Find the range of the two strings and return the substring in between:
NSString *s = @"hi how are... you";
NSRange r1 = [s rangeOfString:@"how"];
NSRange r2 = [s rangeOfString:@"you"];
NSRange rSub = NSMakeRange(r1.location + r1.length, r2.location - r1.location - r1.length);
NSString *sub = [s substringWithRange:rSub];