Page 160 of Protecting Peyton

I couldn’t use the door. I’d heard the muffled sounds now and again that told me the monster’s goons were out there. Without a window, that left only the walls. The one the bed was up against was brick, an outside wall. The other three walls were drywall painted off-white.

Grateful for the home renovation shows I’d watched, I remembered that the wall would have vertical studs set wide enough apart that I could easily fit through.

Eennie meenie miney moe, I had to choose a direction to go and, since I was right-handed, chose that direction. It was the wall with the dresser. Tapping lightly on the wall, I found it thankfully hollow, like on TV, and located where I thought two wooden studs were.

Kicking a hole in it and pulling pieces of the drywall away would get me through, but would be too noisy. I needed something to cut into it that wouldn’t make noise.

Looking at my shoes, I tried to figure out a way to use one, but then noticed my belt buckle. I pulled my belt off and used the sharp edge of the buckle to gouge the wallboard. It worked, and in no time I had a small square hole large enough to get my fingers into.

On my first try at pulling a piece of the drywall loose, I lost my grip and fell backward on my ass. Desperate, I attacked it again. After expanding the hole a little, my second attempt worked, and a large piece of the material ripped loose.

My heart went into overdrive. The sound was loud enough that I thought the guards might hear it. The ten seconds I waited to see if they would come barreling through the door were the longest of my life. I wiped my brow and got back to work.

Carefully, I broke smaller pieces loose, then started a hole through to the other side. When it was large enough, I put my eye to it.

I’d chosen well. It was an empty room with two doors, one that clearly led to the hallway with the guards and another on the opposite wall.

“I don’t care what he said,” a loud and obviously drunk voice said on the other side of my door. “I’ve been waiting long enough. I want my turn with that piece of ass.”

I froze.

“You wait.” The bellow was muffled, but clearly Baldy’s voice. “We all wait.”

I pushed out pieces of drywall into the other room, moving as fast as I could quietly. Then, I wiggled partway through and then backed out.

Why had Monster told Baldy to get my purse?

It didn’t matter why he wanted it. I wasn’t leaving it for him. So, I grabbed it and then went through the hole and scurried to the door on the opposite wall.

It wasn’t locked, so I cracked it open. It was a hallway. One direction was the area the goons were hanging out in, and in the other direction it turned a corner after a few feet. I tip-toed out, closed the door quietly behind me and scurried away. The corridor went left, and then into a dimly lit and scary warehouse area. The lights were off, and from the little light that filtered in from the few small, filthy windows high up, I made out haphazard rows of pallets stacked three high, each holding blue barrels.

Loud voices sounded behind me.

There had to be an exit at the back somewhere, and I took off at a run. The floor was slippery, and I fell the first time I tried to dodge a pallet.

Suddenly, the lights came on. “Find her.”Crap.Monster was back. “She couldn’t have gone any other way.”

Getting up, I could now read the skull and crossbones marks on all the barrels with the words hazardous waste.Double crap.I’d landed in a puddle of toxic who-knows-what. Wiping my hands on my pants, I moved only slightly more slowly toward the back, where freedom beckoned.

“Marko,” Monster bellowed. “In case she already got out. You go outside and take the left side of the building, and Oleg, you take the right side.”

Triple crap. None of the back exits would work. I’d have to do the one thing they didn’t expect and sneak past them the way I’d come in.

First thing though was to hide my purse. I went to the next pallet where the floor was dry and kicked the purse underneath. If they wanted it, they’d have to find it.

Two clusters of pallets later, I turned the corner, and ran straight into one of them.

“There you are,” the skinny dude said. He blocked my way, but was too far away to attack.

I cowered, making myself as small as possible. “Please don’t hurt me.”Come closer, asshole. I’m easy prey.

“Oh, I’m going to enjoy fucking you,” he said as he lowered his guard and walked forward.

Yeah, that’s right. I’m no threat.“Please don’t give me to him,” I mumbled, staring at the ground and his shoes.

When he took another step, I launched upward and hit him as hard as I could in the throat.

He fell to his knees and grabbed at his neck, trying to yell, but it only came out as a gurgle.