Free with You

Chapter 4: The Suit

Vito POV

Hours after escaping the van, all I’ve been thinking about is where the hell I should go. I’m deep in the woods now.

At least the tall trees provide some cover.

Earlier, I noticed my orange shirt was soaked and could attract attention from people or animals. I threw it under a bush, along with the cuffs and gun hours ago. Hopefully it won’t lead the search team to me.

“The f**k am I going to do?” I breathe out. I can see a cloud of my breath from how cold it is outside. As I continue to slow down to a jog, my body begins to relax a bit, clouding my vision. I don’t see the overgrown root that catches my toe, as I fall forward.

“s**t!”

My hands stop the fall, but I’m too exhausted physically to stand up. I crawl over to the nearest tree trunk, grunting on my way there, resting my back against the bark.

My eyes are closing on their own, but I can hear the heavy rain pour on the puddles around me. My limbs are too numb with the cold that I don’t feel anything anymore.

“I guess this is the end for me” I laugh to myself, as I take one last look to the sky, my heart slowing down.

…

I’m barely holding on, when I hear a whimper, inches from my face. It sounds like an animal.

Okay, now I’m done for.

I’m going to be a human popsicle treat.

I can’t feel anything and I can’t move. My eyes are frozen shut.

“He- bud…you okay?” a voice out of nowhere says. I can barely make out the words. Relief floods through me.

But, I can’t open my eyes or say anything! Then suddenly this piece of s**t has the nerve to kick me in the leg.

Now I’m pissed!

“wi- be ba- fo- jacket” says the stranger.

Huh?

Warmth spreads across my chest and over my shoulders. A second later, I can sense heat near my cheek. It feels like a ray of sunshine.

“HH-elp me” I try to say, but I don’t think my frozen lips are moving. I try to repeat it a few times, but I hear footsteps getting farther away.

Is this stranger really about to leave me alone out here?

…

It seems like hours have passed, and I can open my eyes now.

Too bad it’s pitch black out here.

No light anywhere. I’m still frozen, but the jacket is helping to break the cold wind from giving me hypothermia.

I figure I should remain sitting since there’s no point to find my way in the dark. I’m starving, cold, and wet too. Not sure if I’ll make it by morning.

A moment later, I see flashing lights in the distance, a group of voices, and I know for sure that’s the search team.

I do my best to stay hidden to evade capture, but a dog comes bounding through the bushes and licks my face.

“Guys! We found him! He’s here!” someone says as a beam of light is directed straight at my face, blinding me. I hear a bunch of voices coming closer.

“Someone get the stretcher! He’s incapacitated!”

“Here hold onto this”

“Help me get him up”

“Yeah grab that” the warm jacket is pulled off of me.

“Ok 1,2,3, up!”

I feel a searing pain starting from my aching arms and legs as they lift me up onto a stretcher.

“GAHHH!” I yell as they tie me down over the layers of blankets now on top of me.

“Hold on, my guy, you’re going to be just fine” a man says.

I hear a faint sound of helicopter blades slowly getting louder. The warmth of the blankets are comforting enough, that I find myself fading again.

…

I open my eyes to a blinding fluorescent light and white ceiling. The sound of beeping next to my throbbing head. My body is aching all over, but I don’t feel cold anymore. In fact, I’m dry and in a hospital gown.

“I guess I survived” I say to myself. I go to lift up my hand, but find that I’m restrained to the bed by a handcuff.

What the f**k?

Just then, I hear a group of people walk into my room. There stands a male doctor in a white coat, one police officer, and one man in a suit. The doctor walks over first.

“Mr. Osorio, how are you feeling? Any residual pain?” the doctor asks with a clip board in one hand. I shake my head and look down at the cuff.

“Can you at least take this off?” I ask the doctor, but he looks to The Suit.

“Not after that stunt you just pulled,” says The Suit with a scoff. “—in fact, keep the cuffs on at all times,” he says to the doctor, who just nods and walks out the door.

“Vito Osorio, you caused quite the ruckus today, we were all worried you had died out there,” The Suit says sarcastically.

“I wish I had” I sigh in return.

“I’m glad you didn’t!” The Suit throws his hands up energetically.

“Now that we’ve found you, I will make sure you are NEVER set free again, do you understand me?” he says lowering his voice into a whispering threat, “—your scams won’t work where I’m sending you.”

“Oh dear God! Where in the world are you sending me?” I shriek in a high pitched feminine voice to annoy him. There’s a hint of irritation etched on his face as I smirk.

“El Hongo. Maximum security prison. Mexico.” he says with a grin.

“What? Why? I thought I would be serving my sentence in the US?” I ask confusion racking my brain, “—I don’t even speak Spanish very well, I’m not Mexican.”

There’s a knot inside my stomach, as I try to absorb my next fate. Just the thought of being surrounded by the folks they lock up down there…

I probably won’t last a day.

“Exactly. You can’t manipulate someone, if you can’t speak the language. Plus, we’re revoking your US citizenship and deporting you,” The Suit turns away now heading to the door.

“Who the f**k are you?!” I yell out in a fit of desperation.

“We’ll come pick you up in a few days, in the meantime, don’t do anything stupid,” The Suit says before closing the door behind him.

A male police officer remains standing, on the other side of the door. No chance of escape even if I manage to find a way out of these cuffs.

After a couple hours, the doctor returns and hands me a neatly folded jacket. It looks like one of those from the US Military.

“No matter where you end up going, I thought you might want your jacket to go with you,” the doctor genuinely smiles at me, “—you know if it weren’t for this jacket, I think you would’ve died out there. You were barely holding on when you first arrived,” he says.

“Thanks,” is all I could muster after having such a twisted conversation earlier with The Suit.

I lift my cuffed hand to grip the jacket’s heavy material and see that the stitched tag says, “Property of C.K.” and below that “Men’s XL”.

So it was a guy probably my size… why couldn’t he save me? Why did he leave me there with his jacket?

He did say he would be back for this…too bad though, because it’s coming with me.