28. willow
CHAPTER 28
WILLOW
HIS FACE
I didn’t try to bolt until the rest of the band left me behind. I thought I could cling to the stage, wait for everything to die down, but when they abandoned me, I made a run for it.
My heels caught the wires and I tumbled, catching myself just in time. It hurt my ankle, but at least I didn’t dive into the angry crowd, beating the shit out of each other.
" Shit! " I blurted out.
"Cops are coming!" someone shouted. "They’re outside!"
Oh, god. This place was twenty-one and up only, the band literally snuck me in. My dad knew about this gig, but if my mom found out—it didn’t matter that I was an adult. She’d be furious.
"Fuck, fuck, fuck me," I stammered as everyone ran in different directions. The stage was in the middle of the room and I needed to go . But the moment I stepped down, someone clipped my arm, and I was shoved off with the rest of them.
I needed to get to my backpack, I had to get to my backpack?—
Someone crashed into me, and I hit the ground, hard .
Not a second later someone wrapped an arm around my waist and picked me up.
Fuck!
I kicked and thrashed, doing everything to be the least desirable kidnapping victim.
"It’s okay, Angel, you’re okay. I got you."
Relief overtook the panic.
I clung to the velvet voice while he readjusted me, pulling me over his shoulders. He drove through the crowd, effortlessly parting it.
Everyone else was running off towards the clogged exits, but he scooped up my backpack and strode through the rooms beyond the curtains. The second he found the back exit, the sound of police sirens blared.
Rain poured, a shock to my system while my heart pounded in my chest. It was quiet this way, and he didn’t stop until we came up to the familiar red truck. The second he put me down, my legs wobbled, and he caught me, throwing open the door.
"King?" I breathed out.
He yanked open the glove compartment and took out something shiny. "Get in the truck. I have to give the cops something to keep them busy."
I should’ve asked questions, but with all the insanity, I did what he said and climbed inside.
King jogged up to the other cars and knelt down to puncture the tires, quick, rapid thrusts before he moved on to the next one. He has a knife? He was so methodical about it, it wasn’t his first time. It couldn’t be.
"What the fuck?" I whispered.
People found our secret exit and started streaming out, slipping in the rain. Someone shouted when they spotted King. A drunk guy lumbered close.
King didn’t hesitate, punching him in the jaw, knocking his ass clean to the ground.
My hand flew to my mouth. "Holy shit ."
Leaning toward the driver's window, my hand brushed against the keys. I didn’t even realize he left them. Was I supposed to start the truck? My hands shook so badly, I couldn’t work the key in. Oh my god, we’d be stuck, and it’d be all my fault. Sucking in deep breaths, I forced myself to concentrate, and his truck finally roared to life.
King ran back, drunk guys trailing after him like zombies.
I pushed his door open.
"Put on your seatbelt." He tore out of the parking lot and took off down the street.
Putting on a seatbelt was laughable . King just slashed tires and knocked down at least two people—what a crazy thing to focus on—but I buckled in anyway and tried to calm down.
Until I looked through the back window, pelted with rain.
"They’re following!"
Not police, just some of the pissed-off people from the bar. Still not good.
King turned the steering wheel until the truck groaned underneath him, racing off down an empty neighborhood. I grabbed for the door to hold on to something while his truck rocketed down the road.
"This fucking truck," he swore. "Slow chunk of metal."
Without missing a beat, he popped open the glove compartment and tossed the knife back in.
What the fuck?
His truck hit the highway, and he adjusted his rearview mirror. "Hold on, Willow."
That was all I did, I couldn’t do anything else. King cut off cars and wove between others, past the barricades, past the barriers until he left the highway entirely, always with an eye on the rearview mirror, on the remaining pursers he couldn’t possibly escape. But one by one, he lost all but two. He took a sharp left down a side road and flipped off his lights in a dark parking lot.
I watched the back window, stunned, as the lights of the remaining two cars continued after where they thought we drove to.
Leaning back against the headrest, I put my hand to my chest, breathing so hard there were spots in my vision. It’d been so long since an actual brawl broke out at one of the shows, I forgot how scary it could be.
King’s face jolted me back into reality.
His bottom lip was swollen and there were bruises along the right side of his jaw. Not to mention the cut under his cheekbone. But he wasn’t focused on any of that, he was too busy unbuckling his seatbelt and reaching for me.
"You’re not hurt, you can’t be hurt, look at me—" Words shot out of him while he cupped my jaw, running his fingers over my skin to inspect for injuries. "Did you hit your head? What day is it?" He jerked back his hand. "How many fingers am I holding up?"
"Two—I’m okay—I’m okay?—"
"You’re okay?"
"I’m okay?—"
"You’re okay," he choked out and his arms engulfed me, yanking me in for a tight embrace.
I couldn’t move while he squeezed me tight but in the time he took to hug me, the adrenaline melted away, and none of this made sense. King finally released me and I gazed up at him, in the tiny amount of space we had between each other. Searching his face for answers because…
"King…what are you doing here?"