A motor sounded at the end of the track, drawing my attention as I chewed my carnitas. Who the hell was down…?
Oh God.
I stood, my food falling to the dirt as Zoe sped toward the ramp at full speed, riding her full-size bike. My heart jumped into my throat.
This was going to go wrong, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.
I ran toward the ramp as fast as my legs could go. Her speed was good, her angle great, but she’d never pulled the kind of weight that two-hundred-and-twenty-pound bike was about to give her.
She hit the top and flew, throwing the bike back into the flip.
“Pull it!” I screamed, but it was too late.
She lost control of the bike, and her grip slipped. She was done.
Zoe fell from the highest possible point of her arc, and everything slowed for me on the ground. I couldn’t get there fast enough. Couldn’t freeze time. Couldn’t catch her or stop the bike.
She crashed into the backside of the ramp with a sickening thud as I reached the platform. I slid onto the ramp, skidding toward her as the bike came down, slamming into her leg with an audible crunch.
She let out a blood-curdling scream and reached for her upper thigh.
Just like me. Flashes of Dubai raced through my brain. The bike. The break. The light. Landon hovering above me. The pain.
The bike came at me and made impact before I could dodge, its tires raking down my side in a skin-rending sideswipe. I yelled out in pain as the bike kept moving, finally coming to a stop at the bottom of the ramp.
I staggered to my feet while holding my side and scrambled the rest of the distance to Zoe. Her shinbone distorted the lay of her pants, and her upper thigh was soaked in blood that was traveling down her leg at an alarming rate.
“Cruz!” I yelled. He would know what to do. He had medic training, right? He knew our safety plan. He isn’t here. “Landon! Pax!” I looked back to see the entire company of Renegades at a run toward us, a phone already at Little John’s ear.
“I’m dead! I’m dead!” Zoe screamed, voice shrill, her gloved hands covered in blood that smeared down her white jacket. I took off her goggles to see her eyes were wide, her pupils dilated.
Shock.
“You’re alive! Do you hear me? You’re alive. You couldn’t be screaming if you were dead!” I grabbed her hand with mine and her face with the other. I couldn’t reach much through the helmet, but it was her only exposed skin that I could touch so she could feel the contact.
Where was she bleeding from? God, there was so much of it. My hands ran over her thigh, where the blood was darkest. “Where else are you hurt? Jesus, what got you?”
“It was in my leg!” she yelled, handing me a piece of sharp, blood-covered metal from the bike.
“Oh my God, you pulled it out?” I dropped it.
“Holy fuck!” Landon yelled.
Finally.
He yanked the bike off the ramp and then hoisted himself onto the platform, coming at us at a run. “Little John has the EMTs coming from the entrance to the park.”
Thank God Cruz made us have them relatively on-site.
“Give me your knife.” I held out my hand, and he obliged.
Careful not to get her skin, I made a clean cut through the rough material from Zoe’s upper thigh all the way to her ankle, careful to navigate the built-in pads. “That’s an open fracture,” I said, pointing to where the bones tore through the skin.
Don’t vomit. You’ve seen worse.
I’d been worse. Wetness seeped through my pants, and I didn’t need to look to know it was Zoe’s blood.
More of the heavy liquid pulsed from a gash on her thigh.
“Take it!” Landon shoved a shirt at me, and I pushed it to the wound, applying all the pressure I could.
Zoe’s back came off the ramp as she screamed.
“Try to stay still!” We didn’t know what else was broken, and from the look of the red marks on her gear, she had other, smaller bleeds.
“Zoe!” Landon got in her face. “Zo! Listen to me!”
Her breath was haggard, but she stopped screaming.
“There you go. Look, you’ve got a nasty break and a really rough bleed, okay? But you’re going to be fine. EMTs are almost here. Penna’s got pressure on the wound, and you’re going to be fine. Penna, you gotta put more pressure.”
I pushed harder at the wound, blood already seeping through the shirt, and Zoe went limp. She’d blacked out.
