by C. M. Owens
Each strike has him breathing harder, his cheeks puffing out as he exchanges old air for new air. But the window holds. He moves to the door, slamming the metal against it in quick repetition, but again, nothing happens.
Right now, Ray Capperton is my favorite person in all the world.
Sirens wail in the distance just as several tires screech to a halt. I watch in awe as groups of men leap out of dark SUVs and rush toward Pete. They’re all in tactical gear with Capperton written across their chests.
Pete tries to run, but they tackle him with little effort. More tires scream, and I catch a glimpse of blonde hair before Kode Sterling is suddenly charging across the yard.
“Let me go!” he roars when two of the men start fighting and holding him back. “Let me go! I’m going to fucking kill him. Let me the fuck go!”
Tria limps to the door, unlocking it and swinging it open, and her voice cracks when she chokes out, “Kode!”
The look in his eyes changes from fury to complete horror when his eyes fall on her. She stumbles outside, clutching her side. The men in black release him, and he runs to Tria, scooping her up as he soothes her.
Cops are suddenly everywhere, coming to take over, and paramedics are right behind them. I sit down, letting them do their jobs, and I don’t argue when they tell me I need to go to the hospital.
I’m so numb right now that this time I don’t flinch when my forehead is touched.
In no time, I’m loaded on the back of the ambulance, and my whole body chills as the adrenaline tries to finally leave me to face the trauma of the night on my own.
Chapter 37
WREN
Dane’s number flashes across my phone as I wind around another road, still searching for Tria and Allie. I answer, hoping he’s heard from Kode.
“Dane, have you—”
“Wren, how far are you from the hospital?” he asks calmly.
“About five minutes. Why? What’s happened?” I ask, turning toward Sterling Memorial.
“Don’t freak out. Listen to everything I say without freaking out, okay?”
My blood slowly chills as dread creeps in. “Dane, you’re already freaking me out. What the hell is going on? Did something happen?” I demand, pushing the gas harder and driving through the yellow light seconds before it turns red.
“Pete Mercer has been arrested. He was outside of Allie’s house. They were close to there when Kode finally got ahold of her. Pete wrecked Tria’s car. With them in it.”
I gas the car harder, weaving in and out of traffic, and putting the phone on speaker so I can use both hands.
“How bad is it?” I bark.
“I’m getting to that. Listen, they won’t answer any questions to us about Allie because we’re not family. Bella is listed as her family, and she’s on her way. Kode says she was bleeding from the head, but she seemed fine. He was preoccupied with Tria. Pete got a few licks in on her before they got away. The neighbors thought it was another vandalism gone wrong after the other night, or they would have come to help. They called the cops, not realizing Pete was intent on killing Tria.”
I skid into a parking place in front of the hospital, grabbing my phone and running toward the entrance.
“What floor?”
“She’s in the ER. Ground level. Tria has to stay a night for observation, so I’m sure Allie will, too. They just got here not long ago. I was trying to get more information before calling you.”
“Damn it, Dane. You should have called me immediately!”
Fortunately, the entrance I’m at is actually for the ER. I round the corner to see the waiting room full of everyone almost. All the Sterlings are here except for Kode. He’s probably back there with Tria, being there for her the way I need to be there for Allie. Rain quickly finds me, holding me back when I make to charge toward the doors leading to the back.
“Don’t,” she cautions. “They’ll kick you out if you cause a scene, and they can’t let anyone back except for family. Allie’s unconscious right now.”
My heart sputters, and Rye stops me from falling. Where did he come from?
“How do you know that if they won’t tell you anything?” Rye asks.
“Because we told them to tell her we’re here and worried, but they said she’s unable to communicate at the moment.”
That could mean so much worse than unconscious.
“Hold him back, damn it,” Rain says, and Dane comes to help Rye wrangle me back from charging the sturdy-looking doors. “They’ll kick him out if he scares them!”
“Trying,” Rye groans, cursing when I shove harder, trying to get free.
