Die for You

Chapter 10

"Miss Armstrong, get down on the floor wherever you are!" I shouted, kicking myself for my carelessness. I crawled carefully over to the window and dragged across the curtain, obscuring the view from the sniper, waiting for the inevitable shots to come through the window. Shots that miraculously didn't come.

We were at her flat now. I was distracted while looking around her empty flat when I noticed, looking out the window when a black Renault pulled up in a space opposite her apartment building. Its rear window rolled down and I caught a flash of light reflecting off a piece of glass inside as I dived for cover.

Taking a chance, I got to my feet and ran into the hallway to find her; she was lying on the floor in the main bedroom and I quickly ran over and pulled the curtains tight shrouding us in darkness.

"What's wrong, Miss Sarocha?"

Her voice drifted in faintly.

"Not sure yet, stay put." I said, trying to keep my voice calm and relaxed.

Carefully, I walked around her tiny home and pulled a chair in front of her door and barricaded it just in case, before joining her in the bedroom.

"What's happening?" she asked, "Are we in danger?"

"I have no idea, miss. We're waiting for the police now." I had already phoned JJ to check on it earlier.

"Police, why?"

'So many fucking questions for someone so tiny, after all the silent treatment, I guess it's nice.'

"There's a car outside, it looks like the one that I thought was following us earlier. I saw a flash from the back when I was looking at it and thought the worst. JJ says they've only got a camera inside and it looks like it's trained on your window. The office is calling the police just in case. We're vulnerable here, there are lots of high vantage points for snipers, and we don't have an escape route other than the front door and the fire escape. I knew we shouldn't have come."

"I'm sorry," she said to me, her voice sounding genuinely upset, "this is my fault. If I hadn't been such a stubborn bitch about coming back here, we wouldn't be in danger."

I felt sorry for her, again, it's been tough for her recently and I can tell she's struggling to adapt. She's quite obviously and quite naturally out of her depth, I can't fault her for that. Even though she's absolutely correct in her assumption, grudgingly, I decide to cut her some slack.

"It's not your fault, miss. Look, for that vehicle to get on our tail, it must have picked up the car before we left the apartment; probably tracked it from the office to my place. Unless someone leaked where you were that is, then it would be even simpler to follow us, they'd just have watched you get in and tracked us here. So it really doesn't matter if we came here, or went straight to your offices or drove to your home in the country, they would have still been able to follow us. Ok?"

She nodded and I was left to think about my words, it wasn't quite the truth, I had seen no suspicious vehicles. The black Renault had made it to her flat, I assumed, most likely due to a leak at Armstrong Industries. Just one more thing to think about if we did get the contract to look after their security.

"So what do we do now, Freen?"

I hesitated, as for the first time I can remember, she used my first name. It sounded so much nicer on her lips than 'Miss Sarocha'. It's softer, less aggressive, less angrier.

"Well, we follow orders, sit tight and wait to hear from JJ, I guess; You holding up okay?"

"I guess so. This is all so strange. I've never had anyone try to kill me before."