NICKI walked out of my ward with mother calling my name. I bumped into father outside. “Son, I thought you just had a heart attack. Was your mother just scaring me to get me here?” he looked so worried. “Apparently, I did have a heart attack, and I just discharged myself.” I walked past him. “Nick, where the hell do you think you are going then?”“To find out who did that to my wife using my name.” father said nothing else, I believe that he too knew what I was talking about. I was the only moron who didn’t know and kept causing her pain on top of everything else. I went to the third floor where ICU was. When I got there Marcus was still there. He didn’t say a word to me.I went and opened Olivia’s room. Ethan sat on a wheelchair by her side with a bandage on his head. What the hell happened to him? he let go of her hand when I got inside. “What happened to you?” I asked. “I was in the same car she was in.” what the hell was he doing with her?“We were coming from dinner when the acci
NICKA week past and Olivia had not woken up. It was driving me crazy. I had tried everything I could think of to get her to wake up. I have asked the nanny to bring Samuel to the hospital to see and talk to her. hoping that she would wake up, but she didn’t. I even let Marcus go into her room and talk to her. mother and father tried as well but my beautiful wife remained sleeping.Ethan was discharged four days ago, but he too lived in the hospital same as me. I would work during the day then at night I would be at the hospital with my wife. Marcus and Ethan rotated the day shift when I was at work. They would be at the hospital keeping an eye on her. We were working on the theory that if that person who ran them off the road wanted her dead, then he was going to try again.For the sake of Olivia, we all put our differences aside and worked together to protect her. In the past week I had seen how much my wife was loved and cared for. The two men I thought had different motives towards
NICKI thought Ethan has something to do with my men at the prison disappearing but after what I had witnessed with mother, father and the man. I was beginning to think that whoever they were afraid of was the one responsible. I hit the wall repeatedly feeling angry and helpless.With all the fucking money I had, I couldn’t do anything to find that person or protect my wife from him. just who the hell was he? “Woah! The wall did nothing to you man.” Ethan said stopping me from hitting the wall. My knuckles were raw and bleeding. My hand throbbed but the pain was nothing compared to the pain and anger I was feeling inside.“Did something happen?” I wished everyone could stop asking me that question and assuming the worst about my wife. “Mother knows who did this, or at least I think she does, but she is too afraid of him to even say his name.” Ethan’s jaw tightened.“Then we find him ourselves, he didn’t go after Olivia alone. I was also in that car; I could have been killed.”“I was wa
NICKMy whole body shook in anger, and I pushed myself off the wall. “I am going to fucking kill HER!” I pushed right past Ethan and just as I rounded a corner my sister appeared out of nowhere. “Woah, where is the fire?” I glared at her, the sight of her made my stomach churn. “Get the fuck out of my way!” my voice was dangerously low and threatening.“Okay, jeez!” she moved aside, I took one step, but Ethan held my arm stopping me. “Why didn’t you tell me this before? I could have told you the truth and prevented you from making the biggest mistake of your life.”“She fucking convinced me not to! I believed her and her doctor confirmed everything! What was I supposed to think?”“Tell me the name of the doctor, I will go there. I want to know why he lied.” The damn thing was a web of lies and even her doctor was involved. I remember that day I wanted to bring her here, but she refused and said she wanted her doctor.The man has a practice close to the mall and I took her there. I told
ETHANSomething clicked in me when Nick told me that, “Let me call you back Nick.” I cut the call and rushed to my car. “Go back to the hospital.” The drive back to the hospital felt very long and it didn’t help that I was on the edge of my seat with worry. My stomach twisted painfully at the thoughts I was having.I hoped it wasn’t true, but it would be the only thing that made sense in all of this. “Step on it or find back roads, I don’t care, just get me there and fast.” My driver swerved and started overtaking cars careful not to hit anyone. We got to the hospital in record time, and I rushed to the third floor.Those few minutes in the elevator felt like hours, why didn’t they make those things a little faster than they were. Getting there I looked around and couldn’t spot the person I was looking for. Instead, I saw Marcus in the waiting room reading something in the newspaper. “Where is she?”He placed the news paper aside with a frown on his face, I didn’t like the guy, I knew
NICKI saw red when she threatened my family like that. In a second, I had my hands wrapped around her neck and squeezing. I was ready to kill her right there and then and prevent her from laying a finger on my family. “Why are you not stopping him from strangling her?” asked Ethan on the side.Marcus shrugged. “They are siblings and siblings fight.” Those morons! “You kill me, you never know who did all those things to Olivia.” I let go of her neck as if it burned me. Ethan was all up in her face in seconds as I stepped back. She coughed uncontrollably and then the evil woman smirked.“You are so easy to fool Nick, did you really think I was going to tell you?” she shook her head as if she pitied me, me, Nick Jones. “I will tell you this though, this whole accident brought you and Olivia close. Or it brought you closer to her because she is out and might not feel the same when she comes to. At least you got to spend two weeks with her, so I guess that’s something.”She continued to sm