“I’m here!” Bella yells, running through the ER and toward a woman. “Where is she, Estelle?” she asks in panic, staring at the old woman behind the glass encased desk.
“She’s in the back. She’s unconscious. Do you want them hearing this?” she asks, motioning toward us. “He looks ready to kill someone.” That’s pointed toward me, and I slowly calm down, or at least fake being calm.
Bella glances my way, but turns back to her. “You always manage to miss the gossip. That’s Angel’s daddy. He can hear everything you have to say.”
The woman’s eyes widen, even though I don’t know how she missed all that.
“You know the doctor is supposed to tell you. Not me.”
Bella looks around at the packed waiting room. But we’re the only ones close enough to the window to hear.
“It’s me, Estelle. You were pissed when you heard I got fired. Get them back by breaking the rules for me. I need to know how Allie is, and Zimmerman will be the attending doctor tonight. You know how slow he is and how much I hate him.”
Estelle snorts. “True. Well, Allie’s fine. Her head took a good whacking, and she needed stitches. She amazingly didn’t have a concussion, but her head was hurting something fierce. Like I said, it took a good whacking. And the wreck probably hurt her muscles like a mean son of a bitch, if you know what I mean. After the adrenaline wore off, she was hurting. They finally gave her a small dosage of a mild painkiller, but that girl passed right out like it was the good stuff.”
My heart is still thudding, and Bella turns around, looking relieved enough for me to relax just slightly.
“What does that mean?” I prompt.
“It means she’s fine,” Bella sighs, running a hand through her disheveled hair. “But if they won’t release her until she wakes up. That’ll be tomorrow. A Norco to Allie is like a double dose of morphine to normal people. It’s probably what they gave her. You know how she is with pain meds. I’ll go back and check on her.”
My eyes dart to Corbin, and I mentally slap myself for not thinking of him sooner.
“Get me back there. Call your dad, or do whatever you have to do.”
He grimaces, regret shining in his eyes. “I can’t, Wren. Kode is already a handful back there, but because Tria is hurting, he won’t leave her side. Pete is back there as well.”
My blood boils, and Rye’s grip tightens on me at the same time Dane’s does, as though they’re preparing to hold me back.
“But,” Corbin goes on, “they’re just patching him up and sending him to the hospital closer to the prison. He won’t be here long.”
“Allie stabbed him with an ink pen to get him away from Tria,” Rain says, trying to talk me off the murderous ledge. “She aimed between the ribs and just barely missed puncturing his lung. I think that’s what she was trying to do—puncture it, not miss. That’s why he’s getting patched up. She might have saved Tria’s life. Now let Corbin keep you from getting arrested. Stay out here until they take her to a room.”
I slink back, feeling all my muscles so tight that they’re ready to snap. “How did this happen? Where the hell did he get that truck?” I ask, needing the distraction, needing some semblance of logic to go with the madness.
“He stole it,” Dale says, walking up from behind Corbin. “They were just a mile from some town when the crew hit them and
sprung the prisoners. The cops think they set the ones like Pete free so they could distract the police from the drug dealer king who escaped. Pete and some of the others ran into town. Pete stole a truck that a guy left the keys in, and he drove like hell to Sterling Shore.”
Maverick chimes in, adding, “People saw him cruise by Tria’s house in that truck. They’ve been calling in with reports, and we’ve been getting updates from the police. Traffic cameras caught him running a red light once he spotted Tria’s car. The pink breast cancer awareness sticker on the back gave her away. Not too many cars like Tria’s have stickers that big on the bumpers. He followed and attacked when he was sure it was her.”
Kode Sterling is suddenly bursting through the doors, all of his muscles flexing as he barely keeps it together.
“Tria is sleeping. They gave her some strong shit for the pain, and it made her loopy for a while, but it finally put her to sleep. I want him dead,” he says, looking at Dane.
