My eyes were squeezed shut and my arms were around Ryder in an even tighter grip.

A moment passed.

Then another...

It took me about 5 seconds to realise that I couldn't feel the impact. I couldn't feel anything except Ryder's body heat and both of our loud and fast heartbeats.

The sound of the gunshot was still ringing in my ear, as a confirmation that a bullet was in fact, fired.

I just wasn't brave enough to open my eyes to see its effect. Because sadly I wasn't sure if I was fast enough but I remained latched onto him.

I was not surprised at all when I jumped in front of Ryder and I knew that I'd do it again, if I have to.

My body just reacted on its own as I pulled him into one last embrace.

"Oh my god..." Ryder breathed out, making me snap out of my trance and my eyes widened.

"What?" I pulled away from him with thoughts of terrible possibilities as I scanned him from head to toe. "What's wrong? Are you hurt?"

He wasn't. I'm sure I heard the sound of a gunshot fired...

I'm so confused...

My wide eyes finally landed on his and I noticed him, looking at something behind me.

I frowned before turning to look at where he's staring.

I turned to see everyone standing frozen where they were, staring at Alex in shock.

Alex stood there with a gun in his limp hand, looking down at his own bullet-pierced chest.

I swallowed a gasp when my eyes shifted to the only other person with a gun in his hand, standing behind Alex.

Jack...

He stood there with a gun in his shaky hand.

I sensed movement, and saw Diana slowly walk towards Alex. Just as Alex was about to fall on the floor, she caught him and slowly laid him on the floor.

I glanced at Ryder who was safe, before I walked closer to Diana myself.

I eyed Jack who got the hint and dropped the gun, leaning on the wall behind him, breathing heavily.

"T-traitor." Alex croaked, looking at Jack, who simply looked away.

To my surprise, I saw his eyes brimmed with tears of his own. "I was basically a hostage." Jack scoffed, making me frown.

"You blackmailed Luke and I into this shit." Jack gritted out. "We could never be loyal to a monster like you. "

Alex opened his mouth but choked on the blood oozing out of his mouth.

Diana sighed, cradling his head on her lap. "You had this coming."

If I didn't know any better I'd think that she actually looked... sad?

"I- I did-" Alex couldn't finish h

"You had ambition but you didn't have the right motives." Diana said, and a tear slipped out of Alex's barely open eyes. "I really hope that you can find peace."

I looked away as I felt my heart tighten. I couldn't help but think of Keith who might never get to know about his real father.

Diana slowly, placed her hand over Alex's face, closing his eyes.

Then his body went limp.

After about 5 seconds of silence, she suddenly laid his head on the floor and jumped of her feet.

"All right, the party's over." She said, looking around at the wounded people still standing in shock.

I walked over to her. "Are you uh-"

"Yeah, I'm fine. We were here to take him down right?" She said looking down at him. "We successfully did it."

I opened my mouth to speak but a loud sound of a door opening cut me off.

"Wrapping up without m-" Jacob stopped speaking as soon as his eyes landed on the scene in front of him. "Woah."

"Yeah woah..." I rolled my eyes.

Jacob motioned over to someone behind him and immediately his gang started to enter the room.

They picked up every one of the injured gang members and carried them out of the room. I'd want to think that they were going to take them to a hospital but I knew better.

Two guy wearing gloves lifted Alex's limp body and carried him out as well.

I frowned when I didn't catch a glimpse of Brody in the crowd but I decided against overthinking it.

When a guy approached Jack, who was still sitting in the corner of the room, I stepped in and stopped him. "Not him."

The guy looked at Jacob who simply nodded, making the guy walk away and out of the room.

"There are hostages." Jack suddenly said, grabbing my attention. "Many innocent people held hostage by Alex in various rooms. You need to release them."

Jack slowly stood up, with pleading eyes.

"My gang was a step ahead. We've cleared most of the rooms and the rest are being taken care of right now." Jacob said, with pride. "And the blonde reason why you went against my brother is on his way to the hospital, right now."

Jack's eyes widened while Jacob's expression looked indifferent.

