Page 278 of Cross Checked
Not exactly.
Something deeper.
Something that understood too much too fast. His eyes flicked to Luke’s face, then back to the word, then back to me.
For one second, Ryan looked like he finally understood what the hallway had really been.
A reckoning.
His throat worked once, then his attention snapped back to me, and whatever he felt about Luke Dempsey dying withNOcarved into his chest got locked away behind the part of Ryan that had decided I was not dying too.
“Cade,” he said, voice rough as hell now. “Look at me.”
“No,” I whispered again.
Ryan’s expression broke for half a second. “I know,” he said quietly. “I see it.”
No.
No.
No.
No more.
My eyelids dragged heavy, and Ryan cursed. “Cade. No. Open your eyes.”
I tried, but I couldn’t.
“Open your fucking eyes.”
I dragged them open one last time, and Ryan’s face swam above me, harsh with fear he was trying hard not to show and failing badly now.
Good.
Finally.
I was tired of him being useful and composed. It made dying feel like an inconvenience instead of an emergency.
“Tell Bliss…” I started.
“No.”
I frowned weakly.
No?
I was actively bleeding out, and Ryan Decker had apparently chosen this moment to develop boundaries.
“No,” Ryan snapped. “You don’t get a dramatic message. You can tell her yourself.”
I didn’t have enough air to tell him that was actually very emotionally mature of him. Rude timing, but mature.
The sirens finally reached the building, distant but closing fast, their sound bending through the concrete corridors like something from another world. Red light flickered faintly across the far wall as an exterior door opened somewhere behind Ryan.
My chest tightened again, and this time, the breath didn’t come back right away.
Ryan’s voice dropped low and fierce beside me. “Stay with me, Cade. They’re here. You hear me? They’re here.”
