Chaos

by Timberlyn Scott

  “How’s he doin’, man?” I asked as soon as we were standing beneath the awning that covered the driveway where the ambulances pulled up to deliver patients.

  The lights were on, casting a glow that carried just a couple of feet out from the covered area. From what I could tell, we were alone, except for a woman walking an elderly lady out into the parking lot, slowly disappearing into the darkness.

  “He’s fucked up,” Garrett stated directly, his dark eyes darting back and forth over all of the faces staring back at him, anxiously awaiting some sort of news.

  “But he’s gonna be all right, right?” Chloe asked, hope ringing in her voice as she clung to Toby’s arm.

  “He’s fucked up,” Garrett repeated roughly.

  Payton placed her hand on Garrett’s arm, giving him a gentle squeeze. The guy looked as if he was about to lose his shit. I knew how he felt.

  Finally, after taking a deep breath and blinking a few times, Garrett exhaled. “He’s got three fractured ribs. Those’ll heal on their own, according to the doc, just cracks, no risk of complications from them. Two or three months at the most, if we can keep him from overdoing it.”

  I sighed, finally able to breathe for the first time in hours.

  “That’s not all, Sebastian.”

  I waited for Garrett to continue, my fingernails digging into the palms of my hands. A sense of impending doom washed over me, and I clenched my teeth together as I waited.

  “They said something about blood in the thoracic cavity. Hemothorax or some shit. They’re putting in a chest tube to drain the blood. If it doesn’t stop, they’re gonna have to open him up to try to stop the bleeding.”

  “Shit,” I barked, thrusting my hands through my hair and turning around. I couldn’t stop the angry tears that flooded my eyes. I wasn’t sure who I was mad at. Myself for the race, Leif for showing up in my fucking car, or Rebel for causing the damn accident. Or maybe all three of us.

  Payton immediately made her way to my side, sliding her arms around me. Leaning forward, I buried my face in her neck, wrapping my arms around her tightly. “How the fuck did this happen?” I asked, mumbling against her skin.

  A strong hand landed on my shoulder, and I released Payton, turning to face Garrett. “Man, I know it’s bad, but seriously. If he’d been in his Mustang… Holy fuck, Sebastian,” Garrett said with a strangled sob, “he’d be dead right now. The roll cage in your Camaro pretty much saved his life.”

  I glanced over at Toby. “Why the fuck was he in my car?” It wasn’t the first time Leif had borrowed one of my cars, but he only did so when there was something wrong with his. And never had he raced a vehicle that wasn’t his own.

  “No idea,” Toby retorted quickly. “Last I heard, he just told me he wanted in. I didn’t even know he was going to be there until he drove up.”

  “How’d you get here so fast, anyway?” I asked Garrett, realizing he’d been on the road just a few hours ago when Aaron had called him.

  “We were just an hour outside of Austin when Aaron called.” Garrett glanced over at Aaron briefly. “We were taking a couple of days off.”

  “Will you go back?” I asked.

  “Not right away, no. I need to be here with my mom and Leif.”

  “How long will he be in the hospital?” Payton asked, holding my arm with both hands. She shuddered, and that was when I realized she was shivering. It was cold as shit outside, but I hadn’t even noticed. My blood was pumping too hard and too fast for me to feel much of anything.

  “Right now they don’t know. Once they do the chest tube, they’ll attempt to drain the blood. If that works, then great. If not, and they have to do surgery, it could be a while. I’m not leaving until he’s home.”

  I nodded, understanding Garrett’s need to stay with his brother.

  “Has anyone contacted Aaliyah?” Garrett asked, meeting my eyes.

  I informed Garrett that I hadn’t had a chance to call anyone, and Payton and Toby confirmed with a headshake that they hadn’t called my sister, either.

  “I’ll call her,” I told him.

  “Good. He was calling her name at one point. They’ve got him sedated now, though.”

  “Will we be allowed to go back and see him?” Toby asked.

  Garrett nodded. “I’ll let you know when they get him to a room. If he’s in ICU, we’ll be limited to when we can see him and to how many can go back at a time.”

