Oscar
I could smell her—that sweet scent that was all Ivy. I must be dying, to be able to smell her and feel her like I could. Peace. For a few moments, I felt perfectly at peace. That was until the agony that I’d endured over the last few hours reared its ugly head.
Something wet hit my cheek, and I opened my eyes to find Ivy’s face hunched over mine, her tears falling onto my face.
“Ivy?” I croaked, my voice not even sounding like my own.
“Oh, my gosh, Oscar. I was afraid you were dead.”
I chuckled and regretted it instantly. “Me too.”
Scooting back, I pushed to where I was propped against the wall with her, not quite sitting up but no longer lying in her lap. I missed her warmth, so I pulled her hand over to mine, holding it tightly.
It took several minutes before I could regain my strength to talk. “How did you know about Washington?”
“I spoke to him on the phone yesterday after you were taken.”
“Why?”
“Santos contacted me and said he would exchange you for me if I would turn myself in.”
I groaned and shook my head. “Please tell me the guys didn’t just allow you to do that.”
She scoffed. “Please—I’m not stupid. We set it up so that I was surrounded. The team was going to take Santos into custody and use him to discover your whereabouts. Only, they must have paid off some teenagers to create a stampede in the tunnel of the Aquarium where we met, and I was swept along with them. Santos grabbed me and shoved me into the car. He forced me to take off my GPS tracker.”
Her words had started to take on an edge of hysteria. “Now there’s no way for them to track us, Oscar. No one knows where we are.”
Her sobs wracked her body, and I pulled her closer, to hold her as long as I could.
“It’s okay. We’ll figure this out. I’m not giving up on my team. They’ll find us.”
The question was, would they be in time?
“They threatened to kill you. He was on the phone with someone. I didn’t know what else to do.”
I held her, stroking her hair as she cried, giving comfort and receiving it from her in return.
We sat there just holding each other, savoring the last moments we had. I didn’t know if the team would make it in time, but I was going to do everything in my power to keep Ivy alive. Of course, the Cabs had incentive too, since they needed her alive to create the antidote. That gave me hope that she would go on to survive this even if I didn’t.
I turned her to face me, my hands gripping tightly to her upper arms. “Listen; when they come back, I want you to just do what they say, okay? Don’t fight them, Ivy.”
“No. They’ll kill you.”
I shook my head. “It doesn’t matter. If I’m going to die, I’d rather it be in your arms.”
“Stop talking like that. I won’t allow either of us to die. The team will come. They have to.”
“But if they don’t make it in time, you keep yourself alive. It’s all worth it as long as you live.”
“We’re supposed to live together. You and me and our future children. We’re supposed to have a whole lifetime together. This—” She motioned to the white room we were in. “This isn’t where we die. We die together, lying in bed, holding hands. Just like the ending of the movie version of The Notebook.”
I smiled at her crazy talk. “That’s just a movie. No one really dies that way.”
“You don’t know that. Don’t argue with me right now.” She leaned her head against my shoulder, clinging to my hand with enough force to break my fingers. “This can’t be our story, Oscar. It just can’t be.”
I was thankful she was on my left side so I could put my arm around her and hold her close. I wanted to comfort her, to tell her it would be all right and that we’d get out of this alive. But the truth was, the rattle in my chest and the ever-growing pressure told a different story, even if we were somehow to find a way to escape. I was a dead man walking.
“Humor me for a moment, please?”
I felt her nod against my shoulder.
“I’ll fight, Ivy. For you and for me and for our survival. I will fight. But if for some reason I don’t make it, I need to know that you will live your life. Find someone to love you, to give you everything you deserve.”
“No, Oscar—”
“Shh. Give me a minute.” My breaths were more labored, and it was hard to even find the strength to utter what might be my last words to the woman I loved. “Find someone who will make you happy. Spoil Cami for me. Use that money to do fun things. Travel. Buy an expensive pair of shoes. Live life. If I know that you will go on living, I can be at peace.”
“I can’t, Oscar. You are my everything. I don’t know how I didn’t see it before. But you are. It’s why I never filed for divorce. Leaving you permanently would have been like cutting off half my body. I’ve only lived half a life all these years, and if you leave me now, there will be nothing left of me.”
I lifted her chin and placed a soft kiss on her lips, careful of my battered face. I could taste her tears on my tongue, and I savored them, knowing a little part of her was inside of me.
“I love you, Ivy Bell. You have to be strong for me now, okay?”
“I love you, too.”
She opened her mouth to say something else, but the door opened, revealing Santos in all his unholy glory.
“I see you made yourselves comfortable.”
Santos pulled his hand from behind his back, a syringe full of nastiness hidden there. The two goons from earlier came in with no preamble and lifted me off the floor. It was excruciating, the pain, the nausea, the pounding in my head, the ever-growing pressure in my chest. Ivy’s cries and pleas made it all the more heart-wrenching.
