The large uniformed officers pulled her away, and even as she moved out of my line of sight, the emotions she’d been projecting seemed to linger, seeping into my bones until I was shaking too. I couldn’t process everything that’d happened to me, everything I had just learned. I hurt everywhere, from the inside to the outside, and the world around me seemed too bright and chaotic.
Finn squeezed my hand hard as I was lifted onto a stretcher, and a moment later, Mason and Elijah were at my side too. None of them looked too badly beat up, although Mason had a purple bruise on the side of his face and Elijah had a smear of blood across his cheek. Hands held onto me, keeping me from flying apart, and when one of the paramedics seemed to suggest I might need space, Mason actually growled at him.
I clung to them harder, begging them in slurred words not to leave me.
Because I didn’t need space.
I needed their hands.
Their warmth.
Their presence.
They held me together as I slipped under a black wave.
When I woke again, I was in a hospital bed.
Mason, Elijah, and Finn were all gathered on one side of the large bed, and as I blinked myself awake, glancing around the room, I saw two empty chairs on my other side, and a bed next to them.
Cole rested in it, his bruised face smooth and almost peaceful in sleep.
But he’s here. He’s here. That means he’s…
“…alive.”
The word scratched out past my raw throat, and the three Princes’ heads whipped up as they realized I was awake.
“Yeah.” Finn sat up straighter, resting a hand on my good leg. “You’re alive, Legs. We’ve got you.”
“No.” I shook my head, the small movement making the room spin a little. “Cole. Is he…?”
“He’s okay,” Mason said in a low voice, his eyes glittering. His entire body was rigid, as if someone had taken all of his muscles and bones and replaced them with unyielding steel. “He’ll live too.”
“With a shitload of stitches and a badass scar,” Finn added with a half-smile, but his eyes still had that hollow look from earlier.
“Your grandparents are here.” Elijah leaned forward in his chair. “They just stepped outside for a bit. They both came as soon as they heard what happened.”
“Are your parents…?”
He nodded, tugging his lip between his teeth. “They got arrested, yeah. I dunno what the fuck’s gonna happen.”
“My dad did too.” Finn shook his head, looking both furious and crushed. “He wasn’t there today, but that doesn’t mean he’s innocent in all this shit. They were all fucking accomplices.”
I remembered Mason and Cole’s dads talking about calling Mr. Whittaker, and how the man had refused to come. He may have been trying to keep his hands clean when it came to me, but had he been so judicious when it came to my mom’s murder? When it came to Adam Pierce?
“My car,” I muttered. “It wasn’t Adena. It was—”
“We know.” Mason’s jaw clenched. “I… called her. The shit she said at prom? She was talking about keying your car. You must not have noticed the scratches when you got in to drive to Finn’s house that day. That’s all she did. The ones who tried to kill you were—”
He broke off, and the same pain I often saw flare when he talked about his mom burned behind his eyes—as if he had too much anger and hurt inside him and no idea what to do with it, where to put it.
I reached for his hand, and as our fingers laced together, a new thought occurred to me. Cole had been sent out with his sister, according to their father, but I hadn’t seen her at the warehouse.
“Penny! Is she okay?”
“Yeah.” Elijah nodded, running a hand through his hair, leaving the ends mussed and disheveled. “She and Cole were at the mini-golf place. They’ve been there enough times that she knows the staff, so he left her there when he went to try to find you. She’s with a neighbor now. Same with Meredith and Sebastian—I’ve got people watching them. I’ll… explain everything to them later.”
A little ball of tension loosened in my chest. Then I shook my head, making the room spin again. “How did… how did Cole know anything was wrong? He didn’t send me those texts telling me to come over. His dad did, from his phone. Then he deleted them.”