The Gold: Lie

"Willow!" Sarah hisses, while shaking me awake.

I groan and roll over in my bed, "What Sarah? Jeez." I notice JJs absence and pop my eyes open to see a scowl on her face.

"JJ is gone. How much do you wanna bet he's at my families vacation house?" She rakes her hands through her hair.

"Oh I know he is. I could tell he was lying last night when y'all argued about how unsafe it was and you made him promise again to not go over there." I admit while sitting up, "You reminded him about our situation by bringing up going home and the wanted posters everywhere, he's probably back to stressing out over losing me." 

"Why didn't you call him out?" 

"It wouldn't have stopped him, Sarah. He has to find this gold, he thinks he can continue to fix things with me if he can provide for me and the baby and get back what my dad spent his life working for." I slowly get to my feet and stretch, "The gold can help me stay out of jail if we can afford a better lawyer than Ward can, you know that."  

Sarah sighs, "Yeah I know. He shouldn't lie though."

"Be mad about that, but don't be mad about the gold. He makes bad decisions but he means well, I don't want him to feel like he did something wrong and hate himself for it." I start walking towards the door with my backpack on, "Lets go find my crazy man."

She follows after me, clicking the door shut before catching up to me on the sidewalk, "I just worry, Willow, things can get bad for us if we try to get the gold. We have no where to hide it or transport it."

"I think he just wants to take a few bars, at least right now. I worry too, I'm not ignoring your concerns, but we both know how JJ is when it comes to protecting people he cares about." 

"If my dad comes here then he will definitely use his resources to find us, it's not like running from Rafe, my dad knows people here and the police."

I sigh, "I know, but we'll figure it out, we can always take off and go somewhere else if we have to." 

As we continue to walk down the road, I start to get an uneasy feeling. 

"Willow, run."

"Something's wrong." I stop Sarah by her arm.

She furrows her brows, "What do you mean?"

"The voice in my head, it's telling me to run." I gasp when something soft slips over my head, everything goes dark while rough hands grab me and drag me somewhere. 

I squirm against the hold on my arms, fearful of the outcome of this while Sarah pleads with our kidnappers to let us go. We're thrown into the back of a truck with a warning that they will shoot us if we make any noise or try to escape.

At least I know it's not Rafe, I'd recognize his voice if it was. But then again, maybe I'd be safer if it was him, these guys are strangers and might do things to me that I definitely don't want done. I need JJ, he shouldn't have left us, we should have stayed at the motel. I could be in bed right now napping, but no, I'm being held captive. 

Fuck, this wont end well. I painfully hold my wrist in my hand, squeezing to distract myself from this whole ordeal. Ignoring the whispers in my ear, God that's getting old. I am seriously going crazy.

"You good, Willow?" Sarah asks from my left side.

I can feel her brushing up against my side when we hit a bump in the road, "Yeah.. yeah. Just stressing out a bit."

"Breathe, Willow. JJ will find us." She blindly hugs me while we drive to some unknown location, staying like this until the truck stops. 

The guys pull us out and walk us somewhere, after a few moments we stop and the fabric is removed from our heads. I breathe in the fresh air and let my eyes take in our surroundings. We're on a porch at someone's house, I think. We quickly realize it's the Captain from the cargo ship and one of his crew members. 

Sarah and I both share a look, this will definitely not end well for me. International prison here I come.

"Sit down and stay quiet." Captain Terrance grumbles before disappearing inside. 

The scary looking crew member guy sits down and watches us, so I drop down onto one of the porch couches and pull Sarah's hand to sit with me.

We sat in silence for a long while until a familiar voice comes from the side of the house, I relax when I see JJ come into view, a dark skinned girl trailing behind him with a knife in her hands. He lets out a sigh of relief when his eyes land on mine, I smile at him and grab his hand when he gets close enough.

JJ grimaces when he notices how angry Sarah is with him, "Hey. Listen. I just--"

"Liar!" She crosses her arms and looks away.

The Captain walks out and grabs JJ by the throat, his hand stays in mine and tightens while he tries to breathe, "You can run, but you can't hide, kids. I got eyes and ears everywhere. After all our hospitality, you left without saying goodbye, made us look for you for three goddamn months."

"Just leg us go." I beg.

"I got twenty five thousand reasons why that ain't gonna happen." 

"We didn't do anything." Sarah argues.

"Maybe not. I don't care. We let the courts decide. Bring her," He points at me after letting JJ go, "to the proper authorities."

"What are you talking about? Hey, no, no." JJ starts to panic, "Listen, listen. I can pay. I can pay you."

"You got 25K in your back pocket? If not, bye-bye."