"Wh- Blon-" Jack stammered.

"Luke? Was it?" Jacob said, furrowing his eyebrows. "The first name he said when he woke up was yours. I did the math."

"Luke?" My eyes widened, and Jack nodded.

"He's my little brother. I've always felt useless as an older brother as I failed to protect him." Jack said, regret clear in his voice. "Alex promised us money for our mom's hospital bills and recruited us in the gang in return. We've been stuck here since then."

I swallowed the lump in my throat as I realised how deceiving looks can be. You never know what someone is going through.

Everyone has their own monsters that's keeping them captive in a cage of hatred and disappointed.

"Alex treated us like crap and Luke wanted out of here. He never thought that our mom would want us to do this. So he retaliated." Jack shut his eyes. "And Alex punished him, without mercy."

"The day I barged in here..." I breathed out, as the cold realisation set in.

Jack nodded, looking at me and I looked away, shutting my eyes as the images of the blonde guy covered in blood flashed in before my eyes.

It was Luke.

"You can go check on him." Jacob said, suddenly, making Jack's eyes widen.

"You're not taking me captive?" Jack asked, surprised just as much as me.

Jacob frowned. "Why would I? You owed my brother, not me."

Jack blinked before nodding. "Thank you. I- I-"

"Now, get going. My men will take you to the hospital." Jacob jerked his head towards the exit.

Jack simply nodded before rushing upstairs.

I didn't realise until now that Diana and I had small smiles on our faces as we looked at Jacob.

He frowned at me. "Aren't you supposed to help lover boy up?"

Then, he turned to Diana while my eyes widened and I rushed towards Ryder.

"Ryder..." I breathed out. "Hold onto me."

I bent down, placing his arm over my shoulder.

I heard him mumble something and I thought I was hurting him somehow to I let go and crouched in front of him. "What?"

He looked at me with drooping eyes. "You're hurt..."

I looked down at my stomach to see it slashed open with a knife. It wasn't deep though.

I didn't feel any of the blows that much because of the adrenaline but as my body is starting to cool down the pain is getting prominent.

I looked up at him and raised my hand to the gauze on his head. "So are you..."

"Why did you do it?" He asked suddenly.

"What?"

"Cover me when Alex fired." He said, pain clear in his voice. "You could've- that bullet was meant for m-."

"I'd do it again." I said, with zero hesitation.

We stared at each other and I could feel our armours getting weaker and weaker.

"Miles? We kinda need to get out of here." Diana's voice came, pulling me out of the grey ocean of his eyes.

"Right. Okay. He can't walk on his own." I said, swallowing the overwhelming emotions.

Diana nodded, supporting him from the other side.

"What a reversal of roles, though." Diana chuckled, as we made out way out of the almost destroyed warehouse.

I frowned at that. "What?"

"No, I mean. It's usually the girl who gets kidnapped, and the guy then tracks her down and rescues her." She said, making me scoff.

Ryder chuckled. "Well, I might as well, thank my knight in shining armour properly, then."

Our eyes met and I felt a longing in his gaze that I've felt inside me since I realised that he was taken.

I've beaten myself up for being so harsh with him at the ice skating arena and saying things that I didn't mean.

Because in reality, having met him after all these years was the best thing that has happened to me.

And I always think that I'm not good enough for him and the fact that he was kidnapped because of me just fuelled that fire.

I still haven't thought about us, but in this moment I'm just glad that he's safe.

I looked away from him and he frowned at that.

"This way." I said, making Jacob frown but he followed me to the other way, away from the other cars.

We reached a black minivan that was a lot closer and easy to reach.

"Of course, you planned this." Jacob scoffed.

"Just be grateful that you won't have to walk another couple of miles." I rolled my eyes.

I slid it's door open and helped Ryder to settle on one side and I got in to sit in the middle while Diana sat on the other side of me.

"Finally! Are you okay?" Lex asked as soon as I stepped into the van. "Woah! That doesn't look very good."

She was looking at the slit in my stomach.

"Yeah, I was a little late." Diana said, fastening her seatbelt.

