Page 22 of Guarded By the SEAL

“What do you think will happen if you do manage to get out of those ties?” he sneers. “We’re on a fucking boat in the middle of nowhere. You aren’t getting anywhere. Might as well save your energy.”

“Where are we going?” I wail. “Where are you taking me? Please, don’t do this.”

“It hardly matters now, does it?” he sneers. “It doesn’t matter where we’re going. You are stuck on this boat and coming with me. We’re going there, and there isn’t any changing my mind. So, don’t even bother trying. You can’t offer me anything to make me save your life. Sorry about that.”

He gives me a look which seems to be one of sympathy before I feel a glass of water pressed between my fingers. I am thirsty now, thirstier than I have ever been before, so I gulp it back hard.

“There, even better.” He laughs at me. “Now you might shut up and give me some peace.”

“What do you mean?” I snap back. “I’m not going to just lie back and let you take me.”

“Like you did back at the house, you mean?” He chuckles. “Because you sure as shit laid back and let me take you then. You didn’t even flutter an eyelash as I lifted you from your bed.”

I shudder, violated. That is a disgusting as hell thought. “Why didn’t I wake up? That’s messed up.”

“Oh, that will be the drugs, sweetheart. You just drank some more of them. You’ll be out again soon. That was just my insurance in case you started acting out. I don’t have time to babysit your ass. I much prefer you when you’re out cold and I can just do what needs to get done. I can’t fuck about, you know?”

I slump backward feeling defeated. If I was drugged so heavily that he took me off the island without my noticing, then I have no chance in escaping this boat. I’ll have to wait until the other end… but the only problem with the other end is that Jake will be there. When Jake gets his hands on me, I’m screwed. I know too much. He won’t want me around to spill the beans on anything. I’m a risk.

A heaviness overshadows my eyes. Much as I want to keep them open, I don’t seem to stand a chance. While a horrible sleepiness comes for me, I start to feel the worst possible things happening to me. Death coming for me in the most horrendous of ways. Strangulation, air leaving my lungs. Blades, hitting and stabbing me from every angle, at every part of my body. Gunshots slamming into me, making me bleed.

I don’t want to die, my brain unhelpfully screams at me, like I don’t already know that. I want to live.

“Jake, yeah, mate,” I hear the man saying loudly. I don’t know if it’s in my head or in real life, but it’s scary to hear anyone talkingto my husband. “I have her here with me now. No, she’s knocked out.”

My blood runs ice cold. I can only imagine the look of glee on Jake’s face as he discovers that he has me exactly where he wants me all over again. The next time we see one another, we’re going to really see one another. I didn’t want to look at him and know that he’s a disgusting criminal. I just wanted to forget that he ever existed. But it seems like I’m not going to get that chance, though. I’ll have to see him.

“I can’t do that, Jake.” Even that man sounds disgusted now. Jake has pushed him too far. “Nah, you can do whatever you want to her when I get her to you, but I’m not doing a thing. Just delivering.”

I don’t know if this should make me feel safe, better, but it doesn’t. I might be left alone while I’m on this boat, but it won’t be forever. I will soon be back in Jake’s arms, being killed.

Oh, my God. It’s too late for me to do anything, but I know who this man is now. Just as the drugs are claiming me and really sucking me into a void of darkness, it hits me. There is a reason that I kind of recognize this man, and now that I’ve realized who he is, I can’t believe that he’s here.

Nathan Ambers, my father’s business partner. At least he was once upon a time. He used to come to the house a lot when I was a kid, but I haven’t seen him much since I got older. I never thought to ask because I don’t normally talk to my dad about work, but I thought they weren’t working together anymore.

Does my dad have something to do with this?I hate thinking it, but in a way, it’s something that has to be considered. If Nathan is here, if he has found me, then it could be because my fathertipped him off. If they’re still working together… but why would my own father want to do that to me? We are all each other has. It doesn’t make any sense that he would want to harm me. He’d throw himself in the firing line, wouldn’t he? Wouldn’t he? The problem with Jake is he’s scarily manipulative. I know that now.

Could he have done something so terrible that even my own father has turned against me? My God, that idea makes me want to weep, but I can’t. Nathan has trapped me inside a bubble of my own mind, and I can’t escape no matter what I do. I’m stuck with my thoughts, my fears of my father, of Jake.

Harry keeps creeping up as well. There’s no real reason to consider Harry in all of this since he left me to get captured, although not on purpose, I’m sure, but his face floods my mind anyway. I think of the rare times that he smiles, when he laughs, when he kisses me… I wonder what he will think when he returns to the island to find me gone. I bet he freaks out, and not just because he’s messed up with his job.

Even though he’s been funny with me today, in the depths of my mind, I kinda feel like he might like me more than he cares to admit. Not in a falling for me kind of way, just liking me. After all, we have connected. Not just sexually, but on another level as well. I think we could be friends…

Although I guess we won’t be friends if I’m dead, will we? We won’t be able to have any kind of connection if I’m sent off and sold to some stranger and I lose control of my life. I guess we will never see one another again, which is a tragic idea. I would like to thank the man for saving me, for looking after me when my life was coming to an end. He put up with a lot of shit from me, and now I’ve just vanished into thin air. I would have loved to have left a note or something. A thank you and goodbye note. Perhaps an explanation for why I was such a nightmare withhim, to apologize for it all because I do feel bad now. I should have made his job easier, but I didn’t. And now, that’s the last memory he’ll have of me. Acting like a spoiled brat, getting stupid drunk and being an idiot, then seducing him before vanishing. God, that’s not a great thought, is it? And now, I’m going to die with only that idea inside his mind forever.

Harry, my father, Jake… all of them circle through my brain. All of them give me a different range of emotions. I get mixed up in them, chewed up in the strangeness of them all, lost inside my brain. The drugs really take me off on a dark journey while Nathan takes me to another nasty place while I’m out.

18

HARRY

Idon’t even look at the speedometer as I whizz along at the speed of light. As long as I’m careful and no cops catch me, I should be fine. I just need to get my ass back home quickly to find out what’s going on with Petra. I’m absolutely terrified that she will be in some kind of bad position, all because of me.

“Max, pick up the fucking phone,” I growl as I drive along. He’s taking too long to answer and it’s starting to piss me off. It’s making me worry that everything has gone tits up. “Fucking hell, come on.”

“Harry.” There is a graveness to his tone which has my hackles on edge. “Where are you?”

“On the way back. I went over to the mainland, and when I returned, Petra had vanished.”

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