I squirmed against him, trying to escape his groping hands. The guy was strong, the steroids juicing his muscles to freakish proportions.
“I’ll dislocate your head from your shoulders if you don’t let her go,” Tate challenged. “You want to pick a fight with me? Fine. Let her go back inside and we’ll settle this.”
I began to struggle when Lincoln’s hands went groping at the front of my dress, picking up one foot and stomping it down on his as hard as I could. He grunted, releasing me briefly. I tried to make a run for it, to go get help, but he had me back in his hold before I could make a clean getaway. Keeping me against him with one arm, he used the other to close the door, kicking the cinder block away with one foot.
“Fight?” Lincoln laughed. “No… there won’t be a fight. The way I figure it, I’m owed a little revenge.”
Lincoln shoved me aside and went for Tate, sticking him with a left hook to the midsection. Tate doubled over but stayed on his feet, still struggling to get free. The other two boys pinned him against the rail of the balcony, each holding one of his arms.
“Stop it,” I screamed, throwing myself at Lincoln’s back.
His elbow jabbed my chest, throwing me away from him. “Stand back and let your boyfriend take his medicine like a big boy.”
Another swing, and Lincoln struck him again in the same spot, knocking the wind from him. With his back to me, I made a dash for the door, hoping to be able to open it.
“Damn it,” I cried, tears springing to my eyes as I realized it had locked from the inside. We were stuck out here.
I turned just in time to find Lincoln going for Tate again, this time with the cinder block held in both hands, raised over his head.
“Lincoln, no!”
I ran toward him again, putting myself between him and Tate, who struggled to his feet as the other two boys backed away to avoid being struck. I placed my hands against the cinder block, attempting to topple it from his grasp. It had to be the heaviest thing I’d ever tried to lift, scratching my knuckles with rough edges.
“This has gone too far,” I panted as he struggled to snatch his weapon back from me. “Let it go!”
“Bell, stop,” Tate rasped, hanging onto the edge of the balcony and trying to catch his breath. “Run… go get help.”
As Lincoln snatched the cinder block back from my hands, I made a run for the rail, leaning over and crying out to the people below us. “Help! Someone help us, please!”
“Shut her up,” Lincoln ordered, causing the other boys to jump into action, each grabbing me and pulling me back from the rail.
I never saw if anyone looked up at the sound of my voice, and I despaired that no one would know where it had come from. Opening my mouth to scream, I never got it out—one of the boys’ hands came down over my mouth, stifling the sound and making it hard to breathe.
“Hold her,” Lincoln growled, now advancing on Tate. “Make her watch.”
Tate lunged toward Lincoln, and the two went down. The cinder block fell to the ground, cracking in half as they rolled back and forth, wrestling to gain the upper hand. Tate swung first, his fist colliding with Lincoln’s jaw with a dull thud. Lincoln retaliated by jabbing a knee into his stomach, and then following it up with an elbow to the jaw, throwing Tate off. I screamed against the hand covering my mouth as Lincoln struggled to his feet, grasping Tate’s head in one hand and giving it a shove, cracking it against the brick wall.
Falling face-first onto the ground, Tate groaned in pain, obviously dazed by the blow. Panting like an enraged bull, Lincoln stooped to grab one half of the broken cinder block.
I struggled against the guys holding me, whimpering as their holds on my arms tightened, sure to leave bruises. The hand covering my mouth slipped away, and I turned my head to avoid being smothered again.
“Stop this,” I wailed, my voice growing hoarse from screaming. “Lincoln, you could kill him!”
“Like anyone would miss the ugly son of a bitch,” Lincoln spat.
Tate struggled to his hands and knees, shaking his head as if to clear it. His movements were sluggish and slow—far too slow to avoid the downward trajectory of the block. It came down on the back of his head, dropping him back onto his stomach on the ground. Tears blurred my vision and my throat burned from the pain of screaming, even as I continued calling out for help. Yet, I knew no one would be able to hear us over the music inside, while those on the ground might still not know to look up for the source of the screams.
If I couldn’t help Tate, who else would?
