The Claiming

Chapter Twenty-One

We drive all the way through the night, stopping once I think to take gas out of abandoned cars. That slows us down a lot, but the Bayfell guards never find us.

Riah, Chance, Alec, and I take the bed in the back of the vehicle, Riah and me in the middle. Alec curls himself around me while Riah sleeps on her back with Chance's hand resting on her stomach. I wake when we stop for the gas, but I don't move. I hear Alec's dad outside talking to Chance's father in muffled voices, but I pick up on their conversation.

"We've gotten ourselves into quite a mess, haven't we?" Mr. Evans says in a monotonous voice.

Alec's father sighs. "Yes, but it's best for all of us. The prince got a little power-crazy in choosing his own wife by choosing someone else's. I'm very proud of the kids for taking matters into their own hands like this. And besides, your grandchild will grow up without a tyrant for a leader."

"Right."

"What's the matter?" Mr. Bentley asks.

"I just can't believe Chance got her pregnant so quickly. I was never very fond of Riah in the first place, and the fact that she's carrying my grandchild..."

"Riah is a very lovely girl, Peter. She and Chance love each other, so what's the problem?"

"I just wish he had chosen someone more... innocent than that girl."

Mr. Bentley is silent after that. Either that or I fall asleep again. All I know is that Chance's father is not okay with Riah or the baby. Make way for family drama...

***

When we wake the next morning, Riah and Chance are out of bed, and I hear their voices coming from the kitchen area. The floor rumbles with the movement of the motorhome going at a fast constant pace.

I feel Alec kiss my cheek suddenly. "How do you feel?" he says gently.

I shift onto my back and look up at him leaning over me. "A little better than yesterday. Rested, that's for sure."

He smiles. "Great."

I stretch out my arms and legs and then sit up against the back wall. "Where did everyone sleep?"

Alec glances out through the open door of the little bedroom. "Well, the couch pulled out into a bed, and above the table is a little drop down bunk, and above the driver's area is a loft, so my parents and Chance's parents swapped out the loft in shifts, I think. And then Sarah and Clarissa took the table bunk or the sofa."

I nod. "It was kind of a tight squeeze in here, wasn't it?"

Alec chuckles. "It was comfy, though. Good thing the bed is decently-sized."

He helps me out of bed and we walk dazedly into the main area of the motorhome. Everyone except Chance's father and mother is gathered around the little dining table with a map spread across the surface.

"So we're thinking if we follow the highway down through Kentucky we can make it into Tennessee and the mountains. It'll be easier to stay hidden that way. Maybe we'll find an old town or something we can stay in," Alec's father says.

Alec and I sit on the sofa as there is no more room at the little table. He wraps an arm around my shoulder and kisses my cheek. "I have no idea what he's talking about," Alec whispers to me. "I've never heard of those places."

I wrack my brain for some kind of history lesson I must have had a long time ago. Then I peer over at the map stretched out on the table. It's an old map of what used to be the United States—back when it was united.