  I met Toby’s eyes over Payton’s head. I had a question for him. One that I knew better than to ask with Garrett there. As it was, I wasn’t sure how I was going to handle it if the answer wasn’t what I wanted to hear.

  “I need to get back there,” Garrett said, turning his attention to me.

  I walked over and hugged him, slapping his back a couple of times. “Thanks, Garth. Keep me updated. We’ll be close, but I’ve got something I need to take care of. And as always, if you need anything, holler.”

  Stepping back, I met Garrett’s dark gaze. He knew I was up to something. Hell, they all probably did. But at that moment, the only thing that mattered to me was that Leif got up out of that bed and walked out of the hospital. I didn’t care if it was one day or thirty. I just needed him to be whole.

  Payton and Chloe hugged Garrett, and Toby slapped him on the back. What surprised me the most was when Garrett asked Aaron if he could talk to him, both men going back into the hospital together.

  “What’re you thinkin’?” Toby asked sternly, pulling my attention to him. He knew me better than anyone else. Well, anyone else except maybe Leif.

  “We’ve got something to take care of.” Whether Toby knew what I was thinking or not, he merely nodded in agreement. I reached for Payton, pulling her flush against my chest. “I’ve gotta leave for a little while.”

  Payton’s eyes reflected her concern, but she didn’t argue. “We’ll be here.”

  “You sure?” I asked. “You can go home and get some sleep. Come back in the morning.”

  “I won’t be able to sleep,” she admitted.

  I knew exactly how she felt.

  Kissing Payton softly on the lips, I cupped her face and drew back enough to look in her eyes. “Call my sister. Tell her what’s going on.” She nodded and I kissed her again. “I’ll be back in a couple of hours.”

  “Be careful.”

  I didn’t tell her that probably wasn’t going to happen. After all, she had enough to worry about.

  Chapter Three

  Sebastian

  An hour later, long after it was probably appropriate to just show up on someone’s doorstep unannounced, I pulled into the driveway of a dilapidated old house that hadn’t seen its glory days since the early sixties at least. From the dim light of a yellow street lamp, I could see that the wood siding was peeling and rotted. The roof appeared as though it was barely holding up. The front windows were cracked and looked like they let more air in than they kept inside the house.

  “Man, you’ve gotta keep your cool,” Toby warned when I put the Ferrari in park. Toby had tried to convince me to let him drive. His Camaro would’ve been notably less conspicuous, but I knew that riding in the passenger seat would’ve left me with even more pent-up energy than I currently had.

  However, it wasn’t lost on me how out of place my car looked in front of this house, especially in this particular neighborhood, but at the moment, I really didn’t give a shit. “I can’t make you any promises,” I told Toby honestly, opening the door and climbing out.

  “I knew I shouldn’t’ve told you where he lives,” Toby mumbled as we walked up the cracked sidewalk path to the front door.

  The lone light fixture on the house put off a golden glow that lit our trail to the rickety front porch and the screen door that was hanging awkwardly, one of the hinges clearly broken. With care, so as not to have the thing come off in my hands, I pulled it open. The accompanying squeak was loud enough to notify the neighbors that their neighbor had a visitor.

  Again, I didn�
�t care.

  I rapped my knuckles on the door. It was just after eleven, and I figured visitors weren’t welcome at this time of night, but I couldn’t let this go.

  “This better fuckin’ be good,” the gruff, angry voice sounded from the other side of the wood door just before it opened.

  As soon as Rebel had the door open wide, I rushed him, shoving him back hard enough to send his big ass stumbling. He managed to right himself before landing flat on his ass.

  “What the fuck, man?” Rebel shouted.

  “Good to see you’re in one piece,” I snarled, still stalking him. I heard the sound of the front door being closed behind us, which meant Toby had come inside.

  “Shit,” Rebel groaned. “What’s your fuckin’ problem?”

