Lift You Up (Rivers Brothers 1)

That was where they did it.

Raped you.

Killed you.

You never shrugged your shoulders, fell into step beside them, and followed them to your own doom.

You fought like hell.

Maybe it wouldn't do any good.

But at least you tried.

At least you did everything you could do.

He moved closer toward me, hand still out, like he thought he was somehow soothing me or something.

But that was okay.

That gave me something to work with.

My hand closed around the knife that was no longer so cold in my hand, so unfamiliar.

And in that moment, I learned something about myself.

Everything changed when my life was at stake. All my hang ups, my fears, my reservations, they fell away. All that was left in their place was instinct, pure survival.

He got closer, arm still raised, and I moved fast, so fast that my own eyes fought to keep up with the motion.

My arm raised.

The knife sliced through the air.

And then through the flesh of his palm.

Blood flowed.

He curled into himself, cradling his hand, cursing.

His gaze fell away from me just long enough to let me curl away, fly upward onto the bed, watching as his buddy closed in on the other side of the bed with a smile, like he had me.

He didn't have me, damnit.

I lunged out, he parried away.

I flew off the end of the bed, jumping far enough to shoot through the door before I landed, coming down hard, wrong.

The pain was instantaneous, shooting up my ankle and leg, burning, shooting, ricocheting off every nerve ending and I was pretty sure I heard a crack.

But the guys were coming.

They were coming.

And I had to get away.

Broken ankle or not.

I had to get away.

I shot forward, bracing one hand against the wall, hopping, dragging my bad leg behind me, even the sensation of it running across the floor making painful tears prickle at my eyes, spilling over as I bit my lower lip to keep the hysterical sob inside, not willing to give them that, no matter how hurt I was.

Something - someone - shoved into my shoulder, sending me flying forward in the living room, coming down hard on all fours beside the coffee table.

"E-fucking-nough of this," one of the voices growled.

And I knew it.

I knew.

It was over.

I lost.

No one was coming to save me.

And I failed at saving myself.

I felt the hand twist into my hair, yanking my head back hard and fast enough to make the back of my neck scream in objection before throwing me forward.

I knew what I would hit.

The edge of the coffee table.

I figured it would hurt.

But there was no pain then.

Only darkness.

Unconsciousness.--Wakefulness came in stages.

I became aware of things as I was still surrounded in that darkness.

Cold was first.

I was bone-deep cold, the ache of it slipping into my bones, settling so deep that a part of me was sure there would be no way to ever get warm again.

A shiver racked my system before my brain was able to latch onto something else.

Pain.

Oh, there was so much pain.

I read somewhere that you could only feel one pain at a time. It was why people with toothaches that wouldn't go away would sometimes break their hands. One pain outweighed the other.

My body seemed to agree with this.

My pain throbbed in strobes.

In my ankle. Then my head. Ankle. Head.

Over and over in an endless, soul-crushing rhythm.

Taking a breath, feeling the tears slip into my mouth as I exhaled slowly, my hand rose, reaching across my body, touching the space where the pain in my head seemed to be coming from. Sticky. My fingers felt sticky. Which meant blood. Which meant a gash. Right there at my temple.

My fingers probed around the edges I thought would be safe, finding only more open spots until the very edge of my hairline where the skin felt achy, bruised, but intact. On a terrified exhale, my finger pressed into my eye, wondering if I would find it there, or just an empty socket. The pain was too all-encompassing to figure out where it was coming from.

My fingers met eyeball, or, rather, eyelid covering eyeball.

And it was right then that full consciousness finally hit me.

Memories swirled back.

Pancakes and kisses with Kingston.

Taking Padfoot for a walk.

Being alone for the first time in while.

Realizing that someone had been watching very closely, anticipating this moment, ready to exploit it, to get me.

The frantic searching, the knife, the slashing, the flying through the air to crash down wrong on my ankle.

As if remembering the moment, my ankle seared again, throbbing, hot, painful.

Then the desperate urge to get to the door, the street, to scream for help.

It wasn't the best side of town. I understood that even screaming might not bring about a Good Samaritan. But maybe Kingston would be close enough to hear, could come.

But I never made it.