Page 66 of Guarded By Them

Chapter Twenty-three

Rue

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WE DROVE ACROSS THE country, right through the night, and through the next day.

My entire body was stiff and aching, both from the hike and from being cramped up in the same space hour after hour. I hated to think how Ryan must be struggling. He must have found the trek back to the car insanely hard, but he hadn’t complained once. I’d wanted to beg the Capellos to let him take a break, but I also wasn’t sure how much they knew about him, and how much he wanted them to know. I wasn’t sure if he’d ever be able to use the missing limb to his advantage, but if there was a way, I didn’t want to be the one to ruin things for him by opening my big mouth. It did worry me, though. He could do lasting damage to his stump—damage that might even lead to a second amputation—and the idea of Ryan having to go through all of that again broke my heart.

He would have been suffering from the hike in the forest, so being forced to spend almost twenty-four hours in a car with a gun pointed at him would have meant the swelling in his leg was probably unbearable. I knew what he was like as well—he wouldn’t have taken off the prosthesis, even if it meant he was more comfortable. He wouldn’t have wanted to show that weakness to the Capello brothers or their men.

Despite what he’d said to me, I couldn’t help worrying about Dillon’s gunshot wound bleeding again. What had opened up the wound? I hadn’t seen any sign of blood when we’d been walking toward the border, before we’d been accosted. Had kneeling on the ground opened it up? It was possible, but deep down, I could tell it was something more. A change had come over Dillon, as though he’d put on a mask, and I was sure it had something to do with all of us almost being killed. He’d put up his defenses.

I didn’t believe what he’d said about what we had together only being about fucking. There was so much more between us all than just sex. He was trying to push me away in the hope I wouldn’t get hurt. But even though I knew this, that didn’t stop his words hurting. I didn’t want him to push me away. This was a time when we should all pull closer together, not try to create a divide between us.

The bleeding seemed to have stopped for the moment, anyway. It wasn’t much of a positive, but it was something. At least I didn’t need to worry about Dillon bleeding out on the seat beside me.

Each time we stopped, we were forced to wait inside the vehicles, while one of the other men went to pick up supplies and bring them back to the car. They were armed and we weren’t, which instantly put us at a massive disadvantage. Even if we stopped for a break and tried to make a run for it, because they’d divided us between the two cars, it would mean leaving the other two behind. We would never do that. And if we left them behind, all it would take was the Capellos threatening to kill them to bring us right back again.

“I need to use the bathroom,” I said truthfully.

“Tough,” Frankie replied. “You can piss on the side of the road like a guy.”

My bladder was full to bursting, so that was exactly what I did, squatting just off the road with my jeans around my ankles and one of the Capellos’ men standing over me with a gun. If I hadn’t been so desperate, I probably wouldn’t have been able to go in those circumstances, but considering I’d been about to have an accident, I let go of my urine in a hot rush and did my best not to splash my pants.

As we reached the outskirts of New York City, the sun was already setting again. The drive had felt like it was never going to end.

I recognized the route we took, and my stomach sank. We were being taken to the restaurant the Capello brothers owned. There was an apartment above, and a cellar below—both places I’d become well acquainted with at the time.

Despite the hour, the restaurant was shut. I imagined it had been the whole time the Capellos had been away, trying to track us down to bring us back again. Not that they’d care about the loss of business. The restaurant was just a front to make their work and family name look legitimate.

They drove us around the back, and I was relieved to see the car containing Kodee and Ryan already there. We’d tailed each other most of the way, so I’d at least taken some reassurance in knowing they were safe, but when we’d hit the city and the worst of the traffic, we’d lost them again. I’d worried that we weren’t going to be taken back to the same place, and that there was a chance I wouldn’t see either of them again.

“Come on. Out. Both of you.”

I was more than happy to get out of the back of the car, though I felt sick with nerves about what was going to happen next. Every muscle in my body screamed with a combination of pleasure and pain as I stretched out my stiff, cramped muscles.

Kodee and Ryan were both out of the car they’d been in as well, and Kodee caught my eye.

You okay? he mouthed at me.

I nodded and flicked a worried glance to Ryan, whose face was tightened in pain, and who didn’t meet my eye.

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