A/N Hey, sorry it has taken me so long to update. I've been sick. Not important so on with the show, well story. So in case you've forgotten, we left off last chapter with the gang in Paris looking for Bex, Cammie remembering that she'd been raped as part of her torture and Zach trying to comfort her then almost being killed by her because she thought he was her rapist because she wasn't thinking straight. I promise Zach didn't rape her. Long chapter for you today, I hope you like it. Please review and tell me what you think, even if you think this sucks and I should quit writing because I'm fouling it for the rest of the world. Also I'd like to give a nice big shout out, thank you, hug and/or warm fuzzy to gallaghergirl112 for a very supportive review that made me smile. Thank you to everybody else that has reviewed, followed, favorited or read. Now then read and enjoy, or don't enjoy. Your choice.
Disclaimer: This will be my last disclaimer because I hate doing them and if you haven't figured out that I'm not Ally Carter yet, you should go talk to somebody. So for the last time, I am not Ally Carter. The Gallagher Girls series, characters and previous plot lines belong to her.
Zach stands in the bathroom in front of the mirror while I wrap bandages around the skin surrounding his rib cage. My face is blank, any signs of emotion wiped clean of it, but I knew Zach would figure out what I had remembered eventually. I would have if it had been him.
"They raped you, didn't they?" He asks me. No beating around they bush, just direct. To the point. Zach.
I look down. "Yeah. It doesn't matter know though. It happened, there is nothing I can do to change it, so I'm going to try to let it go."
He jerks out of my grip, spinning around and pinning me to the wall. "Don't let it go. Don't say it doesn't matter. Cammie. You. Were. Raped."
"I know that Zach, but we have bigger issues. Bex is on her own and has a grudge against the Circle. They have her parents. She will try to kill anybody who keeps her from them and I'm not going to let my best friend know what cold blooded murder feels like." It just slips out. I didn't mean for it to, but know hat I've said it, I realize that it's the truth. The cold hard truth. I have killed, murdered, innocent people. I don't want Bex to know what that feels like and if we don't stop her, she will.
Zach face softens immediately and he kisses me. "You are not a murderer," he says when he pulls back. I just kiss him again, needing to forget. He sets me on the sink counter. "I love you Cammie. I love you more than you will ever know."
"I love you to," I answer. I go to kiss him again but stop when somebody pounds on the door.
"Guys," shouts Liz, a very un-Liz like thing to do. "We have eyes on Bex."
We both run out of the bathroom, tripping over each other to get out first. Over the summer, Bex and Zach grew pretty close. They both spent about a month searching for me in Budapest, and since they both love me they were each other's shoulder to lean on. Liz didn't actually have eyes on Bex, more like numerous cameras it seems she sneaked out to plant late last night. On her on.
"You did what?" Macey says in exasperation.
" While you all slept, I went out and planted cameras around Bex's hotel and for three blocks in every direction going away from it." Liz answers as if this were completely normal and should have been expected.
"You went out on your own, in the middle of the night, in a city that we know for a fact is home to a circle base? Are you crazy Lizzie?" I ask her.
"No, I'm not crazy. In fact I'm quite sane. I'd also like to point out that if we don't go now, we'll lose Bex."
"Let's go then," says Zach before anybody can start arguing again.
We track Bex until we see her. I jump out of the black BMW Liz stole from some poor person. She'd left a note in it's place, apologizing.
"Bex," Her head turns towards me and she smiles as Catherine steps around a corner. "Bex!" I scream.
I see her notice Catherine, see her eyes widen. I start to run. "Hey Cam," shouts Catherine. "Long time no see. I hope the fallout from our last encounter wasn't to bad." She laughs, "who am I kidding? You went behind the back's of the CIA and your parents, then you killed seven people and let a Circle member holding valuable information die. On top of that the whole thing was all over the press. The fallout must have been horrible."
I've reached her now and I push Bex behind me while kicking out at Catherine. I catch her ankles and she falls down, at the last second grabbing my waist and pulling me down with her. We roll and I come out on top but am pulled off by one of her men. Zach, Macey and Liz are here now fighting alongside Bex and I. More of Catherine's people spill onto the street. I hear Zach call my name and see Macey perform a very good roundhouse kick, something that she had worked very hard at because she never could quite get the hang of it. All I can feel is the hand around my throat.
"Put me down Charlie," I spit. Charlie. The name comes from somewhere inside my memory and I know that it is right. Charlie had been one of my torturers, well more of a jailer. He'd been nice enough for somebody who was keeping me locked up against my will and standing by everyday while I was tortured to the breaking point. He'd brought me food, and after a pretty bad beating had once cleaned out the wounds on my back. He used to bring me the latest gossip , usually what people in the circle were saying about me, and even told me about his wife and how they were expecting, she had been almost three months along when I'd escaped. "Please," I say with less venom, "put me down, I won't run, I have people here I love." He looks at Catherine and she nods. My feet touch the ground and my neck is released. I rub it and look behind me. We are outnumbered making it about 1 to every 8 person. I know we can't win against those odds. We can't escape either. I turn around. "Stand down," I shout, "Stand down." They don't so I turn on my comms unit. "We are outnumbered and will not be able to win. If any of you want to live for another five minutes, you need to stand down. They have snipers on the roof tops and Catherine wouldn't be here unless she was sure she could take the five of us. Somebody grab Bex, she isn't on comms, and come over here. We don't have any other options."
Macey says something very rude in response, Liz scolds her, then me and Zach yells at me well beating up a man twice his size and fending off 6 other people. Eventually they agree though and grab Bex who just starts swearing.
"Shut up," Zach shakes her roughly, "you were the one that ran off to Paris on your own, without backup and without a sufficient plan."
I shoot them both a look but it is Catherine who interrupts them, "I agree with my son," she says, " shut up." They both blink at her, astonished. "Very good. Cammie, could you please introduce us?"
"Sure Catherine," I say, hate dripping from my voice. "Bex, Macey, Liz and Zach, meet Catherine and Charlie. Catherine and Charlie, meet Bex, Macey , Liz and Zach." This is ridiculous I think, we are surrounded and in Catherine's grasp and I'm doing introductions? Oh well, might as well be polite, maybe they'll kill us quickly. "Charlie, did your wife have the baby?" I ask him. Bex, Macey, Liz and Zach gape at me, mouths wide.
"You remembered." Charlie smiles. "Yeah, she did. A baby boy, we named him Ian."
"Congratulations, you deserve it." I'm genuinely happy for him. Maybe I'm crazy. I laugh, can you have a relapse of crazy? More likely I'm in shock.
Catherine clears her throat before Charlie can respond. Everybody else is still staring at me like I have three heads. "If you two are done catching up, Cammie, you know the drill."
I nod and turn to my friends. " Empty out your pockets, remove all jewelry and put it with any weapons in a pile at Catherine's feet." They did as I'd said. Nobody had any weapons. It turns out that Bex had been going for gelato and to come up with a plan (she'd left without one as Zach had guessed) and the rest of us had just planned on picking up Bex and flying her back home to Virginia. No such luck. Once we have done that, we are loaded into a car and taken to Catherine's base. None of us speak the whole way there. I wonder how this day went so wrong.
