XXXII

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"Come on, let's go! What is taking you so long?!"

"Jesus Christ Ashton chill the fuck up for a second." Luke shouts through the front door while Ashton waits for us in the car.

I couldn't be more excited about this. The feeling of freedom alone made the adrenaline run through my veins and caused my spine to even shiver.

It has been 2 weeks since Luke promised me this trip to nowhere. We decided to drive to somewhere south, heading to a nice beach spot. I could not wait. Despite being reticent, everyone agreed. Even Calum, to everyone's surprise. Maybe things are finally changing for the better. Finally. I'm so tired of living under a cloud of fear.

"Clo?" Luke knocks on my bedroom door. I quickly tied my shoelaces and buttoned up my white tennis skirt. "Are you ready?"

"Yes, it will be just a minute." I stand up from my bed, looking at myself in the mirror. For all this time that I've been locked inside this house, I was never really given the opportunity to put on my old pretty clothes, which I really missed. I fix the little black stain of mascara on my eyelid and take a deep breath, facing myself in the mirror.

Nothing is going to happen.

You are going to have a great time, relax.

"Wow." Luke peeks in, interrupting my thinking.

I look at him through the mirror and turn around to face him. "Hi" I play with my hands, blushing a little at his expression.

"You look... beautiful." He enters and holds my waist, pulling me into a soft kiss.

"Do you like it?" I ask between kisses, resting my hands on his chest. "Well," I break the kiss and step back, doing a little twirl. "This is me..."

"I already loved you on your PJs and my old shirts but now... You look sooo good." He grabs my arm, pulling me even closer to him.

"Stop, you're making me weak." I giggle lightly as he kisses me down my neck. "Ashton is going to catch us."

"Just one more kiss." I give him what he wants, feeling his smile through the kiss. "Are you ready to go?"

"I'm so ready." I laugh.

"I bought something you will need for our trip." Luke pulls out a little box, wrapped in silver paper, topped off with a matching bow.

"What is it?"

"Open it and you'll see."

I do as he instructs, revealing what was hiding underneath. "You bought me a new phone?!" I look up to him, surprised, trying to convince myself it wasn't some kind of joke. "I can actually use it? You said I couldn't..."

"I's ready to use. It has mine and the boys' number on it, in case you need anything."

"Are you sure? They won't trace me?"

"A friend of mine secured it. As long as you don't turn the GPS on, no one will find you."

I hug him really tightly and giggle. "Thank you so so much!" I even jump a little in exctement before kissing him again. "Thank you thank you thank you, you're the best."

"Hm yeah, I know."

"Cocky." I giggle at him, giving him one last kiss. I know it might be ridiculous to everyone else, but having a phone in my hands was a pretty big deal. Since Luke brought me to his house, he never gave me my phone back. It had all my life in it. Sometimes Luke would let me scroll through the camera roll, but nothing more than that. He kept claiming that Tobias would try to locate my phone and it could put all of us in danger, which doesn't surprise me at all. That guy has crossed the line a long time ago. If it wasn't for luck, my Luke wouldn't probably even be here anymore. And despite everything we went through, even the thought of being without him right now made my heart shrink.

"The gun I gave you, did you put it in your bag?"

Ugh. Good times do pass quickly, don't they? "Really?" I let go of his embrace and sigh. "Do I really need to bring it?"

"It's just in case, Chloe."

"You said nothing was going to happen to us."

"And it won't."

"Then I won't be bringing it." I cross my arms, pouting slightly.

"Don't try to negotiate with me, you know it is not going to work." He sighs back at me. "You know we need to stay safe."

I roll my eyes and pick the gun up from under my mattress, where I kept it hidden, before shoving it in my purse.

"Hey, careful" He grabs my wrist. "Don't put it in there you can fire it by accident."

"It's unloaded you idiot." I take the pack of ammunition from the smaller pocket inside my purse. "See? I'm not dumb."

"I didn't say you were, did I? You had a pretty good teacher..."

"Ehh he was ok." I let out sarcastically, but couldn't hold back my laugh. "I'm kidding!"

I hear a honk from outside, probably coming from Ashton's car. I look down at the watch on my wrist. "We're late."

"Are you ready for this?"

"I'm so excited Lukey"

Luke tales one of his grey hooded jackets and laid it on my shoulders. "This will be the last time you'll have to hide."

"Hopefully."

"You can take it off once we start driving away from here." He pauses before continuing. "This place is cursed."

"Trust me, I know... Just kiss me one last time before we go. Please."

He does as I please, finally taking my stuff and guiding me to the car carefully. Luke sat on the passenger's seat next to Ashton after placing all our luggage in the trunk of our seven seat van.

"Finally guys." Ashton says as he starts the car, driving on the way to Calum's place to pick everyone else up.

"For how long do I have to keep this on?" I ask midway, hiding some strands of hair under my hood and folding the ridiculously long sleeves upwards.

"Keep what on?"

"This- huge ass hoodie" I let out, struggling a bit.

"Only until we drive out of this city Chloe I already told you." Luke answers.

"But Luke-"

"Chloe stop. You know you need to hide. Stop acting like that." He interrupts me. It did bother me to know how nice he was to me behind closed doors and how quickly he changed once any of the boys were around. It's like he was two different people.

Ashton glances at my frustrated expression through the mirror. "Don't worry, Chloe. You will be able to take it off soon." He smiles, trying to comfort me, even though Luke's eyes were glued on his face, filling up with anger. I was familiar with that look, and apparently so was Ashton. He immediately looked away once he noticed Luke's expression. Ashton even tried to say something else to ease the tension, but regretted it right after his opened his mouth. He tried to disguise it, pretending to cough, but Luke's bitch face didn't seem to want to leave.

Needless to say,

this is going to be one hell of a trip.

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