Tempted Hero by Ella Miles

Beckett

I watchthe needle slide into Ri’s arm. I can’t look away. I want to run to her, put a stop to it. I don’t, though. I dig my feet into the ground and root myself to the floor.

Gage tries to say something to me, but I barely look his way. All I see is Ri.

And then she looks at me.

I expect to see anger, pain, fear.

Instead, she looks through me like she’s taking in every line on my face, every freckle, every scar. I return the favor, memorizing everything about her.

Just as suddenly, she squeezes her eyes shut as the needle leaves her skin, and she’s gone to me. She doesn’t look at me again. She turns and faces the two men she’s now teamed up with, men that belong to Ryker.

“Everyone ready?” I ask, knowing I’m about to have a drug injected into my body and could lose consciousness or my ability to think at any moment.

“We’re ready,” Hayes says.

Hayes and Lennox are in charge of keeping Caius safe, while Gage is in charge of keeping me safe. We will all work together as one big team unless we have to split up since Caius and I received the same address with our respective drug packages.

The man walks over with his bag of drugs. “Arm, please.”

I hold out my arm and watch as he injects the needle. The warm-hot liquid spreads through my body. I’ve never done drugs, so I have no idea what to expect or how my body will respond to whatever he just injected, but I suspect it won’t be pleasant.

When he finishes with me, he does the same to Caius.

“You okay?” I ask Caius when the man leaves.

He nods. He’s been very quiet through all of this. I don’t know how he feels about being injected with an unknown drug, but he also wouldn’t quit when I asked him to. I don’t love the guy, but I don’t want to see him killed. I don’t know how to get him to quit the game without him ending up dead.

Gage grabs my arm. “Let’s go; with any luck, you’ll still be with it long enough for us to see how this is going to play out.”

I follow Gage, but he doesn’t let go of my arm. I think he’s too worried about me immediately going into a haze.

We make it to the car we all rode here together in. Caius climbs into the third row with Lennox. I climb into the second row, and Hayes and Gage ride in the front.

“Feel anything yet?” I ask Caius.

“No, you?”

“Nothing.”

“Maybe they didn’t actually inject you with anything except saline. Maybe it’s all to fuck with your head. I can’t imagine that Corsi would actually drug his own daughter,” Hayes says.

“Then you don’t know Corsi very well.” I run my hand through my hair, my body feeling warm, possibly feverish, but I don’t tell them that. It could be all in my head, or it could be real. Either way, there is nothing we can do about it now.

“Just drive. The faster we get there and get this over with, the faster you can throw Caius and me in a bed to sleep it off,” I say.

“Preferably not together,” Caius jokes.

I stare out into the darkness as Hayes drives. I don’t know where Ri went or if the drugs started to take effect for her already. I just hope she remembers me when she wakes up. I hope that when Gage’s and my plan works, she will remember what she did when I extract my retribution.

We drive for over an hour toward the location where we are supposed to deliver our suitcases filled with drugs. We don’t see any other teams on the way, and we aren’t attacked. There doesn’t appear to be any danger as we park the car at the edge of the woods, but that means nothing.

“Good?” I ask Caius before I pull out my gun.

“Good,” he responds like he has a dozen times over the last hour.

We all step out of the car, carefully shutting our doors, so they don’t make a sound.

“It’s so strange. It’s way too easy,” Lennox says quietly, barely above a whisper.

We all nod our agreement, and I take the first step into the trees. The house we are supposed to drop the drugs off at is about three miles into the center of this wilderness. There are no roads, so we will have to walk.

It’s rained recently, so we’re forced to trek through thick mud. It’s going to make the hike take longer than it should, but I’d rather deal with the mud than bullets flying by my head.

Lennox leads the way as we walk silently, each of us with a gun in hand, ready for an attack that may not ever come. After twenty minutes of walking, it seems that no danger will come. This is more or less a silly race and nothing more.

Suddenly, there’s a crack of a branch overhead. I jump behind the trunk of a tree, crouching down and staring up at the sky. My blood is pumping through me a million miles an hour as I try to make out the attacker through the shadows.

A large bird spreads its wings and takes to the sky, diving out of a tree, causing another crack in the branch above.

I let out a deep breath. “It’s just a bird.”

And then a bullet whizzes by my head.

Chaos breaks out all around. The quiet quickly turns to loud shouting and the sound of gunfire. I can’t even tell which direction the fire is coming from.

I try to open my mouth to shout out orders, but my voice cracks, and nothing comes out.

I see a man cross in front of me. I can’t make out exactly who he is, but I know it’s not any of my men.

I move to raise my arm to fire at him, but I can’t move my arm. I can’t move anything. I can barely see a foot in front of me from a haze coating my eyes. Moving my arm through the air feels like moving it through mud. I can move it, but just barely, and it takes all of my effort and concentration to do so.

I’m slowly being paralyzed by the drugs. It doesn’t seem to have affected my brain yet, just my body. But what can I do with any strategy I come up with if I can’t use my body to carry it out?

