Say it.
I can’t. I pinch my eyes.
“One glass isn’t going to make me f**king addicted, Lo.”
I let out a weak laugh. “Lucky you.” I cringe.
“We should go back to the hotel—” He suddenly careens forward, someone knocking into him from behind. I barely notice two beefy guys throwing punches.
And then a pair of knuckles decks my temple. I stagger to the side, almost tripping, my fingers scraping the pavement. The horrific screams bleed my ears, and in one instant, it’s like a hurricane of people, arms flying, shoving—bodies slamming into each other.
My panic has shot up to a new level.
The end of an intense rugby match has brought the beginning of a riot. Ryke reaches out and grabs my arm. We lock eyes for an instant, exchanging a look like: don’t leave me.
And then another fist pounds into the side of my face. The pain welling instantly. I grip his shirt, anything, and sock him in the gut, just so he’ll get off me.
When I turn around, Ryke is being dragged backwards by his leather jacket. I try to sprint towards him, but someone clutches my shoulders and forcefully slams me to the ground.
A boot nails me in the ribcage, and my adrenaline drowns out the intensity of the pain. I elbow someone’s shins, and I try to stand, but the boot side-swipes my head.
Fuck. Black dots burst in my vision.
“LOREN!” Connor yells.
Blood drips from my nose and to my lips. I taste the bitter iron. The screaming. Never ends. Glass shatters. Heat from fires blaze, but I can’t see where they originate.
It’s just pure chaos.
“LOREN!”
Another kick to the stomach, and I fall to my hands again. Get up. You stupid bastard. I punch back, meeting flesh. And I rise to my feet the same time that Connor reaches me with an unreadable expression, masking his alarm. Barely a bruise on his face.
“Where’s Ryke?” My voice is filled with fear. I look around. “We have to find—” Jesus. Christ. Someone nailed me with something in the side. I cough roughly, and Connor is basically guiding me away from everything.
“Stop,” I cough, my feet instinctively following his. I hold my ribs. “Connor, wait!” I scream.
“We have to go,” Connor says, his eyes wide to tell me now.
“Ryke is out there!” I yell. I turn back around. Daisy. And I try to tear into the street, but Connor grabs my waist, two inches taller than me. And stronger. In almost every way.
He forces me back on the sidewalk, not the street where everyone has gone mad. Sirens blare in the distance, growing closer and closer.
“We have to leave!” Connor yells at me.
“I can’t…” I can’t leave them. I spin back to face Connor and shove him in the chest. “You would leave them?!” Tears wet my cheeks. I feel like I just put my brother to rest. And Daisy is gone with him.
“No,” Connor says, his usually emotionless expression slowly unraveling. “I would save you.”
Why.
I shake my head.
“He’s strong,” he reminds me. “He’ll find Daisy, and we’ll meet up with him.”
He’s strong.
It’s hard to say no to someone like Connor. With his hand on my back, we push through the crowds, away from the fight.
Away from people who matter.
* * *
We walked for ten minutes before slipping into a drug store. I vaguely pay attention to Connor who disappears down an aisle. The cashier says something to me in English, about the riot. I think. I open my mouth to answer, but air catches in my lungs. I can’t breathe.
I try to inhale.
I can’t breathe. No bruise or welt amounts to this agony that pounds into me. I push through the doors, the cold night air blanketing me. And I gasp heavily, my hands on my thighs.
I puke on the curb.
Cop and ambulance sirens scream.
I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand, blood smearing from my nose.
“Lo,” Connor says, appearing outside. He rests a hand on my back. His button-down is ripped by the collar. “Come on.” He guides me along the sidewalk. It takes us more time to find a taxi, but when we do, we both climb in the backseat, the traffic horrendous. In French, Connor tells the driver our destination, and I zone out, patting my pockets.
“My phone.” It must’ve fallen.
“Someone stepped on it back at the pub,” he explains, digging in a paper bag. I stare at the headrest, slammed with tonight’s events. With my brother being dragged by the jacket, away from me. I rewind to screaming at him—saying that I wish he never existed in my life.
I rewind further to forcing him to drink alcohol.
“Connor,” I whisper, hot liquid pools in my eyes. What have I done? Connor holds the back of my head, but I can’t stop these raging feelings. I can’t stop the remorse or the fear of what’s happened. He forces my gaze on his. “Please…” My chest falls heavily. “I can’t…”
I can’t deal with it anymore.
I don’t want any of it.
Tears pour out of me, and I try to breathe—sharp pains stab my ribs with each one. My head floats from a lack of oxygen, and all I think is: kill me.
I am miles away from the one person who can talk me down from this edge. From the one person who has been with me every step of my life. Who has shared memories and moments that no one else will ever see. If I give up, she is gone.
I destroy this bond that transcends love, taking her soul with me.
It is the only thing that keeps me breathing.
I watch Connor bite a pill in half with his front teeth. His eyes flicker to mine, full of uncharacteristic concern that he rarely shows anyone.
“Are you putting me to sleep?” I ask.
“Not in the way you’d like,” he says softly. He passes me half of the pill. “I can’t take your pain away, no matter how much I want to.” He pauses. “This is the best I can do for now.”
Every moment of my life has been a mountain that I struggle to climb.
55
2 years : 01 month
September
LILY CALLOWAY
“Lo,” I say the minute Connor hands him the phone. He told me that Lo took a sleeping pill, so I only have a few minutes with him. Tears already stream down my cheeks, picturing them swept up in the Paris riot, footage on almost every news station. Rose and I didn’t know that our sister and the guys were tangled up in it until we called Connor.
I sit on my bed with the comforter pulled up to my chest. Rose has left the room to tell Poppy that Daisy’s in the hospital. Connor, Ryke, and Lo are in the waiting room, unsure of how badly her injuries are.
Rose and I already checked flights and threw clothes into carry-ons.
“Lily,” he chokes. I hear the torment in his voice. I don’t have to ask where it’s from. The origins are most likely many, vast places.
My throat tightens, and I collect myself for him as much as I can. “I love you,” is the next thing I say.
I can practically picture him pinching his eyes to dam the waterworks, his breathing sharper than usual. “I f**ked up,” he says.
“No,” I tell him, as sternly as I can. “You didn’t.”
“You don’t know what I did.”
“It doesn’t matter.” I wish I could hug him. Why do we have to be so far apart?
And then he says with a broken voice, “I’m never going to defeat this.”
“Lo,” I breathe, licking my dry lips. “You’re forgetting something.”