Rapid Spanish echoed all around me, and I looked up to see several paramedics motioning for me to move.
“Penna, come on,” Landon said, taking me by the shoulders. I brushed my hair out of my face, only to pull my hands back and see they were covered in blood.
Looking down, the rest of me was, too.
“Get her checked out!” Pax yelled at Landon, already climbing the ramp to help the paramedics lift Zoe’s stretchered body down.
“I’m fine!” I yelled.
“Bullshit, I saw you take the hit!”
“This way, please,” an EMT gently guided my elbow. I started shaking, stumbling away from the scene.
“I’m fine,” I repeated, even as they sat me on the picnic table.
“Oh my God!” Miss Gibson said, placing her hand over her mouth as she looked at me.
“Where does it hurt?” the EMT asked, his eyes wide and concerned.
“She got hit in the side,” Landon said, motioning to my ribs.
“She can speak,” I snapped. Glancing down, I saw that the bike had ripped the shirt to shreds under my arm. “Damn, and I liked this set, too.” Not that I’d ever wear it again, anyway. I doubted the blood would come out. A hiss escaped as I started to take off my shirt, the fabric catching on the pads underneath.
“Can you lift your arms?” Landon asked softly.
I nodded, raising them above my head. He carefully stripped off the soft, long-sleeved shirt, leaving me in my protective jacket. It was one piece with sewn-in pads—not too bulky for movement.
“Out!” I snapped at a camera team that was filming a respectful three feet from my face.
“Rebel—”
“Get the fuck out,” Nick snapped from behind them. “She’s hurt, and you got that on film, but I’ll be damned if you’ll be filming my best friend in her bra so some perv can fill his spank-bank. She’s never done underwear shoots, and you won’t be the first—documentary or not, so get out.”
Over Landon’s shoulder, I saw Zoe being lifted into the ambulance.
Little John appeared next to Nick and then walked up to me and turned his back, crossing his arms in front of his gargantuan chest.
Rachel joined him, and I almost laughed. She was five-foot-nothing, so it was more symbolic, but I appreciated the gesture.
I unzipped my black and purple jacket and slid my arms out while Landon held it.
“Damn.” His eyes were locked on my red, raw rib cage.
“See, nothing to worry about,” I said. “Bad case of road rash…bike edition.”
The paramedic gently examined the injury, and though it felt like my skin had caught fire, I’d been through a hell of a lot worse.
“Nothing’s broken,” he said. “Very badly bruised. This is the only injury?”
“Yeah. The blood isn’t mine.”
“You’re very lucky,” he said as he finished checking out the area around the tire tracks. “All surface damage. Of course you might want an x-ray.”
“No, thank you. I know what broken ribs feel like, and mine are fine.”
“Penna, you okay?” Pax asked, pushing through my barricade. His gaze went straight to my side, but he still managed to toss Landon a shirt, which he immediately put on.
“I’m fine. It’s going to bloom into a gorgeous bruise, and my ribs are sore, but nothing’s broken.”
Unlike last time. God, what the hell was I doing?
“Why don’t you let the EMT tell you that,” Pax said.
“He just did. I’m fine.”
“Wilder!” someone called out from the ambulance.
“Go,” I told him. “Take Landon and go.”
“You’re sure? I don’t want to leave until we know you’re okay.”
I loved them like the brothers they were, but they weren’t the ones I wanted, anyway. I wanted Cruz, needed to feel his strong arms around me, hear his voice in my ear, and they weren’t exactly capable of giving me that.
“I’m sure. I have Nick, and Rachel, and Leah—”
“And me!” Little John shouted, his eyes still facing the ramp.
“And him.” I laughed, then hissed at the pain it caused.
“Go.” Go before I fall apart and you see what a wreck I really am.
“I’ll take her back to the boat,” Miss Gibson offered from the other side of Little John.
“And we’ll go with her,” Leah told Pax.
I saw the war raging in his eyes, the need to be with me—his sister—versus going with Zoe, who was severely injured. “Go. Now, dammit,” I instructed, taking the choice away.
