Page 39 of Knot Who She Claims
Ridge’s ocean-blue eyes are open, and they’re trained right on me.
15
RIDGE
I waketo antiseptic and pain.
It comes in layers. First the distant, dull awareness that my body exists again. Then the deeper realization that it’s furious about it. My chest feels like it’s been crushed and rebuilt wrong, every breath scraping on the way in. My shoulder burns like someone left a brand pressed there too long. My ribs—hell, my ribs feel like they’re held together by spite and stitches.
I inhale anyway. Because I can.
Hospital. That much registers next. White ceiling. Too-bright lights. The rhythmic beep of a monitor keeping time with my heart like it’s daring it to stop.
Still here.
Good.
I blink, once, twice, vision blurring and snapping back into focus—and then the world narrows down to a single point.
Her.
Brylee is right there, close enough that I can see every lash clumped with dried tears, every red vein spidering through her eyes. Like she hasn’t slept. Like she’s been holding vigil over a body she wasn’t sure would come back to her.
She looks wrecked.
There’s a bruise darkening along her jaw, the kind that blooms slow and ugly. Another shadow mars her temple, partially hidden by her hair. Fear punches through my chest harder than the bullet did.
My heart stutters. Then it slams into an intense, relentless rhythm, roaring its relief.
“You’re here,” I rasp.
The words tear out of my throat like I’ve dragged them across gravel.
Her breath shudders. “Ridge.”
She says my name like it’s something sacred, something she was afraid to say out loud. Like if she said it wrong, I’d disappear again.
Her hand closes around mine, warm and shaking, grounding me instantly. “You scared me.”
Relief hits me so hard that my vision dims at the edges. She’s alive. She’s not locked in some enemy compound or bleeding out in the dark or?—
She’s here.
I try to sit up, instinct overriding pain, and immediately regret it. The monitor spikes, alarms chirping in sharp protest. White-hot agony flares through my chest, but I barely register it.
All I can see now are the marks on her.
Finger-shaped bruises mar her arms, some yellowing with age, others deep purple and angry. There’s another bruise disappearing beneath the collar of her gray dress, and suddenly the room feels too small to contain what wakes up inside me.
Something dark. Something violent. Something alpha and feral that wants blood for blood.
“Who let you in here like this?” I growl, my gaze cutting past her. “Kylian. Luka. Colter.”
They materialize like they’ve been standing at attention the whole time.
Kylian’s usual unhinged grin is gone, replaced with something sharp-edged and lethal. Luka’s eyes are shadowed, exhaustion lining his face in a way only endless worry can carve. Colter stands near the wall, arms crossed, mask on, silent and massive and terrifying as ever.
“She hasn’t seen a doctor,” I snap, every word clipped and furious. “Are you out of your damn minds?”
