THIRTY-TWO
JACKSON
I cradle her in my arms, running through groups of people, not caring who I push out of my way.
“I’m confirming that emergency services have been called,” Derrick, one of the security team who has been shadowing us, says as he jogs up beside me.
“If they’re not here by the time I get out there, I’m taking a car myself.”
“I advise against that. We should wait for medical personnel.”
“I’m not waiting if she’ll just get worse,” I bark.
Deer stirs against my chest, but when I glance down, her eyes are still shut.
“Deer, come on, stay awake.”
She mutters something incoherent, lips barely moving. She’s like a ragdoll; there’s no conscious thought in her.
“Fuck, this is not good.”
I push my legs to move faster, ignoring the burn and instead using it to fuel my muscles. The pain in my body distracts me from the pain in my heart.
I don’t understand what happened. One minute she was fine, the next it was like someone accidentally kicked the power cord and her entire body shut down.
She said she was tired. I should’ve pushed her to stay back.
But I was excited to spend time with her.
God, why did I have to be so selfish?
“I have confirmation that the ambulances are just down the street.”
“As in more than one?”
Fuck. They must think something is seriously wrong with her if they’ve sent multiple. My heart begins to crack.
“No, there’s, well.” Derrick clears his throat.
“There’s what?”
The guy is a lot fitter than I gave him credit for; he’s in a full suit and keeping pace with me without breaking a sweat. It’s impressive.
“I’m not sure it’s appropriate to tell you, given your current mental state.”
“Well, my mental state isn’t really going to matter if you’re fired. Now, is it?”
I take it back. It isn’t that impressive. We can replace him.
“A second ambulance was called for Mr. Covington.”
My steps falter on the last step I’m climbing, but Derrick anticipates my reaction and reinforces my weight by grabbing my elbow. I stop, facing him.
“What do you mean?”
“It appears he is also unwell.”
“Is it the same as Deer? Is he conscious?”
Was there something in the food? No. No, she didn’t end up eating last night. Maybe it was something from today? But that wouldn’t make sense. Our schedules didn’t sync up; she had the cosplay competition, and we were at the showcase for a few hours before the meet and greet.
“I don’t have the full information yet, but Mr. Knight is escorting him.”
“Shit.”
I pick up my pace again, really sprinting this time. It isn’t that much farther to go now.
As soon as I break through the doors to the valet circle, I see Sydney burst out on the opposite end.
“Everyone, move out of the way.” Her voice explodes over the people crowding the ambulances. “Move, or so help me God, I will do everything in my legal power to make you regret it.”
Aleks comes jogging out with Parker on his back. He is definitely awake, but I wouldn’t go so far as to say he’s lucid. Parker looks the same as he did two years ago when he made a bet that he could drink an entire magnum of champagne in under an hour.
I’m torn, wanting to check on him and see what the situation is, but also, I’m not going to leave Deer’s side. Parker is my brother, but Deer is something more.
“Is this the other patient?” The emergency responder meets me halfway.
“Yes, she’s going in and out of consciousness.”
“For how long?”
“I want to say the last fifteen minutes or so, but she wasn’t well a bit before that.”
Another responder comes to remove her from my arms, but I can’t bring myself to release her.
“Sir, I need you to let go. We need to move her into the ambulance for transfer and to check her vitals.”
I relinquish my hold, passing her to the waiting responder.
“Can I come?”
The first responder hesitates, looking me over.
“I’m her boyfriend.”
“Fine, you can sit in the passenger seat.”
I want to argue, want to sit in the back so I can hold her hand, but I don’t want to push and get banned entirely. So, I give her a terse nod and slip into the front where the driver is waiting.
I peer over my seat through the grates, watching as they load Deer onto the gurney and push up the sleeve of her sweatshirt so they can take her blood pressure.
They’re trying to speak to her, trying to get her to respond, but they only manage to pull a single moan from her before she’s out cold again.
“You said symptoms only began fifteen minutes ago?” The first responder glances up at me.
“That’s when she started to get really bad, but,” I try to think back, piecing together every little detail, “she didn’t seem well for the last half hour or so.”
“Can you elaborate? Was she feeling nauseous, dizzy, sluggish? Maybe having difficulty remembering things?”
“She was dizzy and tripping over things, said it was just from being tired.” My voice cracks a little as guilt rears its ugly head.
I watch as they shine a light in her eyes.
“Does your girlfriend wear contacts?”
“Yes.”
It takes them a second to remove them before they shine the light again. The entire time it feels like there’s a hundred elephants stampeding all over my chest, crushing me over and over again.
“Has she taken any drugs today?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
I mean, I wasn’t with her all day, so no, I wasn’t one hundred percent sure. But I’ve known Deer for years. She doesn’t even smoke weed, as far as I know.
“Sir? You won’t get into any trouble. I just need you to tell me the truth so I can help her.”
“She doesn’t take drugs.”
The two responders give each other a look.
“What? What’s wrong?”
The second responder keeps monitoring her, but the first one comes closer to the grate, using a voice that would almost be soothing if it didn’t feel like I was about to jump out of my skin. “Is there any chance someone could have slipped her drugs?”