His jaw flexed, but he finally agreed. “Just take care of yourself and rest. I’ll come back to the ship, or send someone when there’s news, but they think she’ll be okay.”
“Sounds good. I’ll follow you guys as soon as I get cleaned up.”
I wanted a shower—needed to scrub away the blood, the dirt, the memories of her screams, which mixed together with my screams in my head.
The EMT gave me some directions—nothing I hadn’t heard before—and I slipped one of Little John’s shirts over my head that came nearly to my knees. He drove us back to the ship in the SUV.
Adrenaline gone, my head started buzzing with the noise I tried hard to keep out. I shut my eyes against the barrage of images on endless repeat, but that only made them worse, so I focused on the road.
I could fall apart in private, but never here. Not with Miss Gibson in the car. Not where Leah and Rachel would tell Pax and Landon.
“Cruz is going to kill me,” Miss Gibson said.
I flinched at the sound of his name, at her right to publicly use it when I couldn’t.
“It wasn’t your fault,” Leah reassured her, because that’s the kind of person she was.
Me? Not so much.
“He left me in charge for ten whole minutes, and look what happened,” she said, putting her head in her hands like she was the one who’d just had a motorcycle dropped on her.
But she wasn’t guilty, either.
“Stop. He’s not going to be mad. He knows there’s no contingency plan for stubborn and stupid,” I said, my voice scratchy and raw. “In our line of work…things happen. There’s no stopping someone else’s bad decision. Zoe wanted something she wasn’t ready for. This wasn’t your fault. Or his.”
Her eyes met mine in the rearview mirror, and I looked away, as if our secret was there on my forehead to be read.
“What are you thinking about?” Rachel asked Leah, who sat in the middle, softly shaking her head.
“Just…just something Brooke said when we were in Barcelona. It’s nothing.”
I tried to lock down every muscle, every reaction I could possibly have, but I still looked at her. “What did she say?”
Leah’s soft brown eyes met mine. “She said that everyone wants to be a Renegade until they know what it costs.”
Time, tears, broken bones, and broken hearts. She’d said it to me so many times, and I’d laughed her off, not realizing what she was trying to say.
Please quit.
Please walk away.
Please see what this does to the people around you.
But I didn’t quit. I kept going. Pax and Landon kept going. Even Nick, who’d paid a steeper price than the rest of us, kept pushing it.
And then she pushed back.
“She’s right,” I said, breaking the heavy silence. “Because no one sees the price. We’re so damn good at hiding it, even in the middle of a documentary.”
Sure, they saw the lights, the cameras, the roar of the crowd. They saw the stunts, the flips, even the falls. But they didn’t see the tears, self-doubt, scrutiny, and the months of rehab and recovery. They skipped that part until the comeback.
I didn’t want to visit the infirmary, but my friends teamed up with Miss Gibson against me, and I gave in, knowing it would take ten times longer to argue with them. I held it together through the wait, counting the ceiling tiles to keep my mind busy and off what had just happened. After I’d been checked out and cleared by the ship’s doctor, Miss Gibson finally left us, and we headed for the suite.
No doubt she was going straight to the dean now that she’d covered her ass and had me checked out again. Heads turned as Rachel, Leah, and I took the elevator, then walked down the hall. I kept my eyes on the floor, well aware that I looked like something out of The Walking Dead.
Rachel slid our key through the lock, and when the little light went green, my composure bit the dust. I stumbled through our hallway, only to lean back against the wall and slide to the floor.
“I’ll take care of her,” Rachel told Leah. “Maybe go pack a bag for Zoe? Hugo should know how to get into her room.”
I drew my knees to my chest, uncaring that the skin on my side felt like it was being shredded as I moved.
With Leah gone, Rachel dropped down in front of me. “Hey, you okay?”
“I’m fine.” The answer was automatic, rote, the same one I’d given time and again after the accident.
“You’re not fine. What can I do?”
“I’m fine,” I repeated.
