Chapter Thirty-Seven
JAX
I shine my torch towards the small form on the bed. “Mia,” I say, trying to keep my voice as soft as possible.
Her eyes flutter open, and I notice her pupils are dilated before she sluggishly brings her hand up to cover her eyes from the beam of my torch. I turn it off and glance back to Louis, who turns on the dimmer switch to give me enough light to see properly.
River says something into the comms, but my focus is on Mia. Louis relays something back in response as I kneel beside the bed.
“Mia, it’s Jackson,” I say again, gently tugging her wrist away. “Can you hear me?”
She replies, but her speech is slurred.
I glance around the room and notice that her clothes are pulled out of the wardrobe and her dresser is trashed, and I suddenly have flashbacks of finding Lily beaten and broken.
“Mia, I need to check you over, okay?”
“M-kay,” she slurs.
Using the tip of my index and third fingers on the side of her wrist under her thumb, I press down to check her pulse.
Her heart rate is slow, and her breathing is shallow.
Shit.
“Guys, we need to get her checked out at the nearest hospital.”
“What the fuck? Is she okay?” River asks, his voice tight.
“She seems to be semi-sedated. Her heart rate is slow, and her breathing is shallow,” I reply.
“I’m going to kill him,” River seethes, and I hear a grunt followed by muffled voices.
Pulling back the blanket, I notice she’s only wearing a small crop top and a pair of knickers. She needs something to wear. Glancing over my shoulder at the clothes strewn all over the floor, I grab one of her oversized sweatshirts.
As carefully as I can, after some manoeuvring, I manage to get the sweatshirt over her head and gently tug her hands through the sleeves, and that’s when I notice the bruises on her wrists and upper arms.
What the fuck? I have to breathe through my anger and not go back up there right now and end him once and for all. But she needs me, and I’m no good to her right now if I can’t keep my shit together.
“Here,” Louis says, a pair of joggers appearing over my shoulder. I glance up, but he keeps his eyes averted as I manage to pull them up and over her legs.
I wrap her in the blanket and lift her into my arms, her head resting against my chest.
“Jax, shit, man. We have company incoming,” Elliot mutters into the comms.
“Put your balaclavas back on,” I order. Whoever they are, I don’t want them having facial recognition.
“Done. Stay where you are, don’t come up. They’re here.”
Louis’s eyes shoot to mine, his etched in immediate concern. I glance down at Mia, feeling completely torn. I can’t leave her down here while I go above deck, and I sure as hell can’t risk taking her with me and into fuck knows what.
The sound of raised angry voices solidifies that much.
“I’m going to go do some recon, find out what’s going on,” Louis says in a thick French accent. Gun raised, he quietly slips away. I don’t know what his history is, but for such a huge guy, he’s stealthy as fuck.
I back myself into the cabin, laying Mia back on the bed. Pulling out my gun, I close her cabin door behind me, leaving her in relative safety. If anyone comes down here, I’ll be ready and if they even attempt to come for her, they’ll have to go through me.
“Everyone just needs to calm down,” Mason says, his voice low.
His words, however, do nothing to calm the situation as it becomes abundantly clear. It’s only getting more and more out of hand as seconds pass.
“They’re the ones I work for. I’m just the middleman.” Richard’s voice comes through the comms, which means he must be close to one of my guys.
“You lying cunt,” River grits out.
I pace outside the cabin, keeping my gun raised. Briefly, I even consider trying to get Mia off the yacht without detection, but not knowing if we’re surrounded, I can’t risk it. I’m hoping that whatever drug she’s been given is some kind of sedative meant to just keep her compliant. But seeing the bruising, it’s clear that any pretence and patience Richard had for his daughter has long since passed.
“River, Elliot, can you talk? Tell me what’s going on?” I ask, desperation seeping into my voice.
But it’s Louis’s voice that comes back through the comms.
“I made contact with Gabe. He counted five assailants entering the marina, all carrying weapons.”
Fuck !
“Do you have a visual?”
If he replies, I don’t hear it over the sudden echo of shots being fired amidst shouts and returned gunfire, shattering of glass and the breaking sounds of what I’d imagine being furniture.And then there’s a low hiss followed by buzzing.
“River? Elliot?”
Nothing.
“Mason?”
Just static.
I pull out the earpiece and throw it at the wall.
A large body rounds the corner, and I raise my gun, already cocked and ready to go.
My heart rushes in my ears, and I immediately fall into fight mode.
But before I even have a chance to pull the trigger, the guy before me freezes. His lips part, a gurgled sound escaping his mouth as he stutters for breath and then drops to his knees and looks down at his chest now pooling with blood. And then his body tilts to the side and he drops down face first.
Standing behind him is Louis, silencer raised. He kneels beside the body and retrieves the man’s gun, then checks for a pulse. Satisfied, he stands to his full height, and only then do I breathe.
I look past him as if I can see what’s happening above deck and clench my fist. My gaze returns to the cabin door. All hell is breaking out up there, and I’m down here.
If it were any of the others here, I know they’d stay to protect Mia, for Lily. As much as it goes against every fibre of my being not being up there, standing beside the men I consider my brothers, I can’t leave Mia here and vulnerable.
“Now I’ve evened the odds, I’m going up before someone else comes down here looking again,” Louis says, disappearing around the corner as quickly as he arrived.
There seems to be a pause from the commotion above, the noise dissipating, but then it comes back full force with a thunderous roar—the unmistakable sound of a machine gun.
A deathly silence follows right before I hear shouting and then Mason’s voice ringing out above me.
“Fuck, we have a man down. Elliot’s been shot!”