The Cost of Freedom Is High

Trust Me

Chris' POV -

"Do you want someone else to come in with you?" DJ asked as we pulled up to where the MIW crew was staying with Bella.

I chuckled, and looked towards the back of the van where everyone was passed out asleep.

"I don't know if anyone from back there is about to wake up and do much of anything." I whispered to him.

"Fair enough." DJ replied.

"I'll just go in by myself, from what Korel told me an hour ago she's sleeping so I should only be about 5-10 minutes." I told DJ.

"Sounds good, let me know if you need anything." He said.

"Will do." I stated, and went up to the front door.

Right away the door opened up and I was greeted with Rich at the door.

"Hey, come on in." Rich said.

"Thanks"

"She, Shane, and Josh are sleeping right now, and to be honest you might want to keep Bella sleeping." Rich stated.

"Any reason?" I wondered.

"Yeah, she's in a real shit mood today. She actually was pretty good the other days, but today she just refused everything and was well to be honest with you, kind of a bitch." Rich informed me.

"Did something happen today or last night?" I asked him.

"No, we woke her up just like every other day and then it kind of went downhill from there. I mean she wasn't like destructive but I mean she definitely wasn't the quiet and polite girl that we'd gotten used to." Rich admitted.

"Was there any type of punishment?" I wondered.

"Nope. I'm leaving that up to you." He chuckled.

"Good, I think Asking's been itching to put some color on her ass." I laughed a bit.

"If she keeps up with the attitude she had today I've got a feeling she'll get worse than that." Rich told me.

"No doubt about that. So where is she?" I asked him, as we both walked further into the house.

"Here." Rich said, and pointed to a blanket covered lump on the floor in front of the lounge chair.

"I won't bother waking up the others to tell them this, but we did figure out who made that claim to the cops." I stated.

"Who was it?" He asked.

"Chance. We tried incredibly hard to find him and speak to him but we couldn't contact him. We're not sure who else was involved, but we're now really taking caution as to making sure that there's no plan and contact between Chance and Bella. We don't think there is, but this seemed to be a very strange thing to happen suddenly." I explained to him.

"I agree." Rich said.

"Well I guess we should probably get going. Make sure we get to the house while it's still dark enough." I told him.

"Sounds good. Tell everyone especially Vinny that we say hi." Rich said.

"Will do." I stated.

"We'll see you when tour starts in a few days." Rich called to me as I had Bella's body in my arms and I started to exit the house.

"See ya." I replied.

Getting outside I was relieved to see DJ with his door open.

"Everything go well?" He asked.

"Yeah, apparently though she's in a bit of a sour mood today." I told him.

"You causing trouble?" DJ whispered down to Bella who was now in his arms in the passenger seat.

She was still passed out and curled up in the blanket.

It was pretty obvious that she'd had a long day, she normally isn't that heavy of a sleeper.

Or she was still feeling some side effects from getting sick.

I went around the car, got in and started it up.

Once DJ and Bella were buckled up and situated I put it in drive and started up the 4-5 hour drive back to the main house. (The mansion)

"It's funny how only 5 days have passed and it feels like a lifetime away from her." DJ stated.

"It feels longer, the more time you spend with her." I told him.

"Well, we've got a lot more time left, years in fact." He said.

"Exactly." I replied.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
7:30 am the next morning

Bella's POV -

I woke up next an extremely warm object.

I realized soon based on the arm draped over me that I was in someone's bed snuggled up next to someone.

Slowly opening my eyes, I found myself pressed against Danny who was already awake and looking down at me.

"Morning, love." He whispered.

"Morning, sir." I grumbled, and snuggled up closer to him.

"So the rumors are true." He chuckled against my skin.

"What would those be." I whispered.

"That you're actually submitting." He replied.

"Well I'm not perfect, and probably won't be for a while. However, I am working on it." I told him.

"Good girl." He complimented me and as he did that he placed a soft kiss on my forehead.

This was something new. Soft and Danny weren't normally associated with each other.

I could live with it.

"Did you want to get up or go back to bed?" I wondered.

"We should get up." He grunted.

He sat up in the bed and quickly pulled me onto his lap.

"You feeling okay?" He asked, putting the back of his hand to my forehead.

I chuckled, and put my hand on top of his.

"I'm fine, you guys are just too worried." I replied with a light smile on my face.

"That's our job, Bells." He whispered in my ear.

"I thought you were all in bands." I stated.

His eyes quickly met mine and rolled, he was never one for stupid jokes.

Danny finally let his hand fall into my lap and all was silent for a few seconds.

Drifting off into my own thoughts I unconsciously stared at his knuckle tattoos and I seemed to drift off in space.

"Princess." Danny cooed, giving my shoulders a light but efficient shake.

"Sorry." I snapped and pulled my arm back into my chest.

"It's fine, I was just a little curious as to why this caught your attention." Danny told me.

"It's so vulgar and brash, yet at the same time it's kind of beautiful." I stated.

"Sweetheart, I'm vulgar and brash." He said with a deep laugh.

"Believe it or not, you're not the worst." I informed him.

"Oh really, and who exactly is worse?" He asked.

"That's a trick question." I declared.

"How?" He exclaimed.

"I tell you and then suddenly I find myself being punished." I explained.

"You have my word that I won't mention it to anyone." Danny promised me.

"Promise?" I questioned him.

"Yes love, now just spit it out." He chuckled, obviously a bit impatient.

"James and TJ are pretty damn vulgar, and brash doesn't exactly not describe them." I admitted.

