Stranger Danger

SOPHIA'S POV

"Ouch," I cradled my left ankle, groaning in pain. It felt like it had been fractured. Not now, please.

I raised my head up to see Anna still staring at me through the window while yelling her mom's name.

This looked like a countdown. I had to stand up and run as even Lucas himself could carry me back into the house on his shoulders like a foam

I stood up on my feet in the same second the thought clocked me, but fell right back to the ground. My left leg had lost it. Oh my God! I struggled up my feet a second time and limped towards the gate, swinging my hands as hastily as I could to boost myself forward.

Thank goodness it wasn't locked. I left the compound heading for the woods.

Our house was isolated from the city. My dad liked the calm and quietness that surrounded his mansion. It would be another couple few miles before you met another house.

I had never walked this woods myself as my dad was used to taking me out by car. And on the rare occasions we visited the woods, he was always by my side, and guess what? I was seven.

A vast land of trees was all I could behold. No tracks, no guidelines, no signposts, only green and brown trees that were shadowed by the denseness of the night. This was it, my funeral.

But regardless, all this didn't stop me from going right into it. It was my only way out. As I heard the gate open, I quickly hid behind a tree.

"Sophia," it was my stepmother. "Sophia, you come out now or I'm going to call the cops and bury the charges on you. We're the only ones who can save you."

She and her children pointed their flashlights in the woods looking for me.

My heart immediately started pounding like a drumstick on a bass drum; it wasn't cooperating anymore. For some reason, I was responsible for killing the governor of the state. My father's friend.

They had a video of me cooking the food. How would I ever escape the charges? I dropped down on my butt, with my back on the tree. The more I thought about it, the more damage it did to my heart and head simultaneously.

Should I go back? Should I just surrender everything my father had built to a witch who he had accidentally married? At last, I was ready to give it all up. I couldn't stand spending my whole life in jail. My stepmom had already shown me how it feels by locking out from the outside world for a whole year.

I stood up and walked past the tree I was hiding behind. Just then Lucas' flashlight caught me red-handed, and I raised my hands up instantly. "I'd do it. I'd sign everything in your name."

I was slowly walking up to them when I heard multiple sirens wailing from afar. The cops were already on their way here.

"C'mon baby. Come, don't be scared. They're not here for you," this was suspicious, my stepmom suddenly growing soft? She called me 'baby.'

I started retreating back into the woods slowly.

"Come on, baby. Come..." My stepmom kept trying to convince me, making a gentle voice like she was talking to a cat on a tree.

I immediately turned around and took off into the woods, limping and struggling to gain speed. Lucas chased after me.

As I raced through the woods like a main character from a gruesome horror movie, it began to dawn on me that my stepmother would have handed me to the cop regardless of whether or not I signed the papers.

My eyes immediately got watery. I was once my father's princess. From out of nowhere, Lucas dived me to the ground. Without hesitation, he raised me up by my waist, pushing my shoulders against a tree, then he started struggling to raise my gown up.

My life was already over to me. I was broken down. I was gonna let him do whatever he pleases with me. I was dead even to myself.

He lifted my gown up with one hand exposing my butt, while his other hand held up my waist in a bending position, he started hustling with his belt.

Tears drain down my cheeks, of course reality has done me dirty. I was merely a Mannequin in his hands.

But then multiple flashlights approached us with dogs barking from afar. It was the cops. I couldn't be happier, but what was there to be so happy about? They were coming to arrest me and lock me up probably forever.

"Shit," he dropped me down and started buckling his belt again. From nowhere a bullet's sound went off and dropped Lucas down by a headshot.

"Oh my God!" I screamed. There were four other young men in the woods, dressed like cowboys. I quickly crept to the back of the tree I was on.

The cops had also heard the bullet sound go off and had started exchanging fire. Surprisingly, this gang of four men were boldly shooting with them.

I couldn't tell who was winning, but the bullet sounds overlapped the area like I was on a battlefield, and soon men's voices filled the air, some dying and others giving harsh orders.

After a few minutes, the area became quiet. One of the four men who shot Lucas walked up to me with a pistol in his hand, "Are you from this country?"

My gaze rested on his face. I couldn't resist his princely charms. I was instantly lost in his eyes.

"Are you from this country?" He raised his voice a little higher than the first time.

I don't know if it's because I haven't seen a proper dude for a year now, but I seemed lost. "Yes," I managed to articulate words.

"You're coming with me," he lifted me up and put me on his shoulder before I could agree. I didn't struggle, all I wanted now was a sharp and peaceful death.

He put me in the back of his squad bike and then climbed on it. "Don't do anything stupid." He hit the gears and drove off.

All his men were dead, even the cops. As we rode further, I saw more and more dead bodies of both custom officers and gangsters lying on the forest ground. Who is this man?

...

He drove us towards a church and held a quick brake; he was riding in a hurry. He pulled me down from the bike and carried me into the church full of worshippers.

Bang! He discharged his firearm in the air.

"Where's the priest?" He carried me to the altar, walking past the extremely terrified set of people all the way to the priest. "Marry us!" He ordered the priest as he threw me on the altar.

In shock, the priest said nothing. He looked at me with eyes filled with terror, his hands holding onto his puppet.

Bang! The man fired another shot in the air. "Marry us!" He yelled at him a second time.

The priest, without saying a word, walked into his office and brought out a marriage contract. All this while, the stranger had the gun on his head.

The priest turned to him, "Do you accept this woman as your lawfully wedded wife?"

"Do I look like I'm kidding?"

"The vows are a necessity if..." The priest explained.

"Okay okay, I do," he interrupts the priest.

He then turned to me, "Do you accept this man as your lawfully wedded husband?"

Couldn't the priest see I was being dragged into this? What kind of wife sits on the alter at her wedding?

I felt the stranger's gun muzzle on my head. "You have three seconds to decide."

"One... Two... Three..." I counted for him without thinking twice.

He shook his head and pointed the gun at the priest again. "Just do it."

"I pronounced you husband and wife," the priest declared frightened, in front of the audience.

All of a sudden, a burst of siren noises filled the area. The cops were there. The stranger quickly pulled the marriage contract from the priest and signed it. Then he put it beside me. "Sign."

I was tense. I couldn't think straight. For a minute there, I thought it was finally over. Prison was a greater terror than death for me at this point.

The stranger ducked down to me, "You sign here, and I'll help you escape."

Not letting another second slide by, I quickly took the pen from him and signed the marriage contract hastily with my innocent eyes flickering.

He took out his phone to capture a picture of it, then stood up to the priest with his gun on his neck, "This marriage is now legalized, don't mess with my papers."

I was already up on my feet, bouncing and vibrating nervously and anxiously on a spot as I waited for him to devise an escape plan.

Thud! The doors of the church bursted open and the cops poured in with guns. In that same second, I turned around and to my surprise, the stranger was gone.

"Freeze!" The cops put their guns on me like I was a wild criminal who could kill them with a snap.

My life was over before it could even begin. A daddy's little princess now accused of being a loosed murderer.

It seems like liars have more power than honest people nowadays. This two incidents have shown me a lot.