“What?”
Ice rains down on me, causing every nerve to go haywire.
“I’m just trying to check each possibility. It could have been in a drink or maybe even food? Can you think of anything?”
“I—I wasn’t with her all day, I don’t know.”
“Okay.” She nods her head and returns to her colleague, with a hushed tone. “Call ahead and get them to prep for a tox screen. This stuff metabolizes fast.”
***
Positive .
The toxicology screen tests positive.
It takes six hours before Parker is coherent again, although the effects are still wreaking havoc on his body.
“This is the worst bloody hangover I’ve had in my life,” he groans.
Deer, however, is still asleep in the bed opposite him. Because of how much smaller she is, they think it’s going to be another couple of hours until the drug flushes from her bloodstream enough for her to come to. Lee is also out cold, sleeping in the armchair as it’s well past 1 a.m.
I continue rubbing my thumb over Deer’s knuckles, needing to remind myself that she’s here, that she’s not in danger anymore.
“Here, drink some more water.” Syd pours Parker what has to be his fourth cup in the last hour.
“No, I feel sick.”
“You need to stay hydrated.”
“That’s what the IV is for, love.”
I watch her hand grip tightly around the glass, and Parker reaches out to steady her.
“Come on, join me on the bed.”
She puts the glass down on the side table and crawls onto the bed.
“You know, this is quite the déjà vu. Two emergency hospital visits in less than six months. Maybe I should see about the family buying up one of them so we’re not giving all our money to the Harts.”
“This is serious, Parker.”
His face sobers and he squeezes her hand. “I know. I just—”
“I know.” She cuts him off and kisses his cheek. “I know.”
They rest their foreheads against one another’s and speak in hushed voices. All the while I’m here with my heart bleeding on the floor. The police came in to take Parker’s statement earlier, and it seems like they might have a few leads, but until Deer wakes up, we’re in a holding pattern.
Because it’s most likely that she was the target, and Parker just got caught in the crossfire.
It makes me want to smash something.
The door to the hospital suite swings open, and Aleks walks in, running his hand through his hair—which is basically standing straight up at this point from the number of times he has made the motion.
“Any news?”
“Maybe. We still have to wait for Deer’s statement before we can confirm.”
“So, they have something?”
“Maybe.”
I stalk over to him, getting right up to his chest. “Don’t fuck with me, Aleksander.”
“I’m not.” He takes a step closer. “But I’m not telling you shit before it’s verified because you’ll go fucking apoplectic.”
“She was fucking drugged,” I growl. “Under our watch.”
“Boys,” Sydney’s cold voice cuts through. “You will not argue in this room.”
“Well, this seems like a party,” a feminine English accent drawls. The owner of the voice places her hands between Aleksander and me, not so gently pushing us apart so she can walk between us. “Hey, lil’ bro.”
“Pheebs.” Parker sits up, eyes lighting up as his eldest sister strolls over.
“You look pretty shit.” She ruffles his hair.
“Gee, thanks.” He bats her hand away. “What’re you doing here? I thought you were headed to London.”
She scoffs. “I had the jet turn around and reroute here. You’re all over the news. I mean, really, Parker, you think people wouldn’t notice a Covington being rushed to the hospital?”
“Wow. I apologize for the inconvenience.”
“It’s fine, Dad’s handling my stuff.” She rests her hip on the metal bedframe and runs her sharp blue gaze over the rest of us. Phoebe Covington has a perpetually icy aura around her, one that screams ‘don’t fuck with me.’ “There’s quite the army of reporters outside.”
“I know,” Sydney groans, running a hand down her face. “They weren’t appeased by my statement.”
“I can get rid of them.”
Syd looks like she is about to refuse, but her shoulders droop. She’s been awake for as long as I have, and the exhaustion has spawned dark circles that make her gray eyes look even more haunted. “Only if it’s not a hassle.”
“It’s not.” She whips out her cell and starts tapping away.
Over the last year, Parker’s sister has fixed our issues in more ways than I can count—from blackmail, to scandals, to stalkers. She might be the current Chief Financial Officer for the Covington conglomerate and the heir to the entire company, but that woman has connections all over the world that surpass even her family. I’ve learned not to look too closely at how blurry the line she walks is.
There’s a short knock at the door, and Aleksander and I spin around. A man I don’t recognize steps into the room, and while I go on high alert, his demeanor has me hesitating. The security team outside wouldn’t let just anyone enter this room; they were under explicit instructions.
Phoebe glides past us and the man leans down to whisper something in her ear. Her eyes narrow to slits. She pulls him closer to the door and they continue to exchange hushed words.
It sets off a million alarm bells in my mind.
Without ever speaking to us, the man leaves. The room rests in silence as we turn to Phoebe.
She walks calmly back through the room, her designer heels clicking across the floor as she makes her way to Deer’s bed. She perches on the edge of the mattress and reaches a hand out, picking up a lock of Deer’s pink hair and studying it thoughtfully as she runs it through her fingers.
“Seems like someone is gunning for you, little one.”