“Please be breathing!” A familiar voice calls me from the darkness. A feminine voice. A beautiful voice. Soft fingers brush against my forehead and I suck in air. Pain slices through my chest—breathing is bad.
“Please wake up. I didn’t go through this for you to be dead.”
“It’s okay, Rachel,” I mumble. Her tone, a mixture of torture and agony, scrapes at my soul. It’s the same tone Rachel had when she felt I had betrayed her. “I’m sorry.”
The cold fingers touching my head pause. Why isn’t she warm?
“Oh, thank God. You’re alive.”
The voice is familiar, but not Rachel’s. I fight the fog and force consciousness and every muscle screams as I stretch.
“I’m awake.” Not what I meant to say. I meant to ask if she was okay. At the moment, brain and mouth aren’t connected. My mind’s jumbled; a scattered mess as I try to sort out why I fell asleep, why I’m in pain, why it’s cold, why my bed’s hard—
“You scared the crap out of me. I thought you were dead.”
—why there’s a girl in my bed wondering if I’m dead. I pry my eyes open and successfully free one. There’s three of her at first and, through blinking, she slowly evolves into one. “I know you.”
On her knees, Haley hovers near me. Behind her, my car sits, still running. The headlights highlight a couple of blond strands in her light brown hair.
“Why did you follow me?” she demands. “All you had to do was act like we were still talking. But no, you call out after me, then look to where I was heading. Why not skywrite I had bolted for the neighborhood?”
She’s trembling. I reach out and rest my hand on her wrist. The skin beneath my own is ice. “You’re cold.”
“So are you. You’re probably in shock.”
My thumb swipes across her skin, as if that one movement could warm her. Protect her. “It’s all right.”
“No, it’s not. None of this is all right.” She removes her arm and I suddenly feel empty.
There’s a tear on her face. Just one. And she quickly wipes it away. The action causes an ache beyond the pulsating of my skin and head. Something’s wrong. My eyes dart around and I quickly catch up on events. I’m not in bed. I almost hit her with my car, we fought, I discovered she had trouble, I followed her here and then I got my ass kicked. I lift my head and immediately regret the movement with a groan. “Are you okay?”
“You should have listened!”
Not an answer, and I left my patience back at the shopping plaza. “Are. You. Okay?”
“I’m fine,” she snaps. “Just fine. Freaking fantastic fine. Meeting you is the pinnacle of my existence.”
“Some people say thank you when a complete stranger jumps two guys for them.”
Haley slumps against the bumper of my car and a rush of air leaves her body. “Sorry and thank you. It’s—” she waves her hand in the air “—messed up, but that’s not your fault. It’s mine.”
A car slowly drives around us. I expect it to stop, but it keeps going. Great neighborhood. “They left my car.”
“Yeah.” She glances away. “They’re gone.”
My eyes narrow on her face, but she flips her hair so it’s hiding her cheek and jaw. I blink as my sight blurs. Something’s off. They would have stolen the car... “I need to get up.” But not a single cell in my body responds. “They could come back.”
“They won’t.” Haley nurses her right hand. “Trust me—they won’t. At least not tonight. Tomorrow maybe, but not tonight.”
Tomorrow? What? I rise onto my elbows and the nauseating spinning convinces me to ease my head back to the ground. Driving is going to be a bitch.
“Stop it. You need to stay still. In fact, you need an ambulance.”
“No hospitals.” Showing at an E.R. like this will cause Dad to go Chernobyl.
“Your friend told me the same thing. It’s why I haven’t called 911. Possibly a stupid decision on my part.”
The pounding stills. “What friend?”