Code of Honor

Facing the bull the first time had been frightening, but that was nothing compared to the look in his eyes now. I saw that same fear and anger I’d seen the first time. This time it was paired with an inconsolable grief for his missing daughter. He looked like half the man, but that didn’t stop him. He moved forward, past Billy and in a quick second was on me, again.
His hands found the collar of my shirt. He held me tight and pushed me against the wall behind us. The course stones in the concrete wall stuck into sensitive areas of the back but they were the least of my worries. He was staring down at me, I swear I saw his eyes flash red.

“You,” he snarled. “What the hell do you think you’re doing here?”

“Cam wait,” Billy tried to calm trying to calm him but it was no use.

“What did you do with my daughter?” He howled at me. “Where is she?”

I tried to speak but his hands stopped me from doing so. My shirt was pulling tight around my throat and the pain in my back stopped me from forming any comprehensible words. Even if I could speak, it seemed he had already made up his mind about her fate and my involvement.

“Did you kill her yourself, did you have the guts. Or did you have one of your little friends do it huh? Could you even face her when you did it?”

“Cam!” Dimitri’s voice echoed from down the street. “Cam! She’s here. I’ve got her.”

Finally he heard someone else and turned around to look over his shoulder. Slowly his large hands slipped from my shirt and I could breathe again. His attention was no longer for me. I felt another man’s hand on my shoulder gently and looked around. I didn’t recognize him but he seemed to be asking if I was alright, though his eyes were for Grace.

Dimitri instantly handed Grace over to her father. She remained limp and unmoving as they traded. I thought I glimpsed a tear roll down his cheek but it was quickly wiped away. The man beside me removed his hand from my shoulder and moved forward to stand beside Cameron. Quietly shooing off everyone else who was trying to swarm her.

“What happened to her?” The man asked.

“They got caught by the army,” Billy explained nodding my direction. Everyone glanced at me. “But he got her out.”

The surprise was obvious in everyone, especially her father.

“She’s not well,” The second man, the gentle one, said to her father. “Get her downstairs. I’ll look her over.”

Cameron walked past as all, his eyes on for his daughter as he carried her into the building. I watched her eyes flicker as they moved passed me, but they failed to open. A few followed and a few stayed to hear the gossip. The gentle man, who I’d since heard been called Jamison, walked up to me.

“Thank you,” He said and shook my hand. I was flushed for a moment. He went on. “You’re more than welcome to stay with us. I take it your in danger now?”

I nodded. “I’m a traitor as far as their concerned.”

“You can stay hidden with us. We owe you that much.” A small smile took his lips and he nodded his head for me to follow.

We were the last two to enter the building and I soon found out why they could not be found. Their hideout was not only hidden in a building, but beneath it. There was no way anyone could find it, not unless they knew it was there. We took the narrow staircase, hidden in the floor, down to a concrete bunker. Complete with ventilation and lights.

“Wow.” Was all I could think.

“We were lucky,” Jamison said with a small smile, I could still see his concern behind it.

“One of our members was an architect; he helped build the place and knew where to find it.”

“Now I know why they could never find you,” I admitted. And he grinned.

“I’d like to hope so,” he said as we stepped into a room, the one furthest back from the main area. “Everyone who doesn’t need to be in here. Out now.”

His voice echoed around the room moving everyone else out of the room other than himself, me and Grace’s father. I was ordered to stay since I had been with her the last few days. Jamison started to drill me for information about her state over the last few days, about what I knew about what she had been subjected to, where we had been. I caught the feeling I had a suspect for her disappearance all over again. I could hear Grace’s voice mumbling in the background but her eyes were only for her dad who, when Jamison suddenly appeared at his side, wiped the tears away from the corners of his eyes.

The first thing I seen him do was start poking his fingers in under her neck. Trying to find her pulse. His mouth turned into a thin line. Then he went on to check her temperature as best he could and listen to her chest. All the while continuing to throwing questions at me behind him but there was only so much I knew.

“Has she kept anything down?”

“Not in the last few days,” I replied. “As long as I’ve had her, not that she really ate anything...She’s been drinking a lot too.”

“Has she been shaking like this?”

“Yeah, I just thought she was cold.”

Jamison frowned and continued to poke at every part of her. I watched him do what he thought necessary. He didn’t seem to be happy with the results he was getting, nor the lack of response he was getting out of Grace herself. I had thought that as the days progressed, while she was away from her captors, she would start to become more responsive. But she still seemed to switch between moments of lucidness and ones of complete unawareness. He wiped at his forehead and eyes for a moment before pulling a small torch from his pocket. He reached down, pried one of her eyes open and flashed the torch towards it.

The sound that escaped her mouth was almost animal, terrified. She pulled away from him. Rolling onto her side and covering her eyes with her arm. Her broken, beaten body started to shake with sobs. For a moment we were all dumbfounded by her reaction, and at the same time both her father and I stepped forward to comfort her. Being closer his arms wrapped around her first. I fell back knowing he needed some time with her. The man had believed she’d been dead for a long time.

As his large arms wrapped around her, in large contrast from the way they wrapped around me, she fought to push him away. But she didn’t seem to have the strength or he wasn’t letting up. Eventually, she stopped fighting him and collapsed in her arms. Still shaking with heart-breaking cries.

“It’s okay Gracie,” He whispered. His voice sounded as weak as I felt. “No one is going to hurt you, ever again. I promise.”

“How long did they have her?” Jamison asked me.

“About a week,” He replied. “As long as it took me to get her out of there.”

“You...you got her out of there?” Her father asked me. Glancing up at me. “How?”

“They’re too complacent,” I repeated. “They never expected someone to attack from the inside. I had a few friends cause a distraction on one side of the base and took her under the fence of the other.”

“I doubt it was that easy,” Jamison replied, impressed. “Are they going to know it was you?”

“No doubt, the second they notice she’s gone and I’m gone I’ll be a dead man.”

“You can stay here,” Cameron replied as her sobbing subsided. “We’ll protect you, I owe you that much at least.”

“Thank you,” I replied surprised.

“She’s just needs rest,” Jamison concluded with a sigh. “God only knows what she’s been through. She just needs time to heal.”

That was easier said than done.