WILD RIDE (Rafe Cameron x OC) *COMPLETE*

Chapter Fifty-Four (Alana)

CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

Alana

Barbados

When Dad was teaching me how to swim I was five years old. He said that it's just like life. You either sink or you swim. If you fight the current you'll drown. If you stay dormant you'll float but you'll go nowhere. You need to find a way to stay afloat and go with the flow. Don't waste your strength fighting for something that will pull you under. Because fighting the current? There's risk of undertow. Which can kill you.

After the rescue plane crashed and I made it into the water I had a choice to make. Fight the current and risk the undertow of life or stay dormant and go nowhere. Or.. Go with the flow. But the flow is moving faster than I can go. I don't know where everyone else went and by the time I look up to make a choice the choice has been made for me.

A man twice my size is towering over me and pulls me from the water. Holding my hands behind my back like a criminal and shoving me into a jeep. I lost my go-bag and everything I had when the plane crashed into the water.

Even while sitting in the jeep I started to cough up the water that had been logged into my lungs. Doing whatever I can to steady my breaths. Fearful that I'll dry drown. Which is a real thing and Pope once went on a three-hour rant about dry drowning and the statistics of how many people's lives it claims a year.

I don't know the numbers because I stopped listening. Maybe I should have paid more attention to all his mortician talk. To know my survival rate at this point. Right now? The statistics are low.

I'm surrounded by giant men in bullet proof vests with military grade weapons and dogs that are foaming at the mouth. Driving on an island that I've never been to before which water filled lungs and oh- let's not forget the fact I'm pretty sure that I'm pregnant with Rafe Cameron's baby. If I survive all of this? Rafe might actually be the one to kill me.

So... My chances? I'd say it's a 3% chance of survival. And that's counting on JJ to come up with some elaborate plan that Pope says is never going to work. John B tweaks the plan slightly, Sarah and Kie come up with a way to distract and make a getaway ready and Cleo... Cleo will probably stab someone and be the one to rescue me while John B gets all the glory because he's my brother.

I get brought into the estate that feels more like walking into a museum. Even the maid that answers the door and brings me up the stairs to what may or may not be a master bedroom or just really elaborate guest room.

Historical artifacts are in every corner of this estate. Things I've seen in texts books and some things that I remember seeing in Dad's office in pages that he'd printed out. Everything leads back Big John somehow.

A guard stands by the door and before he closes it he looks at me with a hateful expression. "Dinner at eight. Clean up."

He slams the door shut and I look around the room. A wardrobe with silk gowns that range in a few different sizes. I grab what my usual size would be and I hold it against my body. Putting it back in the wardrobe before walking over to the bathroom that's attached to the bedroom.

Terror should be coursing through my veins but.. There's a bed. A shower that's filled with shampoos and conditioners. Razors and soaps and even perfumes of all sorts. I haven't had a shower in a month. I've bathed in a river like I'm in Little House on the Prairie or something. Hot water... A hot shower... I need it.

Towels that are soft and there's.. A towel warmer? Rafe and I had one back at Tannyhill and he used to always prepare it for me. I don't even know how to use it myself. Rafe did all of that for me. Warm towels... Kissing my neck and brushing my hair for me. Putting lotion on my legs for me and then kissing my entire body.