Chapter 16
Ash
The tunnel swallowed Jude whole.
One moment he was there, lying on that gurney with his face twisted in pain, and the next the medics wheeled him around the corner, leaving me standing in the corridor with my heart hammering against my ribs like it wanted out.
What the hell did I just do?
I stared at the space where he’d been, trying to make sense of the last ten minutes. The fight. The chase. The sickening sound of Jude hitting the ground and the way he’d crumpled like someone had cut his strings.
The look on his face when I’d tried to help him.
Don’t. Just fucking don’t.
But I had anyway, because what else was I supposed to do? Watch him writhe on the concrete while guests filmed it for their Instagram stories?
My hands were still shaking. I flexed them, trying to steady the tremor, but it wouldn’t quit. I was running high on adrenaline, or maybe even guilt.
Probably guilt.
If I hadn’t chased him...
If I hadn’t lost my temper during the fight, if I hadn’t tackled him like some territorial animal feral with the need to mark its claim, if I hadn’t pursued him through the zones when he ran, then Jude would still be on his feet.
He wouldn’t be headed to the hospital with a busted ankle and his career potentially in ruins.
All because I couldn’t keep my shit together long enough to stick to the choreography.
I heard Riley skating toward me, her expression unreadable beneath the smeared doll makeup. She rolled to a stop a few feet away and crossed her arms, studying me with the kind of intensity that made me feel like a specimen under glass.
“You okay?”
“Fine.”
The word came out too quickly, too defensively. Riley’s eyebrow arched.
“Right.” She didn’t sound convinced. “What happened out there?”
“He fell.”
“I got that part. I mean before. You two were going at it like you actually wanted to kill each other.”
I looked away, unable to hold her gaze. “We were just playing up the characters.”
“Bullshit.”
The word hung between us, sharp and accusatory.
I wanted to argue but couldn’t find the energy.
What was I supposed to say? That Jude and I had been tearing each other apart for weeks, both onstage and off?
That the line between performance and reality had blurred so completely I didn’t know which side I was on anymore?
That I’d been fucking him anywhere I could get my hands on him, and that I’d demanded too much of him while not having the guts to call it what it was myself?
Riley sighed, and the sound carried something almost like sympathy. “Look, I don’t know what’s going on with you two, and honestly, it’s none of my business. But Jude’s my friend, so if you did something—”
“I didn’t.”
Liar.
I had done something. I’d pushed and provoked and chased him until he’d snapped. Until we’d both snapped and destroyed whatever fragile thing we’d been building between us.
“Okay.” Riley didn’t look like she believed me, but she let it drop. “Parker’s going to want you back out there. Damage control.”
My stomach twisted. “I should go with him.”
“To the hospital?”
The way she said it made it sound absurd, and maybe it was. What excuse did I have? We weren’t dating. We weren’t even friends, not really. We were coworkers who occasionally fucked when the tension got too thick to breathe through.
That didn’t give me the right to follow him to the emergency room and hold his hand while they took X-rays. Even if every instinct I had was screaming at me to do exactly that.
“He wouldn’t want me there,” I said quietly.
Riley’s expression softened a fraction. “Probably not.”
That hurt more than it should have. I nodded, swallowing past the tightness in my throat, and tried to pull myself together. Jude didn’t need me hovering over him like some lovesick idiot. He needed medical attention and space to process what had just happened without me making everything worse.
Like I always did.
Parker appeared at the end of the tunnel, his radio crackling with static and his face set in the kind of grim determination that meant someone was about to get their ass chewed. I braced myself, but he just jerked his chin toward the main zone.
“Ash. With me.”
I followed without argument, leaving Riley behind.
Parker moved fast, his stride eating up the distance as we wound through the backstage corridors toward the entrance.
He didn’t speak until we were almost there, and when he did, his voice carried the clipped efficiency of a man who’d spent too long putting out fires.
“Guests are spooked. I need you out there smoothing things over, keeping them entertained. Scare them good, and if anyone asks, make sure they know this was an accident and not some lawsuit waiting to happen.”
“Got it.”
“Can you do that?”
The question caught me off guard. I met Parker’s eyes and found him watching me with an expression that might have been concern if I squinted hard enough. Like he actually gave a damn about whether I could hold it together.
Can I?
I didn’t know. My hands were still shaking, and my mind kept replaying the sound of Jude hitting the ground on an endless loop. But what choice did I have? Walk away? Quit? Let Jude’s injury become the story that tanked Ridgeway’s Halloween season because I couldn’t get my head on straight?
“Yeah,” I said. “I can do it.”
Parker nodded, satisfied, and pushed open the door to Jude and my scare zone. Light and noise spilled through, along with the murmur of anxious voices and the sharp clicks of camera shutters. I could see that the crowd was milling around. They were waiting to see if Jude would come back out.
I squared my shoulders, shoved the guilt and worry down as deep as they would go, and stepped through the door.