NICKWhile we were busy glaring at each other, doctors ran past us going to the direction of Olivia’s room. As if we planned it. All three of us ran there as well, my heart was already beating fast worried that something might have happened to her while we were busy arguing out there. When we got there, we stood by the door and watched as the doctor took out the tubes from her mouth.Her eyes were closed and for a minute there I thought she was dead. My heart sank to the bottom of my stomach and my knees grew weak. That was until she coughed that my world lit up again. I walked forward and she frowned looking at me. I stopped in my tracks remembering that we were not on the best of terms.My sister was right, I was the one getting close to Olivia and she was not there with me. she didn’t even know what was happening the past two weeks. “Water.” Her voice was scratchy, and Ethan jumped and poured water for her and helped her drink. My sister was right about him too. My best friend had f
OLIVIAI listened as Marcus and Ethan told me everything that happened over the past two weeks. I couldn’t believe I missed so much. I didn’t care that Nick claimed our divorce was not final and that I was still his wife. I cared about the fact that he did what was best for me and made sure I got the best care. On that one he was thinking like the Nick I once knew not he monster he became later.“Thank you, guys, for taking care of me and making sure that my son was safe.” Before any of them could answer, the door opened, and Samuel walked in first followed by Lupita and Grandma Susan. “Mama!” he rushed to my bed, Ethan helped him up and he gave me the biggest hug. He must have missed me, my poor son.“How are you baby?” he gave me a thumbs up and a smile. “Thank you for bringing him, Lupita, how are you grandma?” she waved her hand sitting on the chair next to my bed. “I should be the one asking you that, you gave us quite a scare Olivia.”“Am sorry grandma.” She stood taking somethin
MARCUS“Boss, we’ve arrived,” Steve said, his voice cutting through the thick fog of sleep that had settled over me. I blinked a few times, disoriented, before slowly coming to. My body ached from the constant movement, the long days of traveling across continents, jumping from one city to another, chasing dead ends and half-truths. I hadn’t gotten a decent night’s sleep in days. Every time I closed my eyes, all I could see was the face of my wife, Olivia, fading from my thoughts like a distant dream.I rubbed my face with both hands, trying to shake off the fatigue. The exhaustion was getting to me, but there was no time for rest. Not now. Not until I had her back. My mind was a blur, constantly circling back to the same thoughts: Where is she? Why won’t anyone tell me? The people who had information were all cowards, and none of them would speak up. It was maddening. The jet had become my only sanctuary, a
OLIVIAIt had been two days since Xander left, two days without food or water. My body had grown weaker with each passing hour, and I could feel every ache in my bones, every crack in my spirit. But there was a small sliver of hope amidst the physical torment: the sedative he had used to paralyze me was finally starting to wear off. I could feel a slight tingle in my legs when I pinched them hard, nothing much, but enough to give me the faintest glimmer of relief. Soon, I would be able to move again.That is, if I didn’t collapse from thirst and hunger first.The worst part of being in that hellhole wasn't the paralysis. It was the silence. The uncertainty. I had no way of knowing if it was day or night. Time had ceased to exist in that dark, suffocating tomb, and with each passing moment, I felt like I was slipping further from reality. I was literally buried alive, a prisoner in a catacomb of stone, with no one to help me, no one to hear
NICKLuke’s face changed from shocked to anger very quickly. “Tell him, tell the moron where we are!” he bellowed throwing his hands in the air. “How could this moron do something like this? I am the only one who is supposed to do things like these. You boys are supposed to keep your hands clean!” he paced the room.He was frustrated. “Since when did Marcus become worse than me in things like these, just what the hell is wrong with him?” he said to no one in particular. I didn’t know if he was just frustrated or a little impressed by his son in law. He turned to me with a glare. “What the hell are you waiting for? Do you want him to bomb more cities before you tell him where the hell we are?”I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Just moments ago, Luke had been telling me to keep everything from Marcus, and now, here I was, being blamed for not telling him where we were fast enough. It felt like I had no place to stand, caught between a rock and a hard place. But it wasn’t the time t
