“I won’t be able to use this outside the city,” she reminded him.
“It’s not a cell. It’s a satellite phone. You can use it to send text messages too. When you get settled, send me the coordinates of your location. I’ll do whatever I can to keep the colony sweeps away from that general area, but… I don’t know how much longer I’ll be in charge.”
“Promise me you’ll leave if things get worse. Promise you’ll call me, and I promise you’ll be welcome wherever I wind up.”
He visibly swallowed. “I promise.”
Hudson nodded in relief. “So now what?”
Dom tipped his head toward the tower. “When I give the word, I want you to go to the gate. I’ll deal with the guards.” He unclipped the radio from his belt. “The second that gate opens, I want you to run, H. Run as fast as you can. You should be able to make it to the woods before they spot you, but if they do…” He lifted his rifle. “I’ll cover you.”
Her throat clamped shut. “They’ll kill you.”
He seemed unfazed by that outcome. “Run and don’t look back, okay? You know where all the trip wires are, and the motion sensors on the north perimeter were disabled in the reboot. Get at least ten yards past the perimeter line, and you won’t have to worry about triggering any alarms.” Frowning, he glanced at his watch. “Four minutes until everything’s back online. Time to go, sis.”
Her heart clenched. “I don’t want to say good-bye to you again.”
“Hey, at least this time there is a good-bye.” He ruffled her hair good-naturedly. “You skipped out without a word during your last jailbreak.”
She had to smile. “Yeah. Shitty move, huh?”
“Yup. Now give me a hug and get out of here already.”
Hudson wrapped her arms around him, forcing herself to remember this moment: her brother’s solid chest against her cheek, the warmth of his embrace, the pride in his eyes. Then she released him and whispered, “I’ll see you soon,” and hoped like hell that those words would come true one day.
The next few minutes were a blur. She wasn’t sure how she managed to make it to the gate without stumbling over in terror, or how she swiped the key card without dropping it five times beforehand. She wasn’t sure what Dominik did to lure the guards’ sharp gazes away from the clearing, or if he even had. All she was aware of was the asphalt beneath her boots as she ran as if her life depended on it.
Her lungs burned, the late-night wind slapping her face as she raced toward the tree line. She didn’t dare look over her shoulder to check if the tower guards had spotted her. She just ran. She ran fast and hard, praying that nobody fired at her, that she’d reach the trees before the guards noticed that she —
She’d made it.
Hudson couldn’t contain her astonishment as she sprinted into the brush and out of sight of the tower. No shots. No yells. Nothing but the sounds of twigs snapping beneath her feet as she flew past the motion sensors toward freedom.
Holy shit, she’d done it. She’d escaped – again. She’d fucking done it, but still she kept running, fueled by a sense of triumph that surged with her movements as she put as much distance as she could between her and the compound.
The forest was pitch-black, but she knew every inch of it. She and Dominik had played out here when they were kids. They’d hunted with their father and combed the woods, building forts on the days Dominik got to choose the activity and picking flowers when it was her turn to choose.
Two clicks west. That’s what Xander’s message had said. Hudson had no idea if she’d even traveled a mile yet, but she didn’t see any faces or hear any voices as she hurried through the forest.
She hoped Connor and the others were out there somewhere waiting for her. If they weren’t, it would make her journey a hell of a lot tougher, but she’d done it once, and she could do it again. She had her knives and the two pistols Dom had given her. She had her brains and her courage and a deep-seated will to survive, and any one of those things could get her as far as she needed to go.
She quickened her pace, cheeks flushed from exertion, lungs aching. She had to be getting close to the rendezvous point. A glance at the tactical watch Dom had strapped to her wrist revealed that it was ten minutes to four a.m. And she’d already vowed to wait no more than ten minutes past that.
If Connor and the men didn’t show by then, she would keep running. Make her way to Foxworth to find Tamara, or try to track down Lennox and —
“Going somewhere?”
The deceptively pleasant voice had her staggering to a stop. Hudson whirled around in time to see Knox step out of the darkness, the red stripes on his Enforcer uniform glinting beneath the shards of moonlight slicing through a gap in the trees.
She drew her weapon, but not fast enough.
Knox charged forward and knocked the gun out of her hands, and in the blink of an eye, she was flat on her back and he was on top of her.
His hands wrapped tightly around her throat.