arm on my neck. I draw in a sharp breath as I seem to realize what’s going on, as if my brain needed a moment to process.

  “No,” I say to him, and he presses even harder, making me cough. I try to glance to my right, to the diner, only nobody’s there and the pressure on my throat makes it harder to speak.

  “Don’t start, you aren’t involved in this. But that doesn’t mean I don’t mind killing you,” he says calmly as he moves even closer.

  My body stiffens just for a moment and then I explode, remembering the classes I had followed for years. I kick out with my knee and hit home. He grunts while spittle flies into my face and I hit with my fist into his stomach, adding another grunt as the man bends forward, letting me go. I don’t think, I just run as fast as I can. “Miss your…” I don’t hear the rest as I storm out of the diner. I see the door to my truck open and I jump in as Evan hits the gas. We drive off with squealing tires, throwing sand behind the car.

  “What happened?” Evan asks me as I sit there panting in the passenger seat. “Willow,” he says, and that puts my attention to him. He hadn’t said my name before.

  I take a deep breath, trying to find my voice. “He was there,” I finally mange to say.

  “Fuck,” Evan growls.

  “Evan,” I chastise him. I can’t help it as my stomach twists inside me. I glance down to my arms, covered in goosebumps from the chills that follow the twisting inside my stomach. He’s right, this is fucked up in three ways with singing leprechaun on top.

  I hear a chuckle from between us and I look at Paula. She’s giggling, while there are still tears on her face, dried ones and new ones. I stare at her, as her giggling becomes louder with every new round. I can’t help it as I feel my own bubble up inside me, the tension that’s been inside me wanting to get out. I start to giggle, and we both end up laughing as Evan continues to drive, focused on the road as we keep on giggling.

  “We need to find a place to lay low for the time being, and probably sleep,” Evan says after
we’ve stopped laughing.

  “Yeah,” I say to him as I look his way. He only glances to me and nods quickly before he continues driving. I turn around and stare out of the window as a weighted silence descends on us. I watch how the night starts to fall, as we’ve been driving for quite some time.

  “I’ll stop in the next town, and we’ll get a room at a motel and rest. I got some cash with me,” Evan says, and I glance from the outside world and my musings to him. It feels like a movie, the way he talks and everything that had happened. “Willow,” Evan says, and glances to me. “We need to be careful,” he ads and I nod at him, reacting to his words. I had figured out something like that already, only hearing it out loud makes my heart clench. My fingers shake as I suck in a deep breath of air that feels too heavy for my lungs.

  Evan drives to the next town, a small place called Herensford. It holds one motel — lucky us — a store, a diner, some houses, and that’s it. Even parks the car out of the view from the road and goes to check us in. I wait with Paula in the car, as Evan made me sit behind the wheel with the car on, so that if anything happened, Paula and I could get out of here fast. I’m glancing around, waiting for Evan. I keep checking the rearview mirror, the side mirror and the darkness around us. There are too many shadows, and all of them seem to be moving or holding secrets I hope never to learn. A yelp leaves my lips as the door at my side opens. “Ducker,” I say under my breath as I see it’s Evan. A low chuckle comes from him, and I feel my lip pull up in a smile as an answer to that sound. It’s a nice sound, heavy and all manly. I like manly men, the ones who can hug you and make you feel safe and protected. Evan looks like such a man, and I’m not only saying that because he’s wearing a military uniform. Which adds to it, I love a man in uniform.

  “Come, I got the keys.” He holds them up and we get out of the car. Evan walks around, grabbing his bag as I close the car door after him. Paula and I follow him closely as he walks us to the middle door on the ground floor. He opens the door number eight and gets us in. It’s a simple room, brown and boring. The only real color is a painting of a lake hanging above the first bed. There’s only one lamp hanging above the second bed. Evan walks through the room and to the bathroom. “All safe,” he says, and places his bag on the ground. I glance around at the small room, and I can’t help but think that it would be hard for any bad guys to hide in this room. And we’ve just checked in, not planned anything about this trip, so it would be hard for them to find us. I hope.

  I sit down on the bed and Paula sits next to me.

  “We’ll sleep together if that’s alright with you?” I ask Paula and she nods. She has been silent from the moment we've sped away from the diner. She slides a little further onto the bed, leaning against the headrest.

  “I’ll order some food,” Evan says as he turns to call the front desk, with — what almost looks like a prehistoric old — phone on the TV furniture.

  “Will they deliver, or do you need to pick it up?” I ask him, a little nervous about the idea of being left alone here without him.

  Evan shakes his head but can’t answer me as the front desk answers. He orders the food and hangs up. “No, they have a deal with the diner. They’ll bring it.” It doesn’t take long for the food to arrive and we eat in silence. Normally, when you’re on a trip with people you just met, you talk about who they are, and you get to know each other. But in a situation like this, what do you talk about? Asking if they have pets doesn’t feel like the right thing to say. So, we stay silent, locked in our own minds as we eat.

  “Thank you,” I say to Evan when he takes hold of my empty hamburger box next to me on the bed. He throws everything in the bag it came in. I look behind me, finding Paula asleep, curled up on the bed, with an empty burger box next to her. “Here,” I say softly to Evan when I hand him the box. He takes it with a quick smile and throws everything in the garbage bin. He then moves back to the chair he has been sitting in from the beginning, the only chair in the room, and places it to block the door.

  I look behind me again, Paula in the middle of the bed. “You can use mine,” Evan says, and I look at him. “The bed,” he adds.

  “Don’t you want to sleep?” I ask him, as I’m trying to figure out how to lay down next to Paula without waking her.