  Rebel came toward me, chest puffed up like he was king of the world and hadn’t been knocked nearly off his big-ass fucking feet by a guy considerably smaller than he was. Not that I was small, but even at six foot two, I was no match for Rebel’s six-foot-six-inch frame. The dude was built like a fucking hundred-year-old oak tree. The sweat coating his bald head glistened in the dim light of the living room, and he smelled like cigarettes and sex, not an appealing combination, but it beat the stench emanating from the house.

  “Holy fuck, man. It smells like shit in here,” Toby stated.

  “Fuck off, Toby. No one invited you into my house.”

  “Yeah, well, we didn’t figure an invitation was necessary,” I informed Rebel. “Especially since my best fucking friend is laid up in a hospital right now.”

  I was up in Rebel’s face, trying to refrain from punching him in the fucking mouth, when a short, dark-haired woman stepped out of the dark hallway, wrapped in a sheet, her eyes wide.

  “Go back to the bedroom, Darla,” Rebel ordered.

  I glared at her, and she trotted off down the hall. I only hoped she wasn’t one of those feisty chicks who went looking for some sort of weapon to defend her dick of a boyfriend.

  “So that’s how it works? You nearly kill my best friend and you’re at home getting your dick sucked while we’re waiting to see if he’s gonna live or die?”

  Rebel didn’t reply, his eyes narrowing on my face. “You got a point here? I did my job. I finished the race. No rules, remember?”

  “Common decency says you check on the guy whose car you sent rolling. That’s the way it works,” I informed him bitterly.

  “He’s alive, man, what the fuck do you want from me?” Rebel snapped, and the noise in my head built to a crescendo, blinding me with a rage I hadn’t felt in quite some time.

  The next thing I knew, I was whaling on Rebel, kneeling over him, pounding my fists into his face while Toby tried to pull me off. I could hear the girl screaming and Rebel groaning, but I couldn’t stop. The fucker didn’t give two shits whether Leif lived or fucking died. My best fucking friend. I pounded on Rebel, not caring what kind of damage I did. I lost track of time, beating Rebel until my knuckles were bloody and my head was throbbing.

  Toby yanked me to my feet, spinning me around and getting right up in my face. “We’re done here,” he snarled. “Let’s go.”

  I nodded, the red haze still clouding my vision. I glanced around Toby to where Rebel was lying on the ground. He was spitting blood onto the dingy carpet, his beady eyes focusing on me once again.

  I opened the door and turned back to see Toby standing over Rebel. “Your winnings,” Toby bit out, tossing an envelope onto Rebel’s chest. “If I ever fucking see your ugly face again, the beating you just got will feel like a day at the beach. You feel me?”

  In all the time I’d known Toby, rarely had I ever seen him quite as pissed as he was right then. I felt the guy’s pain, understood his rage. As it turned out, Toby just had significantly more restraint than I did.

  Not that I was apologizing.

  It was closing in on three o’clock in the morning when I managed to convince Payton to let me take her back to my place. After handling things at Rebel’s, Toby and I had returned to the hospital for a couple of hours, but as the minutes continued to tick by, I knew we would have to go at some point. Considering it was late — or early, depending on how you looked at it — I figured a little sleep might do us all some good. My house was the closest to the hospital where Leif was staying, so everyone agreed to crash there for a few hours before heading back north after the sun came up. When I pulled into my driveway, I noticed Leif’s Mustang sitting there, and it took a moment for my brain to register what I was seeing.

  Pulling into the garage, I parked the Ferrari and helped Payton out. By the time I was wandering over to the Mustang, Toby’s Camaro was pulling up behind it, Aaron’s Honda, with Garrett riding shotgun, behind him.

  “Why’d he take the Camaro?” Toby asked as soon as he got out of his car, joining me as I studied the fire-engine-red sports car.

  “No idea,” I said, not seeing anything wrong with the car. “That’s the first question I want him to answer.”

  Taking Payton’s hand, I led her into the house, motioning Toby and the rest of the crew following close behind us toward the guest bedrooms. “Two rooms. One couch. We’ll see y’all in the morning.”

  I didn’t stop walking, pulling Payton along with me. I was exhausted. Between the two hours we’d lost when we’d come back from Vegas that morning and the rest of the events from the day, I wasn’t sure how Payton was still standing. I wanted to put her to bed, and we’d worry about the rest of the shit in the morning.

