Chapter 8 — She Tries to Run
565 Words
Calixta spent the next three days in meticulous preparation.
Every detail of her life was reconsidered, rewritten, deleted, or disguised.
She closed her accounts, changed her passwords, moved appointments, and rented a car under an alias. She packed lightly, carrying only what she needed—and the nagging weight of her fear.
She had convinced herself this time would be different. That distance would buy her time. That the city, the roads, and anonymity could protect her from a force that seemed omnipresent.
The night she left, the city was quiet, fog curling along the streets like ghostly fingers.
She drove in near silence, headlights cutting through the haze, heart hammering with each turn.
She did not check her phone, did not glance at the rearview mirror more than she had to.
It was a mistake.
Half an hour into her flight, a message lit up the dashboard screen:
Voltaire:
You should have left earlier.
Her hands gripped the wheel, knuckles white. She slammed on the brakes and swerved to the shoulder, breath ragged.
The city outside the windshield seemed to pulse, every shadow a threat, every light a signal he had already placed.
She tried to call him back, but the line disconnected before she could speak.
A chill ran down her spine. Not because she feared what he might do—but because she knew he had planned for this.
The car radio, a constant stream of static until now, switched abruptly to a soft, deliberate classical piece—her favorite from years ago.
One she had not played in this life, yet he knew.
She understood, fully, that she had not run.
She had walked directly into the perimeter he had already set.
The rearview mirror caught something—or someone—but the fog made it impossible to distinguish. Then she felt it, a presence behind her that was not the night or the mist or imagination.
He is here.
Her hands shook, and she drove faster, weaving through the empty streets, but every turn, every streetlight, every shadow was accounted for.
Voltaire appeared at the next stoplight, leaning against a sleek black car that had not been there moments before.
The distance between them stretched impossibly small in her chest. He did not move when she saw him, did not raise a hand. He simply existed. Watching. Waiting.
“You can try,” he said softly, almost gentle. “But you cannot hide from inevitability.”
The engine roared as she slammed it into gear. She turned a corner, tires screeching, but his voice followed her across the airwaves—low, certain, and intimate.
Run, if you must. But you will never outrun me.
Every instinct screamed to keep moving. Every thought told her this was hopeless.
And yet… even as terror coiled around her like a snake, part of her felt the same impossible pull she had always felt.
Not love.
Not affection.
Not safety.
Obsession.
Ownership. Inevitability.
By the time she reached the edge of the city, headlights fading behind her, she realized the truth: Voltaire Francisco had made this game entirely his own. And she was already trapped.
No longer by walls, no longer by threats—but by a force she could neither fight nor ignore.
Calixta Hales, princess of another life, thought she had fled.
But some things, she now knew, could never be escaped.
- Writer
