Untethered

35 | Questions

The door of the motel room was propped open in effort to let in fresh air, but the mugginess of the day had barely abated, despite sunset being four hours ago. Julie swept her damp, lanky hair back into a twist, and crammed a couple of pens into it as makeshift chopsticks, to keep it off her neck. The heat and humidity of the past week had also awakened a fresh bevvy of putrid aromas within the room, and she still struggled not to breathe too deeply, for fear of gagging.

She blew out an uneasy sigh, glancing over at Danny for, probably, the millionth time that night. File boxes scattered the room, their contents haphazardly piled on every available surface. They'd spent the last few days doing nothing but combing through the contents of those boxes, looking for the smallest clue, and still found nothing. Danny's patience was wearing ever thinner, and Julie knew it was only a matter of time until he snapped completely.

As the search became more hopeless, she wracked her brain, trying to figure a way out of this. A way to get an advantage over Danny, or trick him. But his paranoia was ratcheted up to a terrifying level, and she'd caught him looking at her through narrowed eyes more than once since Greta had killed herself. He knew something was up with her, and he was determined to catch her in any deception she might conjure up.

Abruptly, she was jerked from her thoughts by a bellow and a box that went flying across the room and crashed into the far wall, sending papers fluttering.

"There is nothing in these damned boxes!" he raged. "Have you found anything?"

"No," she answered, her voice barely a whisper.

She avoided direct eye contact, while still tracking his movements in case he came at her. She fervently wished she had a different answer. He was getting desperate—she could see the wildness growing in his eyes at each new obstacle they encountered. It was like being forced to share a cage with a rabid wolverine. It did not exactly rank at the top of her bucket list. More worrisome at the moment, though, was that the rabid beast had stilled, replaced by a serpentine coldness in his dark eyes.

"Enough of this shit," he finally uttered in a low growl. "Better get some sleep, woman. We need to be up bright and early tomorrow."

"What are you going to do, Danny?" she whispered.

"It's what we are going to do," he sneered, "and it's none of your damn business until I say it is."

Edging around the perimeter of the room, keeping as far from him as she could, Julie headed into the bathroom. As she stared at her reflection in the mirror, forcing herself to take deep breaths to fend off the panic attack threatening to overwhelm her, she took in her haggard appearance. Lack of sleep and living in terror for the past two weeks had taken a significant toll on her. Deep, dark circles ringed her eyes, her skin was ashen, and she'd lost so much weight, she was skeletal. Sitting on the toilet, she gripped her head in her bony fingers.

Danny wasn't sharing his plans with her until, and unless, she needed to know. He was dangerous, and she had no way to prevent him from doing whatever he was planning. For the first time since she laid eyes on him again, she felt true hopelessness, and acute awareness of the likelihood of her impending death settled in the pit of her stomach. Strangely, at the same time, the terror she'd been running on every second of every moment she'd been with him, dissipated.

She was probably going to die.

But that sure as fuck didn't mean she would do it without a fight.

~*~*~

The charming one-story bungalow was situated near downtown Minneapolis in a thriving and lively village-like neighborhood. Unlike many other parts of the Metro area, there was no distinct ethnic identity here. It was a community that drew in a variety of people from diverse backgrounds and walks of life, giving off a cool urban vibe, complete with vibrant graffiti and street art in the form of abstract sculptures. Even the local community garden displayed uniquely-shaped, organic pieces throughout.