Page 77 of Revenge At Raleigh High
“Is…she dead?” Jacob pants.
The vile…fucked up…sadistic…I close my eyes, breathing around the knot of anger in my chest. I was aiming for his heart when I pulled that trigger. I lifted the desert eagle, steadied it in my hands, and I made the call. It’s better that the bullet found its mark in his gut. He’ll still be alive when the cops arrive, so he can answer for what he’s done without the mercy of death letting him off the hook. But I swear to god, if he asks me if Silver’s dead with the same hope in his voice again…
“Doesn’t matter,” Jake wheezes. “I broke her in the end. She screamed…at the top…of her lungs…for me.”
Am.
Going.
To.
Fucking.
DESTROY.
Him.
“Al…ex?”
The gears of hate come to a grinding halt. Silver’s eyes are open, and she’s staring right up at me. For one blissful moment, everything else is forgotten. “Shhh, it’s okay. I got you,Argento. I have you. You’re safe. Everything’s going to be okay.”
“It…”Her eyelids flutter, her face contorting, brow furrowing, and the rage insides me spikes again when I realize that it hurts her to fuckingblink. “It’s okay,” she whispers. “I know. You’re…here…now.”
33
ALEX
The ambulance ride is tense, primarily because I won’t let Silver go. I punch one of the EMTs when he tries to tell me I can’t ride with them to the hospital, but eventually, to keep the peace, they let me into the back of their rig with her. If Silver hadn’t been so royally fucked up, then I doubt I would have gotten my way.
I can’t be too mad at them. They listened to Silver’s faltering account of what had happened and they decided to leave Jacob writhing in pain on the gymnasium floor, even though they probably should have prioritized him as the more emergent patient and taken him with them, while Silver was forced to wait for a second ambulance.
I would have shot them both, stolen their fucking rig, and driven her to the hospital inside it myself if they’d made that call.
Silver mumbles incoherently the entire way across town toward the hospital, and I hold her hand tightly, chanting the same prayer in Italian over and over again…
“The cops are gonna be waiting there for you,” the kid I punched in the face, Dave, informs me as we draw close. “The doctors are gonna rush out first, and they’re gonna take her. She’s in shock, and she’s barely conscience. Looks like she’s taken a number of blows to the head. They’re gonna wanna do a thorough examination so they can treat her properly. You’re not gonna get in their way. Do you hear me?”
“Fuck you, man.”
“Do you love this girl?”
I glare at him out of the corner of my eye. “What do you think, asshole?”
“Then you’ll do what’s best for her, and you’ll let them take her. That’s when the cops are gonna swoop in and pick you up. They ain’t gonna be gentle about it, either. That other kid flat-out accused you of shooting him.”
“Idid.”
Dave rocks back in his seat, blowing out a stiff, unhappy breath. He can’t be much older than me. Twenty? Twenty-one? Aside from having slow reflexes, he seems to have his shit together. “I’m gonna pretend I didn’t hear that. And don’t repeat that until you have a lawyer, either. Things’ll get messy if—”
“I’d say things were already kinda messy, wouldn’t you, Dave?”
He holds his hands up, mock surrendering, and doesn’t say another word until the ambulance brakes jerkily in front of the hospital. From there, everything pans out just as he said it would: numerous doctors arrive in a confusion of shouted orders, needles, back boards and scrubs. They shove me out of the way, tell me I can’t go with Silver, and I force myself to listen to them. Dave slaps me on the shoulder as the doctors wheel my girlfriend away, giving me a tight smile.
“Incoming. Twelve o’clock. Remember what I told you, man. Don’t say shit until you’ve spoken to a lawyer. Otherwise…” He shakes his head, pulling the black nitrile gloves from his hands and dumping into the HAZMAT bin as he heads for the hospital exit. “…A kid like you is probably gonna end up serving someseriousjail time.”
34
CAMERON
