ARKEN

We're Being Followed

Alyssa knew they had to get Audrey back, but she didn't know how. It seemed as though every possible lead was a dead end and Stavish was always just out of reach. It angered her that she was always so close to him, only for something to change.

"What do we do, Lys?" Alex asked her younger sister. "They wouldn't kill her right? Not if they want you to join them again?"

"Once they know they have me, they'll kill her. Or if she gives them trouble." Alyssa turned the phone's ringer on high, she wanted to make sure she knew full well when it rang. She knew more about Stavish than anyone and Alex was counting on her to think of something, but at that moment, she could only stand there dumbfounded.

"There has to be something we can do besides just waiting around for a phone call."

"Let's go back to the motel and figure out how they got her."

They left the building and took the Ranger back to the motel. The whole time, she was thinking about Audrey. I'll never forgive myself for Pops. I don't know what I'll do if we don't get Audrey back. She stopped herself, knowing she couldn't let that doubt get to her now. She was relying on the anger and hatred she directed at Stavish to keep her going.

They returned to the motel and went into their room. The place was untouched, with no sign that Audrey had been forcibly taken. Why would she have left?

"She wasn't taken here," Alex said.

"I was just thinking the same thing. She went out and was taken from somewhere else. She knew how dangerous it is, why would she go out?"

"She probably didn't take it well when we left her to stay here while we went out. Maybe we shouldn't have left her here."

"What was she going to do against Adrian Ford, or a bunch of armed gunmen?"

"I don't know, but we wouldn't be in this situation now if we had at least let her come along. She's not dumb, she knows she's not a fighter."

"I know that..." Alyssa sighed, feeling guilty about it.

They exited the motel and searched the exterior for the way Audrey would have gone. It was dark, the middle of the night now. "We had the truck, and she had no money for a taxi or the bus. She had to walk," Alyssa commented aloud.

They left the motel in the Ranger, driving along the route they thought Audrey might have taken. They both knew that she could not have managed to get too far in the amount of time they were gone. Only enough that someone spotted her. I wasn't there to protect her, I wasn't there to protect Pops.

Audrey and Alex knew how dangerous Stavish's group was, but Alyssa was aware there was another level to their maliciousness that her sisters could never understand because they had not lived with those people for years.

They passed a fire department when Alyssa noticed that the same driver had been a few cars behind them for almost the whole time. She might have discounted it, but they had taken far too many turns for that to be a coincidence. Even then, a normal person might have shrugged it off, but her senses were heightened, constantly waiting for the next ambush from Stavish.

"Alex, we're being followed. Don't look back, look in the mirror. See the brown sedan?"

"Yeah."

"He's been with us almost since we left the motel."

"Do you think he's one of Stavish's people?"