I stop as Cash pulls me in and wraps his arms around me, tightening his grip. “I’ve got you. I will kill every single one of them. I will make sure that when I do kill them, that it will be painful.” Loosening his grip, Cash cups my face. “It’s us now, and I promise that I will do everything in my power to make sure that no one ever puts a finger on you again.” Placing his lips on mine, “I love you.” he whispers.
Wrapping my arms around him, as I feel like this is where I should be; with him and nowhere else. I jump when I hear a loud beeping, and look around the room. “No one should know we’re here.” Cash whispers as he pulls me to stand behind him. He looks over at Argos who is on his feet with a gun pointed to the front door. They both make some kind of hand movement to each other and then they nod. Grabbing the knife off the counter Cash say, “Back to the corner, you stab if anyone comes close to you.” leaning down he gives me a kiss, and then looks at the door again.
I see Argos walking closer to him, and they signal something to each other, as Cash opens the door to a secret cupboard. I never even noticed that before. As the door fully opens I see all the screens, they have cameras all over this place. I haven’t seen the outside of it yet, but just looking at the inside of the house I know it’s a big place, and when I finally get some energy in me I want a tour.
I see them both put their guns away, getting up I walk over to them. “It was a fox that’s all.” Cash looks down to me. Then I hear another beeping, and Cash look over at Argos.
“That’s me,” Argos replies as he walks away to the laptops. Following him over, I stay so that I don’t see the screens. I see Cash look over at me, he knows that I’ve seen what’s on there and says nothing.
“What is it?” I look at Argos tapping away on the laptop. He’s moving from one screen to the other, “Argos!” I shout his name as he seems to be out in this computer world at the moment.
“Fancy a drive?” Argos asks as he finally looks up at me, “I have to go with you. I can’t seem to get a good read inside, but if I’m closer I might be able hack in on the building.”
“It’s not the shipment?” Cash asks. He seems to be better, almost as if he’s realized that Argos and I are just friends.
“No, but this is where he is. CCTV recognized him, and hit my system.” Argos goes back to whatever he was doing, “Don’t worry you will be able to kill someone.” Argos starts laughing to himself.
Cash looks over at me, and I say nothing. I don’t know what to say to him. I know that he won’t leave me here alone, so I have no choice but to go with him.
“How far?” Cash look back over at Argos.
“Forty minutes. Let me just get this all set up on one laptop, so I don’t have to carry everything.” Argos says as he works on five different things at once.
“I’ll get the guns.” Cash walks away from us, and I look at Argos working on whatever it is his doing, “Lucy!” Cash shouts my name and I run over to him. “You don’t leave my side, you don’t leave Argos’ side,” he stops and takes a deep breath in, “you…”
“I fight.” I tell him, fuck knows what is about to happen but I already have a bad feeling about it.
***
I watch Cash and Argos pack up the car, and I sit on the bench in front of the house thinking, I see them both looking over at me now and again. The slamming of the door jolts me up to see them walking over to me.
“Spit it out,” Cash looks at him, and I pinch my eyebrows at him, “you are thinking about something, so spit it out.”
I look at him and Argos, “Fine. Do you really think this is a good move? I mean this man has been a ghost for how many years, and now he can be that easily stopped? Something doesn’t feel right to me about this,” I watch them both looking at each other, “and he knows that you’re looking for him. This could be a set up all over again.” I add as Argos pulls out his laptop from his bag.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m about to check what the fuck is around that place, we were about to go in blind and angry. Lucy has a point. The fucker has been a ghost; he shouldn’t be that easy to flag.” Argos tells him turning the screen so Cash can see what’s around there.
“Nothing, the building is in the middle of fucking nothing.” Cash says looking more pissed off than before. I can see the vein in his neck pumping hard. “Call Tanner, tell him that we have a lead on the girls. How long will it take him to get there?” Cash asks him. I already know what Cash is thinking and so does Argos.
