Deadline≫hemmings a.u

1.0

"Where the hell do you think you're going?" Luke hissed into my ear. His long fingers wrapped tightly around my wrist as he yanked me roughly to the side.

"Elevator?" I glanced down the hallway that was in the opposite direction of the elevator. There was no one there in sight yet, but the voices were growing louder. People were coming. And I wasn't quite sure if he knew this himself, but Luke was pulling us towards them.

"You don't take the elevator when you're being chased," Luke rolled his eyes and pulled me even further down the hallway. "They'll be waiting at the bottom."

"Well you don't go towards them either!" I tried to wrench my arm out of his grasp but he only held on tighter.

"We aren't." Luke said sharply. Suddenly, he turned to the side and yanked open a door, pushing me in and quickly following after me, shutting the door behind him. Luke let go of my wrist and brushed by me.

I took the opportunity to look around the room. It was an office, nothing special about it. There was a simple glass desk, file cabinets, and shelves. There were pictures lining the shelves but I didn't dare look at them. It seemed wrong to look into someone else's personal lives, even though I had helped with the impersonation of one and was steadily becoming more involved in things much worse than simple human codes of right and wrong.

"C'mon," Luke snapped from across the room. He was standing by the window, holding it open with one hand. He was halfway out the window already. Suddenly, I understood why Luke pulled us into this room. There was a fire escape, just like there had been outside Calum's room in our apartment. We weren't here to hide. We were here to escape.

I looked from the fire escape outside to Luke's outstretched hand. I stepped forward but stopped, hesitating. All I could hear was the sound of blood rushing and my heartbeat pounding away in my ears.

"Secret number two," Luke's voice cut through the noise, his face calm but sincere. "You're a girl who lives in New York with a fear of heights."

For a moment I could have sworn my heart was silent, skipping a beat. "How did you-"

"You told me." Luke didn't make any further motions to hurry me up. "I'll talk you through it."

I swallowed the lump in my throat. I glanced back at the door to the hallway, wincing as I heard a shout from the other side. Before i could think twice about it, I took the rest of the office in two strides and took Luke's hand. I let him carefully help me out the window and onto the platform outisde.

"Don't look down." Luke instructed me, putting his free hand on my waist to steady me.

"Got it." I said stiffly, keeping my eyes trained straight ahead. The fire escape was in the alley between the building we were leaving and its neighbor, so luckily no one would see us.

"Alright so there's a couple flights of stairs we have to go down, okay?" Luke said slowly, looking over the side. But without looking, I could tell there was more to it.

"And?"

"And what?" Luke raised his eyebrows at me.

"And what else is there?" I rephrased my question. "After the stairs."

"Uhm," Luke bit his lip. "Well there's a ladder."

"How high?" I took a deep breath.

"I really don't think telling you will do us any good." Luke said, unreassuringly.

"Right."

Cautiously but swiftly, Luke led me down the first flight. "So, I never got the chance to ask."