Chapter 53: Lora
He suddenly felt a sharp pain on his shoulder followed by a cold drip of liquid down to his arm. But he never took his eyes on him, he barely blink while glaring at the skinny man.
“Ernan! Stand back!” The fat man shouted at him and he bow down.
“I apologize, Sir. His disrespect was unacceptable.”
“Whatever, look at the young man. Have you seen how brave he was? He didn’t even flinch.” His amused eyes lingered around him. “How old are you?”
He didn’t answer him so he stood straight and nodded. “How old is he?” He asked the skinny one.
“He is seventeen years old, the only son of the Hernandez-” someone came in and signaled the skinny guy called Ernan, “Robert has words for you.” And the masked guy who came in walked to him. He saw him whisper something and the boss look at Nick.
“Chain him well, and put him down.” He said before he walked out. They checked his chain and added one. They put down Ben and chain him on a chair. After checking it all he went out and they were left inside.
“Ben!” he called out.
“Benjamin!” But he didn’t answer still. His nervousness had started suffocating him. Good thing he saw a sign of a little movement, he moved his head and looked at him.
“I’m good,” Ben said which was a relief to him.
“Are you okay?”
“Not sure, but breathing, that only matters,” Ben answered and moved his hand to escape from the chain. “Shit, I lost my knife.”
Nick looked around and found all their things on the table far enough from them.
“Do you mind if I ask the smartest version of yourself that you are saying?” He was being sarcastic with half meant but it only made Ben blow a sigh.
“Let’s just say, I lost it somewhere.” He answered followed by an awkward laugh.
“As you say,” he boringly answered. “We’ll wait for our death here then.” It was a casual conversation but they both knew what mess they are in. They choose that and they couldn’t complain. Ben started moving his chair, he saw him force his foot to stand.
He loosen the tight tie on his legs and managed to stand on the chair. He started walking toward Nick and sat behind him, there where he could reach Nick’s hands.
“This should work,” he started working with his chain using the last clip he had. After a few minutes, Nick noticed no sign of progress. He felt Ben’s hands go slippery.
“Give it a rest, man.”
“Almost there.” Then he heard a little tick, his chest filled with a little hope. He felt his hands lose he hurriedly removed them and lock pick the other chain on his body.
When he was done with all the chain, he felt the sting sore on his shoulder, there he saw his wounds, it was still bleeding. “We need to get out of here.”
“Ben!” he was panicking while trying to unlock the chains. “Ben! Wake up.” But he couldn’t raise his voice too much.
“I’m okay,” good thing he woke up but his voice was too weak to be convincing. They got up and Nick held him when they heard the door opening. They stopped and lost their hope and waiting it to open. “Dead,” Ben whispered but dropped his jaw when he saw who it was.
“Need help?” Nick saw a familiar figure and heard a familiar voice. It was the same aura he felt when Lora saved them when he and Fera were abducted.
“Lora?” Ben’s weak voice surprised Nick. How did he know it was her when she was wearing a mask? he thought.
“Come on,” Lora got Ben’s other arm and placed it on her shoulder. “This way.” They were heading up, the two men didn’t bother asking about their confusion and followed her. They could hear some gunshots down when they went out of the room.
“Don’t worry, they are my men.” She said when they saw two armed men running towards them. They helped Ben and they ran up to the rooftop.
Soon they heard gunshots near them. He saw Lora open the chopper there and went to the pilot’s seat. They got in too and her men stayed at the building and Lora was their pilot. They went straight to the private hospital owned by Fuentes.
“We shouldn’t be here.” He whispered in her ears.
“I can cover you here.” She whispered back, “she gave me this.” His eyes widen in realization. Fera gave the hospital to her as a gift.
They catered immediately, Lora stayed there and never left until the doctors finished mending their wounds and it was past midnight.
“Can this not reach my grandmother?”
“She already knew, she’ll be here tomorrow morning for sure. Prepare yourself.” He sank his back on his hospital bed and stared at the ceiling.
“Nick.” He heard her call. “I know this is hard for you, but I think you must drop this case. Let me handle this, you are too young for such danger.”
“I won’t.”
“Look you are minor, and dragging you into this is serious trouble especially if your guardian would-”
“They won’t, they knew you weren’t dragging me. It started with me, if I didn’t gather all those evidence this wouldn’t happen. I can just drop it. I made this mess.”
“You made no mess, her family was long messed up. Don’t blame yourself, it has nothing to do with you. Someone was just using your name and this is not good for you. Whoever it might be? He’s using you cause you matter to her.”
“What do you mean?”
“Fera can escape this, whoever was behind this, he was doing this to destroy Fera, using your name as the traitor, nana Felly and me, and mostly her parents.”
“Nana Felly? What happened to her?” Ben suddenly intervened in their conversation.
“She’s dead.”