  He gives me a quick smile as he shakes his head. “No, I’ll keep an eye out tonight.”

  “But….” He shakes his head interrupting me.

  “I’ll be fine, don’t worry,” he says and nods toward the bed. I look at it and then move onto it. Sitting against the wall under the light. “We need to call someone,” he says when I’m settled.

  I glance at Paula who’s fast asleep. “We said we wouldn’t,” I answer him.

  He nods as he looks from me to her. “I know, but I have a friend at the FBI.”

  “Evan,” I start. Movement to my left makes me hiss out the rest at a whisper, “We told her no police. The FBI are even —“I wave my hand through the air. “You know, more.”

  Evan’s lip curls up into a smile. “He’s a good friend of mine. I trust him, Willow. And we need to contact someone. We can’t do this on our own. We don’t know what we’re walking into, and every bit of information we can find can help us getting her back safely.” He looks at Paula before he turns his gaze back to me.

  I bite my bottom lip as I look at him. He’s right, I know he is. But we also said we wouldn’t call anyone. “Alright,” I say to him when I can’t think of a reason not to. And it might be the best decision because I know this is going over my head already. Evan might have an idea what he’s doing, or have some experience in situations like this, or worse. I need to trust him if we want to be sure to get Paula to her parents and stay alive in the process. I haven’t forgotten what that man in the diner said to me…

  He gets up from the chair, takes out his phone from his pocket and walks out of the room. “I’ll be back in a moment,” he says and closes the door, leaving me alone with a sleeping Paula whose breathing fills the room with a soft whooshing sound. I could hear Evan’s muffled voice through the door, knowing he’s standing in front of it. I slide down a little, making myself comfortable as I wait for Evan to get back. We have things to discuss.

  I fall asleep waiting and then my eyes fly open as the nightmare ends, my heart racing inside my chest as I stare at the ceiling that’s not my own. Quickly, I turn to the right, seeing Paula is still sleeping on the bed. I glance toward the door. Evan is there and I let out the breath I was holding. His hair is cropped short, in a typical army fashion — luckily not bald. His beard is trimmed nicely, accentuating his strong slightly squared jaw. I notice that his bottom lip is a little thicker than his top lip, which has a nice cupid's bow shape to it, as I study him from the bed. My gaze roams up toward his nose, which is slightly wide at the bottom, leading up to his eyebrows, it’s a straight nose and fits his face perfectly. His hazelnut eyes never leave my face as I stare into them. His brow furrows down, the brown hairs matching his hair. “Are you alight?” he asks softly, and I nod, my lip curling up to one side into a half smile. I might have wished that I woke up in my own bed after a bad night of drinking or something rather than in this situation. But I was glad that Paula was still safe, and Evan too. I move upright, seeing the light coming behind the curtains. It Is already getting brighter.

  “Have you slept at all?” I ask him softly as I slide toward the end of the bed.

  Evan shrugs. “No.”

  I narrow my eyes at him. “Then it’s time for you to sleep. Get in here,” I say to him and get up from the bed, pointing at it while I do so.

  “I’m fine, Willow,” he protests.

  “Yeah, that may be, but I can sit in that chair as well as you can, and we need you rested and alert.” I walk over toward him, crossing my arms in front of my chest as I look down at him. A deep sigh leaves him as he pushes up from the chair. He stands in front of me, and that’s when I fully notice his height. I’m 5’7 and my head comes just under his
chin. He’s also wide, built with muscles instead of fat. He walks past me, his arm brushing mine and I hold the gasp inside me as I quickly sit down in the chair he just left. He goes to the bed, his gaze on me as he lays down. The tension rises between us as our eyes lock, and I break the contact to look at Paula. “Go sleep,” I say as I feel his gaze on me. “I’ll yell really loud when something happens, alright?” I say to him as I look back, my eyebrow arched up. I see him moving his jaw, clenching it before he nods and finally closes his eyes.

  It’s silent as I sit here watching them sleep. It’s even boring. I don’t know how he managed to keep watch that long. I lean my head against the wall next to the door, staring at the ceiling. Suddenly, a sound makes me sit upright, and I look around. I can’t find anything as I scan Paula and then Evan, letting my gaze roam over the rest of the room. I’m next to the only door and window and nobody’s behind me as the chair stands against the wall. I look over Evan and Paula again and see everything stays silent. I might have imagined it. My hands are sweaty, and I take a deep breath as I swipe them on my pants. Leaning back in the chair, I try to keep my heart under control as I finish rubbing my hands dry on my pants. Then the sound is back, and I stand up quickly. Looking around, my gaze zeros in on Evan. His hands are twitching next to him, and I walk closer. His eyelids are moving really fast, a sign that he is dreaming as his eyes move from left to right behind his eyelids. His mouth opens and a small, almost painful gasp comes out. I lean toward him, not sure what to do, except that he’s dreaming and probably having a nightmare as his hands start to twitch more.

  “Evan,” I try softly, not wanting to wake Paula, too. He doesn’t respond, only his mouth goes open and closed fast. “Evan,” I try a little louder. I look at his body as his hands start to twitch even more. I place my hand on his shoulder as I say, “Evan.” His eyes fly open and they stare right into mine, his breathing fast and his mouth open from the air he’s trying to inhale. “It’s alright, you’re safe,” I say to him softly, keeping my hand on his shoulder, not wanting to move. I don't want to make him jump, and touching him might not be the smartest thing to do. So, I stand still next to him, staring into his hazelnut eyes. “It’s alright,” I say again as he closes his eyes. His hand comes to his nose, squeezing the bridge of it.