Suicide Mission (Guarded Secrets #1)

24: "They should just legalize."

There was constant movement outside of our hiding spot. It worried me so I pulled Tessa deeper into the corridors of boxes. I found a small area where the boxes had been stacked to create a small cubicle that we could hide in and not worry about being seen if someone was just scanning through the room. I was about to pull her into the hiding spot, careful of her injured arm, but she refused.

"What were you even looking for in that office? I want to know right now," Tessa said forcefully as she pulled her uninjured arm out of my hold.

I turned on a dime to stare at her as if she was insane. We were being chased, by people she classified as family, but who were trying to kill her, and she couldn't stop asking about what I was looking for in the office. We could be shot dead at any moment, and she was still stuck on why I was here in the first place. Why did it matter at this point? We just had to work together long enough so that we could make it out alive, and nothing more than that.

"Why does it matter right now? Is that seriously the most important thing on your mind right now, because my mind is on the fact that there are people that want to kill us," I said as I gestured toward the general direction of where one of the men was going to come from if we didn't lay low. "I would like to get out of here alive, and if you don't want to then just tell me how to leave so that—"

"You think I want to stay?" she yelled, completely interrupting me.

"If you keep stopping, and debating with yourself that these people are your family and all care about you then I would say that you want to die! You're asking for them to kill you because that's what's going to happen if we stay here too long or don't find somewhere to hide. Some thug is going to walk through that door and blow us open with bullets. Please decide now if you're with or against me, so that I can leave if you want to die."

"I don't want to die! It's your fault that I'm in this mess," Tessa yelled, repeating her statement from earlier. Clearly she wanted to have this debate before she died, but I didn't want to die with her. She couldn't wrap her head around anything that was going on and that was causing her to get stuck, meanwhile I wanted to plan so that we could get out of here alive and I'd never have to hear her complain again.

"How is it my fault?"

"If it wasn't for you I wouldn't be in this situation! These people are my family—"

"Who now wants you dead." I didn't miss the death glare she sent my way for interrupting her. "Can't you see that? These people aren't your family! If they were then they wouldn't be looking to kill you right now. They would only be after me, I'm the enemy. So why would they want you dead if you were family?" "They want me dead along with you because of the team that came last time. If you hadn't come, any of you, then they wouldn't be chasing me right now!" she said back.

"Did you miss everything they said? They said that you made it easy for them; they were going to kill you anyway. No matter what, if I was here or not, your days with them were numbered from the start and somewhere inside that thick skull of yours you know that. I don't know what they did to make you believe they were family, but they're not. Family doesn't do this, they fight with you not against you!"

"My father works for them! I'm their family!"

"Where is your father now? He's dead," I said. "And from what I know—"

"You don't know anything!" Tessa yelled back at me before I could finish my sentence. "You don't know anything about these people and what we are like! There's no other way out once you're in. You either accept them as family and that they couldn't do anything wrong or you die. There is no way out of this life alive, it's either you're in or your out."