“You can’t kill him. He’s going away for good now. Attempted murder is a pretty serious charge that he’ll be facing. He’ll never see the outside of a prison again.”
Kode cracks his neck to the side, and he bats Corbin’s hand away when he tries to touch him. He looks like he’s ready to kill or ready to cry. I know exactly how he feels.
“They’re taking her up to a room. I was forced to leave so they could do it. I’m going to meet her up there. I was just coming to tell you guys.”
I look around, noticing that Bella has disappeared. I pull out my phone, dialing Mom as a distraction. Thank God Angel wasn’t with Allie tonight.
“Wren? Is she okay? Please tell me she’s okay!” Mom demands, sounding just as panicked as I’ve felt.
“She’s fine. They’re keeping her here until she wakes up. The pain meds knocked her out. How is Angel? She doesn’t know anything, does she?”
“No. You know me. I won’t let her see me upset, and Bella said Allie wouldn’t want Angel worrying either. Right now she seems to think something is going on, but I’ve promised her everything is fine and lied my ass off. You’re sure Allie is okay?”
I nod, then realize she can’t see me nodding. “Yeah. She’s fine. She’s—”
Bella walks out, her eyes trained on me. “They’re taking her up to a room. Come on.”
She waves me through a different set of doors, and I finish talking to Mom. “I’m on my way up to Allie’s room. I’ll keep you updated.”
Mom sighs long and hard before saying, “Okay. By the way, I just received confirmation that Erica is officially gone. Billy says he’s been dealing with Keith. I can’t believe he’d do this. Becks is so pissed that she’s kicked him out of her house.”
“He’s a grown man. He needs to be kicked out.”
She laughs with exhaustion in her tone. “Call me if you need anything. Tell Allie the same. I don’t care what time it is.”
I promise to call her later and hang up as we ride the elevator to another floor. Kode and the others have already gone up to see Tria in another elevator. Bella and I are alone, and I look over to see her shoulders shaking with silent sobs.
“Bella,” I say softly, reaching out to her shoulder.
“Don’t,” she sniffles, knocking my hand away. “If you hug me or some shit, I’ll start crying and I won’t stop. And I can’t do that right now. And don’t ask me if I’m okay, either, because the floodgates are triggered by that question for some reason.”
I nod, understanding—well, sort of.
As soon as we reach her floor, numerous pairs of eyes meet us, and Bella glares at someone. “If I see you anywhere near her room, I swear I’ll choke you to death myself. Understand?” she asks, and the woman’s eyes bug out as she backs up.
Her name tag says Jillian, but I’ve never heard her mentioned before. More pairs of eyes sweep over me, probably remembering the tantrum I threw just yesterday when I found out they’d verbally assaulted Allie and provoked her to the point she lashed out physically.
Hushed whispers erupt every time we pass someone else, and Bella leads me to another corridor just as Allie is wheeled out of a different elevator on a rolling bed. Her eyes are closed as though she’s sleeping peacefully.
My knees fucking buckle, and I almost fall. I swear I’ve never been hit so forcefully by relief. I didn’t know how badly I needed to see her until now. Swallowing down the emotional knot in my throat, I force my legs to start moving again.
Bella stays in front of me, keeping her distance, but her hands are clenched so tightly that her nails are cutting into her palms. They pause at the door, and Bella holds out a hand to stop me from going in as two nurses follow Allie’s rolling bed.
“They’re just going to transfer her to a stable bed. I told them that painkillers knock her on her ass, and since she can’t leave until she wakes up, they’re putting her in a room instead of leaving her downstairs. Pretty sure that has something to do with you showing up with Corbin Freaking Sterling. I’m fairly positive every nurse here will be apologizing to her by the time she wakes up.”
I don’t have it in me to smile, even though I know that’s what she’s trying to do. I want to hit something, break something… do something. I’ve never felt so helpless.
“Oh shit,” Bella says under her breath, looking over my shoulder at something.
I turn to see Billy walking toward me with Keith—the fucker—behind him, and Tag is right behind Keith.