Sarah grabs my backpack, the captain eyes her sudden movements, "Easy, girlie. Slowly." 

She digs the clump of gold out of the bag and holds it up for everyone to see.

"What is that?" The captains eyes go wide.

"What's it look like?" She smirks at him.

"Give it to me."

"Give it to Terence." The crew mate rips it from Sarah's hands and gives it to the captain.

"Easy Stubbs, don't be so rough with the girls."

"I wasn't Cleo." He grumbles, keeping his eyes off her glare. 

"One hundred and forty-three thousand reasons to let us go." Sarah smiles and crosses her arms again. "More than the bounty to turn her in." 

"I'll tell you what. That is your rescue fee. But I want my bounty too." Terrence laughs when he sees us panic.

"No, no, no, no!" JJ rushes out. 

At this point I'm just sitting here trying not to pass out while I grip my wrist again, adding to the bruises I already have.

"No! Terrance! No." Sarah frantically shakes her head, "That wasn't the deal!"

"That's just one! Hey! There's more! Look, I went to Paradise Island, to her family's house." JJ points at Sarah, "There is hundreds of millions of dollars worth of that gold there. It is an empty, undefended house. She has the entry codes." 

Yup, this won't end well either. Bye bye gold.

"Girlie, is this true?" Terrence looks interested now while he watches Sarah nod.

"It's my family's house." She tries holding her tears back, "The gold's there. And I can get you to it."

"Let's go then." Terrance jumps up and tells us to follow him to his truck. 