They tied me back to the chair facing the one person I loved more than any other in the world. I didn’t give Santos the pleasure of watching me beg for my life. Instead, I stared fixedly into Ivy’s red, tear-soaked eyes.
“I love you.” I mouthed the words. She shook her head so hard, I was amazed she didn’t hurt herself.
“I love you,” I mouthed again.
“No.” Her voice was authoritative as she stood to her feet, looking like a lioness standing against hunters in the wild. Feral. Valiant. Beautiful.
The two goons left us alone, shutting the door behind them as Santos paced the room.
“It’s unfortunate you two spent so much time apart. It’s touching how much you truly love each other. But the heart can be stubborn. I credit myself with pulling you back together, only to rip you apart once again.”
“Why? Why us? Just leave us alone. Please.” Ivy fell to her knees in front of Santos, and I wanted to tell her to get up, not to humiliate herself in front of him that way. She was too good, too strong to humble herself before a man who was unworthy to even look at her.
Santos grinned at her prostrate form. He moved to my side, the syringe at the ready. I inhaled deeply, wishing Ivy would lift her head so I could stare into her eyes as I breathed my final breaths.
“This won’t kill you instantly.” The bastard couldn’t even give me that. “But without the antidote, you’ll be dead within hours. You see, we perfected it, and the cocktail of treatments your Dr. Ortiz used on Lola won’t work this time. Even with your wife’s blood.”
I wondered how he knew about Lola and her recovery, but I didn’t have time to dwell on it. The needle was at my neck, and I closed my eyes, at peace knowing for at least a little while, Ivy would live. The team still had time to find her, and I knew without a shadow of a doubt, they would. I heard her roar of battle and opened my eyes to see Ivy lunging from her position on the floor, knocking the syringe out of Santos’s hands. It went skittering across the floor and landed against the wall.
Ivy followed up with a palm to Santos’s nose, but she missed, glancing off his cheek instead. He grabbed her arm and twisted it behind her back, then shoved her to the floor. Ivy grappled, scratching at his face, neck, and arms. Bloody lines bubbled up and oozed from the scratches, and I was damn proud she’d drawn blood.
I pulled against the restraints, but my right arm was completely useless, hanging like a dead limb on a tree. Santos seemed to have lost all reason as he pinned Ivy’s arms above her head. She rammed her knee into his groin, but she must not have made contact, because he grunted, but didn’t lose his hold. He let go of her wrists, only to wrap his hands around her throat.
No. No way. He was going to kill her. With a strength I didn’t know I had, I jerked free of the rope, grateful to whoever was listening to my prayers that the goons hadn’t tied the rope tightly enough to keep me bound. I lunged for Santos, knocking him off of Ivy, who coughed and sputtered.
“Run!” I didn’t know if she’d get far, but if she could get out of this room while Santos was in his crazed state, at least he’d have time to regain his mind and realize he couldn’t kill her. Not if they wanted an antidote.
Santos threw a punch that I was able to dodge, but without my right arm, it was like swinging in the wind for me. I wrapped my legs around his waist and pulled, and Santos tumbled down on top of me. I tried a few maneuvers I’d picked up over the last couple years, but my body was too tired, too injured to perform them effectively.
Santos placed his hands around my neck and squeezed, my vision springing black spots that quickly narrowed into a pinprick of light. My chest was already so heavy, and the lack of oxygen was taking its toll. I blinked rapidly, trying to fight against the darkness that closed in, knowing that once I gave in, that would be it. I’d never wake again.
And then she was there. Like a goddess from the heavens, Ivy appeared behind Santos and stabbed the syringe into his throat, jerking it back at an angle, creating a small hole in his artery.
He made a gurgling noise as blood started to ooze from his neck and up his throat, trickling slowly out of his mouth. With wide eyes, Santos held his neck with his hands, the life-giving substance leaking through his fingers.
Ivy stepped around him and helped me to my feet, but I staggered against her. The pressure in my chest was so heavy, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to walk. “Go.”
She shook her head. “Not a chance in hell, Oscar.”
Pulling my arm around her neck, she shouldered my weight as we made our way to the door. When she opened it, the room beyond it was surprisingly quiet. No guards. No staff. Nothing. Just an empty space.
“Where is everyone?” she whispered.
“No idea.” I could barely get the words out. It was taking all my strength to just take a step forward. My legs collapsed underneath me, and I sank to the floor, almost taking Ivy with me.
“Oscar. What is it?”
I shook my head, unable to tell her I was dying. That even after her heroic efforts, it wasn’t enough.
“Ivy.” She didn’t seem to hear me—instead she was screaming for someone to help her. Did she not realize that anyone who would come running wouldn’t be there to help her? They’d let me die, and she would be next.
I tried to make myself move, to tell her to go, to run. But my body wouldn’t work.
Gunshots sounded nearby, and I turned my head to the side to see where it came from, but nothing would cooperate. I was fading, pushing against the darkness that was strangling me, taking me under, taking me away. Away from her.
