Page 74 of Ryder
“So what is it you want to know about her? You know her daddy’s mafia, yeah?”
“Yeah… I guess we’re in favour with them right now, for saving her, and getting rid of those other bastards.”
He cleared his throat. “Yeah, something like that. She spent a lot of years in institutions and stuff, after the last time this bastard had hold of her though. You need to be prepared for the fact that she might not ever recover from this.”
My stomach clenched at his words, at the thought of her giving up. She couldn’t, I couldn’t lose her.
“Is there much info on her time in those places?”
“I can hack pretty much anything, brother, given time and enough drugs to keep my mind clear.” I was pretty sure the drugs did the exact opposite, but whatever.
“Do you think she might need that kind of help again?”
He was quiet for a moment, like he was thinking about his response.
“I think it’s a strong possibility, brother. She gave up. She didn’t want to live. She tried so many times to end it that they had her on suicide watch.”
My blood ran cold, and I turned to stare at the bathroom, feeling like time had slowed down. She’d been in there forway too long. The locked room she’d disappeared into, looking defeated and lost, and the shower was still running.
“Shit.”
“What?”
“FUCK!” I dropped the phone and ran for the door, rattling the handle before I stepped back and kicked the fucker, breaking the lock.
Jesus Christ.There was so much fucking blood. She was hunched in a corner of the shower cubicle, her head slumped down, and her wrists limp at her sides.
I yelled out for the prospect at the door, as I rushed to her side. The shower was shut off as I reached her, and I heard the prospect behind me. Rob… Was it Rob?
“Get the doc. Fuck! I don’t know what to do,” I barked at him, as I reached for her. She wasn’t wet enough to have actually been in the shower.It had all been a ruse. Her clothes were wet from the water soaking up from the shower floor, and there was blood everywhere.
I grabbed her wrists, trying to staunch the flow, hoping like hell that I hadn’t lost her yet.
“Jesus Christ, Tori. What did you do to yourself, darlin’? You can’t leave me. Not like this. Maybe with a brutal slap to my face, when I’m being a prick, but not like this.”
She wasn’t waking up, but she definitely hadn’t left me yet. I could hear shallow breaths, now that the water wasn’t running anymore. Someone stepped in beside me, helping me wraptowels around her wrists, trying to stem the flow of blood, and then we were lifting her out of the shower.
Doc ran into my room as we carried her from the bathroom, and he pointed to the bed. He took over instantly, directing poor Rob, the prospect, to help him with her wounds.
A hand squeezed my shoulder, and I turned to see Ice standing with me. There was blood on him.Tori’s blood.
“I’m sorry, brother. I should have realised sooner. Fucking hell.” He looked solemn, grabbing my arm to hold me back, as Doc suddenly lifted Tori into his arms, and strode from the room.
“Let him work. You know he has to have her in the infirmary where all his kit is.”
Reacher and Stitch charged into my room then.
“How bad is it?” Reacher demanded, and I just stared blankly at him. “Ryder? Snap the fuck out of it!”
Ice spoke quietly, updating them both, as I stood there in a daze. I should have realised. I should have seen how hopeless she felt. I should have made sure she couldn’t do that.
“Brother? Come on, we’ll go wait in the infirmary with her.” Ice was leading me from the room, and I just followed him, because my brain was too busy tormenting me with the image of her slumped in the shower, bleeding, over and over again, like it wanted to make sure I really fucking couldn’t ever forget it.
What if she died? What if Doc couldn’t save her?This was my fault. I’d been pushing her for a reaction, when I should have been listening to her words. Listening to what she wasn’t saying.
“I fucked up,” I muttered to Ice, as he shoved me inside the infirmary in front of him.
Doc, and two of our brothers, who sometimes helped him out in there, were crowded around Tori, working on trying to keep some of her blood still inside her.
