He'll come through

Quinn’s eyes were fixed on the road, he was accelerating all the time and the bumping and unsteadiness of the road, coupled with Lilah ducking out of view meant she was in agony all over again.

Looking up at him she could see his eyes darting through the darkness.

                “I’m going to have to go off road....”

With that he swerved heavily to the right, as he did he switched off the headlights.  The car bounced across the scrub and she clung on to the handle above the door, for grim life. As she lifted her head she spotted the car to her left, across the road at an angle, Quinn had cut past the rear of the car and immediately the red car started to reverse trying to catch them in their head lights. Quinn trundled at a ridiculous speed over the rough ground before driving past a few isolated trees.

The other car was trying to turn as quickly as possible, but they were still at right angles to the road. Quinn knew they could hardly see them in the dark night, so he turned dramatically and drove across the road and off in the opposite direction. They could barely make out hills in the distance, but they hit so many potholes and divots that he knew they’d soon have to abandon the car.  Less than a minute later there was a bang and he knew that the last few metres had ruined at least one tyre.

                “We’ve got to make it on foot, stay in front of me; I’ll keep an eye out behind.”

Lilah climbed out of the car, they had nothing other than the bag of bottled water, and the gun she spotted Quinn grab from the foot well.

                “Up there!” he gestured to the hillside in the distance and they set off at a run.

When she glanced back she could see headlights behind them, “are they catching us?”

                “Don’t look back, just keep going...”

Her lungs felt ready to explode as she dragged in chilly night air, this was ridiculous she thought, all those hours she’d spent in the gym, the first adrenaline flushed run and she was panting like a dog. Quinn on the other hand seemed to have night vision, skipping over rocks, grabbing her arm every time she stumbled.  The ground was hard, but covered in light sand that made it slippery, every now and again she reached out for a branch, or Quinn to steady herself.

The incline was steep and Lilah could think of nothing but reaching the top as she scrambled after him. They were half way up when the headlights of the red car illuminated the vehicle they’d abandoned, but keeping up their pace, soon they’d left any hint of those lights behind and in the absence of any obvious following footfall, they slowed a little.

                “You ok?” Quinn whispered as they scaled a particularly steep rocky outcrop.

                “I’m fine. Where are we going?”

He climbed onto a flat ledge of rock then turned to help her, pulling her arm as she scrambled up to him. When she was level with him and drawing breath, he answered, “I’m thinking there must be some form of village or town near here. The only issue is whether the men who took us are local. We could be walking into a trap.” He reached into the sack and pulled out one of the bottles of water and a packet of crackers. Opening the bottle he tipped his head back and swallowed a few mouthfuls, then handed it to her as he unpeeled the wrapping on the crackers.

For a second Lilah turned up her nose at the thought of sharing a bottle of water with a virtual stranger, but drank when he laughed, it was after all drink or die!  The crackers were dry, but her empty stomach appreciated the influx of matter, even if it was so little an amount.  She squatted down glad to find her breath and watched as he studied his watch.

                “What are you doing?”

He glanced down, “another hint of their amateurish nature. They didn’t take my watch, and it has a compass, and GPS, but without a laptop to log the information it’s receiving it doesn’t tell me very much. But I can try and work out where we are.”

She stood, “so what are your thoughts?”

Shrugging he looked up at the air, “I’m not great with constellations, but I do think that that cluster there...” he stood behind her, his chin resting on her shoulder and his arm leading her gaze to a group of stars. “That’s the big dipper or the plough, and those two stars point north....”

She nodded, “and north means?”

He dropped his hand, but his chin stayed on her shoulder, his cheek almost touching hers, “it means we’re heading coastward, and that’s where the majority of civilisation is. Small towns and villages we’ll be vulnerable, but if we can get to a City...we can get to the embassy and we can make you safe!”

It sounded so simple, so straightforward, but it was getting colder, and now that they’d stopped running she could feel the cold creeping into her bones. The last thing she wanted was to start shivering; Quinn needed her to be as strong as him. So she started to jog on the spot, hoping she’d feel a little warmer. That morning she’d dressed for a flight in linen trousers, a short sleeved tunic and fortunately flat shoes, but they offered no support for her feet and very little grip.