“What the fuck?” I ask Billy as my mind turns, trying to think of places I can hide my cousin’s body.
“I thought you might need to punch something, and no offense, but I’m sick of it being me,” Billy says, moving aside with a smirk.
My eyes dart over to Keith, and his eyes grow wide like he just heard what Billy said.
“You said you were bringing me here to make peace! I swear I didn’t know that shit was going to blow up and go full-blown crazy like that!”
I take a step forward, and he returns his gaze to me. He turns to try and escape, but plows over Tag who shoves him back toward me with very little effort. Before he can speak, my fist is airborne, slamming into his face, and it almost hurts my hand because of how hard I hit him.
“How much blood is there?” I ask, my eyes closed. Now would not be a good time to vomit. The only time I’ve been able to handle blood is the first day I beat the hell out of Billy. That’s because I was so furious that it never really registered what was going on until it was over.
“A lot,” Tag says, a smile in his voice as Keith wails from the ground—or it sounds like he’s on the ground.
“You broke his nose,” Billy says, sounding amused. “Now I’m not the only one who needs plastic surgery in the family.”
“You bastard!” Keith yells at me.
“I’m not the one who jeopardized a child, dickhead,” Billy says, which means that bastard wasn’t pointed at me after all.
Something wet finds my hand, and I jerk a little.
“It’s just me washing the blood off your hand with baby wipes,” Bella says. “I always have them on hand for a sticky-fingered six-year-old girl. No more blood.”
I look down, seeing my clean hand, but I avoid looking at the bloody weasel who is sobbing on the ground.
“I’ll get him to a doctor now,” Billy says from somewhere behind me.
“Thanks,” I mumble just as Tag comes up and grips my shoulder, a show of support.
Rye joins us, and Brin wipes her eyes as she leans into him. “Scariest night ever,” Brin says. Rye looks like he’s never letting her go. Dane is probably doing the same to Rain.
“Where’s Ash?” I ask Tag.
“At home with Trip. As soon as I get home, I’m going to curl up and keep her against me for hours. A lot of bad memories came with this phone call. But I had to be here for you the way you were for me.”
The circumstances are completely and totally different, but I get what he means.
“You can come in now,” a nurs
e says.
I walk in first, and Bella is right beside me. Allie’s face is bruised, and there’s a large cut on her forehead that seems to travel into her blonde hairline. Her hands are spread out beside her body, and there’s an IV.
“Why does she need that?” I worry, moving toward the line.
“It’s standard procedure to hook a patient up to fluids. Especially if they don’t know how long it’s been since they last had something to drink. Sit down. Don’t worry. Allie is fine.”
Don’t worry? She’s fucking crazy.
I pull the chair up, seeing better that her arms have numerous bruises, too. I wonder how much of her body has been hurt. She looks fragile, broken, and precious at the same time. I’d love nothing more than to curl up beside her and hold her all night, but I’m afraid I’d hurt her.
So I settle for holding the hand that doesn’t have a needle in it. She has some weird clip on her index finger that seems to be monitoring her heartbeat, but I work my fingers through hers like it isn’t there, and I hold on tight.
“How long are you staying?” Bella asks me, pulling a chair up as everyone else stays quiet.
“I’m not leaving her side.”
Chapter 38
ALLIE
Something soft tickles my arm, and my eyes jerk awake. My stiff body curses me for trying to move, and I groan inwardly at how sore I am. But I know where I am as I take in the surroundings.
I had to stay the night? Ohh… They gave me painkillers. I told them this would happen if they did that, but I couldn’t resist escaping the migraine that was forming.
Glancing out the window, I see the sun trying to rise, but it’s still dark, except for the small glimmer of light on the horizon. Then my eyes fall on Bella who has stuck two chairs together and made a very uncomfortable bed next to the window.
Why would she do that? She had to have read my chart. Just some stitches and a few mild bruises. She knew I’d be alright.