Chapter 6
Emery
The blackness that surrounds my brain is gone between the space of two heartbeats as I jolt in place while memories of Tray assault me.
Thinking he was Xavier.
His fist smashing into my face and my head bouncing off the wall.
Waking up in that room with the weird light.
My head exploding with pain.
Guns.
A loud, erratic beeping fires off around my head, and I try to shift away from it, but my wrist is trapped, and it screams in agony the moment I put weight on it. Lungs tight, I try to suck in air, but it feels like there is an elephant sitting on my chest.
“Shhh, Ems, it’s okay. You’re in the hospital, you’re safe.” The quiet feminine whisper is like a soothing hand against the fear and pain. The voice is familiar, and it takes a second to place it, but then her face comes to mind—Oakley.
“Oaks?” I croak, cracking my eyelids open the tiniest amount.
Light floods my eyes, and I flinch, immediately shutting them again at the onslaught of pain, but at least the nausea is gone. Did she say hospital?
“Yeah, it’s me. Oh god, Ems, I was so scared.
When Prof—Xavier answered your phone, I was just about ready to call the police.
But then they all came and they found you.
They brought you here.” She keeps her voice quiet, but there is a quaver at the end.
Like she is barely keeping it together and is seconds away from crying.
I lick my lips, trying to wet them. My brain feels like I left it behind three days ago. “Can you turn the lights down, please?”
“Yes, one sec.”
The bed is bumped the tiniest bit, and a cord near my arm moves before the space behind my eyelids goes almost black.
“There, it’s as dark as I can make it.”
Slowly, I force my eyes open again, testing it out with just a slit. When I’m not immediately smashed with jackhammers to my skull, I relax and allow them to open farther.
I search the room for Oakley and find her sitting right next to my bed, face all splotchy and her eyes red.
She really had been crying over me. I don’t think anyone has ever cried over me before.
Oakley smiles, but it’s wobbly at best. “Hey, bestie.”
My lips quirk. “Hey.”
“Can I get you anything?”
“Some water would be great,” I reply, mouth like a desert.
She reaches to the side, returning with a cup and a straw as if by magic, then holds the straw to my lips. Grateful, I take a sip and another, but the effort of swallowing saps my energy.
Her words from earlier float to the surface of my brain fog. “You said they brought me here. Who is they? The cops?”
Oakley’s face scrunches up. “You don’t remember?”
I shake my head, trying not to think about the guns that had been aimed in my direction.
“Your,” she starts, then pauses and glances back over her shoulder at the door, as if checking we are alone, “daddies. They came looking for you at the dorm, but all we found was your stuff in the bushes. Xavier tracked you somehow, and they all left to get you.”
“They came for me?” I ask, barely able to get the words out past my rapidly tightening throat. I’m also not sure I actually understand her words. Xavier tracked me?
“Yeah, they must have only been a few minutes behind you. Honestly, woman, when you are better, I’m going to have to yell at you. Calling me and then getting yourself taken. It was like something out of a freaking movie, and I did not sign up to play a side character.”
I try to laugh, but it sounds forced even to my own ears. “Nothing but main character energy for you, Oaks.”
She gives my hand a squeeze. “Damn straight.”
We go quiet for a minute, the beeping heart monitor the only sound in the room.
I can’t seem to join the pieces between my daddies and the guns I saw.
The ache in my head is a dull throb, and my entire body feels exhausted, except for my wrist, which seems to be aching in time with my head. Which reminds me…
I raise my arm and find a black brace around my left hand, wrist, and forearm.
My fingers wiggle easily enough, but my thumb aches when I try to force any kind of movement.
Turning it from side to side, I see the front and back support plates that go all the way up my hand and the three Velcro straps.
The whole thing feels heavy and tired, like I did a forearm workout or something.
“What—”
“Nothing’s broken, well, no bones are broken. A tendon. It has a partial tear.”
“Will it heal on its own, or am I going to need surgery?” My stomach sinks at the idea of surgery.
Not just the fact that someone will need to cut into my body, but the fucking medical bills.
I don’t have insurance, and I’m not covered by the state anymore.
Most college-age kids are on their parents’ insurance.
I glance around the room and see that it’s a private room, and it’s fancy as fuck, cabinets, curtains over the windows, and there is even a fucking private bathroom. There is no way that this isn’t costing more than what I have in my bank account. I could fucking cry.
“The doctor was confident that it will. You might need physiotherapy once you get the brace off, though.”
I lower my arm back to the bed, mostly because the ache has traveled down into my elbow, and turn to her, mouth open to ask another question, but she has her hand held up to stop my words.
“No, I don’t know how long you need to leave the brace on, the doctor said she would be back to discuss it tomorrow.
” Oakley lets out a massive yawn, covering her mouth with the back of her hand.
“Sorry, after getting your call last night, then finding out you were gone, then the hospital calling me a bit after midnight, I think I might be starting to crash from the adrenaline rushes.”
“Oaks…” I don’t know what to say to her. Thank you doesn’t seem like enough. I don’t even know what to think about this whole situation myself.
“Why did you?” she asked. “Have the hospital call me, I mean? Your daddies were all with you.”
My eyebrows shoot up, and my heart beats heavily in my chest, the stupid monitor keeping pace. “They were?”
Wait, fuck. My brain feels like it is full of Jell-O. I know Oakley said they came for me, so it makes sense they are here. Probably followed the ambulance or the cops or whatever.
Oakley glances at the monitor, then back at me. “Yeah. The hospital called because you asked for me, and when I got here, they were all sitting in the waiting room, looking tired as fuck.”
I stare up at the ceiling. “Huh. So the cops rescued me and they followed the paramedics.”
“No, babe, they did.” Oakley’s face is serious. Like super serious. Like she truly believes they are the ones who saved me.
But that does not explain the guns. What is more likely is that they tracked me to that house before calling the cops. I know I should be more concerned about the tracking thing, but my head is throbbing. “I think you might be confused.”
She shrugs one shoulder, then she seems to remember something and leans forward. “Oh, Xavier told me to tell you that you fell in your heels when you were coming home from a frat party.”
I frown. “But—”
“Just remember it for when the doctors come by again.”
My skull feels like it’s in a vise, and my eyelids are growing too heavy to keep open.
“Is it okay if I text them that you woke up for a few minutes? Derek has been messaging me for updates every ten minutes or so.”
I let my eyelids fall closed. “I don’t know.”
“They’re still here, you know? In the waiting room. I can go get them instead of texting?” Oakley offers.
But the thought of having them all in this room while I feel like trash and am at their mercy, unable to leave if I want to, makes my stomach twist on itself, which doesn’t help my overall sense of wellness. “No. Just text. Go away.”
Oakley’s pause is so long that it’s quite possible I’ve fallen asleep again. “You want me to tell them to go away?”
I swallow and nod with my eyes closed. “Don’t want them here. We’re over.”
I’d thought I was playing their game and winning. When, in reality, they took all the pieces off the board and my power with them. I’ll never forgive them for that.
So, no. I don’t want them here. I don’t want them anywhere near me.
I don’t want to breathe the same air as them.
And I especially do not want them touching me, ever again.
Pretending to care. Pretending they actually want me.
When all they really wanted was a stupid, na?ve little girl who they could control because she thought she had found her place in life.
They just wanted to be able to use my body, take my submission and burn me with it.
Fuck all that bullshit.
No. I’m better off on my own. Just me and my future cats.
And maybe Oakley. I might keep her too.