Bring Me Home ✔

Don't Leave Without Me: Part 24

The next two weeks went by slowly for Juliet, as Lucas and Liam took turns watching over her. They spent the first few days, watching movies and playing cards. She had learned a lot more about what had been happening once Lucas got clearance, and the details made her cringe.

There had been a drug and prostitution ring running through several countries that had been making its way to the U.S. There had been a girl, Scarlett, who had been taken during a summer vacation in New Zealand with her college roommate, and was 'put to work' as the man had worded it to Juliet. She had gotten out when the location she was being held at was raided by the local law enforcement.

A few years after being returned to the U.S., Scarlett had begun to speak publicly about her experience to warn other people of the dangers when traveling, and how to protect themselves. When her talks began to gain popularity, the organization (who had been establishing roots in the U.S.) spotted her online. Scarlett had been one of the leader's favorites, and with all that she had seen of the operation and of those that ran it, they knew that she could be a threat that they needed to silence.

Lucas would not tell Juliet what had happened to Scarlett, but when she looked the girl up on Liam's phone, she saw that the girl had no online presence for the past few months. She could only assume that Scarlett was either dead, or had been sitting in a safe house.

Matthew had been assigned to collect proof that the organization in the U.S. was connected to the group the C.I.A. had been investigating overseas. Once they had it, they would be able to hand the information over to the F.B.I. so they could begin an investigation on U.S. soil. Unfortunately, the group who had migrated to America were still placing their roots, and had been doing a great job at staying under the radar. It wasn't until they went on their manhunt for Scarlett, that they had given themselves away enough for the agency to collect any useable information on them.

After the first week of being locked up in the safe house, Juliet had grown bored and was getting impatient to the point of anger as she waited to hear news about Matthew. It didn't help that she had to spend time each day practicing her new signature, and reciting the information about her fictitious childhood and life as Julie Kaines. It was just a constant reminder that she would be leaving without him. She knew once they sent her away, no one would be able to reach out to her to let her know if he was okay.

She had tried to convince Lucas to at least grab the flash drive from her apartment that contained the back-up copy of the book she had been writing, but he said it was not a possibility. The possibility of someone keeping an eye on her apartment and then following Lucas back to her, was too high of a risk.

While the loss of her book was far less upsetting than losing Matthew, she did still cry for a solid hour once she was alone in his room.

"Are you ready yet?" Liam asked with his boyish excitement. He was in charge of getting her to the U.S. Marshal's that would take over her care and get her to her new location. She was not ready though, and had done everything but scrub the baseboards as a way to stall.

That morning she had taken a shower so long she almost questioned if it was possible to run out of cold water and had cleaned every surface of the house twice (much to Liam's protests), with the claim that she didn't want to leave a mess behind for Matthew. At one point, she even locked herself in the bathroom with the lie that her stomach was upset. All were pointless, as she was going to have to leave sooner or later. She had just prayed that it would be after she heard about Matthew.

The last thing she did before being dragged out of the house, was write one last letter to Matthew; a letter written about her love for him. It sat folded in half on his dresser also waiting on his return.