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No answer.
Fear rips through my heart. What the hell is going on!? My free hand instinctively wraps across my belly.
“Where are you!?” a familiar voice growls over the body guards radio. Dante.
“We’re nearly there,” replies the brute.
We turn a corner and practically sprint down a hall. Suddenly, we’re at a familiar looking doorway.
Oh no. No. No. No
There’s no way I’m going down there again.
My captor loosens his grip around my wrist for a split second as he opens the dark door down to the pitch-black basement, and I take the opportunity to rip away from him with all of my strength.
“Hey!” he shouts, as I slip from his grip.
It takes me a second to realize I’ve actually escapes, but when I do, all bets are off. I turn and sprint from that dark doorway with all my might.
I’m hardly fast enough to outrun the body guard, but I have to try. I make a sharp turn back into the open space on the main floor and desperately try to think of anywhere I can hide.
The nearest doorway has collapsed into itself, though. The fantail staircase we just came down is already crumbling. A blast shakes the walls and throws fiery light over just how hopeless my situation is.
I don’t stop running, though. I can feel the body guard on my tail. He’s getting closer and closer...
Suddenly, a roar fills the hall.
I flinch, ducking and nearly falling to the floor, but I somehow manage to keep my feet.
A dying groan creeps through the air, and I glance back to see my pursuing guard lying flat on his face, drowning in a pool of his own blood.
He’s been shot...
“Cat!”
The familiar voice rips my eyes off the corpse and up to the top of the crumbling fantail staircase. I know who it is even before I lay my eyes on him, but I don’t dare hope that he’s actually here.
My heart freezes when I spot Angel leaning over the railing of the second-floor hallway.
“Angel!” desperate happiness leaks out through my lips. I immediately start running towards him, but I quickly notice there’s no way up the stairs anymore... and no way down. Rubble fills the steps nearly to the ceiling.
Angel and I can finally see each other again, but we’re still separated.
“Are you alright?” he shouts down to me.
I just nod, my words catching in my throat. He doesn’t know about the baby...
My saviour looks around, desperately searching for a way down to me. “Find a spot to hide down there,” he calls. “I’ll be down in a—”
Suddenly, a cacophony of roars re-fills the stale air. I wince away, falling onto my ass, and when I look back up to Angel, I see a trail of bullet holes exploding in the wall behind him as he makes a run for safety.
“No! Angel!!!” Just like that, he’s gone again, flung behind a pile of rubble.
“Shut the fuck up!” It’s Dante. I try to scramble away from him but he’s too fast and angry. Even with a limp, he’s at my side and reaching for my wrist before I can find safety. “You’re coming with me,” he hisses.
“Never!” I kick at the slimy asshole and my heel catches him in the shin. He yelps in pain and raises his gun, pointing it directly between my eyes. I freeze.
“If you ever strike me again, I will kill you, understand?”