The Cost of Freedom Is High

This Raises A Red Flag

We finally arrived at F,ML's house, and before AJ even fully parked the rest of us got out of the car and headed into the house.

Rich and Shane were right behind me as we walked in.

"Josh?" Chris called.

"We're coming." I yelled back.

We arrived in the room that everyone else was in and I noticed that Ricky was cradling Bella in his arms while she was only in a light tank top and a pair of boxers. Her face was paler than a sheet of paper, she almost looked dead.

"Please tell me you've got a plan." Tyler said.

"Shane found a small hospital practically in the middle of nowhere where no one should recognize her face, even from the news." I explained.

"Good, let's just get you guys going so she'll get looked at faster." Chris replied.

"Okay, Shane go back in the car and tell AJ to start it up. Rich grab Bella, bring her to the car and I'll be right out." I stated.

"Will do." Rich said, grabbing Bella's seemingly lifeless body from Ricky and bringing her out behind Shane.

"Just give one of us a call once you find something out. If something were to come up and someone recognized you or heaven forbids Bella, get out of there as fast as possible and meet at Logan's house (an MIW Crew member)." Chris instructed me.

"Will do, no matter what though we'll try to get her some medicine or something. I've got a feeling it isn't too detrimental, but we'll still take the proper precautions." I told him.

"Sounds good, one other thing though. Don't let Rich be too hard on her, at least wait until she's better." Chris warned me.

"No problem." I said, and finally left to go in our vehicle.

I got into the passenger's seat next to AJ, and waited for Shane and Rich to get settled in with Bella in the back.

"How long is the drive?" Shane asked, once we finally started going down the road.

"3 Hours." I replied.

"As long as she doesn't wake up we should be fine." Shane said.

I looked back in the rearview mirror and saw Rich cradling Bella so that her head was tucked close to his neck.

I could only hope that it would stay like this, at least until we get to this hospital.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
3 Hours Later ~

"I told you to find a hospital, not grandma and grandpa's fucking house." I yelled at Shane.

AJ pulled into the parking lot of a small house, and I couldn't believe it.

"It is a hospital of sorts. It's a few doctors that moved out of the way to help people that lived far away from other hospitals. Plus, they shouldn't be able to recognize Bella even if they've heard about her." Shane said.

"Whatever, just get out and grab her. No offense to everyone else but you're the least likely person to be questioned." I told him.

"Fine. Come on Bells." Shane grunted, picking her up from the backseat.

"Try to get in and out as fast as possible." I asked him.

"Will do." He replied.

"Thanks!" I called to him as he left the van.

"He's fucked if she wakes up." AJ groaned.

"I know." I said.

_____________________________________________________________________

Shane Britt's POV ~

I walked calmly into the building and found myself in front of an empty front desk.

"That's not good." I muttered, looking down at Bella's still unmoving body.

"Hi, how can we help you?" A middle aged man asked, coming out to greet me.

"Overnight she became quite ill, throwing up, fever, all of that stuff and a few hours ago she just passed out and she hasn't woken up since. I just want to get her better." I replied.

"What's your relationship with her?" He asked.

Oh shit, I had to bs something right on the spot.

"My girlfriend's younger sister." I lied.

"Okay, well I can take her in the back and have one of the doctors take a look at her and see what they can do." He said.

"I'll go back with her." I told him, about to stand up.

"I'm sorry, that's against policy. It's far too small of a facility to bring others back." He informed me.

"Okay." I muttered.

I sat down and instantly texted Josh (Korel) who was back in the car with AJ and Rich,

SB : Bella just got taken in back to get looked @. I'm not allowed. What should I do?

JK: I guess we don't have a choice. Don't do anything suspicious.

SB: I lied and said she was my girlfriend's younger sister. Just wanted to let you know, in case it came down to that.

JK: Thanks, text me if something goes wrong, or she's done.

SB: Will do.

I shut my phone off at that and threw my head back.

I was positive that everything would work out perfectly before, but now as usual I was a little worried.

For an entire 45 minutes I sat there, but finally boredom came over me and I went up and grabbed a cup of coffee.

The guy that took her back had come back out after about 15 minutes, and he was reading through a newspaper that appeared to be months old.

"You hear about that poor Bella girl?" He asked me.

I froze, how the hell could he have figured it out.

Did he even know that it was really Bella in the back.

I needed to keep my lies up.

"No, what happened?" I fakely pretended to not know.

"She was kidnapped from her school, and she's been gone for months now. I want to say it's almost been a year. Most people think she's still alive, but if you ask me I'd say she's dead." He told me.

Holy shit this wasn't good.

"I agree." I lied.

Thankfully like an angel sent from heaven, a middle aged doctor came out with Bella cradled in his arms.

Thank the lord.

"Well, it's nothing serious. It's very clear that her body's been under a lot of stress and that seems to have taken a toll on her physically. I'll give you some pills and even a liquid medicine to give her daily and within a few days she should be back to normal." He informed me.

"That sounds great. Thanks so much." I thanked him, taking Bella back out of his arms.

He went in the back once again, and quickly came back with a medium sized bag.

"Inside are all of the instructions for each medicine, give her everything for a minimum of 5 days and a maximum of 10. Decreasing some of her stress would also help her get better faster." He said.

"Sounds great, thanks again for all your help." I said.

"No problem, call if she doesn't get better."

"Will do." I lied.

With one last final goodbye I walked out the door.

Once I was at the car, the door slammed open, everyone looked worried.

Something was wrong.

"Get in now and close the door." Josh barked.

"What's going on?" I wondered, quickly buckling the both of us in.

"Someone's reported seeing Bella in Vegas, while it's a place she wasn't at obviously there will be police all over Nevada looking for her. We're going to get the fuck out of here before we are even noticed, and Chris and the others will make sure that every trace of her is gone. Not that they'd even go to Chris and them." Josh explained.

"Wait so we're in charge of her for as long as it takes them to get things sorted out?" Rich asked from next to me.

"Yeah." Josh answered.

"Fuck yeah." Rich exclaimed.

We all rolled our eyes, and focused back on the direction that AJ was driving us.

Originally we had feared that something like this would happen, but after a while we figured no one would see or think much of her.

Obviously not see, because she was in the house with us.

There was not a single instance that Bella had been out in the open in Vegas.

Who would make something like that up, and why?

I guess we'd deal with that later though.

As of now we were just set on getting the hell out of dodge.