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Chapter Twenty-Seven
Thorn
“Breathing. Pulse. Weak.” Ace snaps. “Help.”
A surge of adrenaline - it’s not too late! - courses through me and I race to his side.
“What do I do?” I ask. I want to help, to be useful, but I don’t know how.
“Hold this. Press hard.” He nods to his hands which are pressing a towel down onto her wrist. I blink in confusion because on the other side of the bed, Ace is making Rebel do the same to her other wrist.
“Did she do this?” I ask, frowning. Guilt courses through me that we might have led her to such a drastic action. I’ll take being locked in a burning building over Raven hurting herself any day of the week.
“No. Never,” is the curt reply from Ace.
“Why’s there so much blood?” I panic.
“Don’t worry,” is all he says. Either he’s too busy making sure she doesn’t bleed out, or he doesn’t have the language skills to explain. I hope it’s the latter. But I might just pay for some English lessons for him anyway. He works too hard to be sending every penny home, and I have more than enough to share. We should have tried harder to teach him English. We’ve not been good friends.
Sirens bring me back to the present and before I can process what’s happening, I’m being pulled out of the way. EMTs fall to work on Raven, a harmonious team moving as one to lift her onto a stretcher and, once they’re happy she’s stable, out into the waiting ambulance.
“Who’s coming with us?” The one paramedic asks.
“Me!” Rebel barks before anyone else can get a word in, immediately leaving the room to follow Raven out to the ambulance.
“Ok,” the medic replies. He looks over at the piece of shit on the floor. “What’s the story there?”
“Intruder,” Ace mutters.
“And you guys beat the shit out of him?” The guy isn’t judgemental, just curious.
“Clumsy intruder,” Ace corrects and the medic laughs. “Hurt before he got here.”
“Sure,” he says. “Not my circus, not my monkeys.”
“Huh?” Ace’s brow creases.
“He means he’s not interested. That story will be for the police,” I clarify and Ace nods his understanding.
“Don’t suppose either of you guys want to give me a hand getting him downstairs?” the medic asks.
“Fuck no,” I reply. I know it’s rude, but this bastard may have just killed Raven. I don’t trust myself anywhere near him.
Ever the good boy, Ace silently helps. I follow them down the stairs, assessing the damage as we go. There’s no blood up the stairs or along the hallway, so it looks like the bulk of his attack was contained to the bedroom.
I don’t know how I feel about that.
I traipse out to the ambulances - they sent two but the prick doesn’t deserve one if you ask me - and I speak quickly to the lead EMT who’s taking care of Raven.
“She’s going to need blood tests. I think he may have put something in her drink. There’s no way she would have been overpowered by him if she was at full health; she’s martial arts trained.”
The guy acknowledges my words and moves to shut the doors, so I quickly shout to Rebel, “We’ll follow behind and meet you there. I’ll phone Jax and Baxter too.”
I know one of us should phone the police - probably me - but that’s just not my priority right now. Besides, the paramedics will probably have phoned it through. So help me God, I think, if that piece of shit gets taken to the same hospital as Raven and it turns out that he’s seriously hurt her.
We jump into Rebel’s car, using the spare key we all have a copy of, and follow the Ambulance. They don’t have the lights and sirens going like you see so often in films. They don’t even drive through red lights. It’s like they don’t register this as an emergency and it takes every ounce of self control I have not to lean on the horn to make them drive faster.
“Why are they going so slow?” I complain out of frustration.
