My Kidnapper's Mistake

Chapter 3: Hide Out

Julian's P.O.V.

We parked the cars in front of a rundown warehouse. To everybody's knowledge including the government, the building belonged to a Mr D. Briggs and was not used for anything, when in fact there was no such person as D. Briggs and the ground floor was the only unused part of the building.

"Tristan give me your shirt." I demanded holding out my hand.
"But..."
"You have two on, just give me the damn shirt. You'll get it back later." I snapped, cutting off any objections.
Tristan huffed a few curses but handed his plait shirt to me. I folded it horizontally, so that it made a long thin strip.
I opened the trunk of the Mustang. The boy made an attempt to get out of the trunk, I hit him over the head with the butt of my handgun and he dropped like a sack of potatos. I blindfolded him with the folded shirt and hauled him over my shoulder. The boy was lighter than I had expected, to my hands his body almost felt feminine, but who was I to judge.

I walked into the warehouse through the rusty door hanging on it's hinges. The ground floor was shrouded in darkness due to a lack of windows to let in light. Rotting pallets were scattered everywhere. The place had long ago been raided of any useful items or scrap metal. In the far corner I noticed that some poor soul had chosen to set up camp here and I made a mental note to deal with it later. Word quickly spread through the homeless community, if there was a dry place where nobody cared to kick you out, they flocked in like a plague and we definitely did not need drunken homeless people drawing attention to this place. I ignored the obvious choice of stairs and walked to a partially concealed staircase. I scanned my thumbprint and entered the code on the keyboard next to a heavy steel door concealed behind graffiti. The door opened with a click and we all filed in.

The second floor was much better. A small cubicle for the bathroom had been sectioned off by partitions. A kitchenette was mounted to the west wall. Four bunk beds were pushed up against the east wall and in between was a round wooden table covered in maps and notes. The north wall was mostly made up of windows and let in plenty of light. I dragged one of the chairs from the round table and set it in a corner. I dumped the boy into the chair. He won't be waking up for quite a while so I searched through every drawer in the kitchenette in search of some rope. I don't really know why I just didn't kill the boy and be done with it, I guessed that maybe I had killed enough people for one day. The rest of the team hadn't said a word and I knew they wouldn't ask about my motives at this stage. I would tell them in due course but now... Now I just needed to lie down. When the Boss came I, as leader, would take responsibility and suffer the consequences of our failure, the others knew that and that was probably the main reason for their silence. I tied up the boy and walked to my bed, the others watched my every move, waiting for instructions. I sank down with a huff and closed my eyes.

It felt like I had only slept for a few minutes before I was woken up by someone shaking my shoulder.
"Julian. Julian. The boy is awake." In my state of half sleep I couldn't even comprehend who was talking to me and I tried swatting him away.
"Julian we have bit of a odd development."
I groaned wishing this pesky voice would go away.
"Julian! Get up!"
I shot up, hitting my head on the top bunk.
"I'm up. I'm up."
Stuart's face came into focus. It was safe to say that he was not my favourite person in the world at that moment. I got up and stretched out my muscles.
"What happened?"
"Our hostage has miraculously changed genders." Tristan stated matter-of- fact.
"And the Boss is at the door." Kevin added.

Crap. What do I address first? Possibly the Boss. Then again a gender swap?! I walked to the middle of the room. The CCTV footage showed the Boss getting out of his car. I made a split second decision. I grabbed the chair with the boy... Girl? Whatever. I dragged it into the small bathroom, feeling soft hair brushing against my arm. I didn't dare look down, worried that I would get caught up in the mystery and be unable to focus on the real threat at hand.
I closed the door hoping our whatever would be sensible and stay quiet since I had forgotten to gag it earlier and there was no time for it now.