Page 137 of Pretty Savage: Defy

Carrson is somewhere behind me in the fire, and every step toward safety carries me farther away from him.

Ashford House on fire. Art by: Polina Zavodina

Chapter thirty-four

After

Carrson

Smell returns first, the sting of rubbing alcohol and disinfectant. Then sound, a steady beeping that grows louder as consciousness drags me toward it.

I pry open my eyes. White ceiling tiles form a perfect grid above me, one stained yellow near the air vent. The room is dim except for sunlight leaking through the blinds.

I drag in a mouthful of air, and pain scrapes through my chest. My lungs feel lined with sandpaper, each inhalation dragging across raw tissue. I try again, slower, but the burning only worsens.

Burning.

Smoke filling the tunnel. A wooden beam crushing my father’s legs. Thomson and I lifting together until our muscles shook while flames consumed the supports behind us.

Laurel disappearing into the darkness ahead.

I sit up so fast the room spins. The monitor beside the bed protests, its steady rhythm breaking into frantic beeps, and the IV taped inside my arm pulls against my skin. I grip the mattress until the walls stop moving, then search for my clothes, my phone, anything that might tell me how much time I lost.

The door opens, and Thomson walks in carrying a paper cup.

He stops with one foot still in the hallway.

His shirt is wrinkled enough to have been slept in, although judging by the shadows beneath his eyes sleep is not something he’s been getting a lot of. A white bandage wraps his forearm. Dirt rims the soles of his shoes, dried into the grooves, and the coffee cup bends beneath the pressure of his hand.

“Oh, thank God.” He enters and lets the door close behind him. “You’re awake.”

“Where’s Laurel? How long have I been unconscious?”

Thomson crosses to the table beside my bed and puts the coffee down. The warm, nutty aroma of it fills the air.

“Three days. You had severe smoke inhalation. Your oxygen levels wouldn’t stay stable, so they sedated you while your lungs recovered.”

“Where’s Laurel?”

His eyes move to the monitor, then the IV, then the streaks of sunlight on the floor. Anywhere except me.

He picks up the cup again, blows the steam from the surface with his lips pursed. “I need you to stay in bed.”

The ache behind my ribs has nothing to do with smoke.

“Where is she?” I ask again, frustration beginning to spike.

“We don’t know.” He finally looks at me, and the exhaustion in his face tells me this is not a problem he discovered on his way into the room. He’s been carrying it since the fire.

I swing my legs over the side of the bed.

Thomson moves immediately, planting himself between me and the door. “Carrson, listen to me. You’ve been unconscious. You can’t get up and start running around the hospital.”

“Then explain what’s going on.”

“Laurel’s missing,” he says without softening the words. “Sam, Abbie, and Cicley too. Almost half the Sisters from our year haven’t been seen since the fire.”

His thumb moves over the crushed seam of the coffee cup, pressing it deeper. “They just…vanished.”