Perfectly Toxic (Sterling Shore 9)

When they show up, I dart out to the car, ready for the distraction, and grateful they seem happy to thrift shop with me.

We hit a couple of places, and after three hours, I’m exhausted.

“Should you be getting so much exercise?” Ruby asks me, worried.

“Of course,” I tell her. “But I’m tired. What about you two?”

Brin acts a little spaced out, and she doesn’t seem to hear me as she checks the nooks and crannies of this huge, overly stuffed, three-story shop.

“Is she okay?” I ask when Ruby stares at her with me.

“I think so. She and Rye had a little bit of an argument earlier. She came home with me, since Corbin had to go help Maverick with something.”

I nod, even though now I’m worried. Rye and Brin bicker, prank each other, and then they make out. They never actually argue.

“Will they be okay?” I ask.

Ruby puts her hand on my shoulder, and she starts guiding me toward the stairs.

“Yeah. They love each other, and believe it or not, that trumps most anything.”

My heart squeezes, but I stuff down the emotion as I start walking down the stairs, thinking of what life would be like right now if Ethan had just fallen in love with me. It might not have changed anything at all. I’m not so sure that love really does trump all else.

My head is swimming with a thousand scenarios, and it takes a second to register the fact my feet are treading on air and no longer on the stairs… I’m falling? How am I falling?

Ruby is screaming my name as a sick, airborne sensation steals my stomach and shoves it up to my chest. My hands reflexively grab my middle protectively.

Someone is screaming as pain shoots up my leg and back, searing through me like a h

ot’s knife blade from the impact. It’s me... I’m screaming!

What happened?

I can’t breathe! Why can’t I breathe?

I suck in for air, but it won’t enter my lungs. All of the sights around me are a dim blur.

Suddenly, all the air hits me at once, and the pain is almost unbearable as my lungs expand with the multiple breaths I’ve been gasping for. I feel as though I’m being sliced in two as the painful breaths cut into me.

The world above me is spinning, and something wet is all over my legs. Ruby is over me, saying my name and so many other words I can’t understand. She’s shouting… I think. But she’s shouting at someone else as she lifts my head.

I glance down the length of my body, and my legs lift, letting me know they’re still working. But my heart sinks to my toes when I see all the blood seeping through my jeans.

So much blood...

It just keeps pouring out, turning my jeans darker and darker red, and I reach down, touching the wood at my sides. My fingertips get wet, and I stare in horror at all the blood on them.

Too much blood...

My baby! No. No. No. No. No. Please, God, I’m begging you, don’t take my baby away from me.

Blackness swarms me as my eyes roll back in my head.

“Bella! Bella, no! Don’t close your eyes, please! Stay with me!” is the last thing I hear Ruby saying before it all disappears.

Chapter 68

ETHAN