Page 48 of Nick

We stepped around him and kept walking. I turned down a side street and looked around. Everything looked the same. It was as gloomy in the daytime as it was at night. The chills went through my body, remembering my time as their prisoner. These people were dogs.

I remember hearing stories of when the Bellos first began and how they looked out for the little man. They don’t look out for anyone these days. This place has turned into a place of terror. It needed to be destroyed. I would make sure it was.

“Let’s not go that way. It’s a dead end. We’ll turn here.” Six men surrounded us. We smiled, and they took a step back. It was almost laughable that they would think they could beat us. We were all excellent fighters.

When they brought knives, we still smiled. One of them pulled out a gun, and I kicked it out of his hand. Ten seconds later, they were all knocked out cold. Matt stopped and looked down. “You know they’ll come after us with others the next time. Let’s do something with them.”

“What do you want to do with them?” Ryker asked. He was frowning.

“We’ll zip-tie them and tape their mouth shut. Tie them like hogs.”

“Are you saying you have duct tape and zip-ties on you?”

“Well, sure. Don’t you carry zip-ties with you? I take them everywhere I go. Literally.”

I took out my zip-ties, and Matt took out his flat pieces of duct tape. Ryker smiled. “I’ll start bringing this stuff with me.”

“We wouldn’t leave on a mission without it,” I said as we taped their mouths shut. “We need to ensure they can’t pull each other’s tape off.” I looked around and spotted the pipes. “We’ll attach them to those pipes.” We had that done in no time and got back to walking.

“Hey, this is one of the places I was held. Let’s see if we can find a way in here.” I walked around the building and saw that damn fake window I had tried to get out of for hours. Then I remembered the fake door. I started pushing on the walls and heard a click. I pushed, and we saw the door open. On the floor was someone curled up in a ball. I walked inside and took out my mini flashlight.

“Hey, are you okay?” The guy turned and faced us. “What’s your name?” I asked. He was beaten up pretty badly. By the looks of him, he had been here for a while. I took off my backpack and gave him a drink of water.

“How did you get in here? I’ve tried getting out,” he said weakly.

“A fake door. What’s your name?”

“J-John Buckley.”

Ryker walked up to him. “We are here trying to find our friend Ethan. He came here hunting for his brother.”

“These guys are crazy here. This is where the taxi dropped me off when I told him to take me to my hotel. I thought someone had put something in my drink, and I wanted to go to the hotel before I passed out. God, I hope your friend is still alive. He’ll be fighting every one of these men. I can’t stand up. My leg is broken, and my ribs are busted up. Leave me here while you find your friend.”

I rubbed my hand down my face, knowing I wasn’t going to leave him here alone. He would be dead before we came back for him. “One of us needs to take John to the hospital. Who wants to take him?”

“I’ll take him,” Jackson said. “But I’m going to drop him off, and then I’m coming back here. My admiral needs my help finding him. I know the admiral. He’ll start throwing punches. He’ll have five men down before they stop him.”

22

Nick

This place was creepy. The deeper we went into this hell hole, the worse it got. Why did these guys get away with taking over these few blocks of the city? A bullet slammed into my arm, and then all hell broke loose. Bullets flew at us until we started firing back. Then we heard boots running down the street.

“Is everyone okay?”

“I think you are the only one who was shot. We need to go back to your place and check your arm out,” Matt said, walking up and standing next to me. “They must know we mean business and want us dead.”

“Yeah, they're angry because we rescued John. They probably found the guys we tied up. We’ll go home and regroup. I will find out who is getting paid for leaving this scum alone. I wonder if Jackson is back. Let’s head to the vehicle.”

We were on our way out of there when we heard a shout. I looked around and didn’t see anyone, but I knew a man was shouting. I ran to the other side of the street to a building. I heard scuffling. I ran around and saw the door. The guys were right behind me. I kicked the door, and it flew open.

Ethan Sullivan was on the floor. It looked like they had broken a few bones in his body. Matt and Ryker grabbed a couple of guys, and I kicked one in the face. He went down fast. There were a total of seven men in the room. It didn’t take long for us to knock them out.

Matt pointed at me. Blood poured from my arm. I took my shirt off and wrapped it around the wound. Ryker picked Ethan up and carried him out the door. We followed him. Matt ran behind me, watching my back. I was starting to get weak from the loss of blood. I saw Jackson pull up with the vehicle; Matt caught me when my legs gave out. I couldn’t focus, so I closed my eyes. When I opened them again, I was in the hospital.

I looked at Matt, who was standing at the window. “How is Ethan?”

“I’ll tell you how Ethan is. I’m pissed.”

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