Page 54 of Bound to the Crime Lord

“Leo?”

“I’m sorry you had to go get caught up in all of this.” He stepped forward with a syringe in his hand. “This is likely going to hurt.”

I tried to pull away from him, but it was too late.

He plunged the needle in the hallow between my shoulder and neck, injecting whatever liquid he had inside the syringe.

Within seconds, I felt the effects of whatever had been forced into me. My legs gave out from under me as I slammed into his hard chest. Leo held me in his arms, staring at me with a conflicted gaze in his eyes.

“W… why?” I muttered under my breath. The weight of my eyelids increased with each passing second, no matter how hard I fought to keep consciousness.

Leo looked me dead in the eye when he uttered the words. “Diego would like to see you.”

And then everything went black for me.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Juliette POV

Ifelt something cool hit my forehand and I groaned. My muscles ached all over, and my head felt like it had two bulldozers ramming into the sides of my skull.

My bearings were completely off and I had no idea where the hell I was. All I could feel was something lumpy underneath my body, and then the coolness of what I presumed was a towel of some sort on my head.

I could hear the faint dripping of water off in the distance, like a leaking faucet of some kind.

I blinked, my vision slowly coming into focus, and then I was met with kind caramel eyes from above. A cold towel pressed onto my forehead again, effectively cooling my heated skin. The coolness was welcomed, but the memories of what had occurred leading up to wherever I was hounded my thoughts.

I went to move my hand but the motion pinched my skin and caused me a great deal of pain.

What in the world…?

I looked down at my body to find that not only were my wrists bound together, but my ankles as well. Thankfully, I was still in my scrubs, which meant that no one had undressed me. That was a relief, at least.

When I tried to move again, a pair of aged hands came over my wrists stopping my movements. I trailed my eyes from the wrists, up the arms to meet those same kind eyes that I had woken to.

“Don’t, you’ll hurt yourself,” her gentle voice commanded me. “The knot is designed to tighten the more you pull on it.”

My head pounded when I tried to move it to the side, and the woman above me cupped the sides of my face. It was then that I noticed just how hot my surroundings were. My body dropped with perspiration, and my entire body felt dehydrated and worn down.

Whatever those assholes had injected into me, it had one hell of an after-effect.

From what I could tell, I was in some kind of concrete room that smelled like wet rocks. My back rested on a mattress that smelt like mildew and retirement home.

My eyes then moved back to the woman who still had her hands cupped around my face.

“Let me help you sit up,” she said with a small, kind smile on her lips.

She helped me to sit up against the wall. She made sure that my back was upright the correct way, so I wasn’t compressing my spine too much.

“Whe… where am I?” My voice was incredibly hoarse. It felt like I had swallowed rusted nails.

“You’re in Guadalajara,” she said softly. “You were brought here last night by his men. I’ve been tending to you since.”

The old lady turned and picked up a bottle of water and held it to my lips. At first, when I made no attempt to drink it, she drew the top to her lips and took a generous sip.

“It’s not poison. I would not hurt you.” The sincerity in her eyes was what got me.

I allowed her to give me the water and took long and generous gulps of the cold water. My system welcomed the refreshment, feeling more alive and alert with each molecule of water.

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