“I will call him, to give you enough time.” Argos shuts the laptop and walks away.
I stand there for a moment. Am I ready to fight this all over again? The last time we lost, they took me. Raphael has a bigger team than his brother did, he has a lot more evil in him than his brother did.
“Do you trust me?” I lock eyes with Cash, and think about that question before I answer. Do I trust him? Yes. Do I believe that he can win this fight? Yes. Do I think that he’s in the right mind frame to win this fight today? No. Until he fixes things with Argos, and makes sure that they are on the same page, I don’t know if they will work together.
“Yes.” I tell him, and take his hand as we make our way to the car.
Sitting in the back of the car, I look out the window as Cash starts driving, “So what are we calling ourselves, now that there are three of us?” Argos asks. Then looks back at me, gives me a wink, and I start laughing.
“What did you two call each other, when it was just the two of you?” I ask him, and he starts laughing. I look at Cash through the rear-view mirror watching me and Argos talking to each other.
“Nothing, Hades thought that having a name was stupid.” I give him a nod, realizing that we can only use nicknames from this point forward. I have to remember that; I have to call him Hades. I want to ask when they visit family, when do they have time to relax? If they have any at all. I know that Tanner has seen Argos, but not Cash yet. Then again no one has seen them both; no one knows what they look like. So, Cash could easily go out, and no one will know him as Hades.
I look around as the car engine stops. This is it. We’re here and the worried feeling I had before is still there, telling me this is not a good idea. My eyes move to the rear-view mirror and Cash can see the worry all over my face.He knows I don’t feel this is the best idea.
“What you got?” Cash turns to Argos who already has his laptop open and typing away at things. “It looks dead to me.” he tells him, and I look up at the building to see if there are any lights on.
“No there is someone in there, I can get Wi-Fi,” I hear Argos, as I continue to look at the building, “from what I can get there are a lot of people in there. I can already tell you we didn’t bring enough guns.” Argos looks over at Cash, but Cash keeps his eyes on me. “There seems to be some girls in there. Tell me the plan, so I know when to call Tanner.”
There is a moment of silence. Argos closes his laptop and looks behind at me, as I look at him. We both wait for Cash to tell us something. What is he thinking?
“Do you know layout of the building? Where are the girls?” Cash asks looking straight ahead.
“Fourth floor, third door on the left. I can’t tell you how many men are around the room, or inside the room. No CCTV around. I can get…”
“No, I’m going in…”
“Hades there are way too many people in there. I know that you are the best shot in America, but even I know that is a lot for one man to take on.” Argos tells him and my heart is beating so fast that I think that they can both hear it too.
“That’s why we are all going.” and with that said he gets out of the car, and I look at Argos in shock. Did I just hear him right?
“You stay close, you don’t leave us, and…” he stops and looks at Cash outside, shaking his head, “stay close.” I don’t think he even knows what the hell is happening.
As soon as we are out of the car, “Call Tanner, Argos, I know you don’t like this part, and you feel safer behin
d the screen but…”
“I have your back. I have your back behind a screen, and I have your back now. Always.” Argos takes the gun off him, and Cash grabs my hand as we make our way to the building.
I must be squeezing Cash’s hand a little tighter than I thought as I feel his thumb rubbing mine. I look behind me as Argos walks behind me. Something is not right here, I can feel it.
“My queen has come back to me.” I hear and I move closer to Cash, as he spins around to see where the voice is coming from, but I can’t see him anywhere. “My Queen, you left me, and now you will see what happens when you make me angry. Open the door to your left.”
“His talking through the speaker.” Argos whispers.
“Fucking coward.” I hear Cash.
“I won’t hurt you, not today anyway. I want my queen to know what happens when I get angry.” Cash looks at the door to his left, and puts his hand on the handle slowly opening it. Before I can see what’s inside Cash closes the door. “Now, now show my queen what she caused. If you don’t, well you don’t want to know what I will do next time.” He sounds as though he’s enjoying this.
