Free Hell in a Handbasket - The Journey by Damara Blackthorne Page A

and gossip about. “You lied to me…” Dipping
my head, allowing my hair to cover my face as I whispered, “You knew who I was. You acted like you didn’t know me. You knew…you knew the whole time…how
could you do that to me? What did I ever do to you to deserve being treated
like that? I-I-I trusted you…“ I glanced up at him, “Oh God , I threw my
morals out the window for you…everything—everything, that I believed in…gone.
In one day…gone, in one day.” I took a ragged breath in an effort to stop the
tears from spilling. I couldn’t stop them, and the tears started.
    Ryder reached for me again, and I jerked out of his reach,
causing the chair to fling out from under me, and crash farther down the wall.
I heard a few people gasping, and making rude noises on the other side of the
room, but no one said anything outright. Ryder never took his gaze off me, his
jaw was clenched, and hurt showed in his eyes.
    My back was pinned against the wall, but at least Ryder
wasn’t reaching for me anymore. I pressed myself as far into the wall as I
could, and eased my way against it, trying to get to a point where I would be
able to get around him, and as soon as I was sure that I could get past him, I
bolted for the door. My hand hit the heavy glass door, jarring my bones up to
my neck, and jolting me with pain at the base of my skull. The door barely
moved, just enough for me to slip through. I ran to the elevator, and hit the
button, dancing as adrenaline and nerves pinged inside me, telling me to run. I
heard a ruckus inside the conference room. I didn’t want to think of Ryder, or
the hurt in his eyes, knowing full well that I couldn’t trust myself around
that man.
    The elevator seemed to take forever as I fidgeted in the
lobby. It finally opened, and as I started to rush in, I remembered what Ryder
and I had recently done in this very elevator. Feeling as if I had been smacked
hard in the face, I backed out of the elevator. Fear showing
in my every movement. I turned around not knowing where the stairs were,
only that I could never get into that elevator again. I spun and saw Ryder
standing mere feet from me. Too close, he was too close. I gasped, and felt
more tears streaking down my face. The look on Ryder’s face hurt me almost as
much as knowing that he had lied to me. No, no, I couldn’t look at him, I couldn’t feel for him, he lied to me .
    I started running, not sure of where I was going, or how I
was going to get back to the airport, or how I was going to get home. Nothing
seemed to be making it fully into my thoughts, nothing except escape. I wasn’t
worried about anything other than the fact that I had to get away and fast!
    I spun again and spotted what appeared to be a door down at
the end of the hall and I took off running as fast as my skirt would allow me
to go.

 
    * * * *

 
    I ran to the door, relieved that it had an image of stairs
on it. I paused just long enough to try to take a deep breath, my lungs didn‘t
seem to want to accept any air into them, and I nearly choked. I looked back
down the hall, from the direction I had just come, and there was Ryder looking
as gorgeous as always and sadder than I think I had ever seen anyone look. I
shook my head trying to get any sympathy for him out of my mind. I gasped as I
tried again to take a breath, and I felt a pain in my chest that hurt almost as
bad as when my Gram died…almost.   I hung
my head, and opened the door to the stairs. I started to run down them, tripped
over my skirt, and decided that maybe a slower pace would be better. Thankful
that I had made it to the first floor, I thought I couldn’t move another step.
I paused for a moment to gain some composure and take another deep breath, I walked over to the corner, and sat down on the
cold tile floor. I pulled my knees up to my chin, wrapped my arms around my
legs, hung my head, firmly planting my face into my knees and began to sob. I
am such an idiot! I had no idea