Jacob was on his phone, sitting opposite to us, facing Diana.

"Well, if you weren't busy locking lips with Jacob, this could've been avoided." Lex muttered, making my eyes widen.

I saw Jacob smirk, still on his phone.

Diana clenched her jaw but just before she could pounce on Lex, I spoke up. "What?!"

Diana rolled her eyes. "I'm so done with these kids."

I narrowed my eyes at her before shifting my gaze to the driver's seat. "Alright! Let's go."

Jason turned to glare at me before starting the van.

"What the fuck is he doing here?" Ryder asked, looking at Jason in disbelief.

"Your psycho girlfriend dragged me into this!" Jason exclaimed, driving around the narrow path in the woods.

Lex chuckled at that.

I rolled my eyes. "Just drive, J."

"J?!" Ryder exclaimed, raising his eyebrows at me.

I sighed, patting his chest as an 'I'll explain later'.

"Here." I said and Ryder frowned at the pills in my hand.

"Painkillers." I responded to his confused expression and handed him a bottle of water.

He nodded before swallowing it and gulping down the whole bottle of water at once.

"Did they- uh hurt you- well, other than that?" I asked, pointing at his head.

His eyes softened as he shook his head. "The wound on my head was enough to keep me tired and dizzy."

I nodded slowly. "I'm sorry." I muttered, making him frown, but I quickly handed him a sandwich out of my bag, urging him to eat.

I looked away from him and towards Diana, who was looking out of the window at the passing trees.

We were on the highway now.

"You good?" I asked, grabbing her attention.

She nodded. "Yeah. Just tired."

"It's obviously more than that." I said, softly. "You just saw the father of your son die. I'm here if you want to talk."

She chuckled softly. "I'm honestly good, kid. I ran away from him, for a reason. I guess I'm just- I'm just worried about Keith."

I slowly nodded, encouraging her to continue.

"I'm glad that we could avoid dragging him into this but I can't help but feel like giving him a normal childhood and being a good mother, is going to be a challenge." She sighed, looking down at her hands and I noticed Jacob looking at her, as well.

Even Lex's attention was on Diana and she listened to her intently.

"Because, as of now, he has a single mother, who does nothing and a dead father, who was a very bad gang leader." Diana, chuckled.

"That's not true." Jacob butts in, looking up from his phone and into Diana's eyes. "He has a mother who is amazingly strong and is willing to do anything for her baby. And an uncle, who isn't that great, but will try his best to protect him from anything, at all costs."

Diana, just like everyone else in the van was left speechless as Jacob stared at her with no signs of humour is his eyes.

"Just let me know, if you ever decide to dump him, please?"

I rolled my eyes at Lex before smacking her in the back of her head. "You have a boyfriend."

She chuckled rubbing her head. "I was kidding."

I scoffed at her.

Silence filled the van as the exhaustion set in.

We spent the journey, with small talks and some sarcastic comments.

Ryder was restless and kept asking me about the cut in my stomach while my answer was always the same.

"I'm fine Ryder. Just rest, will you?" I said, pushing his chest to make him lean back in his seat and relax.

He sighed before finally shutting his eyes.

*****

I felt someone lightly shake my shoulder, making me open an eye.

"We're here. Come on, I'm tired of babysitting you." Diana said, getting out of the van.

We were parked in front of my house and I realised that I had fallen asleep, due to the exhaustion and pain of the last two days.

I felt strong arms around me and I wasn't surprised to wake up in Ryder's arms with my head of his chest.

Ryder was awake and looking down at me. "You must be tired."

I chuckled at that, pulling away a little.

"You're the one saying that? You were kidnapped."

Everyone had gotten off the van by now and Jacob was making calls, while the others were stretching their cramped muscles.

"I had nothing to do there but sleep." Ryder shrugged. "You on the other hand, probably haven't slept in two days, have you?"

I was robbed of my speech once again and I sat there simply looking at his face.

"Don't ask me questions, you know the answers to." I said, pulling away from him.

The door on Ryder's side slid open suddenly.