                “Do you think I’d be better off barefoot?” she asked extending a foot and checking out the inappropriate shoes.

He shook his head, “no, don’t even think about it. There are sharp rocks, bugs, who knows what, you could rip your feet to shreds!” Suddenly smiling he added, “We’re only part way in to this, we could be walking for a long time. You’re doing well. But I think we need to start bearing right a little. You ok for this?”

Ok? Lilah thought, what was the alternative, sit and wait for the men to decide her fate. As she nodded, agreeing to carry on, she suddenly thought of Gavin. She had to face a few realities, firstly that she’d read more into their dalliance than she did, she’d had some time to reflect and she could see that, she’d wanted a readymade family, the excitement of living abroad, but the safety of the enclosed complex. What had Gavin wanted? A baby sitter...and the occasional shag. That was literally what their relationship had consisted of.

As she followed Quinn, crossing the flatter part of the hill, she tried to deal with the fact that he’d not come to her rescue. If Quinn’s translating had been correct, then he’d been told she was captured, that they wanted something from him, but he’d denied that they had her. Did he think it was unlikely that she was with a man? Or jealous and angry?  She couldn’t imagine that he’d leave her there because of something as trivial as jealousy. That seemed surreal. But how well did she know him? She’d defended him so completely to Quinn, unable to imagine that her instincts had got it so wrong.

Lilah was so absorbed in her own thoughts that she didn’t see him stop, raise a hand encouraging her to do the same, she careered into the back of him and nearly knocked them both over.

               “What is...”

His index finger flew to her mouth before she could say anymore.

                “Look...” he whispered. In front of them, maybe a few hundred metres away was a shack, a shed, nothing more. “It’s probably an occasional shelter for farmers...”

                “Are we going to stop there?”

Looking down at her, he half smiled, “if they’re looking for us in anyway, this is an obvious place to hide out, it’d be better if we could keep going, I reckon if we can get the other side of that mountain then we should be safer...”

                “I can manage it, I promise.”

                “OK.” He swung the strap of the gun over his shoulder and took her hand, “come on sport, leys get going.”

It was too fast and too frantic to be a stroll, but it was quite calming to feel his fingers linked through hers, the gentle pressure of his hand leading her, directing her.  Lilah felt calmer, more in control as he led her up another incline.

                “So tell me about your family Quinn, growing up.”

He paused to look at her, “what? Why?”

                “Because my feet feel blistered raw from these shit shoes and if you tell me cute stories about your childhood I just might be able to ignore them.”

                “We can stop if you like?” he turned to her, “I don’t mind.”

She laughed, “Was it that bad that you want to change the subject? I have no intention of stopping, now spill!”

He deliberated for a while, loudly umming and ahhing, before he finally succumbed, “how about we get one question each, take it in turns?”

“Great idea! Me first! Tell me about your parents, do you have any siblings?”

Quinn glanced down at her for a second then turned back to the route ahead of them, “my father was a Second World War vet, his first wife died and he ended up marrying his secretary, I am the product of a twenty-five year old woman and a fifty nine year old ex army major. My Dad died when I was fifteen, my mother brought me up after that, but I’d been brought up with a military disciplined home life, after that the army at sixteen was a doddle. I have two brothers, Gerald is sixty and works in London, a solicitor, my nephew Jonty is his prodigy and he’s older than me! Robert would be sixty three, but he died of cancer about five years ago.”

                “Wow!”

He nodded, “oh yep, dysfunctional families are us! But hey we’ve all got our skeletons, haven’t we?”

Smiling she started to explain about Rose the eternal hippy who had long cobweb hair and made her own clothes, her father Tony who loved his three spaniels Elfin, Dexter and Martin more than anything except his small plot of land. They tried to live self sufficiently, but they had to make some exceptions. She described their frenetic home, holidays that they’d spent in Ireland, France. How she was different from everyone in school and hated that growing up. Suddenly she realised that she’d spent far too much time giving away far too much of the intricate history that made up her psyche.