Cash’s grip tightens on my hand. What the fuck is behind the door? Cash opens it again, my heart is feeling sick already. If Cash is going to show me that means he’s worried what will happen next.
I gasp, bringing my hands to my mouth. I stare; I look at each bed in the room. I look at each girl in the room. The fucking bastard! He gave these girls to sick men for them to get raped, burned, cut, you name it and they’ve had it done to them. Letting go of Cash’s hand, I walk over to one of the beds. A sob tries to escape as I look at her naked lifeless body. The girl’s face is so badly burnt that I can see her cheek bones. She looks unrecognizable and I don’t think anyone will know who she is. I can’t help but stare at her wondering if I caused this? I take my jacket off and I place it on top of her hoping that I can at least give her some privacy in her death.
Then I walk over to the next bed to find something to cover her with. I can’t look at the girls. I can’t see what has happened to them. Seeing the first girl has my heart broke and I know that if I see any more of them I’m going to break. I look at Argos, he is emptying his jacket pocket. He walks over to the young girl and places it on top of her. I walk to the last one and for some reason I kneel next to the bed. As I do I hear a wheeze sound…Oh my God, she’s still breathing.
My heart soars as I hear her breathing, but I know that she’s never going to be the young girl she was before. I take hold of her ice-cold hand and I know deep down that if she doesn’t get help soon she’s not going to survive. “Help’s coming. You need to hang on, help is coming.” I repeat that to her over and over hoping that she can hear me. Tears fall down my face when she lightly squeezes my hand. This poor young girl, she shouldn’t have had to go through this.
“You see my Queen I will get you back and if you leave me again this will be worse.” Worse how can it get any worse than this? How much more fucked up can this man get? “And you, Mr. Bodyguard, you killed my friends. You killed my right-hand man and you killed my brother, so…” I hear a bang. My heart leaps into my mouth and I turn to Cash who’s running my way. He’s okay! I turn to Argos just as he hits the floor
“No!” I scream. Argos, no he can’t be shot, he has to be okay!
“We have to go!” Cash yells at me and I can hear sirens coming.
I lean down to the girl and whisper in her ear, “My friend Detective Tanner is coming. He’s going to help you; I promise that you’ll be safe with him.” I’d love to tell her that everything’s okay but I can’t lie to her.
“I need to get Argos patched up,” Cash helps him to stand, wrapping his arm around his shoulder and dragging him out. Argos has his eyes closed; he’s not looking at us.
“Hades…” why isn’t he looking at us?
“I know, I know, let’s get back.” He says as we rush out of the building and to the car. “Get in the back with him. Push down hard on the wound and talk to him. Make sure you keep him alert.” Cash lays him in the back, and I jump in. But before the door closes the car is speeding off.
Chapter 10
Cash
“Lucy, keep pressure on it. We’re almost to the safe house.” Fuck! That motherfucking asshole. How did he know we’d be there? How did he set it up? I’m going to kill him. There’s no ifs, buts or maybes. That fucker is a dead man.
“Cash, he’s not talking.” I look in the rear-view mirror at her shaky voice. Damn this isn’t good. I need to get back to the safe house so I can get him laid down so I can see what we’re dealing with. “Argos?” I hear him grunting and I smile as she’s putting more pressure on the wound. “How’s Ruby? Are you still sleeping with her?” She picks this time to question him? She has odd timing. I know that she’s trying to get him to talk, but asking him about Ruby isn’t going to get him to answer.
I do a few evasive maneuvers just to be on the safe side, I don’t trust anyone and I wouldn’t put it past Raphael to have us followed. Once I’m sure that we’re okay I drive to the safe house. As soon as I come to a stop Lucy’s out of the car and rushing to open the front door so I can carry Argos directly into the house. He’s awake but in pain, the grimace on his face tells me that much. I help him out of the car and throw his arm around my shoulder; I take the brunt of his weight as his leg looks completely busted.