ETHANThe moment Nick hung up the phone, his face shifted, his expression unreadable. It was as if all the colour drained from him in an instant, his skin paling in a way that I had never seen before. I had been around Nick long enough to know that he was no stranger to bad news, but this? This was different. It was as if something beyond our worst fears had just been set in motion.We had already been living through the chaos, Luke, Xander, Olivia’s disappearance, and now, the kids were safe with us. That much, at least, had been a small mercy in the storm. But Nick looked like he had just been hit with the weight of something even worse, something that none of us could prepare for. My mind raced, trying to figure out what could possibly be so bad. And then it hit me. Could it be…? No, it couldn’t be.Before I could make sense of it, I moved closer to Nick, my concern deepening. I needed to make sure that whatever was going through his mind wasn’t as bad as I feared. Leaning in, I wh
NICKI had been holding onto the hope that once Xander showed up, everything would fall into place. That the mess would be cleaned up, and we could put an end to the nightmare that had been plaguing us.Luke and Xander reached some sort of agreement, at least, that’s what I gathered, but the specifics were still hazy in my mind. Luke had told Xander to bring Olivia, or he would destroy his father’s remains.What exactly that meant, I wasn’t sure. It felt like a vague threat, but the tension in the air told me it wasn’t just idle talk. Xander responded with some sort of counter-deal, loaded with things I couldn't follow. Honestly, I was drained. I didn’t care about the details anymore. I just wanted this whole nightmare to be over. But Xander wasn’t backing down, and neither was Luke.Luke had his men tail Xander. And, as expected, Xander went straight to the hotel. He wasn’t trying to outsmart anyone or go off the grid. He was playing by his own set of rules, one that I didn’t fully u
XANDERI was about to take the biggest gamble of my life, and I knew it. Luke was offering me a choice, an impossible one. It was a trap, a setup where only he could win. The terms of his proposition were clear: there would be no chance for me to exact my revenge on him, and there was a very real possibility that I would lose my life in the process. But I wasn’t ready to die, not yet. Not when I had a son waiting for me, hoping I would make it back.I had to think fast. Luke had me cornered, but I couldn’t show him how much fear his words stirred inside me. I had to put on a face, act like I was in control, even if I wasn’t. It wasn’t just about surviving this moment; it was about finding a way out. I wasn’t going to let him win that easily.I stood tall, trying to exude confidence, even though inside I felt like a bundle of nerves. My heart hammered in my chest; my hands clenched into fists at my sides. I could feel the sweat starting to bead on my forehead. If I didn’t hold it toget
XANDERFor the past few days, I had watched them stumble around in their futile attempts to track me down. Every morning, they would set out at dawn, and every night they would return empty-handed, their efforts wasted. It was amusing to me.They had no idea where to look, no real understanding of how to hunt someone like me. It was almost laughable. I had thought they were dangerous, but I quickly realized how wrong I was. There was nothing good about them, nothing that made them worthy of fear.Perhaps they just hadn’t met their match yet. Until now.Now, they had encountered me, and they knew they were nothing compared to what I was capable of. They were amateurs, playing a game they couldn’t win. But Olivia... she was another story. She surprised me. I had expected more resistance from her, some fight, some fire. But instead, she complied. She ate the food I gave her, barely muttering a word of protest. The silence was almost worse than anything. I could tell that the trauma from
NICKThe island was still, too still. No one slept that night. Luke had kept busy with his men, the sound of his voice drifting through the halls, low and intense. I couldn’t make out the words, but I could tell they weren’t discussing anything good.Ethan had joined them; he was more involved than I would have liked. I had asked him to keep an eye on Luke, to make sure things didn’t escalate further. I didn’t trust Luke, not when he was like this, wild, unpredictable, the kind of man you couldn’t reason with once his mind was made up. He was like a caged animal finally set free, and I was terrified of what he might do to the people on this island. They were innocent; they didn’t deserve to be dragged into whatever madness Luke was planning.As for me, I was stuck dealing with the kids. I tried to keep my mind occupied, tried to push away the dread gnawing at me. But before anything, I knew I had to prepare. I organized money, lots of it. It felt like I was bracing for something big.
NICKIt had been three days since Olivia disappeared, the longest, most agonizing three days of our lives. Every day felt like a never-ending loop of despair. We woke up, checked the rooms, scoured the island, hoping to find some trace of her. But no matter how much we searched, it was as if she had vanished into thin air. There was no sign of a struggle, no indication that she had left the room, and absolutely no lead to follow. It was like she was swallowed up by the earth itself.The island wasn’t that large, and it seemed impossible that someone could just disappear like that. But here we were, endlessly combing through every corner, every inch of the place, but we kept coming up empty. It felt like we were chasing ghosts. The stress, the exhaustion, the hunger, none of it was helping our situation. It wasn’t that we didn’t have food. We had plenty of food. But none of us could bring ourselves to eat.The nanny we had hired to take care of the kids, a kind woman, had been cooking