  “I need to shower,” Payton said after I closed my bedroom door, sealing us off from the rest of the world for a little while.

  I nodded toward the attached bathroom as I lowered myself onto the bed, resting my head in my hands.

  Payton came to stand in front of me, my forehead pressing against her stomach, careful not to hit the bandage covering the gash I’d received earlier. She placed her hands gently on the top of my head, her fingers linking into my hair. It was the safest I’d felt since early that morning before I’d dropped her off at her apartment. Having her there with me… I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to be away from her anymore.

  As fast as our relationship seemed to be moving, it made sense to me. It felt right. I could breathe through the pain that had taken up residence inside of me. She made my existence bearable. I loved her. I needed her.

  However, now wasn’t the time to drop that little emotional bomb on her. She’d been through enough that day already.

  “I love you, Sebastian.” Payton’s whispered words had me looking up. Wrapping my arms around her waist, my palms flattening against her back, I pulled her even closer, pressing my face to her stomach, breathing her in.

  I sat there like that for a couple of minutes, completely content just to be with her. My thoughts continued to drift to Leif, who was laid up in a hospital bed, clinging to life while his family waited patiently for more information. The few minutes I’d been allowed to go back and see him hadn’t been enough. His mother had hugged me, assuring me everything would be all right. All the while, I had wondered how she could be so strong. How Leif could be so strong.

  At least he had family to help him through.

  Payton’s hands slid from my head, down over my shoulders and then my arms. She pulled them from around her waist, linking her fingers with mine. “Shower with me,” she whispered.

  I nodded. No matter how exhausted I was, there was no way I could tell her no.

  She led me to the bathroom, and while she turned on the water, I grabbed towels from the closet, placing them within reach of the shower. While she undressed, I looked at myself in the mirror. I still had the bandage on my forehead, so I peeled it back, revealing the jagged cut beneath. They hadn’t stitched it up, probably because I wasn’t all that cooperative, but they had used some sort of tape to keep the gash closed. The other scratches and bruises that marred my face were minimal, especially compared to the damage that Leif had endured.

  When Payton was in the shower, I
pulled off my clothes and tossed them on the floor with hers before opening the glass door and joining her. She maneuvered around me so that I faced the wall beneath the shower spray. While I pressed my hands against the tiled wall, my forehead resting on my knuckles, I fought the tears that still threatened. They were a mixture of anger and pain, desperation and total relief. The only thing that made it manageable was when Payton proceeded to wash my hair and then my body. I could hardly move, every muscle beginning to ache, my head throbbing from the intimate contact I’d had with the concrete earlier. But still I stood there, motionless, savoring the feel of her smooth hands on my skin.

  When she was finished with me, she reached for a towel and urged me out from under the spray. While I dried off, Payton washed up, joining me outside of the shower a few minutes later, wrapping herself in the other towel.

  After pulling on a pair of shorts, I grabbed a T-shirt from my closet and helped her pull it on over her head. I left her alone after that, offering her a few minutes of privacy.

  My legs finally gave out on me, and I dropped onto the bed, reclining on my pillow and staring at the ceiling.

  Of all the shit that was going on in my life, I just couldn’t believe that this had happened.

  And worse … I didn’t know what it meant for the days to come.

  Chapter Four

  Payton

  For the last couple of hours, I think I’d been walking around in a daze. My body was tired, my mind equally so. The events of the day had taken their toll on me. By the time I climbed into bed with Sebastian, I could hardly keep my eyes open, but even when I tried to close them, my brain wouldn’t stop processing everything that had happened.

  It seemed as though the day would never end. From the limited amount of sleep I’d gotten last night to the flight back from Vegas that morning, dinner with Chloe and Aaron, the race, the accident, the hospital… It all seemed to morph together into one giant nightmare, and I was ready for it to be over. If it wasn’t for the fact that I had some things on my mind, things I needed to tell Sebastian, I would’ve just closed my eyes and forced my brain to cease for a little while.