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He slips the bottle from my fingers and stalks up to the register to pay. I see that he's also purchasing a coffee along with another bottle of water. The forty-something female attendant bats her eyelashes at him and giggles as she gives him the total. If he notices at all then he's not letting on. With his looks, women most likely hijack his cell on a regular basis to program their digits into it for him. Ugh!
He takes my hand once again while carrying the bagged drinks in the other. We rush through the bitter cold toward his truck and this time he doesn't attempt to help me get in.
It is a struggle to climb into the cab, but once I'm seated I reach out and slam the door in his face, making certain that it's left unlocked.
Please let this plan work.
My breathing is out of control as the adrenaline begins to course through my veins.
I watch cautiously as he hauls his big frame up into the cab, and just as he reaches into the bag of drinks I lurch my door back open and jump down, falling hard onto my knees in the snow. It stings like a beast and I bite back a groan as I lurch to my feet and begin to run back, hell bent, toward the tiny store.
I ran track throughout college and know that I'm quick, but my knees are killing me from the impact and the snowy ground is a far cry from a proper track. When I'm halfway across the parking lot, someone passes me in a sprint. Alreck?
Before my brain can register how to evade him, he turns around and faces me with rage in his eyes before charging at me. He hauls me up and over his giant shoulder before I can so much as pivot away from him.
Speechless, I look up in terror at the attendant who's watching us from inside the window in stunned surprise.
Like a complete Neanderthal, he locks a hold across my suspended legs and prowls right back to the station. He says something to her in Norwegian that, to my complete dismay, makes her laugh and wave to me as I'm carried away.
"Call the …!" I wail, yet before I can complete the sentence a hard slap lands without mercy right on my ass cheek, effectively silencing me after I let out a startled, "Ooh!" as the burn spreads across my rear.
The attendant gives me cheeky smile. What did he say? She seems to have zero clue what I'm desperately trying to convey to her.
I'm doomed.
Too frightened to struggle, I let my body go slack as I'm carried to the truck.
