Page 37 of In My Blood
My worry for her had begun the second that she stepped from the plane and I saw her for the first time in so long. She could barely stay on her feet, and she had been shaken and terrified of all of the men surrounding her, though she had done an admirable role of masking it and playing her part. I saw it though. I saw everything. Her pain. Her fear. Her loneliness. Her beauty. Her strength.
By the time we got her home, she had been even paler and shaking harder than before. When she blacked out, all I had wanted to do was scoop her up the way her brother had. Anyone would have felt the same. She just looked so exhausted, not just physically either. I had looked into her eyes and all I had seen in them was a deep, desperate fatigue – the kind you only got from life tearing you down over and over and over a-fucking-gain until you had nothing left to give. I knew because I had been there, and I saw it in Cara’s face. She had suffered. That much was so very clear.
“Exhausted, and in a lot of pain. Gia’s staying with her, and I gave her some painkillers, so hopefully she’ll get some sleep now,” Rafe sighed as he stopped to grab a beer from the fridge, then sat at the island with Dario, Arran, and I.
“Do you want me to stay with them while you get caught up here?” Dario offered.
“No. I spoke with Cara. She told me she wouldn’t do anything to hurt herself, for now at least. I believe she’s safe wile Gia’s with her. Cara told me she’d never put Gia through that.”
“Through what? She hurt herself?” I pushed. I had seen Cara’s pain, but I had hoped we would have time to try and help her through it, as Rafe and Dario had helped me.
“She almost damn well succeeded. Drowned herself in the bath at the hotel over there,” Rafe ground out bitterly. I looked to Dario with shock I couldn’t even try to mask.
“She wasn’t breathing when we found her. I managed to get her back, but she’s not in a good place right now. We think she’s been through a great deal in the time she was gone,” he clarified.
“Like what?” Arran asked. “We’ll be needin’ to know if we’re to take care of her.”
“We don’t know much,” Rafe cut in. “My mother didn’t take care of her, I know that, useless fucking drunk. I never should have sent Cara with her. What was I thinking?”
“Rafe, you did the best you could. Isabella was the one who ran from everything you set up for her,” Dario assured him.
We were all watching our boss, and brother - in everything but blood- with concern. For eleven years all Rafe had wanted and worked hard to achieve was getting Cara back. Now he had her, it wasn’t shaping up like he had wished it to, and he looked rocked by it all, far more so than I had ever seen him.
“Dario’s right when he says Cara’s in a bad place. She admitted it herself up there. She doesn’t know if she wants to go on right now. I don’t know everything she went through, but there are scars on her body, or the parts I’ve seen anyway. She’s been working herself almost to death to care for our mother, and keep a roof over their heads. She’s flippantly mentioned a few things that make me think she’s faced some physical abuse at least. At some point she has taken classes to defend herself, so there had to be a reason for that,” Rafe continued.
“She got Don and Brax on their asses and got past them while they rolled around in pain. She’s fast and she definitely has some moves,” Dario agreed.
“Yes. He’s right. You both need to remember that if you’re with her outside of the house. She can run like an Olympic sprinter too, so don’t let her get away, or you’ll have no chance of catching her again.” Rafe looked pointedly between Arran and I, and we both nodded.
Rafe had already asked us to act as close security to Cara until we all knew she was safe from the threat that had already taken out their mother. One of us would always be in the house with her, or at her side if she had need to leave the property. Rafe refused to trust anyone but family with her safety, with the new threat looming, and I understood that. I felt anxious about her safety too and I barely knew her.
“We’ll keep her safe,” Arran added, trying to reassure Rafe, who looked anxious and irritated in equal measure.
“Did she mention the pills to you yet?” Dario asked.
“Pills?” I questioned. Dario leant over the back of the chair he sat in, and pulled something from the pocket of his suit jacket that he had hung there before he sat.
“We found these in her coat pocket,” Dario said as he set down a sizable baggie of white pills before us all.
“Any idea what they are?” Arran asked.
“No. And she hasn’t said anything or asked for her coat again. Maybe they weren’t hers?” I could see the hope in Rafe’s eyes that he was right.
“Well, if she were taking them, she’d be showing signs of withdrawal by now. Did you notice anything?” Dario looked to Rafe again.
“How would I know, Dar? She’s as pale as a ghost, in a whole world of pain, shaking and emotional! Are they symptoms, or are they just the results of everything she’s been through? Because I’ll be damned if I can tell the bloody difference right now!”
“If she’s nae throwin’ her guts up, or flashin’ between chills an’ sweatin,’ I’d say either the drugs werenae hers, or at least she wasnae addicted to them, at any rate. Could she have been deliverin’ them to someone else?” Arran suggested.
“I hope so. I’d rather get rid of some dealer she’s mixed up with, than have to send her away again to rehab,” Rafe growled.
“I can look into it when I get over there, but you really should just ask her, Rafe. We need to know who exactly we’re dealing with right now, with all the shit that’s going on,” Dario insisted, and I had to agree with him.
“I’ll see how she’s feeling tomorrow. I don’t want to upset her any further than I have to, when she’s already so close to the precipice of a fucking cliff.”
“We’re all here for her. She doesn’t know us yet, but she will, and we’ll help her, as well as protect her,” I spoke up, wanting Rafe to understand that he wouldn’t be alone in the shit fest we all seemed to have ended up caught in the centre of.
“Aye, I agree. Whatever she needs, Rafe. We’re here. Callan too.”
