Jenna Black - Resistance

According to the map on Dante’s handheld, if they forged ahead on foot through the woods behind the store, they would eventually emerge right near the Sanctuary. It was still chilly at this time of year upstate, and the woods looked relatively easy to navigate with most of the undergrowth still dormant. Even so, the moment they stepped out of the car, Nate realized they had a couple of problems, both centered around Agnes’s opera finery. For one, she had on high heels that would make it impossible for her to even walk through the woods, much less run. For another, since she hadn’t been planning on an excursion outside, she hadn’t even brought the gossamer, ineffectual wrap she’d worn into the theater. If Nate felt the cold through his tux, she had to be freezing in her strapless gown.

“I think you’ll have to wait with the car,” he told her as she crossed her arms over her chest and shivered. “You’ll never get through the woods in those shoes.”

She looked down at her feet as if startled to find she was wearing heels. “Damn,” she said, her breath feathering in the cold air.

“We can’t leave her here alone,” Dante protested, eying Agnes with suspicion.

“Oh, come on!” Agnes said with an exaggerated roll of her eyes. “What do you think I’m going to do? Steal your getaway car? You have the keys, and you have my phone battery.”

Dante ignored her and focused on Nate. “You should stay here with her.”

Nate laughed with no humor. “Yeah, right. Not gonna happen.”

“She could run off the moment we have our backs turned,” Dante argued. “Just because she doesn’t have a working phone on her doesn’t mean she can’t find one. No offense, Miss Belinski, but I still don’t get why you’re ‘helping’ us, so I’m not about to take any chances.”

“I’m not helping you, ” Agnes said with disdain. “I’m helping Nadia. And in case you’ve forgotten, I’m already in this up to my neck by now. Plenty of people saw me leave the theater with Nathaniel—willingly. Once they figure out what he’s up to, they’ll know I was an accomplice. I don’t know what’s going to happen to me, but it’s not going to be anything good.”

Her eyes shimmered with tears. It was a rare Executive girl who couldn’t conjure up crocodile tears in an attempt to get her way, but even so, Nate believed her. In the heat of the moment when she’d insisted on helping him, and even when she’d refused to allow them to lock her in the trunk, Agnes might not have fully comprehended what the consequences of her actions would be. But she’d had more than four hours to think things through, and she was not stupid. It was far too late to change her mind now, and she knew it.

“I’m coming with you,” Nate told Dante, “and Agnes will wait with the car.”

Dante bristled, drawing himself up to his full height and shifting his weight onto the balls of his feet in a posture that screamed of aggression and intimidation. He was an imposing specimen with muscles on his muscles, and Nate had no doubt he knew how to fight. He probably learned all kinds of useful skills like that in spy training school.

“Stay with Agnes,” Dante ordered, as if ordering around the Chairman Heir were business as usual for him. “Or I’ll make you.”

“He’s your servant,” Agnes put in drily, nodding. “Ri-ight.”

Nate was sure he’d come out the loser if he got into a fistfight with Dante, but he wasn’t about to let the bastard ride off to Nadia’s rescue while he sat around in the car and twiddled his thumbs. Internally wincing, pretty sure he was about to get the crap kicked out of him, he raised his fists and gave Dante his fiercest glare.

“Fine. Make me.”

“We don’t have time for this,” Agnes said before any punches were thrown. “Put me in the trunk if that will satisfy both of your overblown egos. Stop acting like kids on a playground and get moving.”

Nate’s face flushed with heat as he realized how right she was. What possible reason could he have for refusing to back down except that his ego was too big to let Dante be Nadia’s hero? Childish and selfish. He was really on a roll.

Nate forced his fists open and straightened up from what he was sure was a pathetic imitation of a fighter’s crouch. Conceding to Dante was harder than it should have been, and he chose his next words carefully, trying to get his point across without escalating hostilities once more.

“If you really think I’m more useful sitting in the car with Agnes than coming with you as backup in case anything goes wrong, then I’ll stay here. But we’re not putting her in the trunk.” She deserved better than that.

Dante looked back and forth between the two of them, then sighed and scrubbed a hand through his hair. He stared at the pavement at his feet for a moment, then looked up again.

“Do you know how to use that gun you took off Fischer?”

“Um, I assume I just point and shoot.”

Dante grimaced as he held his hand out and made a give-it-to-me motion. Nate handed over the gun, and Dante took a quick look at it.

“This is a semi-auto,” he said, “so it is basically point and shoot. Just make sure you have the safety off before you do.” He turned the gun over and pointed at a toggle switch beneath the grip, then handed the gun back.

“Is it on or off right now?” Nate asked, even though it made him sound like an idiot too ignorant to be allowed around a deadly weapon.

“On. And keep it that way until I tell you.”

Nate swallowed a protest, knowing that objecting to Dante’s tone was just petty. If Dante was the one who knew what he was doing, then Nate was just going to have to be a man about it and listen to him. Even when he insisted on giving orders.

“I’m getting back in the car,” Agnes said, her teeth chattering with cold.

Nate slid his tux jacket off and handed it to her. “It won’t be much warmer in the car,” he said. He might have tried to talk Dante into leaving the keys so she could turn on the heater, but he didn’t want to start another argument.

“You’ll need it,” Agnes said, trying to hand the jacket back.

“With all this adrenaline pumping through me?” he asked with a grin. “I won’t feel a thing. Besides, we’ll keep warm by running.”

Reluctantly, Agnes slipped the jacket over her shoulders. “Good luck,” she said. “Bring her back safe.”

“That’s the idea,” Nate said under his breath.

And then he and Dante were jogging through the darkness of the woods, using Dante’s handheld as a half-assed flashlight and trying not to trip over roots and underbrush.

Itdidn’t take long for Nate to realize his occasional forays into the gym for a bit of exercise had not prepared him for real-world physical exertion. He was huffing and puffing in no time, even though they weren’t running terribly fast. Dante, of course, wasn’t even breathing hard. If Nate wasn’t careful, he was going to give himself an inferiority complex. He wasn’t used to feeling inferior to anyone, and he couldn’t say he much cared for the experience.

Eventually, they saw the glow of the Sanctuary’s lights in the distance, and they slowed down, picking their way much more cautiously through the woods. When they got close enough that they could catch glimpses of the fence, Dante came to a complete stop and crouched behind a tree.

Nate had no idea where they were in relation to the tower Nadia was planning to escape from, and he knew even the superspy couldn’t have figured out their position based on the tiny expanse of fence they could see through the trees.

“Why are we stopping?” Nate asked, his breath still short from the run.