Blinking the tears away, I elbowed one of the guys holding me as Lincoln waited for Tate to try to stand, taking up the other half of the cinder block. I stepped on the second guy’s foot, then turned and kneed him in the crotch. Leaving them both cursing and holding the parts of them I’d injured, I ran to get between Lincoln and Tate just before the cinder block fell. Behind me, I could hear Tate’s harsh breathing, the sound of his shoes scraping the pavement as he struggled to stand.
“Get out of the way,” Lincoln bellowed, blood trickling from his lip from where Tate had struck him. “He isn’t worth protecting! This is what you want? Some diseased asshole who can’t even fight for himself!”
“He doesn’t have to fight,” I hissed, glaring up at him. “I will stand between you and him any day. If you want at him, you’re going to have to go through me, because I’m not moving.”
“Bell, don’t,” Tate managed between gasps.
With one arm, he pushed me aside gently but firmly, with more strength than I’d have thought he possessed after being clocked in the head with a cinder block. Blood coated the back of his head and trickled down to stain the collar of his shirt, but he stayed on his feet. At this point, he had to be running on pure adrenaline.
“You want me that bad?” Tate challenged, words slurring as he spat a mouthful of blood onto the ground before wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “Come on. I’m right here.”
“How’s it feel to know you can’t protect her?” Lincoln growled, stalking closer to Tate. “When I’m done with you, I’ll get a piece of her, and there won’t be a thing you can do to stop me.”
Snarling his rage, Tate made a move for Lincoln. He dodged when the cinder block was hurled at him, and then threw himself against Lincoln, pinning him against the side of the balcony. Everything happened so fast, I might have missed it if I’d blinked. Despite the blow he’d taken to the head, anger seemed to fuel Tate’s strength, and after a few traded punches, he had Lincoln by the lapels of his jacket, bent back over the edge of the balcony. I gasped as Lincoln’s feet left the ground and he teetered precariously on the edge, held up only by Tate’s fists gripping his jacket.
“What the fuck, man?” Lincoln rasped between ragged breaths, struggling to free himself from Tate’s hold. “Is this how it’s going to be? You gonna kill me?”
“You… threatened… Bell,” he replied between labored breaths. “Damn right… I will… end you!”
“Tate, don’t,” I cried, rushing toward them. Shooting the other two idiots a glare over my shoulder, I scowled. “Don’t just stand there. Try to get the door open!”
Jumping into action as if forgetting they’d just held me down while their asshole friend beat up on Tate, they obeyed—likely realizing now just how serious this had gotten.
Laying a gentle hand on Tate’s arm, I fought to steady my voice. “Tate, baby, look at me.”
Trembling with anger, he cut his eyes at me, one of which was starting to swell. Blood stained his hair and the side of his face, and he was paler than I’d ever seen him.
“You’re hurt,” I crooned, stroking his arm. “We need to get you help, and this won’t fix matters.”
“No,” Tate growled from between clenched teeth, fighting to maintain his grip on Lincoln. “I warned him… to keep… his hands off you.”
I shook my head. “But I’m not hurt. Look at me.”
Standing back, I held my arms out to my si
des, so he could see for himself. My shoulders would be bruised later and the sleeve of my gown had been torn, but I was no worse for wear.
“I’m okay,” I whispered, tears springing to my eyes. “But if you do this, you won’t be. What happened to starting over? You can’t do that if you kill him.”
“Self-defense,” he argued, turning his gaze back to Linc and scowling. “He… came at me first.”
I nodded. “Okay, but now’s the time to walk away. It’s over, okay? Put him down, and let’s find a way off this balcony. Do it for me, Tate. There isn’t anything I wouldn’t do for you, so do this for me. Let it go.”
“Listen to her, man,” Lincoln said, still struggling to get back on his feet. At the angle Tate held him, it was impossible… unless Tate set him back on his feet. “Listen to your girl.”
Tate hesitated only a moment before backing away and releasing Lincoln, who slumped to the ground with a sigh of relief, leaning back against the rail. Tate collapsed on the opposite side of the balcony, leaning against the wall just as the door swung open, hitting one of Lincoln’s two cronies in the head and knocking him back. The second dashed and made a run for it down the stairs, just as Douglas stepped out onto the balcony.
