Chapter 5 - The Narrow EscapeThe flashlight beam cut through the darkness, illuminating the neat, intricate circles of bottle caps spread across the platform floor.
“Hey! Over here!” one of the men shouted, his voice echoing sharply off the curved tunnel walls. “Looks like she was staying right here.”
Heavy boots crunched closer. Josie bit down hard on her lower lip, pressing her small body flat against the damp concrete wall behind the crates, praying to a mother she hadn't seen in five years.
A gloved hand shoved the wooden crates aside with a loud splintering crash.
“Gotcha,” a rough voice sneer-whispered.
Before the man could grab her arm, Josie exploded into motion. Small, lightning-fast, and desperate, she ducked beneath his outreaching grasp, scrambled through a narrow drainage pipe that led down toward the old maintenance tunnels, and vanished into pitch-black darkness.
“Dammit! She’s in the drainage chute!” the second thug roared, firing a flashlight beam down the pipe. “After her!”
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Josie crawled frantically through the cold, sludge-filled pipe, her elbows scraping against rough concrete, her breath coming in ragged gasps. She didn't stop until she popped out through a rusted iron grating near the riverbank, tumbling wet and exhausted into the tall weeds along the muddy shore.
She was safe for the moment—but she knew the city was no longer safe for her. They were hunting her.
