He'll come through

Chapter 8 - Escape to Victory

Chapter 8

The group of buildings was not exactly what she was expecting, she was used to European towns, even the City she’d lived in with Gavin had been built up full of life. This was a few dozen houses, and not much else, all separated but barely paved roads. Small gardens housed animals, the odd goat, but otherwise there was very little sign of life, anywhere.

Quinn led her into the group of houses most were single level brick buildings with flat roofs but there were a few with two stories, and he gestured towards one.

                “They’ll be sleeping upstairs - easier to sneak in,” he explained. He chose the third house that fitted the criteria, after spending lots of time looking through windows and outback at the others.  

Depositing Lilah behind a wall he placed a finger on her lips, “if I’m not back in fifteen minutes.” He handed her his watch, “you need to try and get away, on the back of this watch,” he flipped it over, “are three numbers. If you call any of them they’ll respond immediately to your GPS location and the code word ‘augment ‘.”

                “How am I meant to find a phone if you can’t?”

He winked, “I will, and you can use your feminine wiles on the rare, very rare occasion that I fail!”

Lilah was shaking her head as he disappeared into the rear of the building.

Quinn had done this a million times before. Searching houses in the dead of night, finding keys, phones, maps, anything he could use to get him to a further destination, but it was the first time he’d done it with someone as vulnerable as Lilah outside, waiting. So he was quicker than normal.

Glancing at the watch, Lilah moaned quietly, he’d been almost ten minutes. If he’d been discovered she’d imagined there’d be lights turned on, some sort of commotion, she was praying that the silence was her friend. Gaining a little confidence she peeped up over the wall watching the door, waiting for Quinn to emerge, waiting until she could breathe again.

It was then she spotted in the distance, maybe fifty metres away, a man, heading towards them. Was it someone who lived there? Or one of the men after her? She couldn’t bear to watch them grab Quinn, hurt him. She had to intervene, had to stop this.

With a courage she didn’t know she possessed, Lilah crept along the low wall, trying to make her way closer to the other man. She had to think of a way to distract him, to change this action. Throw something? That was her only option, but she was no baseball pitcher, she had a real girly throw, no point causing a distraction closer than the guy already was.

Taking a small rock, no bigger than a walnut, she launched it as hard as she could away from her, in the opposite direction to the house where Quinn was currently ensconced. Peaking up she saw the man stop as the stone caused a small kafuffle off in the distance; he called out something in a language she didn’t understand. Waited for a response then turned and walked off in the opposite direction.

Letting out her breath in a pant, she crawled back to her starting place, then almost bumped into Quinn.

                “Where the hell have you been?” he hissed pulling her into his arms with relief, dropping an impromptu kiss onto the top of her hair. The relief for Lilah was complete, she sank into him.

                “There was a man....” she pointed off in the distance, “I distracted him but I think he may come back.”

The sentiment and relief in Quinn disappeared immediately, “we don’t want to be chased. If we go then it’s a proper escape. Let’s take stock for a while.”