“What in the world…” Douglas trailed off at the sight of Tate, now passed out near the door. “Tate!”
He crouched beside his son, reaching out to give his shoulder a shake. Tate was unresponsive.
The second boy, recovering from being dazed by the door, made a run for it, too. I watched as he disappeared down the steps, and then turned back to Douglas, who worked to get his arms beneath Tate so he could lift him from the ground.
“Son of a bitch isn’t worth saving,” Lincoln growled from across the balcony.
I glanced up just in time to see him lumbering toward Douglas and Tate with the forgotten half of the cinder block raised over his head, his eyes wide and wild with rage. Glancing from him to Tate and Douglas, I didn’t think twice—I simply made a decision. Rushing toward him, I pushed both hands against his chest and heaved with all my might. The weight of the cinder block carried him backward, and he stumbled away from me, toward the rail again. This time, he couldn’t fight the momentum as it took him up and over the side of the balcony, and then down to the ground below with a bloodcurdling scream. A second later, the sound of his body making contact on the ground caused a surge of nausea to well in my gut.
Rushing toward the edge with my heart in my throat, I bit back a sob at the sight of Lincoln’s crumpled body lying in a heap on the front steps. People began to gather around him, a few of them glancing up toward the balcony. Trembling, I felt my knees buckle as I realized the magnitude of what I’d just done.
“Oh my God,” I whispered, falling to my knees on the ground. “Oh my God… I killed him.”
“Bellamy,” Douglas said, his voice firm. “Look at me.”
Turning, I pressed myself against the railing and glanced up at him with tear-filled eyes. “I killed him.”
Douglas shook his head, seated on his knees with Tate in his arms. “You don’t know that. What you do know is that Tate is hurt and we need help.”
Pressing a hand over my mouth, I glanced at Tate’s pale face. “Is he… Is Tate…”
Douglas jerked his head toward the open. “Go downstairs and find someone… anyone. Make sure they know we need two ambulances and that the other hurt person is up here. And maybe grab a security guard to go after those other two boys. They’re the only other witnesses to what happened up here. Hurry, now!”
His tone threw me into action, and I picked up my skirts and ran, my chest burning from the strain as I fought to breathe. I wanted to cry and sob and collapse on the ground in a heap. If Tate died, I didn’t know what I would do. I didn’t think I could bear it. And his parents… Max and Emma. None of us would ever be the same.
“No,” I whispered to myself. “He can’t die.”
I tripped on the stairs but remained on my feet, throwing myself down the last few steps and stumbling into the lobby. I blinked rapidly, struck dumb by what I found waiting for me. Lying on the ground was one of the two boys who had held me back while Lincoln beat Tate. On top of him was Ezra, who appeared to have tackled him to the ground, and now kept him pinned with his hands behind his back.
Through the open lobby doors, I could see a crowd of people gathered around what I assumed must be Lincoln. I avoided looking too closely, afraid of what I would find if I did.
“Ezra,” I cried, stumbling forward.
“Security guard only had one set of cuffs,” he huffed between deep breaths. Sweat coated his brow, and while his legs seemed all but useless, his upper body strained with strength, keeping his captive in place. “I’m supposed to hold this idiot down until the cops can get here. Where’s Tate? What’s going on? I came outside for some air and heard people talking about screams coming from the balcony. Next thing I know, that kid comes flying down from up there, and this idiot and his friend appear, running like they had something to hide.”
“Tate’s upstairs,” I explained quickly. “They beat him up pretty bad, and he… he…”
Ezra’s eyes widened when I choked back a sob. “How bad is it?”
I felt my throat constricting as I blinked back tears, shaking my head. “I… I don’t know. Douglas sent me to… I don’t know, Ezra.”
He nodded, his mouth a grim line. “Go find Faith. Make sure she gets an ambulance here for Tate.”
Apparently, word traveled fast, because by the time I made it outside to where Faith stood with Dad, Max, and Emma, she was hanging up her phone. Turning to me, she burst into tears.
