Taken Hostage

Tear gas.

Bullets tore through branches and leaves rained down on their heads. Colby pulled her down into the underbrush, dirt flying into her face as he positioned himself prone and looked into the wake from where they had come.

Two men were stalking them, walking forward slowly. They were off to the right and the direction they were heading had them in a trajectory that wouldn’t intercept where they were hiding. However, if they moved, they would certainly alert them to their presence. Colby fingered through the dead leaves and produced a fragmented bit of black plastic.

“Rubber bullets,” he whispered.

Regan nodded. From her years of physician training, she knew rubber bullets were less lethal but could still produce significant injury if the victim was hit the right way. However, the tear gas and use of less lethal ammunitions meant these men were more interested in detaining them than in killing them.

Regan reached for the cooler and pulled it close to her body. The two men continued to veer right, in the direction of the spent tear gas canister, when another man broached the tree line.

Colby inhaled sharply, his hand tightening around hers. “I know that guy.”

They both remained prone, covered well by a grouping of waist-high bushes. “From where?” Regan whispered.

“The military. Delta Force. We served together.”

“Maybe we should just surrender then,” Regan said.

Colby shook his head. “Never surrender until you know the intention of your enemy.”

Why had Colby called a man he’d served with the enemy? Particularly former comrades.

A car engine roared to life as someone pressed on the accelerator with the car in Neutral. Regan reflexively rolled her eyes. There was a gentleman who lived on the street behind her who repaired cars out of his garage. This daily occurrence was usually annoying, but now Regan might need to bake him cookies because it drew all three men off in a run away from them.

Colby patted her back and motioned in the other direction. They hustled, half bent over, Colby taking the lead. After several minutes they came to a small clearing in the trees where Regan spied what was non-affectionately known as a death machine in medicine.

A motorcycle.

Regan pulled away from Colby. Even if their lives were in danger, she couldn’t imagine getting on the back. It was black with burnt orange metallic accents. New or at the very least idolized. He took her purse and the cooler from her hands and set them on the ground. Taking off his black leather jacket, he handed it to her and then muscled her purse into a small saddlebag. Without instruction, she put it on, swallowed up by the heavy fabric and the scent of his cologne. Colby grabbed the black helmet from the seat and handed it to her. She held it in her hand like a foreign object.

“Put it on,” he ordered.

It seemed ridiculous to argue and Regan tried to push from her mind the hundreds of surgeries she’d performed on brain-injured patients from crashing on these bikes.

“Where’s yours?”

“That is mine. I didn’t think I’d be taking you with me.” He straddled the bike and pulled it upright. “Regan, hurry. Pick the cooler up. It’s not going to take them long to figure out they went the wrong direction.”

She handed him the cooler and pushed the helmet over her head. Definitely too big, but it would afford some protection if she fell off or they crashed. Colby motioned her forward and tightened the strap under her chin, which only mildly improved the situation. He grabbed her arm and helped her up. The passenger seat, if that was even the correct term, was perched higher than Colby’s seat and it forced her forward, the front of her body against his back.

Colby kept the cooler pinned between him and the front of the bike. “You’re going to need to reach around me and hold the cooler in place so I can drive.” He clasped her hands and pulled her forward so she was snuggled tightly against his back. Her fingers felt the cool plastic handle and she gripped it tightly.

The motorcycle roared to life when suddenly something sharp hit Regan square in her midback. She gasped, released the cooler from her hands and began to fall off the bike to the left. Colby turned and grabbed her before her body was introduced to the ground. Regan patted her lower back and brought her hand up. No blood.

As Colby steadied her, his eyes narrowed, and Regan turned to see what he’d zeroed in on. Regan glanced back.

They’d been found.

Regan resituated herself on the bike, thrust her arms forward, found the cooler again and held it tightly. “Go!”

The motorcycle surged forward, Colby taking a deep right turn, kicking up dirt and grass. Regan closed her eyes, her stomach in her throat. The vibration of the engine tingled every nerve in her body.

“Don’t let go!” Colby ordered.

One thing she knew—if she let go of Colby in that moment, she would die.

* * *

Colby turned into the parking lot of a run-down highway motel and stopped the engine. He held the bike centered, allowing Regan to climb down before he set the kickstand in place. He couldn’t help but smile as Regan walked, legs slightly wider, to shake off the muscle tiredness of sitting on a bike for over an hour. She pulled the helmet off her head, her red hair spilling onto her slender shoulders.

She turned back to him with a smile on her face and a mischievous gleam in her eyes. “I might have to change my mind about these things.”

“Fun, right?”

However the smile melted from her face as soon as she closed the distance between them, her hand reaching behind her.

“Take off the jacket. Let me look,” Colby said.

Regan eased the jacket off her shoulders and handed it to him. Colby pushed himself off the bike, set the cooler on the ground and laid the jacket over the bike seat. He walked around so she wouldn’t have to move anymore.

“Show me where it hurts.”

Her hand reached behind her and her fingers tentatively traveled up the middle of her back. “Here. Is it bleeding?” she asked.

Through the thin material, silk if he had to guess, there wasn’t any blood seeping through. “No blood.”

She exhaled. “Good. Bruising?”

Colby gingerly raised the fabric until he saw the lower outline of a purple bruise and then pulled the shirt back down. “Yes, you have a bruise.”

“How big?” Regan asked.

Colby took a step back and held his breath in an attempt to get his heart to stop hammering against his ribs. “I don’t know. It looks nasty, but not as bad as it could have been. The jacket saved you from a bigger injury.”

Regan turned to face him. “You’d make a lousy doctor,” she said, a frown on her face.

“And you’d make a lousy bounty hunter, so we’re even.”

“What makes you say that?”

“I don’t know—hiding out at your own house with the goods you stole from the hospital, for one. For two, opening the door on the first knock.”

Regan crossed her arms. “Point made.”

Colby surveyed the scene around him. He didn’t see anyone suspicious and he hadn’t seen anyone following them. As soon as they’d fled on the bike, he was pretty sure he’d gained enough distance before their pursuers could even get in a vehicle to track them.

What was odd? No police seemed to be too interested in their presence. If local law enforcement had a BOLO, Colby and his bike would be easy to spot.