I wanted Ivy to know. To know that even though I was dying, I didn’t regret finding her again. That I would give my life over and over for hers every single time. That even though I wouldn’t be there in person, I’d never stop watching over her. I’d be with her always. I would love her always.
There was a crash, followed by sounds of shouting. I tried to stay awake, but my vision wouldn’t cooperate. All I could see was her tear-stained face as she hovered over me. There was nothing else.
“They’re in here!”
“We’ve got him.”
Ivy was frantic, pulling at my shirt, begging me to stay.
I’m trying, I tried to say, but nothing would come out.
“Stay with me, Oscar. Stay. Please.”
I smiled, opening my mouth to tell her, where else would I go?
Cruz’s features appeared above me, the look on his face worried and upset. I wanted to tell him it was okay. They were here. They’d found us somehow. I knew they would. Ivy would be okay.
“His lung is collapsed. Hang on, Oscar. We’ve got you.”
There was a sharp pain in my side, followed by blessed relief in my chest. Suddenly, I was lifted, and something slid underneath me. The lights on the ceiling whooshed by me as I was jostled around on the hard surface.
“Ivy. Where’s Ivy?” I tried to ask. Was she okay? They’d found us. Surely that meant Ivy was safe. I needed to see her to be sure.
Finally, the crisp air of the evening settled over me, stars twinkling in the night sky. I needed to stay awake. I felt like it was important that I not give in to those beautiful stars that were drawing nearer, coming to take me away to a better place. A place with no pain. No sorrow. A place where I could find peace.
A place where I’d find Zachary.
***
Ivy
I watched as the men I’d come to call friends carried the most important person in the world to me out on a stretcher. All around me was carnage; men lay bleeding on the floors of the once-pristine house. I wondered absently if The Vicar and The Angel had been among the dead. I knew The Saint was gone because I had killed him.
Most people say that when you take someone’s life, it haunts you. That there’s this regret that settles deep into your bones because you ended their existence here on the Earth. Even in self-defense, you hear of people who were troubled for the rest of their lives over what they had to do.
But I didn’t feel any remorse.
Perhaps that made me savage or soulless. But in the moment, I’d had to decide between the bastard who had kidnapped me and taken me from my family, taken my sister and tried to kill us—or the man whom I loved with all my heart, mind, and soul. It had been no contest, and I’d had absolutely no hesitation. I chose Oscar, and I would choose him every day for the rest of our lives if he just pulled through.
An ambulance sat in the driveway of the underground home, and Cruz climbed into the bay with Oscar. I wanted to cry out, plead for them to let me go, but I knew there was no room. I’d have to follow behind them.
Jolie ran over, still dressed in her touristy clothes from earlier that day, a blanket in her tiny hands.
“Ivy! Oh, my gosh, are you okay? What happened?” She fussed over me like a mother hen, pushing my hair back from my face, no doubt seeing the bruises that Santos and his thug had left earlier that day.
“I’m fine. I need to get to the hospital. I have to be with Oscar.”
“You need someone to look you over, then I’ll take you.”
I shook my head, a headache starting to form behind my eyes.
“No. I need to go now. He needs me.”
Jolie looked at Ryder, who’d just walked over, and he nodded. I followed them to the van and slid onto the single bench in the back seat. Ryder pulled away, stopping momentarily to tell Levi where we were going and that I could recount everything later. Levi peered through the window at me and gave me a nod. “You did good.”
I didn’t know about that. It felt as if everything had gone wrong from the moment those teens swept me away in their sea of chaos and right into the arms of Santos the Unholy.
Ryder drove fast, and I couldn’t thank him enough for it. I needed to get to the hospital and see my man. Put my hands on him so I knew he was all right.
The Shadow Force team had arrived just in time. A few moments later, and he’d be dead. I knew that. I owed them my life. I owed them Oscar’s life, far more valuable than my own.
“How did you find us? Santos made me take off my watch.”
Ryder glanced at Jolie and then straightened his shoulders as if about to tell me something I might not like. “I put a tracking device in your locket. Jolie told me where to find it yesterday while you were sparring, and I put a tracker inside hoping they wouldn’t find it until we’d already traced you to your location.”
I wrapped my hand around the small locket, suddenly more grateful to my mom for this precious memento than ever. I opened it, and sure enough, there lay a small rectangular chip nestled inside.
“Thank you. You saved our lives.” I met Ryder’s gaze in the mirror. “But why didn’t you just ask me for it?”
“I didn’t want you to know it was there, in case they asked you about it.”
“Good thinking.”
Ryder smirked in the rearview mirror. “We try to be prepared.”
“I didn’t think you’d get there in time. I thought all hope was lost.”
Jolie turned in her seat and took my hand. “We’re family now. And family is always there for each other.” She smiled, but it was sad and a little worried. “Always, no matter what.”
And I knew what she meant. Even if Oscar didn’t pull through, they would be there for me. They were my family now.
The thought of Oscar not keeping his promise to love me forever was unbearable, so I turned back to the trees flying past me in a blur and prayed.