Dark Endings (18 page)

Bull pulls a bottle of chloroform out of his bag and rushes over. I have to look away as they tackle the poor woman to the floor. She’s scared, frightened and sadly has come to know her masters here and possibly even think she loves them. I can’t imagine what that does to someone. Rusty lifts the slumped girl over his shoulder and carries her towards us.

“Any more of you scream, and you’ll have the same thing happen. We’re here to help, not hurt you.”

The other women don’t acknowledge me speaking. They just continue moving. God, they really are just broken bodies. There is no life left in any of them. No soul. We begin loading them onto the boat and settling them down beside each other. I turn and stare back at the island, hoping I’ve done enough. I’m about to climb onto the boat with the men when I hear someone call my name. I turn and squint, and see Huck running through the trees towards me. What. The. Fuck.

“JAGGER!”

I leap off the boat and rush towards him, wincing in pain as my body is forced to move. When Huck reaches me, he’s panting, bloody and terrified.

“What the fuck are you doing here
, Huck?”

“You can’t blow this island, you can’t.”

“Tell me why not?”

He looks me dead in the eye. “Because Willow is trapped up there, and your father has bombs planted on this island. He was going to kill you all. We have exactly twelve minutes left, and we’re all dead.”

My world begins to spin.

CHAPTER
18

WILLOW

I can’t believe we got caught. I can’t believe I was a hero. Huck and I got onto the island
together and were managing to sneak through when I saw that they had missed two girls. Being the hero that I am, I tried to help them. I didn’t want them to die. It was a mistake. Now I sit tied and bound in a huge open airfield, surrounded by guards. We’ve got six minutes left, six minutes and we’re dead. I tried to tell them that, but they all laughed at me.

I feel silent tears slip down my cheeks. All I can think
about in this moment, is Cody. I’ve failed him. I should never have left. I should have just stayed and let these men do what they had to do without me. I tried to be a hero, when all along Jagger probably could have dealt with it and been off the island before Mick’s explosives went off. Huck got dragged away, I think he’s dead. It’s all my fault.

My lip is bleeding where a guard hit me three times. My leg feels like it’s close to being broken and my head is pounding. Desperation took over me about ten minutes ago, and I started screaming and begging. All that got me was a few good kicks in the stomach
– after they removed my bullet proof vest. Now my head is bowed and I’m crying, big, hot tears stream down my face. I’ve failed and my son will now grow up without me. I can only pray Jagger got free. I can only pray. It’s all I have left. Five minutes to go.

I hear a gun shot, then another, then another. I snap my head up and see the
guards around me dropping like flies. I peer around but I can’t see anyone. More guards rush out only to drop to the ground too. It’s a machine gun, I can hear the clear pop pop pop. I throw myself to the floor as bullets whizz past me to hit the guards closest to me. The gun is loud and intense, and the sound is cold and frightening. Before I know it, someone is gripping me in their arms. Another guard?

“Willow.”

Jagger, oh god. Oh no. No….

“Willow, don’t move. I have to untie you.”

He quickly cuts through my binds with a knife, and then spins me around to face him. He’s covered in blood and he’s panting. His arm is bandaged up and he looks a little pale.

“Jagger no,” I rasp. “You should have run.”

“I’d never leave you, ever.”

He pulls me to my feet. “Run, we have to run.”

“We only have minutes, Jagger.”

“I know, run!”

He begins pulling me towards the trees but I’m limping. The guards kicked me so many times in one leg it burns. I close my eyes and think of my son. Fuck my leg. I pick up my pace and Jagger runs so fast he’s pulling me most of the time. I’m just making my legs move so I don’t fall. I hear gunshots behind us, but Jagger doesn’t turn. When something hits me in the back of the leg, followed by an intense burn, I know I’ve been shot. I scream and my legs collapse.

Jagger spins
around, raising his gun and shooting ferociously at the guards nearing. They drop like flies. He leans down and lifts me into his arms, roaring in pain as he does. He begins running again. The burning pain in my leg is so intense I actually throw up on Jagger. He dodges through the trees and I know we have a minute left, if that. We’re going to die here. This is the last moment we’ll have. We reach a cliff, it’s high but it soars off into nothing but clear blue water. No rocks, just water. Jagger curses.

“I went the wrong fucking way.”

Gun shots begin sounding out again. Jagger turns to me and a hot tear streams down his face. I don’t know if it’s from pain or because he knows this is the last time we’ll see each other. He takes my face in his hands.

“I love you baby, forever and always.”

Then he throws me off the cliff, just as a loud boom fills the air and orange lights the sky.

CHAPTER
19

JAGGER

Pain jerks through my body as salt water fills my lungs. I’m spluttering and coughing, trying to get myself to the surface. I can’t feel anything, my body is beyond pain now. It’s just numb. I surface and breathe in a breath full of smoky, horrible air. I dive back under when a huge rock flings into the water. The island is still trembling and exploding. Willow. I have to find her. I jumped after her, I saw her go under.

I dive, searching the water even though it burns my eyes. I reach out, hitting only bits of rock and
debris. I surface again and the smoke burns my lungs as I desperately try to breathe.

“Jagger?”

A tiny voice in the distance calling my name. She’s alive.

“Willow!”

I swim towards the sound, dodging bits of hot rock as they begin landing everywhere around me. I see Willow further out, struggling to stay above the water. She’s not a good swimmer. I swim over, wrapping my arm around her and running my hands over her face. She’s bleeding badly from a wound in the head.

“You got hit.”

“A rock,” she whispers.

