“Reid,” I whisper, realising I can’t move until he gets off.When he doesn’t answer, I nudge him, getting no response.“Reid?”
Still no response.
If he wasn’t like a dead weight on me, I would think I had missed his reply.But he hasn’t moved, not even a flinch at the loud bangs echoing around us.He’s just still.
I try to wriggle free, panic engulfing me.“Reid?Reid?”I scream.“Oh my god!”
Please be okay.
Please be okay.
Jaxon kneels down next to me, fear clouding his vision as he rolls Reid off me.I turn to Reid immediately, my panic becoming hysterical.Blood is running down his cheek, his complexion ashen.“Someone call an ambulance.”My hearing clears a little, enough for me to hear the panic of those who have ran out of their homes.
“We need to move him,” Jaxon orders.I know he says more, but my focus is on Reid.
“We can’t move him.It might cause more damage,” I stress, and realise he isn’t talking to me; he’s talking to one of the triplets.
Whichever triplet it is reaches down, placing their arms under Reid’s armpits, and starts to drag him away from the house.Jaxon reaches for me, and I numbly follow, ignoring the sounds still going off behind me.
Liam is standing near my car, his hands linked on top of his head as he stares at the destruction of his home.
I follow Reid and whichever triplet has him.Once he lowers him on the grass in another garden, I sit down next to Reid, placing his head in my lap.
This can’t be real.
It can’t be.
Jaxon kneels down in front of me, reaching for my face.“Are you listening?”he asks.
“W-what?”
His gaze softens.“Summer, you can’t tell the police you knew.”
“I didn’t.I mean, I did, but I didn’t,” I rasp, and I would have gone back to looking at the house but Jaxon doesn’t let me turn my head.
“You can’t tell themanything.You came to visit Reid, okay?They don’t need to know anything else.Do you understand?”
I don’t, but I do at the same time.
Katherine is responsible for this.
I nod.“Yes.I won’t say anything.”
His phone rings.He pulls it out of his back pocket, his brows pinching together as he glances at the screen.
“Paisley?”he greets.
I vaguely hear her hysterical cries, but not enough to make out what she’s saying.Not until...“It just blew up.Todd was trying to figure out what was wrong with it, when it just went boom, throwing him across the drive.”
“Is he okay?”he demands.
More sniffles echo over the line.“Mum is on the phone to the ambulance service.He’s pretty banged up.”
“We have our own situation going on here, Paisley, but we will be back as soon as we can.In the meantime, call Landon home, get Mum, and stay away from the businesses until we get back.”
He ends the call and I meet his gaze.“What is happening?”I whisper.
“Black,” he replies, his tone hard, unforgiving, and lethal.
