She's Stronger Than You Think

Escape

I knew this had been a bad idea. As the guard slowly investigated, I crawled underneath a table and tried to force myself to calm down and breathe. It was as if my lungs weren't working properly. I could hear my heart beating in my ears.

The guard wandered around the room a little bit, almost as if he was taking note of what was there. He was going to see that some stuff was missing. My heart pounded. I tucked my legs underneath me as the guard's flashlight beam shone near my body.

I heard his footsteps approaching. Nate was trying to say something to me through the speaker, but I had to turn it down. Someone might hear it. I held my breath as the guard strolled past me. As he walked in front of me, I shifted out of view--and onto something hard.

The guard stopped and seemed to be fiddling around with some of the artifacts. I put my hand under my thigh and touched my gun. I felt my heart leap a little as an idea came to me. I peeked out from underneath the table and saw that the guard had his back turned and had placed his flashlight on another table. Now was my chance.

I slowly crawled out. As I moved, I silently removed my gun from the holster. Thankfully, my boots somehow made no sound as I made my way over to the guard. He seemed too distracted to know that I was moving in on him. I quietly raised my arm. At the last second, he turned. I panicked and quickly brought the gun down on the side of his head.

He collapsed to the floor with a grunt. I took a step back and tried to catch my breath. Blood rushed to my head and my heartbeat was so loud that I couldn't really hear anything. As I tried to calm down, I reached for the flashlight. For some reason, I wanted to se the guard's face.

I shone the light on him and gasped. I dropped the flashlight beside his body. The man wasn't a guard--it was Sean.

"Oh my gosh," I whispered. I felt myself start to panic again. My breathing caught in my chest.

I could hear someone trying to talk to Sean through his earpiece. Matt. I felt tears burning as a wave of homesickness washed over me. Then I remembered that Nate was trying to reach me. I quickly turned up my headpiece again.

"(Y/n)! If you don't answer me right now, I am coming in!" Nate was yelling.

"Nate!" I said. "I'm here, I just--we gotta go. Now!"

"What?"

"There's--There's someone here. I almost got caught. We need to get out of here. Immediately," I told him earnestly. The panic was really starting to set in now. What just happened?

"Wh--Alright. Just take what you have and come to way you came in," Nate said. "I'll take care of the rest."

"Okay," I breathed, trying to calm down again.

With shaking legs and hands, I hurried over to the table and grabbed the bag. All sorts of questions raced through my mind. Why had I agreed to do this? Why was Sean here? How? Was Matt planning something? If so, what? My  brain was going at a hundred miles per hour.

I somehow found my way to the window.  Nate was standing on the dock waiting. I tossed the bag down to him. He caught it and passed it off to Tyler, who hurried to the car. I grabbed onto the edge of the window as I inched out. The window had to have been nine or ten feet off of the ground.

"(Y/n)!" Nate called. "You have to jump!"

I wasn't sure about that. But I had to suck it up, I knew that much. With a big breath, I hesitantly let go of the window and pushed myself away from it. I only fell for a couple of seconds, but it still surprised me when Nate caught me. For some reason, I almost didn't think he would.

"Are you okay?" He asked. That surprised me even more.

I looked up at his dark brown eyes. They were something else I had never noticed. Slowly, I nodded.

"I think so," I answered.

"Hey!" Mark yelled. We both turned toward his voice. "We gotta get out of here before the cops show up!"

"Right," Nate said quietly. He lowered my legs to the ground and let go of me. He led me down the street right behind Tyler and Mark. We dashed behind buildings and through alleys until we finally made it back to the now empty café, where Felix and Ethan were waiting for us.