Page 145 of Archenemies

A big, loud, furious part of him wanted to chase after her. To tear off her mask, to make her face him, to look him in the eye, to tell him why she would do this. To destroy Max’s home, his glass city, his everything, and then to attack him—to attack a child! What purpose— What possible point—

But he didn’t chase after her.

In part because he already knew the truth.

Max had helped to defeat Ace Anarchy, and now Nightmare had tried to exact her revenge against him.

And he didn’t go after her because…

Because…

“Max,” he said, the name overtaken by a sob. He fell to his knees over Max’s body and did his best to remember the training they’d had. How to deal with various injuries so they could keep their comrades alive long enough for a healer to get to them.

But he had never seen this before.

Max’s shirt had already been pushed up, revealing a deep gouge beneath his ribs. There was blood, but there was also ice. Flakes ofbrittle white frost creeping across the skin, forming a protective barrier over the wound.

Stolen from Genissa Clark, no doubt.

But even with the ice, the blood beneath Max’s body was sticky and thick. The wound was deep, and could have punctured an organ—his kidney, his stomach, his intestines.

How long did he have?

Adrian’s arms shook as he scooped them beneath Max’s body and lifted him as tenderly as he could.

Nightmare was gone. Despite his fury, he hardly remembered her leaving. There was only Max. Whose skin appeared thin as tissue paper. Whose chest barely rose with each breath.

Holding the kid close, he ran from the building. Out onto the street, where even now he could hear sirens approaching. The Council, the rest of the Renegades, having heard about Nightmare’s attack. Rushing to the scene of the crime.

They were too late.

Adrian only hoped thathewasn’t.

Turning away from the sirens, he ran.

No—he flew.

The healers were all at the gala.Everyonewas at the damned gala, and the hospital was six miles away and Adrian could think of nothing but the blood on his hands and Max’s weak breaths rattling through his skinny chest and the fact that all the stitches he could draw wouldn’t be enough to keep the life from slipping out of him.

The ice had bought him time, but still, he was dying. Max wasdying.

And the hospital was six miles away.

Adrian had never moved so fast in his life. His entire world became a tunnel, pitch-black and narrow. He saw only obstacles—the buildings in his path and the streets crammed with traffic. He saw only the hospital waiting at the top of the hill, too far away, then closer, and closer, as he bounded from rooftop to fire escape to water tower to overpass. All the while he clutched Max’s body so tight he could feel the faint flutter of his heartbeat even through the armored suit. No, he was probably imagining that. Or it was his own heartbeat, erratic and desperate.

There was wind and the hard slap of boots on concrete. Another leap, another rooftop, another building, another city street blurring below, and the hospital—closer, closer, but never close enough.Don’t die, hold on, we’re almost there, I’ll get you there, don’t die.

And then hewasthere, a lifetime having passed in the minutes—seconds?—since he’d raced out of headquarters. He was moving so fast that the automatic sliding doors didn’t have time to register him and so he crashed through, sheltering Max’s body as well as he could as glass shattered around them.

Gasps and screams. Bodies leaping away from the infamous prodigy who had just burst into the emergency room waiting area.

A man in scrubs jumped up from behind a desk.

“A doctor, quick!” Adrian yelled.

The receptionist stared.

“NOW!”

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