"I want to go home and take a hot bath. Come on, be quick." Diana said, grabbing Ryder's arm and placing it over her shoulder.

After getting out after them, I did the same with Ryder's other arm.

I swallowed a gasp as I felt the pain in the cut of my abdomen resurface.

As we were walking towards my house, I noticed Jacob's men discussing details of the people held hostage with him.

There were also people unloading arms and loading them into different cars with hidden cabinets.

Lex went ahead and rang the doorbell.

The door opened immediately revealing a disheveled Alec.

His eyes landed on Lex, then on me and they almost popped out of their socket.

"Holy shit..." He breathed out.

I let out an amused chuckle. "You're officially an adult."

After hugging Lex for about a minute, he reached me. He scanned me before sighing.

"I can't even smack you, when you're in this condition." Then he suddenly pulled me to him. "God, I was so worried."

Diana didn't complain about having to hold Ryder on her own, while I hugged Alec with a sigh of relief.

"I'm fine." I said.

"Yeah sure." Alec scoffed, pulling away from me.

His gaze then shifted to Ryder.

"Come on in. You need to be treated quickly." Alec said, and I was grateful that he didn't act stubborn, the way he always does, with Ryder.

Alec walked over to Diana's side and placed Ryder's arm over his own shoulder.

"Are you sure you guys don't wanna come in?" I asked Diana and Jacob, who was standing only a few feet away.

"I told you, I need to go take a bath." Diana rolled her eyes.

Jacob chuckled. "Other than that, we have some bodies to take care of and some captives to torture, so I guess I'll pass, too."

I gaped at the fact that he actually said it with a straight face.

I slowly nodded and was about to speak when Jacob whipped his head to the side.

He suddenly frowned at the car just outside our driveway. "Hey, you!"

The guys loading the car stopped to look at Jacob with confused looks, except one. A guy with a blue cap.

He froze with his back towards us.

Jacob turned to look at him completely. "I don't think, I know you. Turn around."

I tried really hard to not show the surprise on my face at the fact that Jacob noticed something off, even when he was here, having a conversation with us.

My body was on alert as soon as I heard the alarming tone of Jacob. And everyone around us froze too.

When the guy in the blue cap didn't budge, Jacob took a step forward. "I'm pretty sure you know, that your boss is dead. There's no way for you to escape, man. You might as well just surrender."

Suddenly he started shaking and then we heard a booming laughter.

I tensed up a little more and looked beside me to see Ryder standing with his arm over Alec's shoulder, and beside them stood Lex.

With all these people here, a sudden realisation hit me like a truck. I'm surrounded by all the people that I deeply care about.

I'm not really the heartless bitch that I pretend to be on a daily basis and that makes this situation much scarier for me.

I can't let any of these people get hurt because of me.

I just can't.

Jacob took another step forward, but Diana grabbed his shoulder as a warning.

"Surrender? Me?" The guy suddenly said, between laughter.

My eyes widened as the voice sounded oddly familiar.

His laughter stopped.

"Well, unlike my boss, I don't hesitate in completing my mission." He said in a psychotic tone, before he whirled around to directly face me.

I froze as my eyes met with Brody's. "This is revenge."

He aimed a gun right at me, with a cynical smile on his face and without wasting a second, he fired.

My senses stopped working and I shut my eyes, waiting for the impact, but for the second time today, it never came.

I slowly opened my eyes only to be met with the very familiar, beautiful grey orbs, staring back at me.

My heart stopped for a second as realisation set in.

My gaze dropped down to his chest, only to see his white t-shirt drenched with blood.

I paid no attention to the commotion around us, as my vision grew blurry.

I small gasp escaped my lips. "No..."

Ryder's lips broke into a small smile. "I told you, I'd protect you."

His legs gave out and I caught him just in time. I sat on the ground, cradling his head to my chest. "No! Please, no! Ryder!" I cried, as tears freely flowed down my cheeks.

Ryder raised his hand and placed it on my cheek. He wiped my tears with the pad of his thumb. "Don't cry beautiful."

I continued sobbing. "Why would you do this? Why would you fucking do this?"