Page 123 of Cut Me Down

“D! Wake the fuck up, man! You can’t do this now! There was someone in your goddamn house! What do you want me to do!?” What can I do? What can I do? It’s too late, they already got to her… My men. Could they have gotten to them to?

“Send a crew to the house and test everything. Every last thing in that fucking house…” I try to take a deep breath; a wave of rage begins to flow through my body. “Send a separate crew to the Basement and do the same, then evacuate it. How the fuck did they get in…” I ball up my fists to try and contain my rage from lashing out at Carter.

“Zander’s checking cameras for abnormalities now.” Every time I close my eyes I see her face…she looked so scared …

“I WANT THEM FUCKING DEAD!!” I turn and hit the closest thing to me. Which happens to be the glass wall behind me blocking the nurses’ station from my rage. It shatters under my hand, and I feel Carter’s arms around me again. I just want to feel something other than this agony…this pain…

I am going to kill them all. No Dust member is safe from me…my mind begins to wander to all of the ways I can torture them…they’ll pay for what they did to her…I will find every. Last. One.

“D! You can't do this man! They’ll make you leave, you hear me? They will arrest you, and you won’t be here for her! You've got to keep cool.” I fall to my knees. I've never felt such emptiness before. Every inch of my being is quaking, a frozen stream shoots through my core, and my head is weightless…

“I need to see her…” He squeezes my shoulders in a sad attempt at comfort.

“They’ll come get us when you can, D.” He helps me up and moves me over to a chair. “They’ll tell us something as soon as they can.”

“Whoo! That’s my girl!” Dad screams from my left as Emma runs down half the field to score a goal for their team.

“Now John, you know she doesn’t like us yelling too…COME ON REF! THAT’S A FOUL!” My mom screams from my right. Emma does hate it when we yell too loudly, but only because the other families stare at us.

She should know that we don’t care. Emma is the best player on the team, and we’ll always cheer her on. We just also want to make sure she can hear us do it.

Her bright blue eyes look over at me as her blonde ponytail swings around. She moves her pointer finger to her lips as if to tell us to shut up, but I shake my head at her. Her eyes roll playfully, and she makes a heart symbol with her hands. I nod back to her in response like I always do, and she turns to join her team for a quick huddle.

“I'm telling you, she’s going to Penn State or Stanford with how well she plays.” My mom says to us.

“She can go wherever she desires, Leanne.” My dad says in a grumpy tone.

“Yeah, anywhere as long as it’s within a three-hour drive.” I say out loud.

“Now Damien, what if Emma wants to get out and see the country?” My mom exclaims.

“They have the internet now.” My dad chuckles as my mom roughs my hair. The players get back in formation, Emma right in front. She looks determined. Focused. Whoever comes down the field with the ball, she’s going to kick that girl’s butt.

She runs, taking off towards Emma and her team before she passes it to a girl on the left. This girl only has it a moment before she passes back to the middle, and Emma is already on her. She runs up, but once she reaches the girl, she stops, and lets her run right past her. I stand up, wondering why the hell she’d let that girl go.

Even as the play continues behind her, she still stands there. Something isn’t right. She’s just standing there. Not looking around, not breathing weird. Nothing…

“Em?” I yell out to her, and she turns to look at me, but only meets my eyes for a second before her knees give out and she falls to the ground. “EMMA!”

I’m rocking back and forth in this God forsaken chair. This bullshit waiting game is killing me. My hands are sweating. Well, everything is sweating. I’ve been bouncing my leg at such a rate and for so long, I'm surprised the muscle hasn’t doubled in size.

We haven’t heard anything, not a fucking word. Serena told us that’s a good thing. That it means they’re still working on her, and that means she’s still alive. Ashia is so strong…she’s survived everything else. She’ll survive this. I bet she’s awake and screaming at them to let me back there right about now…

Carter said it’s only been forty minutes…it feels like forty years. I keep trying to think of something else. Anything else. The only times I haven’t been next to her was when I’ve been working. I can’t think about work right now either. The urge to drag someone into an empty room and start swinging is already in full throttle, but I can’t leave. I can’t leave her here. I have to see her. Hold her. Smell her, even. Tell her I'm sorry, and how much I love her…

We look up to see security and one of the doctors that was with her walking through the doors. I scramble to my feet, barely able to stand. My knees shake, but I stand tall. Even as security and police officers approach me with cuffs in hand.

“He’s fine boys.” Serena says to security as she holds up her hands.

“We have some questions for him.”

“Well, you can ask later.” She says sternly.

“With what you said…”

“I didn’t say shit.” She interrupts them. I wonder why the sudden change of heart? She turns to the doctor who was working on her and crosses her arms. “What’s going on Derek?” Serena walks up with me and asks.

“She was most definitely poisoned.” My heart sinks. I'm not sure why hearing it out loud makes everything worse, but it does… “With the short amount of time it took the poison to take effect, there was only one antidote we could give her. We did, and we got her heart beating again, and we got her breathing. The effects of the poison itself seem to be wearing off.”

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