~Celine~
“What are you doing?” I asked in confusion and terror as I watched Ethan pull out his phone in haste.
“Pack your stuff right now. We are leaving.” He uttered, and without questioning him, I grabbed my bag from the closet and rushed up to him.
“How do we do it? How do we escape him?” I asked as my body shivered.
“Hey, I’m the guy you gave a lift about an hour ago. Can you please come back to the hotel? I need you to park at the side of the hotel this time, and…” he grabbed my hands, opened the door, and pulled me out of the room.
“Leave the doors open.”
After saying this, he threw his phone in his pocket and began to run. I could easily catch up with him because running was the easiest thing for me.
“Ethan, we are not heading out. The exit is on the other side.” I uttered as we ran.
I looked back and there was Alpha Marcus and some of his men, right behind us.
“I know what I’m doing, okay? We can’t go through that exit because Alpha Marcus is coming from that end. There’s an exit at the back.”
“Wait… how… How do you know that? Have you been here before?” I asked in awe as our racing pace increased.
“Your wolf isn’t the only one with extreme abilities, Celine.” He answered as we both dashed into a door. In front of us were so many stairs that led down.
“Go! Go!” He yelled, and without hesitation, I began to run down the stairs. I ran harder than I had ever run. I jumped two steps sometimes, without even looking back.
Just then, I saw that Ethan wasn’t behind me anymore. I couldn’t hear him or feel him behind me.
“Ethan?!” I called as I kept running without looking back.
After a few seconds, I heard footsteps right behind me.
“Stop right there!” They yelled, but instead of stopping, my speed increased. There was a door right in front of me, and even though I was unsure if it was open or not, I put my hands forward and ran into it, causing it to yank open.
I busted into the parking lot. I looked left and right, unsure of where to run to, but hearing the voices of the men who came behind me made me quickly figure out a way.
“You should hide behind one of these cars!” Kiara yelled in my head. My eyes scanned the whole parking lot in a second, looking for the perfect spot to hide.
Just then, the men burst out of the door and saw me.
“F**k!” I yelled as I resumed running. I wasn’t sure which direction I was running to when all of a sudden… I heard the loud horn of a car behind me.
“Are they chasing me with a car now?!” I wondered in fear. I could hear the vroom! Vroom! so loud in my ears, causing fear to overwhelm me.
And as I kept running, I began to hear grunting and screaming from behind. In shock, I turned to look back and I saw the car happened to be a Taxi.
On the floor behind me were two of Alpha Marcus’s men who had been hit and were lying weakly on the floor.
“Celine! Get in!” I heard Ethan yell even when I couldn’t see him. The door of the Taxi flung open as it headed towards me.
Even though the remaining men charged towards us, I was confident they could never get to us anymore. As the taxi made a turn to where I stood, I threw my bag inside the car and jumped in.
Shutting the door after me, I looked out through the back window and saw us lose the men.
I heaved a loud sigh and looked up to see Ethan driving the taxi, and beside me was a young man, who had caught my bag when I threw it.
“You… you drive?!” I asked in shock as the man returned my bag to me.
“Of course, I drive!” Ethan answered as we all jumped in the car and busted into the main road.
“Hi, I’m the driver.” The man next to me said with a grin, stretching his hand to me.
“Hi,” I answered with a faint smile, shaking his hand.
“Your boyfriend is so cool, he came out of nowhere and took the steering wheel from me.” He narrated, using his hands to demonstrate the actions, but I paid no attention after I heard him call Ethan my boyfriend.
I ignored him and looked at Ethan again, and that was when I saw that he had a different shirt on.
“Where is your shirt?” I asked, furrowing my brows.
“I got rid of it. Alpha Marcus and his men saw only my shirt when we were running, so to walk past them, I had to remove that shirt. Luckily, I had one underneath.”
“You walked past Alpha Marcus?!” I asked in shock.
“Yes, I did. He doesn’t know me, remember? Also, he was too busy with getting a hold of you, he didn’t bother looking at those who passed. I had to meet with the taxi at the side of the hotel, so I’d come down here to pick you up.” He explained.
“Oh… you scared the hell out of me when you suddenly disappeared. Why didn’t you tell me about your plan?”
“We had no time to map out a plan, Celine. I had to do what I thought was best.” Ethan answered, taking a glance at me through the rare mirror.
“And that is why he’s so cool!” The driver butted in, and I let out a deep breath and shook my head.
“He’ll never leave me alone, will he? Why can’t he just let me be?”
“I don’t think he’ll ever stop, Celine. I saw the look on his face, the aura he had. He won't stop until he gets to you.”
“So what do we do? You’re scaring me, Ethan.” I uttered, looking back to see if we were being followed.
“We'll have to fight back. We can’t keep running.” He answered, and I blinked in disbelief.
“Fight back?! Who fights an Alpha without being an Alpha? Going against Alpha Marcus is like going against my father. We can never beat him.” I uttered, grabbing onto the chairs in front and moving closer to the driver’s seat.
“Who said we would be fighting back alone? Once we find an apartment far from here, I’ll figure it out.” He answered with his eyes glued on the road.
I nodded slowly, staring at his face. I had always known Ethan to be a smart man, but I never thought he was this smart. ‘Is that a special ability he has?’ I wondered.
“What are you looking at? Is there something on my face?” He asked, jolting me out of my thoughts.
“No. No.” I stretched out my hand and placed it on his. “Thank you so much, Ethan.”
He moved his hand away from mine, causing me to slowly withdraw from him.
I had almost forgotten that we were having a hot argument before Alpha Marcus showed up. I rested my back on the chair and shut my eyes to relax, and before I knew it, I drifted into slumberland.
***
“Celine?” The voice sounded very faint like I was being called from afar.
“Celine? We are here.” This time, the voice was loud enough to wake me up. I swallowed as I slowly opened my eyes. I looked at my side and saw someone standing next to me, outside the car.
It was nighttime, and I could barely see a thing.
“We have to head in now. The driver needs his taxi back.” He added, moving away from the door. Then I saw the reflection of the dim light from a house behind him.
I squinted my eyes as I sat up and grabbed my bag. Getting out of the car, I looked around and saw nothing apart from the house in front of me.
“Where are we?” I asked, looking at Ethan.
“A secure place for the meantime.” He answered me and turned to look at the driver. “Here is the key. Thank you so much. I’ll keep in touch.” He said to him, and the driver nodded.
He waved at me as he headed into his taxi. We stood outside the house until the driver drove off, into the dark road.
“Let’s go in. It’s cold outside.” He said, collecting my bag from me and heading to the door. I followed behind me, looking back several times.
Opening the door, he switched on the lights inside the house and stepped aside so I could walk in.
Entering the house, I looked around, slowly admiring the place. The furniture was all covered in white fabrics. The living room had a door frame that led to the kitchen.
And there was another door that was shut. “That is the bedroom. It has only one room. You should take it. I’ll sleep on the couch.” Ethan uttered with a straight face, pulling off one of the white fabrics from one of the couches.
He dusted it with the fabric and laid on it, shutting his eyes tiredly.
I clenched my jaws and stared at him for a minute before speaking. “Ethan, I’m sorry…”
“Not tonight. I’m exhausted. Go to bed.” He butted in, causing me to gulp hard.
I nodded slowly and made my way to the bedroom. “He hates me, Kiara.”
“Tch.” Kiara scoffed. “At least his hatred is nothing compared to that of Kilhan.”