Crashed(book three)(135)

“Colton!” A hand jolts my shoulder and I snap out of my trance, unsure of how much time has passed, but I see them now. The medics and the flashing lights swirling on my walls through the open front door. And I know they need to take her from me to help her, but I’m so f*cking scared right now I don’t want to let her go.

She needs me right now but I damn well know I need her more.

“Please, please don’t take her from me,” I croak as they lift her from my arms and I’m not sure who I’m talking to, the paramedics or God.



“How long, Sammy?” I shove up from the chair, nerves gnawing at me and my legs not able to eat up enough f*cking ground to make them go the f*ck away.

“Only thirty minutes. You gotta give them time.”

I know everyone in this f*cking waiting room is staring at me, watching the man with blood all over his clothes pace back and forth like a f*cking caged animal. I’m antsy. Restless. Fucking terrified. I need to know where she is, what’s wrong with her. I sit back down, my knee jostling like a f*cking junkie needing a fix and realize that I am. I need my fix. I need my Ryles.

I thought I lost her today only to know I didn’t, and then when I think she’s f*cking safe—f*cking protected in my arms as we fall asleep—she’s ripped the f*ck away from me. I’m so goddamn confused. So f*cking angry. So … I don’t even know what I am anymore because I just want someone to come out from behind those f*cking automatic doors and tell me she’s going to be okay. That all the blood looked a hundred times worse than it really f*cking was.

But no one is coming. No one is giving me answers.

I want to scream, want to punch something, want to sprint ten f*cking miles—anything to get rid of this f*cking ache in my chest and churning in my stomach. I feel like I’m going crazy. I want time to speed the f*ck up or slow the f*ck down, whichever is best for her, as long as I can see her soon, hold her soon.

I get out my phone, needing to feel a connection to her. Something. Anything. I start to type her a text, express to her in the way she understands best how I feel.

I finish, hit send, and hold on to the thought that she’ll get this when she wakes up—because she has to wake up—and know exactly how I feel in this moment.

“Colton!”

It’s the voice that’s always been able to fix things for me and this time he can’t. And because of that … when I hear his voice call out to me, I f*cking lose it. I don’t stand to greet him, don’t even lift my head to look at him because I’m so f*cking overtaken by everything that I can’t function. I drop my head in my hands and start sobbing like a f*cking baby.

I don’t care that there are people here. I don’t care that I’m a grown-ass man and that men don’t cry. I don’t care about anything but the fact that I can’t fix her right now. That my endgame superhero can’t fix her right now. My shoulders shake and my chest hurts and my eyes burn as I feel his arm slide around me and pull me into his chest as best he can and try and comfort me when I know it’s not going to do a goddamn f*cking thing for her. It’s not going to erase the images of her lifeless Raggedy Ann body and pale lips that are staining my mind.

Humpty f*cking Dumpty.

I’m so upset I can’t even speak. And if I could, I don’t even know if I could put words to my thoughts. And he knows me so f*cking well he doesn’t even say a word. He just holds me against him as I expel everything I can’t express otherwise.

We sit in silence for some time. Even when my f*cking tears are gone, he keeps his arms wrapped around my shoulders as I lean forward with my head hanging in my hands.