I search through the darkness, trying to find Gage or Lennox or Hayes, even Caius. I can’t find any of them. I see only shadows running through the woods.

The world starts spinning, and I lean my head back against the tree trunk, closing my eyes briefly. I squeeze my forehead with my hand to try to stop my headache. When I open my eyes, the dizziness is worse.

We are still a good mile or two away from the house. It will take me all night if I try to walk now, but that’s my only option. I need to start walking and hope that Gage or one of my other men find me. I’ll have to stay low to the ground to keep from being seen since I’m in no condition to fight.

I start army crawling on the ground, slinking from behind the tree trunk to behind a bush. It takes so much energy out of me that I realize I can’t do this for miles.

I’m sweating profusely, my hand and legs shaky, and I can barely make out what’s in front of me. I’m not sure how I’m going to survive.

And then I see her.

Ri.

She’s running fast, faster than I’ve ever seen her run. She’s gripping a gun in her hand, and she doesn’t look behind her. She doesn’t appear impacted by the drugs in her system, at least not yet.

I try to call out to her, to offer my help, but I can’t help her. I’m a paralyzed fool who can’t speak, let alone fight. She’s on her own.

My gaze drifts behind her, and I see the man she’s running from—her stalker.

I frown.

Is he one of the men fighting to marry her?

If so, how did we not realize who he was earlier?

She runs into a hard chest, coming to a quick stop. My heart sinks because I want to be the one to help her, but I know she’s in safe hands as much as it annoys me.

I watch her in his arms. I watch him hold onto her, protecting her when I can’t.

She smiles at him when she should be smiling at me.

She holds onto him when she should be holding onto me.

He leans in and whispers something in her ear, and her demeanor instantly changes.

Her eyes glaze over as if in a trance. He releases her, and instead of running, she turns to face the man she fears more than anything.

I don’t know what happened. I don’t know what he said to her that caused such a swift change, but she turns to fight.

She’s one of the best fighters I know, but with the drugs coursing through her system, she shouldn’t fight—not right now. She should run and hide and find the two men who are supposedly on her side. These drugs could rob her of control of her abilities at any second.

I try shouting.

I try to stand.

I try to do anything to get her attention. But I’m trapped in my own body, unable to move, unable to help her.

I hold my breath as I watch. This is my nightmare—being so close to someone I love who is hurting and not being able to do anything about it.

Love.

Fuck.

I love her.

I hate her, and I love her.

I wasn’t sure it was possible to love someone you hate, but there it is—the truth.

I love Ri.

I’m still pissed at her and want her to pay for the sins she’s committed, but I love her in equal measure.

I love how independent she is, how strong. I love her fighting spirit. I love that she puts me in my place. I love that she’s my equal in every way.

I just don’t know whose side she’s on. Is she my enemy or my ally?

Should I love her or tell my heart to stop the bleeding? Every other time I’ve fallen for a woman, I’ve fallen for the wrong one.

All I know is I don’t want her to die, not now, not like this.

The man gets closer to her, holding his gun casually in his hand. She doesn’t move. She stands there, ready for a fight.

Run!

I open my mouth and beg my voice to work, but it doesn’t.

Please, Fighter, run!

She doesn’t run. She holds her ground.

The man gets closer and closer until she can easily see him.

Shoot him!

She doesn’t raise her gun, probably wanting to disarm and kill him in a much more personal way. She shouldn’t risk it, though. Everyone is preoccupied with the battle that has broken out. No one is around to protect her.

Any second now, the drugs will engulf her, and she’ll be trapped just like me. I’m surprised it hasn’t already affected her. Her system must have a higher tolerance to the drugs after being injected multiple times before.

I wait for her to attack, to make her move. But by the time she launches herself at him, it’s too late.

He gets her in a hold. Her arms are pinned behind her back as he whispers something into her ear. I can’t tell if he has a gun or knife against her throat.

I try with everything in me to yell for help, but only a whisper comes out.

I can’t help her.

I can’t save her.

I’m destined to watch another woman I love be taken from me or killed in front of my own eyes.

My heart bursts at the thought, but I don’t give up. I can’t. Any moment the drugs could wear off enough so I could help her.

Fight him. You’re strong enough. You can win.

She wiggles a little in his grasp, but only barely.

Why isn’t she fighting harder?

Did the drugs hit her? Is she just as helpless as I am?

I don’t blink. I can’t tear my eyes from her, not even for that split second. So much emotion and adrenaline are rushing through me; I must be able to break through the hold of the drugs soon.

The man whispers something into Ri’s ear, and she goes lax.

I narrow my eyes, confused at what I’m seeing.

The man releases her and is gone as fast as he came.

My heart beats again when I see Ri still standing and seemingly unhurt. I want to run to her, put my arm around her, and get her the hell out of here—so fucking far away from here.

I blink, and she’s gone.

I don’t know where she went.

I don’t know if she’s collapsed behind a bush or tree.

But I have to hold out hope that she’s alive. I have to hope my plan can work, that Gage comes through. He’s the only one I truly trust. At the moment, I’m not even sure I can trust myself.