“Oh, Bellamy, there you are,” she cried, reaching to grab my shoulders. “Are you hurt, honey? Are you okay?”
I nodded as she stepped aside to let Dad get at me. He looked me over, and then crushed me against him. In the distance, the sound of sirens called out through the night, coming closer with each passing second.
“Dad, Ezra needs help in there,” I said. “Now.”
Nodding, he followed my gaze inside to where Ezra kept a boy twice his size pinned to the ground. Jogging inside, he quickly took over, hauling the boy to his feet and keeping him in a tight hold by his collar. Ezra’s date appeared from the ballroom, her face a mask of worry as she knelt to help him back into his chair. I watched as he let her help him stand, and then lowered himself back into the chair.
From there, everything else happened in a blur. What seemed like the entire police force showed up, tailed by two ambulances, all with sirens blaring and lights flashing. The security guard turned his cuffed prisoner over to the cops before gesturing toward Lincoln’s crumpled form. The paramedics from the first ambulance went to him, while the second set followed Faith upstairs to where Douglas and Tate remained.
Dad shoved his prisoner toward another cop, who quickly took him into custody. “The paramedics went up for Tate?” he asked.
I nodded. “Do you think they’ll let us ride with him to the hospital?”
Ezra rolled up beside us in his chair, his expression grim. “They’ll likely only allow one person in there with him. Besides, the police are going to want to talk to him about what happened up there.”
Bile rose up in my throat, and my gut began to churn as I watched the paramedics lift Lincoln’s stretcher and begin wheeling it toward the waiting van. From this distance, I couldn’t tell if he’d survived or not, but, for the moment, I didn’t much care. My mind couldn’t grasp anything beyond the fact that Tate could be dying upstairs, and I wasn’t with him. It seemed to be taking forever for them to come, and, for a long while, we simply stood there—Dad, Ezra, the kids, and me. The ambulance containing Lincoln sped off into the night, and still Tate hadn’t been brought down from the balcony. I could tell from the way Dad and Ezra were looking at me that they wanted to ask me what had happened, but seemed to be refraining due to the presence of the kids.
“Are you okay?” I asked Ezra after a long sil
ence. “You didn’t hurt yourself taking that kid down, did you?”
Ezra shrugged, gesturing toward the scuffed knees of his pants. “I’ll survive, but this was my favorite suit.”
My stare dropped to his legs, and he followed my gaze.
“It’s okay to ask me what you’re thinking, Bellamy.”
Inclining my head, I glanced down at his legs. “You aren’t… I mean, you’re not…”
“Paralyzed?” he offered, shaking his head. “No, I’m not. I can stand and walk, though not very far. I have a disorder called Limb-Girdle Muscular Dystrophy. Long story short, it affects the shoulders and hips, and the limbs attached to them. My type of LGMD affects my lower half mostly. The chair keeps me from being weak and tired all the time, and from frequent falls.”
“I guess all that time in the gym put you in fighting shape, huh?” I joked, trying not to panic that it was taking so long for them to come down with Tate.
Ezra’s date appeared at his side, placing one hand on his shoulder. “Damn right it does. Are you okay?”
Glancing up at her, he placed a hand over hers and smiled. “Fine, honey. This is Bellamy and Nate. Guys, this is Janine.”
“Hi,” I said, taking her offered hand.
“Nice to meet you,” she replied. “Though, I’m not fond of the circumstances.”
Tell me about it, Janine.
Just then, a flurry of activity near the doors caught my attention. The paramedics pushed Tate’s stretcher, forgoing the stairs in favor of the wheelchair ramp sloping down toward the ground. Douglas and Faith followed, holding tight to each other’s hands as they ran toward the ambulance Tate was being lifted into. Picking up Emma, Dad took Max’s hand and followed Ezra and me as we moved quickly to meet them near the van.
“Is he all right?” I said just as Tate’s stretcher had been settled inside. I stood on my tiptoes to try to see inside, but couldn’t make out much, with two paramedics working swiftly to hook him up to an IV and other machinery.
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