Page 82 of Hold Me Down
“Open the door, baby! Let me in!” Damien yells again, but I can’t move. I’m stuck.
A faint pull on my leggings snaps me out of my daze, and I look down at the feeling. Alex’s eyes are half closed, and he’s breathing shallowly as he looks up at me. That reaches something deep inside of me, and I shuffle over to the door with heavy, dragging steps.
I unlock it, barely having enough time to take a step back before Damien and the guys come barreling through the door. Damien pulls me into his chest, wrapping his arms around me so tightly that it takes my breath away. The room starts to sway as he pulls me to the side of the room.
“Alex needs help…” I whisper out, still fighting through the throbbing daze.
“There’s an ambulance out front.” Carter’s voice fights through the fog. Damien lifts my chin up, and he frantically looks me over, but I’m focused on the scene beside us. Red. There’s so much red. I didn’t know a body could bend like that. Out of all of the dead bodies I’ve seen, his is the most twisted. He dropped like the world was already through with him, as if it was just waiting for his strength to give out. Grease and Viking lift Alex off the floor and run him out, leaving nothing but my pulse in my ears—that, and beeping.
Damien lowers his forehead to my shoulder, trying to catch his own breaths while I turn to look at the computer. The same ‘initiate restart’ command flashes on the screen, despite our turmoil. It’s funny, isn’t it? How even when the world seems to stop, it doesn’t truly. Everything around us keeps revolving, regardless of what happens.
“Baby, look at me, please?” Damien pleads, and I do as he asks. I turn my head back just as he picks his up and rests against my forehead. “Don’t look. Just breathe.”
I am breathing, I think. That incessant beeping continues to roar through the rest of the noise, so I do what I was supposed to do from the beginning. I press the enter key, keeping the world on its axis. It continues to rotate, not caring about anything that happened today.
When I turn my head to meet him another time, his icy blue eyes drown out everything else around us, swallowing me whole.
“Kade said he was sorry…” I whisper before I can forget. I think I’m floating now. I’m moving without moving my legs, and all I can feel is Damien’s arms around me. I sink into his hold, trying to fight off the chill in my bones with his heat and scent. “He said he was sorry…”
Chapter 29
Damien
I stand behind Derek as he checks Ashia’s blood pressure for the second time, trying to get an accurate reading. When Carter notified Serena about what was happening, she told Derek and made a call to have an ambulance come out here, and it’s a damn good thing she did. A few of our guys are hurt, on top of Alex, but thankfully, none of the others are life threatening. Last I heard on Alex, he’s going to be heading straight to surgery when they get there. So now it’s just a waiting game.
The bodies of those that didn’t either escape or side with us are being loaded into one of the HEMTs for disposal, and then the two of our men that died are being loaded into a separate vehicle. Derek arranged two spots in the morgue for Darnell and Lucas. So, we’ll have time to arrange memorial services.
“If we can’t get her blood pressure to come down in the next few minutes, we should take her in,” Derek says quietly, not wanting to alarm the others. Zeke and Carter are standing a few feet away as their idea of giving us space, but we’re not stupidenough to believe they’re not listening in. I just nod and step back over to her, wrapping her in my arms the second I sit down. “I’ll check on the others again.” He pats Ashia’s knee and stands, then gives her a soft grin before walking away.
“How’s Alex?” she asks me so softly that I barely hear her. I look down at her and run my fingers through her blood-caked hair, hating how she shivers under the touch. She has one of the warming blankets wrapped around her shoulders, but it’s not really helping right now.
“He’s almost there, then going right into surgery. Zeke’s going to head over there, but he wanted to make sure you were okay first.”
Her head bobbles in a small nod.
“Did someone call Trina?” Her tone is so monotone, almost dead, like she’s fighting wars just to speak.
“He asked us not to yet. He didn’t want her to worry.” She looks up at me like words hit her.
“She should know in case he…he…” Her bottom lip quivers, and my heart twists. I run my thumb over it to soothe her.
“He’s going to be okay, baby. You know Alex. He’s tough as nails.” My attempt to reassure her is half-baked at best, because I’m also terrified of him dying. That motherfucker. That wonderful, stupid motherfucker. I hate that he’s hurt, but I’m so fucking grateful for what he did for me. The moment we know he’s going to be okay, I’m calling Trina. Maybe when she gets back from her sister’s, she’ll hit him for me.
We are all taking a much needed, long vacation after all of this shit. He’ll take hisafterhe recovers. Hell, I might not let him back until his kid is at least a year old, but that’s a fight I’ll have with him later.
Zeke steps over to me and hands me a water bottle, no doubt for her. He looks down at his sister with worried and sympathetic eyes.
“Dani’s getting you some clothes from the house. She should be here soon.”
“We might head to the hospital for observation,” I tell him, even though he heard anyway, but Ashia shakes her head.
“I’m okay, just a little shaken up.”
“If Derek says we need to go in, then that’s exactly what we’re going to do.” I kiss the top of her head, not giving her any room to argue. “How are your ears?”
“Better. My headache is starting to go away, too.”
“Good.”
