Uriah's Girl

Chapter Three- Emily

Uriah's name rang through the house and the two guys I had seen chasing Uriah earlier pushed through the crowd.

I glanced at Uriah and saw him drop an F-bomb. He grabbed my hand and started to yank me towards the kitchen. Now, I had just drank a lot of alcohol in a very short period of time and was not nearly sober enough to be running, let alone at the speed Uriah wanted to go. I could hear people yelling behind us as we pushed through the crowd of people and heard the two guys yelling for Uriah.

I continued to stumble along behind Uriah until he reached a screen door. He yanked it open and we were in a backyard. Uriah glanced behind us. The guys were still close. Uriah grabbed my hand again and raced us to the fence.

"Come on. We're going over."

I stared at him like he was crazy. "Do you see me right now?" I mumbled out. My mouth felt funny and my words came out slow. "I can't get over that like this."

"I'll get you over it." Just then, the sliding door slammed open. "Go!" Uriah screamed at me. He nudged me as I lifted my leg to try to climb the fence.

Uriah propped his hand under my foot and gave me a huge push. I got to the top of the fence and looked over. There was no way I was sticking this landing.

"Jump!" Uriah yelled. "It's not that high! You'll be fine."

I closed my eyes (bad idea) and pushed myself off. I did not stick the landing, in case you were wondering, and ended up in a heap on the dirt.

I heard Uriah land next to me and felt him start to pull me up. I pulled my right leg under me and tried to stand up. I felt a searing pain in my ankle and fell back to the ground.

"I can't. I did something when I jumped."

Uriah grumbled annoyed and pulled me up, more gently this time. "Get on my back. We just gotta make it to my truck."

I, very ungracefully, clambered onto Uriah's back. He wrapped his arms around my thighs and took off sprinting. If I was soberer and could process, I would've been extremely impressed by his strength in this moment.

As Uriah ran, I could hear the two guys behind us then suddenly there was a gunshot. Uriah cussed, "Oh shit!" and ran faster. Hearing that gunshot sobered me up real quick.

Before I got a chance to ask what the hell was happening, we reached the truck. Uriah tossed me in the front seat and ran around to the driver's seat. He climbed in, slammed the door, and started the car. He jerked away from the curb so quickly his tires squealed on the asphalt. I glanced in the rearview mirror and watched as the guys tried to chase the truck but eventually gave up.

"What the hell just happened?" I demanded as I buckled my seatbelt.

Uriah glanced in the rearview mirror, "Just a little scuffle. That's all."

"Uriah, those guys shot a gun at us! That was no normal gang shit! What the hell just happened? Tell me the truth."

"Emily, this isn't your world. This isn't something you need to know."

I huffed and sat back in my seat annoyed. He was right though. His world wasn't mine and it was probably best I didn't know what happened. But, part of me still really wanted to know.

"How's the ankle?" Uriah asked, checking the rearview mirror again to make sure we weren't being followed.

I tried to move it around and winced. "Hurts pretty bad. I can't move it."

"You probably sprained it falling off the fence. I'll look at it when we get to the house."

I looked out the window and suddenly realized we weren't going back in the direction of my house. "Wait, where are we going? This isn't the way to my house."

"We're going to my brother's house. I need to make sure you're safe and I'm not taking you home smelling like a mini bar."

I was about to protest but sniffed my shirt and realized I did smell pretty bad. Maybe I spilled on my shirt without realizing it. "Okay, I will admit to smelling like a mini bar, but my dad won't care. You can take me home."

Uriah gave me a pointed look, "No, I can't. You need to come with me."

"Why?"

Uriah sighed, "Emily, this is a need to know basis situation."

"If you can't take me home for my safety then you need to tell me what I need to be kept safe from."

Uriah went silent. Finally, he responded, "Fine. We'll talk about this when we get to the house."

The rest of the ride was deathly silent. We finally pulled up outside of a house. It was a quaint little house but nice. Uriah came around to my side of the truck and I climbed onto his back again. We were met at the door by who I can assume is Uriah's older brother. He looked just like Uriah except he had green eyes and shorter hair and was a little taller than Uriah.

"Xander, the backpack is Emily. Emily, this is my older brother Alexander." Uriah introduced us as he walked passed his brother into the house.

"Can't wait hear about this." Xander responded closing the door.

Uriah set me down on the couch. "Let me go get some ice and then we'll talk."

Xander followed Uriah into the kitchen. I was going to take the time to look around the room when I heard murmurs coming from the kitchen. "You promised me, Uriah." I heard Xander hiss.

"Yeah, well, something came up. Patrick asked me to finish up a job and there was a lot of money in it for me, so I agreed."

"That's not how this works, Uriah. You promised you were out. You can't keep going back when he offers you money. You'll never be free!"

"It's not that easy, Xander. You know that. Look, I'm done with this. I've gotta go give this ice to Emily."

"We're not done talking about this."

I heard Uriah mumble a whatever under his breath as he came back into the living room.

"Hears ice for your ankle. You can ice it while I explain what happened back there and then you can shower."

He placed the ice on my ankle and sat on the carpet beside the couch. Xander came into the room and sat in the armchair. "I wanna hear this too." He said crossing his arms over his chest, looking more like a stern father than an older brother.

Uriah took a deep breath and launched into his story.