The phone call with Satriano…
Talking with Gage…
Morning at his place after being up all night…
Riding down in the elevator…
Arriving at the club…
Stepping into the parking lot on the way to lunch…
“Oh, God…” It hits me suddenly, the same way the blast did. Blindsided. Then blackness. “An explosion.”
I open my eyes and Mom nods.
“Yes. You’re going to be okay, though.” She presses her lips together, swallowing thickly to hide the emotion I can see in her gaze. “A severe concussion. You’ve been out for a while.”
“What’s a while?”
All sense of time is gone.
The memories still not lining up properly.
Like they got thrown in a blender and dumped into a glass and now I’m trying to pick out tiny pieces and arrange them back in an order that makes sense.
She glances over her shoulder to look at the clock on the wall, her lips twisting before her focus comes back to me. “Eight hours.”
What?
“Eight hours?”
My brain struggles to piece together everything, to process what she just told me and the bits of memory.
The bright sunlight…
Gage leaning against the SUV, talking to Luca…
Dad about to get into his car…
Savage, Gabe, Isaac, Coen, and Stone only a few feet away from us…
The world exploding in a crash of light and sound…
“Is-is everyone else okay?”
The way her brow furrows, I can tell that she doesn’t want to give me the truth. She wants to hold back, save me from the pain of whatever it is that’s too hard to say. “Mom? Is everyone okay?”
She swallows thickly, clutching my hand tightly. “Savage has a few broken ribs and a wicked concussion like yours. He was unconscious for a while but woke up a bit ago. Gabe suffered some physical injuries and hasn’t woken up yet, but they’ve done an MRI and there seems to only be some mild brain bleeding they’re hoping will resolve itself on its own.”
Oh, God…
“But Stone, Isaac, Coen, and Dad are all fine, just shaken up and sore.”
I release a relieved breath for them, but it catches in my chest thinking about Savage and Gabe. “Good. I mean…”
She smiles softly. “I know what you mean.”
Warm blue eyes flash through my head…