“Geez, you could do with losing a couple of pounds.” I mutter under my breath. The fucker’s heavy and my breathing is beginning to become labored.
“Fuck you, asshole. It’s all muscle.” He lets out a groan as I half drag; half carry him up the stairs. “You’re doing this on purpose!”
“You’re such a fucking baby!” I get him onto the sofa and lay him down again; this fucker spends more time on his back than anything.
“I’ve been shot!” He cries out as I rip his jeans up to his knee. Ouch, it looks as though his knee’s been busted. This is going to take a while to heal.
“Yeah? Join the club, we’ve all been shot and you’re the only one being a bitch about it. Lucy, will you get me the first aid kit and some warm water?” I need to clean this up before I can see how badly damaged his leg is.
“Fuck you. Why are you such an asshole?” I don’t answer him instead I walk into the kitchen. I know I drank all the whiskey last night but surely there has to be some other spirits in the house. I search the cupboards knowing Argos usually stocks up well, but he only got one bottle of whiskey. And everyone knows that isn’t enough to keep me stocked for more than a day. “There’s no more whiskey.” You can hear the pain in his voice.
“Why is that exactly?”
“Because you drink whiskey like it’s going out of style. Hell, you drink it like normal people drink coffee! It’s not normal Cash. You need to see someone about this: you’re an addict.”
“You don’t see me telling people who drink coffee that they’re addicts.” I’m still looking for something, there has to be something alcoholic in this house!
“Why would you tell them that they’re addicts? Cash are you feeling alright? Are you going through withdrawals? Shit, there’s a bottle of vodka in the cupboard in the bathroom.” Damn, he hides them from me? What in the ever-loving fuck? I grab the vodka bottle along with some towels, pissed that the fucker thinks I’m an alcoholic.
“He’s right; you do drink a lot of whiskey.” Lucy inputs, which just pisses me off even more.
“So, you think I’m an alcoholic?” I ask them as I get to work on cleaning Argos’ wound.
“Ummm…” Lucy says and it sounds as though she’s not really sure what to say.
“What she means is yes.” Argos laughter is cut short when I push hard on his knee. “Ouch.”
“No, I’m not; drinking is the only thing that blocked the pain of losing you. Now stop your bitching and let me clean this so I can see how bad it is.” I start to clean the blood around the wound first. He’s bleeding like a stuck pig and I need
to stop it. But I also need to see the damage and going to the emergency room is out of the question.
“Cash…”
“Will you get more water and more towels?” I cut her off as I don’t want to talk about anything right now. I need to get his leg fixed. I search through the first aid kit and come across the forceps, just what I need to take out the bullet.
“Why are you such an asshole?” Argos asks me as I start to dig around his leg trying to get this damn bullet. I can feel it and it feels whole so it hasn’t fragmented.
“I’m trying to focus on getting the bullet out of your goddamn leg.” I pull his leg toward me so I can get better access to it. I feel Lucy return and she places the water bowl beside the one I’m currently using. Every time the forceps move so does Argos and I’m tempted to tie the fucker up so he can’t move.
“Do you need help?” Her soft hesitant voice makes me look at her, she has tears in her eyes, fuck, it’s because I said that I’d rather be an alcoholic than a liar.
“Give him the bottle of vodka; hopefully it will help the fucker quit his bitching.” I manage to get a hold of the bullet with the forceps but with the amount of blood that’s flowing it’s hard to keep a fucking grip on it. “I’ve got the bullet, don’t move.” He goes solid so I’m able to pull the bullet out. I put the bullet and the forceps into the water and move the bowl out of the way.
“So how is my leg?”
“It’s not as bad as I first thought. You’ll be fine, as it’s not hit anything major, but you’ll be sore for a few days..” I start to clean the wound so I can stitch it. It’s not that bad, just bleeding a lot.
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