Lost and Found

Chapter Thirty-Five

Trubel's POV

It was a little more than a three-hour drive to Seattle, but it still felt like forever. I couldn't help but wonder how the whole situation would go wrong - actually, I mostly wondered which of us would make it out alive.

The odds were not in my favor. The whole way to Cash's house, Andre told horror stories of things Cash had done. They were all terrible, but in my opinion, the worst was a story of how Cash found and murdered a guy's son because the guy had stolen a few hundred dollars to buy his family some groceries. That was almost a perfect example of how heartless this guy was. I obviously didn't plan on stealing from Cash, but that didn't mean there wouldn't be other reasons for him to want to kill me.

A goal of mine was to avoid the topic of Nick. If Cash found out about the deal Andre and I had made, it would show him that Nick was someone that could be used against me. I didn't need Nick on another person's hit list; we were both screwed enough.

I sighed to myself in the backseat of Andre's Mustang. I was frustrated. I gave up my whole life to protect Nick - and I would do it again considering that if it weren't for him I wouldn't have a life to give up - but I needed to find a way to get us both off of 7th Street's radar before something really bad happened.

I didn't know how to do that, so for now, the plan was to somehow get Cash to like me... and to do Seventh Street's bidding forever.

"Trubel?" Andre asked, sounding irritated. He glared at me through the rearview mirror.

"What?" I asked.

"Did you really not hear anything I just said?" he demanded. I shrugged and he groaned before complaining, "Cash is going to kill us."

"Would you relax?" Roy asked. "You're making me nervous."

"We haven't done anything that would piss off Cash," I told them both. "We should be fine." I didn't really believe what I was saying, but maybe they would.

Andre huffed angrily. "We haven't done anything yet," he hissed.

"That's encouraging," Roy grumbled.

Andre looked back and forth between me and Roy. "Here's the deal. You guys don't talk unless he asks you a question," he began to list. I rolled my eyes, and Andre saw me in the mirror. "Don't do that," he told me.

"Andre-" I began to object.

"Don't talk back," he added to the list.

"Don't attack anyone," Roy added, turning completely around in the passenger's seat to look at me pleadingly.

"I got it! I got it!" I yelled at them. I knew the risks were high, and I didn't need them reminding me of all the ways I could screw up.

"Good because we're here," Andre announced.

I looked out the windows as we passed a sign that said, "PRIVATE ROAD." We drove a few more seconds and ended up in front of a massive metal gate with armed guards standing in front of it, holding guns on the car. Andre held a hand out the window and made some gesture that I didn't recognize and the guards lowered their weapons, walking up to the car as they did.

"Who are you?" a large man with a deep voice demanded.

"Andre," he explained. "I'm meeting with Cash to show him out new... asset."

I wished he wouldn't call me that.

The man nodded at Andre and then nodded at the other guy who spoke into a handheld radio. The gate started opening automatically, but the second guy didn't move out of our car's way. Instead, he barked orders for us to get out of the car.