Chapter Nineteen
Camila ripped one of the shirts she found in her bag and wrapped her cut hand. She didn’t have a lot of experience with injuries, but she thought the cut would need stitches, which made her already dire situation worse.
She sat on the ground with her head to her bent knees and wrapped her arms around them.
So many thoughts and emotions bombarded her, making her dizzy and slightly sick.
She thought some of it had to do with the sight of blood, but the rest was because of the situation she found herself in. She was clueless about what to do.
She thought of calling Betty, the sweet woman she’d met in the diner a few times, but didn’t think she should get her involved, although she had become a friend in the short time she’d been with the men.
Her next option was the sheriff, but all her stepfather had to do was produce the documents he had made that explained her emotional problems and how she tried to hurt herself.
She knew he’d believe a distinguished man like Edward above her.
She had learned the hard way that money fixed problems and paid for people you never thought it would.
A sound at the opening of the cave made her raise her head. Fear spiked when Aiden came through and stood towering over her. She scrambled away, stood, and tried to dart past him.
“No!” she yelled, fighting to get away from him. “Just let me go. I’ll be gone, and you won’t ever have to see me again.”
Aiden pulled her tighter into his arms and rocked her as he murmured comforting words to her. “Everything’s going to be okay.”
“No, it won’t ever be okay. You guys don’t understand.”
“Malik and I are going to make sure you’re taken care of.”
She laughed roughly. “Yeah, I’ve seen the way you want to take care of me, and I’d rather be dead. Now, let me go.”
Aiden cursed. “We are so sorry, baby. We had no idea about your stepfather.”
“It doesn’t matter. The only chance I have is to run. You can’t stop him.”
“Yes, we can.”
She fell against him and sobbed. “No, you have no idea what he’s capable of.”
“Malik met him.”
Her head snapped up, and all color rushed from her face as stark fear raced through her. “He’s here already?”
“Yes. But Malik will take care of him.”
She started to struggle again. “If you cared at all for me, you’d let me go.”
“Settle down, baby. It’s because we care about you that we’re going to do everything in our power to protect you.”
“You don’t want anything to do with me. I know that now. I just wish you’d given me a chance to leave on my own.”
“Jesus, baby. We never wanted you to leave.”
She collapsed against him, so he had to take all her weight. He cuddled her close to his chest and sat on the ground with her on his lap.
“Easy. We are so sorry we put you through this. If we had known, we wouldn’t have called him. He had law enforcement out looking for you, and we thought if he just saw you were doing okay, he’d be fine and go back home when he saw how happy you were with us.”
“I was too afraid to tell you guys. He’s sick.”
“Hey, there you are,” Malik said, and he rushed into the cave. He pulled her out of Aiden’s arms and held her tightly against him. “I am so sorry. God, the man is nuts. We would never have put you in this situation.”
“It’s partly my fault,” she said. “I was embarrassed to talk about it.”
“We’ll talk about it on our way into town.”
She leaned back and looked at him. “In town for what?”
“We’re getting married.”
“What?” she yelled.
“It’s the only way to protect you, and frankly, we were going to get there anyway.”
She pushed away from him and looked back and forth. “What do you mean?”
Aiden stood by Malik and grinned at her. “You were going to end up marrying us eventually. You’re crazy if you ever thought we’d let you go.”
“But the way you guys talked, it was like he was coming to get me.”
Malik shook his head. “No way in hell. We knew you’d choose to stay with us, and we didn’t know what a threat he was to you, so we figured he’d come to say hi and make sure you were okay and then leave.”
“What did he say?”
“He’s determined for you to go home with him.”
She nodded. “I know he is.”
Aiden grabbed some of their things and then latched onto her hand. “Let’s go. I want this done, and us home by the time he gets there.”
She gasped when Malik grabbed onto her other hand.
He snatched her hand and looked at it. “What the hell did you do?”
“I cut it.”
“Fuck, baby.”
“No, don’t unwrap it yet. It's not bad. I want to get going. I don’t trust that man,” she said.
“None of us do.”
“I’ll look at it in the truck while Malik drives,” Aiden said.
The three were headed back to the house to get the truck. They didn’t know how much time they had, and they didn’t want to miss a minute of it.