Her eyes are rolling slightly. I hear a sliding sound, and I turn. The cliff that we jumped
off is slowly beginning to slide down as more explosions go off. Holy shit. I start swimming, dragging Willow beside me. She’s kicking her legs as best she can, but she’s losing a lot of blood.

“Hang in there baby, I’m gonna get us to safety.”

I kick harder, forcing my legs to move even though they don’t want to. I feel Willow stop kicking just as I’m out of the way of flying rocks. I pull her in front of me, kicking my legs madly to keep afloat. She’s got her eyes closed and oh god, there’s blood all over her face.

“Willow,” I rasp, “baby wake up.”

She doesn’t move. Panic seizes my chest and I slap her face a few times. Nothing.

“Willow no, don’t you die on me. Don’t you fuckin’ die on
me.”

Tears burn my eyes and I slap her again.

“Willow!”

I hear the sound of a speed boat and jerk my head
up, I can see a white boat speeding towards us at a great rate. I wave my hand, desperate. It slows just as the next explosion rocks the island. This time more rocks come launching into the water. We have to move. We’ll be dead in seconds. I see it’s Ace and he leans over the side, gripping Willow and sliding her on board. Then he pulls me on too. I drop to my knees beside Willow, shaking her tiny body.

“Wake up, baby, wake up. Don’t die, please don’t die.”

A rock smashes the side of the boat.

“ACE MOVE!”
I roar.

Ace spins the boat around and speeds out into the blue depths. Soon the air is clearing and the smoke is clearing off. In the distance all I can see is a mass of black smoke and
occasionally a red mushroom shoot into the sky followed by a loud noise. Mick really did have that planned well. No one would survive that. No one. I look back down at Willow.

“Ace, first aid kit?”

“Under the seat.”

I move the plastic white seat along the side and pull out a kit. I begin frantically cleaning Willow’s head but she’s lost so much blood. It looks like her leg is nearly
broken, it’s twisted in odd ways and blood seeps from a bullet wound. I close my eyes a moment, then I begin cleaning her up, applying pressure where I can. She’s still breathing. If she remains breathing, I’ll get help.

We arrive at the larger boat the boys came in on further out at sea. It relieves me to see they’re all alive. Angel leaps over onto our boat and grips Willow’s head. “No,” he rasps.

“We need help, we have to move.” I say, my hand trembles.

“Jagger, you have to be prepared that we might not…”

“NO!” I roar. “She won’t die.”

Angel nods and looks over at Ace, then he turns to the other boat.

“Get me a blanket, she needs to stay warm. Throw over as many first aid supplies as you have. MOVE!”

The boys on the other boat begin tossing things over. Ace wraps Willow’s leg and Angel tends to her face. I take a needle and thread,
unsterilized, and I stitch her head. If we don’t stop the bleeding, she’ll die. An infection is the least of her problems right now. She’s still out, and her breathing is becoming more jagged. We don’t have long, hours if we’re lucky. I wrap her in a blanket and crush her to my chest.

“Go as hard as this fucking boat will take us Ace, now.”

He nods and I hate that sympathetic look on his face. I hate it because I know what he’s thinking. He thinks she’s going to die. I won’t let her die. God, please don’t let her die.

CHAPTER
20

WILLOW

I hear voices, lots of them. I can hear them but I can’t open my eyes. I’m not in any
pain, I can’t feel anything at all. Maybe it was all just a dream. Maybe I didn’t land in the water so hard it broke my ribs. Maybe I didn’t get hit in the head with a flying rock. Maybe we never left for that island. Maybe I’m imagining this all and it was just a nightmare.

“She’s
stirring.”

It’s a
familiar voice, Ava maybe. Are we home? Am I safe? Is this a dream? Maybe I’m dead.

“Willow, hey, can you hear me?”

My mom?

“Willow, come on honey, open up.”

I’m trying, I want to scream. I’m trying to open my eyes. I focus all my attention on them and finally they move. As soon as the air touches them, they burn and I clamp them shut with a wince.

“She opened them!” Ava – I think – cries.

She makes it sound like this is a massive thing.

“Call the doctor.”

A moment later, someone is pulling my eyelids open and shining a torch into them. Jesus! I groan and shove at the hands.

“She’s moving her hands
too, this is all very good signs.”

That voice was unfamiliar.

“Willow honey, it’s Ava. Open up.”

I force my eyes open again but they burn.

“I’ll put some moisture in them. They’re likely burning.”

A moment later someone is playing with my eyelids again and opening them to drop tiny cool drops into my eyes. Oh that feels nice. The next time I try to open my eyes, it doesn’t burn so much. I blink and blink, trying to clear my blurred vision. When I manage to make out shapes, I can see a girl leaning over me. Ava.

“Hey sweetie, how are you?”

“Oh my baby is ok.”

“Mom, don’t get in her face.”

They’re all here.
My mom, Jenny and Ava. Where’s the rest? Oh god, oh please no. Is Jagger dead?

I open my mouth to speak but only a croaked “Jagger” comes out.

“He’s ok honey, they’re all ok.”

Relief floods through me. Ava grips my head and gently puts a straw in my mouth. I suck and the cool water soothes my aching throat. The doctor leans over me and begins asking me stupid questions like
‘what’s your name’ and ‘where do you live?’ I answer them all in a croaky voice, but I don’t care about that. I want to see my son and my fiancé.

“Jagger,” I say again
, my voice hoarse. “I want to see him.”

“He’s just gone home
honey, he’ll be back in about half an hour.”

“Is he hurt?”

“He got shot, but he’s ok.”

“How long have I been here?” I croak.

“A week sweetie.”

A week?
God, what happened?

“What…happened?”