“Not here to hurt anyone, Justin.”
He cocks his head to the side with a sneer. “Really? You think getting hit by a Taser tickles?”
“You know as well as I do there’s no permanent damage,” I respond in a cold tone.
He moves his gun side-to-side, indicating I’m to face the wall. “Arms out to the side and feet spread apart.” His tone brooks no argument, and I immediately comply. Being that he’s the one holding the gun, he’s coming off a tad cocky and a little too self-assured. As he approaches me, I plan to use his overconfidence to my advantage, and catch him off-guard. Since he doesn’t think I will try to fight him, I act fast by swinging my right foot around and knocking the gun out of his hand. We both drop to the floor, fighting each other while struggling for the gun. I give up trying to reach his gun, instead using my precious seconds to grab a tranquilizer out of my jacket.
We’re both grunting and punching, using everything we have not to be the loser. I let him gain the upper hand, pin me down, and get one good punch in to allow me time to unsheathe the needle, and jab the shit out of his left thigh. I express all its contents into his blood stream in less than a second.
“Son of a bitch!” he bellows. He tries for a second swing, but he’s too late. I block his swing with one hand, and then punch him in the throat with the other. He rolls over onto his back, gasping for air and clutching at his throat with both hands. Quickly, I grab his gun and place it in the back of my waistband. “You won’t get away with this,” he rasps out.
I quickly zip tie his wrists and ankles, securing him immobile, and by the time I’m done, he’s halfway unconscious. “Looks like I just did.”
“I know why you’re here, and he will find you, Travis. He will scour the earth to find her, and when he does, he will kill you.”
I nod. “Thanks for the heads up.” He’s not telling me anything I don’t already know.
“He’s got ways to find you…contacts and systems in place you don’t even know about,” he reveals on a hoarse whisper. I watch as his eyes flutter closed briefly, and then reopens them as he fights the drug. “You better sleep with one eye open. You don’t know what Nick is capable of.”
I kick Justin in the side for good measure, and he glares and me and grunts. “I always have and I always will sleep with one eye open, but how nice of you to worry about me.” He’s always wanted to be Nick’s little sidekick, but he’s not smart or ruthless enough. “And for the record, neither of you know what I’m capable of.” I wave my hand around the facility. “Obviously.”
I know I’m losing valuable escape time chit-chatting, and since he’s almost out cold and securely tied, I mentally run back through my game plan again, making sure I’m not forgetting anything. My next stop is the clinic, so I head in that direction. Once I enter the clinic, I go straight for the locked medicine cabinet, swipe my hand over the sensor to open the door, and begin filling my bag with a shit load of Blyss, some other meds I’ll need, and a few filled syringes of pain meds and tranquilizers.
Once I’ve completed the task, I quickly head toward Jules’ room. As I enter, untold emotions run through me. She’s lying face down on the bed; her blonde hair sprawled out every which way, covering her face. Her back is bare, and I cringe at the red welts present. There are some intermittent areas I can tell Nick broke her skin, because there are fine lines where blood has clotted and started scabbing over. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt in a few other places her skin was broken, because I see Jared kindly cleaned her up and placed bandages over the wounds. I clench my jaw at the thought of her being whipped, and my gut twists in a knot. I have to tamp down my anger and focus on the task at hand, which is getting the both of us out of here right now in one piece.
I grab a set of pajamas and underwear from her drawer and make quick work of getting her dressed, being careful not to touch her back. In all of my tousling her around, she tries to come to, but she’s still out of it. She murmurs, “I’m sorry. I’ll be good.”
Her promise twists a knife in my heart, and I’m not sure who hurts worse at the moment. There’s a crack in my voice I don’t recognize when I whisper over her, “Oh, my sweet Jules, I’m so sorry. I’m here, sweetheart.” Emotions stir inside me, ones I haven’t felt for a long damn time.