Page 43 of The White Rider
should have been scared shitless. The world's fate hinged on me faking getting kidnapped long enough to get to the White House and kill everyone inside without alerting my father’s militia. It was probably the craziest thing I’d done in my entire life. I still had chunks of my memory missing, but I could remember enough to know I hadn’t exactly been the sanest person before all this.
I wasn’t scared. I probably needed decades of therapy, even before all this, but I wasn’t about to back down now. My blood was pumping, and I was so ready for this. It was time I put my faith in this whole painting the future thing. I’d been doing it for as long as I could remember, and I knew I was deathly accurate. My painting about this had changed over the years, but we won the last time I had a vision about it.
I was going with that.
The angels brought me to a park where some Bubbas had tents set up. There were so many empty houses now, as they had all set up camp to be as close to my father as possible. The East Coast weather was a little similar to what I experienced on the West Coast, but much colder at night since all the bombs fell. The only reason I was even remotely comfortable sleeping outside or without power when we had to rough it was because I had the Horseman of Death as my own personal bed warmer.
Wehad planned this well. Asher handed me a wicked-looking knife with a sheath and a belt to strap it to my waist.
“It doesn’t make sense for you to be out here, alone without a weapon, but be sure to make it easy for them to take this from you. This all hinges on Aeron not going crazy until we’re inside.”
“I can control myself,” Aeron sniffed.
“We’re all going to have issues if they hurt her, asshole,” Dice said. “You and Leif have a history of losing when it comes to Ariel. Leif got his shit togetherwaybefore you did.”
I was nipping this in the bud. The less riled up Aeron was, the better.
“Hey! Stop fighting and stick to the plan. We only have one shot at this.”
“She’s right,” Leif said. “Speedy, hand me Smurfette. I’ll keep her safe until we get inside. I know you don’t want a Bubba getting their greasy hands on her.”
“Damn straight!”
I handed Leif Smurfette and, one by one, the Horsemen strolled into the Bubba camp. Asher had his big ass bow out, and the rest of them had guns we liberated from the Bubbas Aeron killed at the ammunition factory.
These guys werestupid.A big gun and the Horsemen making their egos even more prominent, and these guys thought they were their friends. They weren’t even considering they were the big, evil terrorists my father warned them about because they were using words they agreed with. The only face they would have recognized was Asher’s probably.
That was my cue. The Horsemen had infiltrated the Bubba camp. They were milling about and had their Marthas cooking over an open fire. I needed to get their attention, but I had to make it at least a little believable, so walking straight into the camp and asking them to kidnap me was out of the question. Getting kidnapped the first two times went much smoother than this, but it wasn’t my idea then.
They weren’t looking for me. They didn’t expect me to be this close to them. I needed them to think I was alone, and I didn’t need them getting spooked and randomly firing into these trees and hitting me. The Horsemen knew that too. These dudes were trigger happy. The apocalypse and the fact that my father told them terrorists were coming to take over America made it worse.
I saw Asher raise his bow and point it at the trees. Thank God. Asher let them know I was out there, and if anyone could keep a bunch of Bubbas from shooting at me, it was Dice. He must have said something about spotting pink hair. The men had their guns strapped to their chests, but they pulled knives from their belts and spilled into the woods.
I ran and hid. I needed these assholes to find me, but I couldn’t make it too easy or even these apes would realize something wasn’t right. I was probably the dumbest Nephilim to ever live because I didn’t have a lick of self-preservation. I was actually havingfunhiding from these pricks. If the entire world didn’t hinge on them catching me, this could have been my new favorite hobby.
This Bubba with a beer gut and a receding hairline looked like life had thrown him some shit. There was dried food on his shirt, and I’ll bet his tighty whities had skid marks. He was probably one of those guys who, before all this went down, was super unlucky at pretty much everything and was only here because Isaiah promised him a break from all that. Don’t get me wrong though, he was also here because he was a garbage human.
I decided to throw him a bone and let him think he won at something instead of just getting a participation trophy. He was going to be the one I let catch me. This shouldn’t be nearly as fun as I was making it. Maybe me and the Horsemen could play chase when this was over, but we would make it much kinkier.
I stomped on a particularly dry-looking branch until it broke to alert him of my presence. He grabbed his gun and raised it. Shit. Maybe I shouldn’t have picked one of the more trigger-happy ones to get the prize of catching me.
“Come out!” he said. “I have orders not to shoot you, despite all the death and destruction you’ve caused. That doesn’t mean my finger won’t slip. I had friends at the ammunition factory, and a Martha picked out at the church.”
Officially no longer feeling sorry for him.
I stepped out from behind the tree with my hands up and faked looking afraid of him. I didn’t have Smurfette, but I could probably still fuck him up.
“Are your terrorist friends with you?” he asked, licking his lips as his beady eyes darted around the woods.
I tried not to grin. They werealwayswith me, and we’d be fucking shit up shortly. I had learned how to cry on command after I ran away. I guess all the times my father and his scientists forced tears out of me had taught me one thing useful. I totally used that shit to get a business loan to open my tattoo shop and to get out of a few speeding tickets. You can either focus on what abuse has done to you or what abuse can do for you.
I burst into tears, and he looked uncomfortable.
“I got separated from my group. Please, help me. I don’t know where they are! I’ve been walking all night trying to find them. They could be anywhere!”
He lowered his gun. Crocodile tears worked like a charm, even during the apocalypse. I tried not to break his nose when he frisked me and took my knife. I’d been frisked before after a bar fight, and this was definitely a creepy frisking. He copped all the feels.
“I found her!”he hollered.“She’s alone. Anyone got rope?”
