Credence

The burn scorches my throat, and I cough, someone taking the bottle out of my hand again, and I dry heave, ready to fucking throw up. That’s nasty.

But I grab the bottle again and force down another shot.

Kaleb leans over the box, pulling out a needle and thread, and I watch, the tequila blazing a path to my stomach as he uses some sort of clamp to thread the needle and then flick a lighter under it, sanitizing it.

What the fuck?

And then it hits me.

Oh, no.

I shake my head. “Kaleb, no.”

He shoots his eyes up to me, his dark green gaze unflinching.

But his stomach—the top half of his body bare, because he never got completely dressed when he ran outside—tightens with his heavy breaths. Almost like he’s…nervous.

He takes my arm, clenching his jaw, and presses his fingers into my arm, pinching the torn skin back together.

I cry out. “No, Kaleb, stop.”

I can’t do this. I turn my face away, sucking in breaths.

“You have to do it,” Noah says, handing me the bottle again. “If you don’t, you might get an infection, and then you’ll wish you were dead.”

I down another swallow of the tequila.

Kaleb’s eyes meet mine once more, and then his fingers—red and stained with my blood—pinch the skin closed again as he sticks the needle through.

My stomach churns, and I shake, a cold sweat hitting me as he pulls the thread through. I bite my bottom lip until I taste blood. “Noah,” I sob.

It fucking hurts. I want Jake. They don’t know what they’re doing. Isn’t there a super glue thing now? You know, where you glue your skin together?

Kaleb pulls the thread tight, a searing snake bite hitting my arm, and I clench my teeth, tears hanging and threatening to fall.

Fuck.

Noah hands me the bottle again, but I push it away. My stomach is warm, and I feel the lightness in my head, but I’m about to fucking throw up.

I take deep breaths, inhaling and exhaling and trying to calm my damn stomach, but Kaleb sticks the needle through my flesh again, and I can feel the blood spilling down my arm as white hot pain shoots off through my body.

“Please” I cry. “Please stop.”

I shove him away, trying to get his hand off my arm. I can’t do this. We have to wait. Jake will know what to do. I can’t do this. I won’t lay eyes on a doctor for five more months. What if the pain never goes away? What if it doesn’t heal?

I pry his hand off. “Get off me,” I growl. “It hurts!”

He stands up, and before I know I can tell what’s happening, his hand whips across my face, and my neck twists so hard, a tendon nearly snaps.

My eyes pop wide, my mouth falls open, and I stop crying, pulling in a breath as I sit there, my ears ringing and my body frozen.

What the fuck?

He hit me.

He hit me!

He plants his fists on the sides of my thighs and leans down into my face, and it takes a moment to get my bearings again because the room is spinning.