Page 56 of Ryder
The other guy nodded. “We didn’t manage to take them all out. They’ll be coming for us.”
Ryder sighed. “I… we need to carry you.” He looked morose as he spoke, probably understanding exactly how much I didn’t want to be touched right now, but would it be okay if it was him? He cared. He wanted to help me, not hurt me.
“You,” I whispered, making him blink with surprise.
“Me? You want me to carry you?”
“Only you,” I added, my body starting to tremble, even though I still couldn’t move.
“Okay, darlin’. I’m gonna pull you across the bed, and lift you, okay? It might hurt.”
“Everything hurts,” I whispered back, my throat feeling hoarse, now that I was trying to speak more.
“He’s been choking her,” the blonde guy murmured quietly, nodding at my neck. Ryder cursed, his eyes dark and angry.
“Kinda wanna kill him again.”
I gasped. “He’s dead?”
Ryder smirked as he reached for me.
“Only a lot.” I didn’t panic as his hands closed around me, and he slid me from the bed, carefully tucking the sheet around me as he lifted me. If anyone else had touched me right then, I’d have been screaming my head off.
“Do you wanna see?” The other guy asked me, and it took me a moment to realise what he was asking. My head lolled against Ryder’s chest, but the word ‘yes’ hissed out of me pretty fast then.
They both chuckled quietly, and then Ryder moved away from the bed, and turned us toward the wall. Has-Been reached down and grabbed something; Dom’s hair. It was soaked with blood, and his face was badly beaten, but I knew it was him. There was a lot of blood, and many dark, dripping holes in his chest. He was really, truly, dead.
“Thank you,” I whispered quietly to Ryder. I would be safe now… if I planned to go on. Right now, I really didn’t know if I would, or could.
“We need to get going,” someone barked, sticking their head into the room, and then we were hurrying out into the hallway.
Ryder
Icouldn’t let mymind focus on anything other than getting her out of there. She was in my arms at last, and I knew that it was the right place for her.She belonged in my fucking arms.
That bastard was dead, and I had to let that be enough, because right now, I wanted to find every last person who knew him and kill them too, but I had to focus on her;Tori. She’d been through hell, and I had to be the one to get her through it.
The others surrounded us as we made our way out of that place, taking out several guys as they appeared. The place was littered with bodies, and we’d put bullets in quite a few. I’d practiced with a gun, but never killed anyone with one before today. It seemed fitting that he’d been one of the first. I only wished he’d survived to feel all of the bullets I’d fired into his cowardly asshole body.
We made it out to the van, and I sent one of the prospects to ride the bike back, under strict instructions to protect it with his life or I’d kill him slowly. I climbed in the back of that van, and sat on the hard metal floor, with Tori still cradled in my arms. She was warm against me, but limp, not moving. I hated it. I hated this lethargy that he seemed to have caused in her somehow.
She didn’t speak, she just kept her face buried against my chest, her breath warm against my skin through my t-shirt. It shouldn’t have felt so good to have her pressed against me like this, but it felt right.
“You still with me?” I whispered to her, hearing her breath catch in her throat, like I’d startled her.
“Yeah,” she finally replied, when I’d expected just a nod of her head.
“He dosed you with something?”
She groaned, her body trembling but otherwise unmoving.
“Paralysed.”
Bastard. She groaned again, and then she cursed.
“Gonna… throw up…”
I moved her just in time, angling her away from both of us, as she purged the contents of her stomach all over the inside of the van.