There was a pounding at the door, and Rachel sighed, then left to answer it. “Hey, Doc. Yeah, she’s here.”
“Cruz?” I asked, my voice tiny.
He pushed past Rachel, his eyes wild, growing even more panicked when he saw me. “Penelope. Oh God.” He hit his knees in front of me, brushing my hair back. “Lindsay said you got hit. We have to get you to the hospital.”
“No, I’m fine. I got checked out. It’s not mine…the blood.”
“Which side?” he asked. Not that I could blame him. The blood was everywhere.
“This one.” I motioned with my head.
“Okay.”
My eyes slid shut, and I felt his arms surround, then lift me carefully, keeping my injured side in the clear. Just that small amount of contact and my muscles relaxed, as if they got the message that I was safe now, that he would somehow make everything better even though my ribs still screamed.
“It’s okay, baby. I got you,” he said, his lips against my forehead.
He kicked open my bedroom door.
“Ummm…” Rachel stepped forward.
“I’ve got her,” he told her.
“Penna?”
“It’s okay,” I told her as he prepared to shut the door in her face.
“Apparently,” she said softly, her eyes wide.
He set me down on the bed, then turned on the shower. Once the water was warm, he stripped me to my toes, cursing at the damage he found on my side.
“Tires,” I muttered. “I just need to get it clean and gooped up with antibacterial ointment with some bandages. I’ve been through it before, I’ll go through it again.”
He gathered me in his arms and lifted me against his chest.
“I can walk,” I said softly, but tucked my head onto his shoulder.
“I need to carry you. Please just let me.”
I’d been hurt plenty of times in my life, but I’d never been taken care of like this, or rather never let anyone take care of me.
He carried me to the large shower, walking in fully clothed. The water cascaded down my body in red streams, and he gently washed my face, my hair, then my torso. When he got to the tire tracks, he couldn’t have been more careful with me.
He turned off the water and then wrapped me in one of the giant, fluffy white towels, patting me dry. Then I slipped into my terry bathrobe while he put on a set of dr
y clothes he kept in my one of my drawers.
Then he peeled back my robe, lathered me with ointment, and joked that we were going to need the economy-size bottle.
I didn’t bother to tell him that Landon’s parents owned that company, so we wouldn’t run out anytime soon. He applied gauze, wrapped my torso like a mummy, and put me to bed, tucking me into the curve of his body.
“Painkillers?” he asked.
“They offered. I declined. The pain isn’t too bad compared to other injuries.”
“You sure?”
“You know what happened?” I asked, changing the subject.
“Lindsay gave me the gist.”
“I didn’t know what she was doing until it was too late.”
“I know.”
“No one could have stopped her.”
“Penelope, this isn’t your fault. You know that, right?” He stroked my hair back from my face.
My eyes prickled, and I blinked quickly. “I should have seen what was going on. Should have known what she was thinking. I was right there with her. I said I’d help her after lunch, and then I turned my back for a second. How did I not see what she was going to do? Why didn’t she tell me? She should have told me.”
He gathered me tighter and kissed my forehead. “You had no way of knowing what she was thinking or what she would do.”
“I should have. She’s just like me, and when I want something, there’s nothing I won’t do to get it. Look at the position I’ve put you in, right now.”
“I am exactly where I want to be,” he assured me.
“Why didn’t I see it? There were so many signs. If I had just taken the time and listened to her, or paid the slightest attention, I would have seen it. I should have known. Out of everyone, I’m the one who should have known.”
Cruz rolled until he hovered above me. “You are not responsible for the choices other people make. This is not your fault. Dubai was not your fault. Zoe is not Brooke.”
My throat tightened, and several moments passed before I could speak.
“I can’t talk about her to them. Not after everything she did. It’s like there’s this giant portion of my heart that’s slowly dying, all blackened and ugly, and they won’t understand. I chose them. I always choose them. But there’s this part of me that says I should have chosen my sister, and I can’t even tell them that I miss her.”
Rebel (The Renegades) Page 28