Page 30 of Crystal Wrath
I take a step forward. Then another. My keys are ready in my right hand, the car remote positioned between my fingers likea makeshift weapon. My phone is clutched tightly in the other. Just a few more steps, and I’ll be safe inside my little Honda, driving home to my apartment, where I can lock the door and try to forget this day ever happened.
A sharp sound breaks the silence to my left. My head snaps in that direction, and my phone slips from my grasp, crashing to the pavement.
Nothing. Just empty air. Just my paranoia. I crouch down to retrieve my phone, my heart hammering in my chest.
And then the world explodes.
A roar, unlike anything I've ever heard, tears through the night. Not the rumble of an engine or the crash of thunder, but something destructive that seems to come from the earth itself.
My body lifts off the ground before my mind can process what's happening. The sensation is surreal, dreamlike as if gravity has suddenly decided to release its hold on me. Heat sears across my skin as if I've been thrown into an oven. A blinding light floods my vision, brighter than the sun and more colorful than anything I've ever seen. Colors explode behind my eyelids in patterns that don't exist in nature.
Then I crash back to earth, my body slamming into the pavement with a force that drives all the air from my lungs. My shoulder takes the brunt of the impact, and pain explodes through my bones like lightning. The asphalt is rough and unforgiving against my skin, tearing through my clothes and scraping away layers of flesh.
Glass rains from the sky like deadly confetti, the pieces catching the street lights as they fall. Some of the shards are as large as dinner plates, others as small as sand grains. They crasharound me, creating a symphony of destruction that drowns out everything else.
Car alarms begin wailing, their electronic screams adding to the chaos. The sound is disorienting, emanating from all directions simultaneously. Somewhere in the distance, I can hear more glass breaking and people shouting.
I taste copper in my mouth, a metallic, warm sensation. Blood. My own blood. The realization comes slowly, filtered through the shock and confusion that has overtaken my brain.
“Elena! Jesus, Elena!”
The voice seems to come from very far away, though I can feel footsteps thundering toward me across the pavement. It's familiar and comforting. Nick's voice is rough with panic and concern.
Strong arms pull me up from the ground, though every nerve in my body protests the movement. My vision flickers in and out like a television with bad reception. My ears ring with a high-pitched whine that drowns out almost everything else, making it difficult to process what's happening around me.
“Call an ambulance!” Nick yells at someone, his voice seeming to come from underwater. He cradles me close to his chest, and I can feel his heart hammering against his ribs. “Stay with me, Elena. Don't you dare close your eyes.”
But keeping my eyes open feels impossible. My eyelids are lead weights, and the darkness that keeps trying to claim me feels so peaceful, so welcoming. It would be so easy to just let go, to stop fighting and let the blackness wash over me.
I try to focus on Nick's face, but he's a blur of worry and gray hair. His mouth is moving, but I can only catch fragments of what he's saying. Something about staying awake. Help is on the way. Something about everything being okay.
The last thing I hear before the darkness finally swallows me whole is the distant wail of sirens, growing closer with each passing second.
The hospital lights are sterile and cold, but they bring me back from the void that has claimed me. My eyes flutter open slowly, fighting against the brightness that seems to pierce straight through to my brain. For a moment, everything is white, quiet, and peaceful. No pain, no fear, no memories of what brought me here.
Then reality crashes back like a wave hitting the shore.
Pain floods through my body, dull but insistent and absolutely inescapable. My shoulder feels like it's been put through a meat grinder, wrapped in bandages that are too tight and smell like antiseptic. My face stings with dozens of small cuts, each one a reminder of the glass that fell from the sky. My whole body aches like I've been hit by a truck, then run over by the same truck, then maybe hit by a second truck just for good measure.
“Elena.”
The voice is soft, gentle, and filled with a sense of relief and love. Amelia. My best friend. The person who knows me better than anyone else in the world.
She's sitting by my bedside in an uncomfortable-looking plastic chair, her usually perfect appearance disheveled and tear-stained. Her blonde hair is pulled back in a messy ponytail, and she's wearing the same clothes she had on yesterday, which means she's been here all night. Her hands are wrapped around mine like she's trying to anchor me to this world, to keep me from floating away.
“You're awake,” she breathes, and fresh tears spill down her cheeks. “Oh my God, I thought I thought I was going to lose you.”
Her voice breaks on the last word, and I can see the fear in her eyes. It’s a deep, primal fear of having someone you love almost torn away from you.
“I'm okay,” I whisper, though my voice comes out cracked and thin like old paper. Even talking hurts, like my vocal cords have been scraped raw.
“No, you're not,” she says firmly, wiping her cheeks with trembling hands. “You almost died, Elena. Your car exploded. You were just feet away from it. If you hadn't dropped your phone and stopped to pick it up…”
The memory comes back in pieces, like a jigsaw puzzle assembling itself in my mind. Walking toward my car. The strange feeling that something was wrong. Fumbling with my keys and dropping my phone. Bending down to retrieve it just as the world erupted in fire and light.
If I hadn't dropped my phone, if I hadn't paused those few seconds to pick it up, I would have been standing right next to my car when the bomb went off. I would be dead right now instead of lying in a hospital bed counting my injuries.
“He called me,” I whisper. “Bennato. He threatened me. I didn't think he'd actually do it.”
