I threw myself on top of The Defender a second before the door flew open.
His body went stiff.
My heart was pounding too quickly, and I squeezed my eyes closed and tried my best to pretend to be asleep. Would they not take me if I was unconscious? Did he know something I didn’t? Why had it taken him so long to hear them coming?Should I have laid down beside him?I’d just wanted to protect him….
Shit, shit,shit.
“Remember, Boss said not to hurt her,” a voice spoke up from the direction of the door.
If anything, The Defender’s body went even harder under me. I was literally sprawled on top of him. Covering him like a pitiful blanket.
I squeezed my eyes closed and tried not to pant from how nauseous I suddenly felt. My poor fucking stomach did a barrel roll, trying to warn me again. Too late though. Way too late. Why hadn’t it acted up before?
Footsteps squeaked across the floor. “If you know what’s good for you, stay right where you are,” the same voice said. I was pretty sure they were talking to The Defender. I hoped he kept his eyes shut. I hoped he didn’t do anything to bring attention to himself until he could get out of here. “Shoot him if he moves. Take her.”
Oh shit, oh shit, oh—
Please don’t move, buddy. Stay where you are.
Hands clamped down on my wrists and ankles.
I wanted to move; I really did. I was ready to claw some eyeballs out, maybe bite a few fingers off. But I wouldn’t, and I knew that instantly too. Because maybe if I didn’t do anything, they would leave him alone.
That was enough to keep me immobile.
For him.
So that they wouldn’t try and hurt him, then figure out who he was.
Oh God.
Terror like I didn’t know gripped my entire body as I was lifted. He’d said to pretend to be asleep. He’d said to be quiet, but the second I was up, my weight focusing on the joints of my wrists and ankles, which was pretty fucking painful, totally fucking vulnerable…
I opened my eyes and locked onto the long body belly-down on the floor.
Fear wrapped its brittle, too-hot wings around me right then.
Not the kind of fear like when I’d watch a scary movie or when I heard a strange sound in the middle of the night. It was pure, genuine terror. Like what I’d felt immediately after my grandma had passed away and I’d thought there was a good chance I was going to be alone for the rest of my life.
Some people say that the opposite of love is fear. But the truth was, without fear, there can’t be love. If you can’t worry about losing something you find precious, it probably isn’t all that valuable to you in the first place.
And I had already lost the two people in the world who meant everything to me. Now everything else was gone too. I was going to lose my job after this shit too, but that was at the bottom of my list of concerns at the moment.
But to lose my life? Maybe it wasn’t perfect, and I had roadblocks set up at every corner preventing me from living it the way I dreamed or at least would have settled for, but it was something. It was mine.
I didn’t want to lose it. Not my life. Not my future.
I wasscared.
I was scared they were taking me. I was scared my life was really going to be over before it had even really begun. I was just… plain terrified.
And reason didn’t exist when terror was present. I suddenly understood why people did such stupid fucking things in horror movies that got them killed. I would have been one of those dumbasses, and I wasn’t fucking proud of it.
But I still did it.
I tilted my head just enough so I could spot him still flat on his stomach, his eyes closed. I was pretty sure his features might have been strained, but I didn’t know for sure. My vision was too blurry.
“I’m sorry!” I cried out, just in case….