JJ and Sarah take the seats in the cab of the truck, while the rest of us lay in the bed of the truck under a tarp to avoid the prying eyes of the security guards. I already have a feeling this won't turn out how we want it to because of the voice in my head that's throwing out warnings. But we don't really have a choice in the matter so I'm stuck going along for the ride. 

~~~~~

We thankfully made it through the security gate at the front of the neighborhood because of  Sarah and JJ making up some lie about housesitting or a leaf blower, I don't know, JJ sorta rambled on until the Guard got annoyed and let us through. 

Once we pull up to the house, we all jump out and make our way to the door. Damn this house is gorgeous, prettier than their house on Figure Eight. Sarah grabs the house key hidden under a fake rock and lets us inside. Right there in the foyer is a massive safe, with deep scratch marks in the tile floor like someone dragged it in, how lazy, ever heard of a dolly?

"Okay, let's see here." Sarah kneels down in front of the keypad on the safe.

"Showtime, girlie." Terrance looks around at the house. 

"Um..." Sarah punches a code in but it doesn't work.

"You best remember that combo."

"Usually, he uses his birthday." She whispers to herself, "Maybe I entered it wrong."

"Chop-chop. Let's go."

"T, maybe you could tone it down a notch." I politely smile at his disgruntled expression, "She's doing her best here, so give her a minute." 

"What about Rose's birthday?" JJ runs his hands through his hair, his hand on my hip while I stay close to him. 

These days were pretty much always touching each other, it's like we can't go more than a few minutes without knowing the other is right there.

"Rose's..." Sarah tenses when that code didn't work either.

"I tell you what, you don't get it open, I get my 25K consolation, alright?" Terrance threatens.

"Just give her a second, alright?" JJ shoots him a look to shut up. 

"Try your birthday." My hand squeezes her shoulder to reassure her. 

"Okay." She typed it in and the door clicked open. 

Holy shit that's a lot of gold.

"Bingo. Nice job, girlie." Terrance smiles and picks up a gold bar, "Would you look at this." 

"Wow. I'll be damned. I need shades its so bright." Cleo grins at me and hands me a couple gold bars, so I quietly slip them into my backpack while everyone is distracted.

"Go get the bags, Stubbs. Go get the goddamn duffel bags!" Terrance excitedly pushes him towards the front door.

"Yeah. Yeah. Yeah." Stubbs grumbles, before abruptly spinning back around to face us, "Shit. Guys. Security's here!"

"Let's get outta here. Should've never let you talk me into this." Terrance stresses while heading through the french doors leading to the back of the house.

"Rent-a-cops, incoming." Cleo calls out as she looks out the window.

"Come on! Come on!" Stubbs follows after Terrance, Cleo now right behind him.

JJ quickly shuts the safe and grabs my hand, pulling me with him and Sarah, following after Cleo, but we stop short when Terrance slams the back door shut in our face and locks the security lock from the outside so we can't escape. Who the hell puts locks on the outside of the house so you can't leave.. Apparently psycho Ward does.

"No!" Sarah and I both bang on the door after Terrance runs off.

JJ rattles the handle a few times before giving up and cursing under his breath. I can see the stress and anger building in his eyes, his body tense while he looks around for a way out, already knowing he's going to do something crazy to try and protect me, our baby, and Sarah.

"Willow, you need to find a way out." 

Yes, I am very aware of that. 

"JJ, they're coming. They're coming." Sarah cries out, "What do we do?"

"Yup, it's time to go." I whisper, "I should be in bed napping." 

JJ pulls us through a room and shushes us, "I'll go upstairs and distract them."

"No, no. You'll get caught." I fearfully whisper, clutching his shirt to steady my shaky hands. 

My heartrate sky high while we listen to the security guards come into the front door.

"What else can we do?" He painfully watches me panic, "I'm sorry, baby, I should have found a way out of this, we should have went home earlier."

"Stop, don't blame yourself." I peck his lips, "I don't feel good about this but you're right, we don't have many options."

"Okay. If you distract them, we can go get the keys to the boat we have in the cove behind the property." Sarah whispers, "Meet us there as soon as you can, okay?"

"Okay." He caresses my face before running off.

"Come on, Willow. Stay with me, okay?" She pulls my hand as she runs the opposite direction as JJ. 

She leads us through the house to a side door, we slip outside and run around the length of the house until we get to a tree near a path leading to the cove. She grabs a keys off a hook on the back of the tree, twirling it around with an accomplished smile.

"That's.. a horrible.. hiding spot." I pant, a small laugh escaping me, making me sound weird since I still can't breathe after running so much. 

She starts to laugh but stops as she looks past me with wide eyes, "No." 

"Give me the keys." Terrance's voice hisses from behind me, "Don't play with me rich girl." 

I turn around, noticing the gun he's aiming at us, my body bends over with my hands on my knees after my breathing starts to get worse. Why am I having such a hard time breathing? My chest hurts too.

"Willow, you okay girl?" Cleo steps towards me and rubs my back. 

"I don't know." I gasp for air like the idiot that I am, fear nipping at my mind, where the heck is JJ? And what is wrong with me right now?

"You play silly games with me, baby, you get silly prizes." Terrance eyes me but continues talking to Sarah, "Don't try me. Give me the goddamn keys now. Get the keys, Stubbs." 

"No. No." Sarah cries after Stubbs rips the keys from her hands.

"Let's go." Terrance stalks off towards the boat, leaving us to fend for ourselves.

"I have to go with them." Cleo looks at me with sad eyes, "I'm sorry."  

I give her a thumbs up and lean into Sarah when she grabs my waist to steady me.

"Damn it." Sarah quietly curses as she watches them leave, "Now what?"

We can hear JJ out front fighting with the security guards now, making me ten times more stressed than I already was. I force myself to stand up right, my breath shallow while I try to get proper oxygen to my lungs, Sarah wearily eyes me as we round the corner of the house where JJ is, my heart sinks when I see him kneeling in the middle of the front yard with his hands up, four guards holding him at gun point. His eyes land on me and widen, fear clear on his face. 

Please don't do anything stupid, baby.

We hide behind the corner of the house, watching the head guard holding his phone up, talking to Ward, my thumb presses into my wrist, squeezing with all my might, fuck Rafe can't find me.

