Among the Echoes (Wrecked and Ruined #2.5)(13)

My eyes immediately find hers from where she stands across the darkened room. Her arms are raised and the gun she is holding shakes wildly in her hands.

"We need to get out of here," I say very calmly, careful not to frighten her. "Put the gun down." I push to my feet and take a step towards her.

"Don’t move," she pleads with a whine as the tears stream down her cheeks.

"I won’t hurt you. I promised you that. But I need to get you out of here. You have to trust me. We have to go before he wakes up."

She stares blankly at me for a second before she loses grasp of her emotions. A sob rips from her throat as she very slowly lowers the gun.

I rush forward, lifting her small body into my arms. "Shh… It’s okay. Don’t look."

Looping an arm around my neck, she melts into my touch. I'm almost to the door when a weak voice comes from the man lying bloody on the floor.

"Riley," he gurgles, and she explodes in my arms.

"Leo!" she screams, fighting from my grasp. I hold her tight, desperate to restrain her. "Leo! Oh God. What did you do!" she shouts at me, breaking free and rushing to his side.

What did I do?

At the last second, I catch her around the waist, dragging her away. I have no idea who he is, but I’m not letting her anywhere near that man.

"Let me go!" She kicks and hits me, all the while screaming his name.

"You need to calm the f*ck down. I just woke up to him holding a gun in my face. Who the hell is he?"

"He’s my..." she starts but pauses for a beat before finishing. "He’s not the enemy."

"You don’t know that," I growl.

"That might be the only thing I really do know," she retorts before spinning out of my arms and heading to his side. "Leo. Oh God." She kneels over his body, carefully inspecting him.

He grunts and reaches up to palm the back of her head, pulling it to his chest with a sigh. "I’m okay," he rasps.

"No, you’re not. You have a deep laceration over your left eye and a possible left orbital fracture too." I listen to her ramble off medical terminology, even more confused than ever.

I watch with a sick feeling in my stomach as she begins to repair him. Is he why she is afraid? Is he the man she was searching for earlier? Or better yet, is he the man she was flinching from when I tried to touch her?

"I need ice," she demands, but I don’t move an inch.

"There’s some in my apartment," I say quietly, but no one could mistake my menacing tone. I need three minutes with this man. One round—that’s all it would take to give him a little reminder. I would really only need half of that, but with the way Riley reacted, I have a feeling I would need the next ninety seconds to clean up.

"Well, go f*cking get it!" she yells, continuing her examination of his face.

"I’m not leaving you with him. If you want ice, you are going to have to get it yourself," I say without an ounce of hesitation.

"Adam," she hisses, but he catches her attention.

"Go get it. I’ll be fine," he says weakly.

She begins to reassure him, and it makes my skin crawl. "I’m not leaving you."

"Come on. I need some ice or I’m going to look like Sloth from The Goonies tomorrow." This f*cking * is trying to make a joke right now. It only intensifies my rage.

Riley turns to me and asks, "Will you come with me?" I know she doesn’t want to leave me alone with him. Rightly so, because I am going to f*ck this * up the second she closes the door.

"No," I answer, never taking my eyes off the pitiful excuse of a man on the floor.

"Adam, please," she urges, but she could beg all day and it wouldn’t change my mind. With or without her permission, I’m going to take care of this situation.

"Riley, just grab the ice. I promise we’ll be okay," he answers, pushing up on his elbows.

"There’s a bowl under the sink. Ice is in the freezer," I say emotionlessly.

"Don’t touch him. Swear you won’t touch him!" she orders, and my eyes flash to hers for only a second. She’s pleading with me, but I don’t give a damn. Her reactions over the last twenty-four hours speak louder than her words ever could.

I don’t answer her demand, but he does. "Go. See if he has any gauze while you’re at it." He pinches his nose and gently touches a large cut over his brow.

"Damn it," she swears, looking between us, but finally, marches out the door.

I don’t waste any time. "Who are you?"

"Why were you sleeping on my couch?" he counters.

"Who. The. Fuck. Are. You?" I move closer to crowd him.

"Dave Roberts. I’m not her boyfriend if that’s why you’re trying to have a dick show," he says, spitting blood on the floor between us.

"Dave, huh? Then why the f*ck does she call you Leo?"

"I don’t know, Slate. Why does she call you Adam?"

Shit.





"Come on, come on, come on," I chant to Adam’s ice trays as I quickly try to dump them into the bowl. The way Leo—I mean Dave—looked tonight tore me to shreds. I thought for too many hours that he was dead, and to see him lying lifelessly on the floor… God, I lost it. I haven’t felt that level of panic in years. Not since that night when they managed to find us.