Asher (Inked Brotherhood 1)

I can’t draw enough air into my lungs.

“Will he be all right?” I grab hold of a paramedic’s sleeve and tug. “Please tell me.”

“Are you next of kin?” he asks and I shake my head.

“He doesn’t have any next of kin left,” Zane says bluntly and I wince. “What do you need to know?”

So Zane steps in front of me and answers the barrage of questions flung at him—What happened to Ash? How did he hit his head and ribs? What caused the wound? What did he eat today? Is he diabetic? Does he have a heart condition? What medications and drugs does he take? How old is he? Does he have any allergies?

It goes on and on. Meanwhile, the others bring out a stretcher and load Ash on it. Then they pull a thermal blanket over him and roll him into the ambulance.

I start after them, then see Zane do the same and stop.

“You go,” I say.

Zane puts a hand on my arm. “They’ll only take one of us.”

“You’re his best friend. You should—”

“He’d want you to go. He’s been in love with you since forever.”

Strangely, after everything, this is what makes me cry. I wipe at my eyes angrily. I can’t fall apart now. “Well, me, too.”

Zane gives a faint smile. “Well, I’ll be damned. He’d better wake up soon to hear this.”

I mock-punch him. “Shut up.”

“Go. We’ll follow you in Tessa’s car. The emergency room is just around the corner from here. He’ll be fine.”

I nod and hurry after the paramedics.

***

I beg the paramedics to let me ride in the ambulance with Ash, and they cave in because it’s such a short distance to the emergency room. So I hunch over where I sit on the bench, feeling vaguely claustrophobic and uneasy, watching them take Ash’s pressure and start a drip.

They talk among themselves, using terms I’m not familiar with. They might as well be speaking Chinese. They check Ash’s pupils, ask him simple questions like his name and the date.

Leaning forward, I listen for his replies. His voice is just a hoarse rasp but it wraps around me like a warm embrace. I reach over and put my hand on his arm, over the thermal blanket. I want him to know I’m here, but I’m not sure he sees me.

The ambulance halts. We’ve reached the emergency room. The doors open, and quickly and efficiently the paramedics pull the gurney out and push it inside while I hurry after them.

A triage nurse stops them and, after exchanging a few words I don’t catch, she gestures for them to continue. I think she might stop me from following, but she doesn’t.

They wheel him into a room with an examination bed, but don’t make a move to transfer him there. A middle-aged doctor in blue scrubs arrives and joins the paramedics huddled around Ash.

I hang back, trying to piece together what they’re talking about. Hypothermia. Concussion. Internal bleeding.

Oh god. Did we reach Ash too late? I find a chair at the back of the room and sink in it, rubbing my burning eyes. I can’t stop the tears; they keep coming.

At some point Zane and Tessa appear by my side, looking somber. Zane puts a hand on my shoulder.

“I thought,” I whisper, “that my problems were big. Important, you know? My life, my problems. They just seem so small now.” My stomach twists. “I never thought he was in such danger. That he had no place to go. If I’d known...” Screw my mom’s objections, then I’d have invited him to stay over. Then he wouldn’t have been fighting illegally. Wouldn’t have been exposed to the cold. Wouldn’t have been hurt.

“Don’t blame yourself,” Zane says quietly. “I should have seen this coming. I blame me. I knew he had no place to go, but I put off talking to him.” He frowned. “It doesn’t matter now. This...” He gestures at the gathered nurses and doctors around Ash’s gurney. “He was stabbed. That didn’t happen in the fight club. Someone attacked him.”

“Because he was on the street,” I say, biting my lip to keep from whimpering.

“We don’t know why yet.”