"Sarah." I whimper, she pulls my hand off my wrist and signals for me to be quiet.

"What's he look like?" Ward frantically asks, his voice blaring through the guards speaker.

The guy looks at the other guards, "Hold his head up." They pull JJs head back by his hair, making his face visible to the phone camera.

"Follow me, I have an idea." Sarah rushes off, so I trail behind her, almost running into her when she stops. I glance over my shoulder while she turns on some kind of sprinkler system, when we hear the guards shouting in surprise, she pulls me into a small hut that covers the water system. 

We hold our breath when one of the guards runs up and clicks the sprinkler system off. After he runs off we quickly scramble out, Sarah holding a can bug spray makes me raise my eyebrows in confusion, she just shrugs and grabs my hand, pulling me with her as she heads back over where JJ is.

"What is going on?" Sarah exclaims, I stand behind her, putting our hands up when the guards all point their guns at us.

"Who are y'all?" One of the guards questions us.

"I'm Val. This is Brookie." Sarah points between us, "We're house-sitting for the Cameron's." 

"You live here?"

"No, we're house-sitting." She bites her lip to stop her from laughing at his stupidity, if I wasn't still struggling to breathe I would probably laugh with her, "Just started a week ago."

"We caught this guy trying to break in." He gestures to my boyfriend who's watching my every move. 

"Oh, I know him." I stutter since my breathing is still wonky, "He cleans.. boats for the-the neighbors."

"Which neighbors?"

"The Stanleys." Sarah quickly adds, "Down the street." 

"What's his name?"

"Vlad." Sarah smiles to herself, probably thinking of my brother. 

Her and John B have these weird nicknames as some roleplay shit they do, its silly but kind of funny. JJ rolls his eyes at the nickname, obviously not finding it funny to be called his best friends kinky bedroom name.

My body stumbles backwards when Sarah sprays the guard closest to us in the eyes with the bug spray, both of us laugh when she goes on a spraying fiasco, sending all the guards to the ground but one, JJ jumps up and shoves the last one in front of him away, his hands grabbing mine and Sarah's before he runs towards the road, "Come on girls!"

"Go! Go! Go! Go!" Sarah yells, "Keep up Brookie." 

"I'm going... I'm going." I breathe out between gasps, "This shit ain't easy when I this fucking pregnant." 

JJ grabs me by the waist and hoists me into Terrance's truck he left behind, I look out the back window to see Sarah in the bed of the truck fighting off a guard.

"No! Get off me!" The guard has ahold of her leg as JJ starts driving us away, "Hands off!" She kicks her foot straight into the guys face, sending him to the ground while we race down the road.

JJ lets out a whoop and reaches out to caress my face, a huge smile across his face, I smile back while sliding over to sit closer to him, my breath leveling out now that we're safe.

"Oh, shit." Sarah laughs as she leans against the side wall in the back of the truck.

We cruise through the streets until we reach our motel, JJ still has that cheesy grin on his face when he parks, he plants a kiss on my lips before pulling us both out of the truck, "Okay. I have no doubts about you being a pogue, Sarah Cameron. That was crazy. You straight up donkey-kicked that dude--"

"You lied to us." Sarah cuts him off.

"What are you talking about? We're fine." He furrows his brows when he realizes she's still mad.

"No, we're not fine! You lost the only money we had! You almost got us caught. How is that okay?" She jumps down from the truck, "You shouldn't have gone to the house in the first place."

JJ grimaces at me before turning back to her, "I'm proactively admitting I screwed up and willing--"

"Proactively admitting doesn't do anything. I lost my father. I lost my brother. I have lost my little sister. I can't lose you guys. We can't lose this baby." Sarah points at my belly, "What you did today put both Willow and our sweet baby bean in danger." 

JJs eyes soften when he looks down at me, "Look, it won't happen again."

"I'm calling the shots now." She grabs the keys from his hand and walks off towards our motel room.

"Okay." He turns to me and smiles, "Barbies mad."

"You pissed her off babe." I laugh when he rolls his eyes, he rests his arm on my shoulders and leads us to the room.

When we settle into our beds, Sarah goes on to tell us her plan for our next steps in Nassau, and it spikes my heartrate again. Always chasing gold. This shits gonna be the death of me... again. What else can go wrong to hurt me or the ones around me? We better not get shot or end up dead, I have a baby to protect. And a long life to live with my sweet Jay.

I cuddle into JJs side, my head resting on his chest, "I'm scared, Jay."

He pulls me closer and kisses my head, "I'll protect you, Princess."

"I can't lose either of you. Getting this gold is going to be so dangerous."

"I know," He murmurs, fear in his voice as well, "but we have to do this before the golds gone for good. We will be okay."

"Do you promise?" I know he can't really promise but I ask anyways, I need the reassurance so I can sleep tonight.

"I promise, Princess, we will be okay. No one's going to get hurt, I won't let it happen." He pauses to press a few kisses to my face, "Are you mad at me too?"

"No, I knew you'd go over to the house eventually," I chuckle, "but it did worry me, Jay. You've been doing so good at being less reckless, it scares me to think you could get yourself arrested or hurt when we have a baby to think about."

"I know, Princess. You and the baby are everything to me, I promise I'm trying to do better, I want to be there for you both. I felt bad leaving, knowing something could happen to either of us if I wasn't close by to protect you, but this gold could change everything."

"The gold isn't worth losing you. Or the baby."

"I agree," He sighs, "it is worth a lot though."

"I'm over six months pregnant, Jay. We have three months max to be in a good spot to be parents, so I understand the importance of getting our hands on money, but this baby needs a daddy. So please just be careful, that's all I'm asking."

"I will be, baby, I promise." He kisses me, his hands in my hair while I press myself into him, both of us breathe out at the same time when we break apart, "We have a long life to live together."

"Yes we do. I love you, goodnight."

"I love you too, Princess." He kisses my head and starts to run his fingers in my hair, "Goodnight."

"Goodnight." Sarah sleepily tells us, "Love you guys."

We both chuckle, telling her goodnight and that we love her as well. My best friend and my boyfriend, if I had to chose between anyone to run off to hide from the law with, it'd be them every single time. I doze off to sleep, letting creepy gold dreams filter into my mind. 

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