I had to find my numbness. I needed that back.
“Haven. Move it,” Luke ordered and it was then I noticed he was tugging on my arm. Dillon grabbed his phone from me.
Kevin reached for Luke but before he touched him Luke spun around. It took nothing more than a look and Kevin let him go. “Listen, ummm . . . well, you should know . . .”
“Spit it the fuck out before I rip it from your throat,” Luke shouted. A few students passing-by gasped and darted away.
“This hot chick was asking about Haven.”
Luke’s entire body stiffened and if he wasn’t already scary, he was now and Kevin paled. “What? When?”
“She came up to me coming out of sociology.” He looked at me. “Crisis was . . . well, that was when he came to class.” And kissed me outside of the class. “She waited until I left the building then asked me when our exam was scheduled for.” Probably because Roman had been with us.
“And you didn’t think that was odd?” Luke barely had control over his tone.
Kevin glanced at me. “Well, she said she was an old friend and had a surprise for you after the exam.”
“Jesus Christ. Stupid.” Luke grabbed my arm. “Next time some strange chick asks about a friend of yours, use your brains and not your cock.”
Luke ushered me out of the building and into what was this crazy girl’s surprise—a fray of reporters. “Fuck.” He moved his arm to go around my shoulders and pushed through the horde of people shoving microphones in my face while cameras flashed.
How did this happen? Who would do this? Why? Luke kept me close, his hand on my head, keeping it hidden from the camera as we ran to where he always left the car. Kite was there, and as soon as Luke pressed the unlock button, Kite opened the door and while Luke ran around to the front, Kite shielded me from the reporters as I jumped in then dove in after me.
“How the hell did they know where you were?” Luke shouted as he took off. I noticed he didn’t go too fast to draw attention to us, but he wasn’t following the speed limit either.
“Jolie sent all of us the article ten minutes ago. I tried calling, but your phones were off.”
“In her exam,” Luke stated.
“Crisis, Roman and Vic are meeting us at the condo.”
“No. Call them back. We head to the farm.”
Kite got on the phone and I sat looking out the window as Luke navigated traffic toward the highway.
I glanced up and met Luke’s eyes in the rear-view mirror; they were hard and unflinching.
“Tammy doesn’t fit any of this,” he said. “How did she find the story on you? No one knows you’re Ream’s sister except your friends and us.” And my friends didn’t know anything about the club. “Even if she did get that out of Kevin. Tammy may have seen you with Crisis and this is escalating, but the story about you stripping . . . that doesn’t add up. Not a chance she can know about that.”
Kite held out his phone to me. “Crisis.”
I took it and noticed my hand trembled. Shit.
“Baby? You okay?”
I loved hearing his voice. It was like being handed a warm wool blanket to curl up with in front of a crackling fire. “Oh, God, I’m sorry—” I was cut off by Luke’s shout.
“What the hell?” Luke slammed on the brakes and the tires squealed just before a loud bang as a large truck plowed into the side of the car, sending us spinning out of control.
“Haven!” I heard Crisis shout as I screamed, dropping the phone.
VIOLENTLY ROLLING AGAIN and again, my head whipped from side to side making the seatbelt cut into my shoulder and waist. All I heard was metal being crushed under the impact until finally the car stopped rolling.
I moaned, my hand going to my temple where I touched the warm blood. My body felt as if it had been hit with a baseball bat and my neck muscles were strained from the whiplash.
Kite. Luke.
I opened my eyes and it took a second before I was able to focus and saw Kite with his head hanging forward, blood trailing down his forehead over his silver piercing then into his eye.
“Kite,” I shouted.
His belt held him in place, but his eyes were closed. I heard a tire still spinning as it rumbled around and around and a loud swoosh like—
Water.
I looked out the window next to me. Water rushed by us, splashing the side windows that weren’t yet submerged.
Oh, my God. We were in the Don River. I couldn’t swim.
I didn’t know how deep it was, but water leaked in through the cracked rear window that was completely submerged. We were at an angle, the front of the car above water, but I didn’t know for how long.
I unsnapped my seatbelt after several tries then crawled through bent wreckage toward Kite.
Fuck. “Kite,” I yelled, grabbing his arms that hung limply over his head. “Kite, we have to get out of here.” Blood dribbled from the corner of his mouth and there was more on the side of his head.
“Oh, God, Kite. Kite.” I shook his shoulders. “Damn it.” I leveraged myself against the seat then kicked at the side window that was half-above water level. That was our way out. If I could get us on top of the car maybe we’d have a chance until help came.
I kicked and kicked at it, but it was like kicking a cement wall. Nothing. Shit. Shit.
There was no way I’d be able to open the doors with the water.
The only way was to pull Kite between the front seats, through the front crumpled windshield and onto the hood of the car. But if I kicked out the rest of the windshield, the spray of water might flood us. And even if I could get us all out, I couldn’t swim to shore. I couldn’t save any of us.