"Someone needs to lock you and TJ in a room together until you come out as close to him as you are Tyler." Danny stated.

"We'll see." I groaned, getting up from the bed, standing and stretching out my somewhat sore limbs.

"You need to change into some other clothes." Danny told me.

"What do you have for me?" I asked.

"Here." He said, after getting up, grabbing something from the closet to the right of the room, and tossed it on the bed.

"Oh, God." I groaned, picking up the two pieces of 'clothing'.

There was an OMAM hoodie along with a pair of incredibly small and black lace underwear.

"Is there a problem, love?" Danny cooed.

"No." I muttered, totally bullshitting him.

I didn't want to wear this but I didn't really have a choice.

"I'll meet you downstairs in the large lounge room, okay." Danny said.

"Okay, be down in a minute." I replied.

I slipped on the underwear and the hoodie and with a quick groan, I then shut up and made my way down to the lounge which was two stories down from where I was.

It felt incredibly weird to be walking around in only this, but I had a feeling I was actually getting a good deal. After all I could be naked.

Once I was down to the main hallway that would take me to where I needed to be I could already hear incredibly familiar voices.

The two main voices that I could make out was Max Green's and Thrasher's.

Taking a quick yet deep breath before I walked into the room I told myself to just stay calm and remember the contract.

Correction, our contract.

A minute later I finally gathered up the courage and stepped through the threshold.

"Well look who finally showed up!" Ben exclaimed as I walked in.

"Hi." I quietly said, not really venturing into the room.

With a quick glance around the room I noticed that everyone from MIW, AA, ETF, and FIR were in the room and Kuza, Max, Angelo, and Tyler were also in the room.

"Come here." Craig said, patting his lap, on one of the chairs.

I walked past Vinny, Robert, and Max on a couch and took a seat on Craig's lap.

"Where's Michael and DJ?" I wondered, as Craig pulled me closer to him and gently ran his hand up and down my back.

"Making breakfast." Kuza answered.

"Oh, okay." I replied.

"So how'd your little stay with Josh and the guys go?" Balz asked, with a slightly noticeable grin.

"Good I guess,... well I mean yesterday wasn't great, but I've got a feeling you already know that." I responded in an incredibly soft and quiet tone of voice.

"Yeah Rich told me about that. It's really a shame that you acted in that way, because now you know what needs to happen." Chris told me.

"No! It was an accident and it was a one time thing, plus they aren't a part of the contract so it shouldn't matter how I was towards him, especially the fact that it was a one time thing." I cried out, my voice raising even though I really didn't want to.

"Bella, lower your fucking voice." Craig quickly warned me.

Taking a second to think things through, take a deep breath, and calm my voice, I managed to relax a bit.

"I'm sorry, but please just hear me out. Ever since we've gotten the contract I've tried my absolute hardest to follow it to a perfect T. Yesterday I messed up, and was definitely not on proper behavior with Rich, and I'm sorry. So please just keep that in mind." I calmly pleaded to them.

"We'll talk about it, for now though go with Angelo." Chris told me.

"Okay." I muttered.

Angelo got up, and held out his hand to me.

Without any hesitation I gently grabbed onto his hand and then followed him out of the room and down the hall.

"Don't worry, you're fine." Angelo reassured me, giving my hand a little squeeze.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

12 Hours later - 7:00 pm

TJ's POV ~

Cameron and I finished setting up the bed and everything on it while Bella was finishing up her shower.

As she was in the shower I had slipped her a small little note telling her to meet us downstairs, of course we left off the names.

"Done." Cameron stated, finishing up tying the restraint to the bed, at all four corners.

"Nice, she should be down any second now." I told him.

Cameron went over to the back wall and gazed at the selection of 'toys' we had, as I went over to the bed and sat on its edge, facing the door.

Within a couple of minutes, there were very distinct footsteps walking down the staircase.

The footsteps stopped in front of the door, and there was a shaky knock coming from the other side.

"Come in." Cameron called.

The door slowly opened, and we watched as Bella gingerly stepped into the room with her towel wrapped around her body just as she'd been instructed.

We both noticed the ghastly white shade her knuckles were as she clutched the towel for dear life.

"It's okay princess, just relax. First close the door though." I told her.

Her body's tremors were incredibly apparent as she closed the door and turned back to us.

"Please don't hurt me!" She suddenly cried, her voice breaking.

I looked back at Cameron and slightly nodded my head towards Bella, trying to get him to get over towards her and calm her down.

"Calm down, love." Cameron cooed walking over and enveloping her in his arms tightly.

She let out a small whimper, but after a few seconds she fell silent, and Cameron walked back to me and sat right next to me.

"You're not in trouble, and you're not getting punished." I told her.

"Really?" She whispered.

"Really now come here." I instructed her in a soft voice.

She gently walked over to me, and I carefully pulled her down into my lap.

"You're really not going to punish me?" She asked, looking up into my eyes.

"Well I was, but then after your little heartwarming speech, I was touched and figured that maybe we should go on a different route." I explained.

"And what would that be?" She wondered, her facial features finally eliminating most of her fear.

"We want to show you the good part of being here and agreeing and following the contract." I told her.

"And what would that be?" She smiled, now obviously much more relaxed and even a bit happy.

"I think you're about to find out." Cameron whispered, pulling her back to him so that he could tilt her head back and place his lips onto hers.

She then emitted a small squeak, and based on the sudden flush of her skin tone and the small yet noticeable nod Cameron gave me I knew we were almost ready.

"Let go, princess." I whispered