Gulping she snapped her mouth shut. Quinn squeezed her hand, “it’s ok to talk, and we all have our problems, our skeletons, hey? And I have to say,” he stopped and spun around to face her, “you are definitely different, and different where I come from Blondie is a VERY good thing!”

They started to walk again, “my question now!” Quinn announced. “What did you do after school? I mean you’re what twenty six? That’s years from school.”

                “I studied at university, teaching. But I hated it, not the course, the kids, but the structure. I hated being tied to something, so once I graduated I left the country, spent some time in Thailand helped in an orphanage there, then backpacked through Malaysia, to Australia. It was meant to be a month to relax, but I was gone for almost two years. Even when I got back I didn’t want to work, not every day, every week. So I came here, for Gavin, looking after Maria, who is a little darling!”

Quinn didn’t respond for a while, instead they had no negotiate a really rocky descent.

                “How completely opposite are we? I had the structure, got into the army, the regimented lifestyle that my father instilled.”

                “Why did you leave?”

Quinn reached in the bag and found the open bottle of water, drinking some before passing it to her. Dropping to perch on a rock, he watched her empty the bottle.

                “We were a Special Ops team, called in for major security issues, kidnaps, hijacks. But one mission, we were in mid Africa, a group of mainly British gem miners had disappeared. We found them rescued them, three months later they were involved in a coup, taking over the government, all to get more money. It led to civil war, hundreds if not thousands of deaths. We were called in again, and I had the pleasure of finding a school full of dead children....” Shaking his head, she could see the vision still stayed with him, “they were slaughtered, so brutally. But it was all due to these bloody greedy European mongrels that I lost my best mate saving!”

Lilah gave a long slow whistle, “that is awful. Tell me about your best mate.”

He looked at the sky, “the sun is about to rise, look.” He pointed to the horizon, a hint of light started to show. “They’re going to come as soon as the sun rises, we need to find somewhere to hide, get some rest.”

                “Back to that shack?”

                “Sitting ducks in there. Stay here, let me just...” With that he dashed off into the rocks nearby.

Without him next to her she felt lonely and very vulnerable. The sun was throwing a few more shafts of light into the previously dark sky, she felt exposed as she waited for him to return. A few minutes later his head emerged from between some rocks a few feet away.

                “Over here!”

She rushed across the rocks, sliding and slipping before almost falling down the ravine into his arms. He caught her with a grin, “What is it with women falling for me?”

She punched his shoulder, “I just got a bit nervous....”

Hugging her briefly, he led her deeper into the crevice between the two huge slabs of rock. At the narrowest point she spotted a ledge, it was barely visible in the poor light, but it seemed so deep that she knew it’d be protected from the sun.

                “Climb up, you can only see the ledge from here I’m sure. If they come they’ll not see us unless they actually climb down here. But it doesn’t look obvious from above so I think we might be safe.”

Lilah climbed onto the rock, she could barely sit in the gap as the overhanging rock was so long, so he laid down and rolled until her back was against the rock. Quinn passed her the bag of scant supplies and hopped up next to her.

                “Are you cold?” When she nodded he pulled her into his arms, nestled her head onto his shoulder and lay beside her. “We’ll be fine, I promise.”

Suddenly she was so tired, her eyes could barely stay open, and despite the hot day, the running they’d done, he smelled so good. So she nuzzled into him and relaxed for the first time in days.

Quinn was alert, he didn’t need to stress Lilah out, but he was nervous as the morning light approached. Just as he started to think that he’d over reacted, he heard a buzzing sound, in the distance but getting closer...

Sliding free from Lilah, who fortunately didn’t wake, he slipped across the rocks and looked back down the mountain, in the distant, faint on the horizon was the shack they’d passed a while ago. He’d honestly thought they’d covered more ground, but as he watched he realised the buzz was coming from an ATV that was bouncing over the rocks, climbing the mountain towards him. Jumping down he turned to Lilah and realised she was barely visible from where he stood, so he retrieved the gun and lay in front of her, training the barrel along the ravine, listening as the buzzing got louder, and louder.