Honor

When the car came back down, it landed on the roof and everything crunched down around me like I was on the inside of a trash compactor. The noise was deafening and the impact was enough to rattle all of my bones. The top of my head collided with the concave metal—hard—and everything instantly went foggy and out of focus. I felt shards of glass shatter around me and pierce my skin. I had to blink blood out of my eyes as my vision started to get blurry. My head really hurt and everything was the wrong way, but I could smell gasoline and the copper scent of my own blood, so I knew I was still alive . . . at least for now. I tried to move so that I could release the seat belt, but the car had crunched so far down that this was impossible. I groaned and lifted a hand to the blood liberally flowing over my face.

I couldn’t move. I was stuck upside down in the mangled mess of my car because someone had run me off the road. I groaned as my vision started to fade to black.

I heard someone call my name in a frantic voice and realized it had to be Key. I wanted to yell at her to stay in her car and just head to my house in the woods where it was safe, but I couldn’t make words work. My tongue felt too thick in my mouth and my thoughts were fighting through a bunch of darkness and haze in the effort to become speech.

“Nassir! Are you okay? Oh my God, that SUV ran you off the road!”

Suddenly her face was in the window and I had to squint to see her clearly. Her gray eyes were taking up most of her face and her usual sexy sneer was replaced by pinched concern. “You’re bleeding. Bad.”

I couldn’t reply, so I just closed my eyes and then startled when I felt her fingers tap against my cheek, at first softly, but when I refused to open my eyes she used more force.

“None of that. I called 911. They’ll be here any second to get you out of there. Just hang in there.” She sounded scared and really worried.

I sighed and turned into her touch. It felt really nice.

“Why didn’t you just outrun that SUV, Nassir? As much as this car cost, I know it goes faster than that ordinary piece of junk.”

She was stroking my cheek and I knew she was talking mostly to keep me awake and alert, but all I wanted to do was close my eyes. My head really hurt and it was starting to throb.

“Didn’t want them to . . . hit . . . you . . . let them hit me.” The words were slurred and I wasn’t sure I got them out in the right order. I shuddered a little when she brushed her thumb along my bottom lip. I wished I could move my hands and that I wasn’t hanging upside down.

“Jesus, Nassir. You can’t do something that chivalrous and thoughtful and then die on me. Keep those eyes open.”

I thought I heard sirens, but maybe it was just the ringing in my ears. I must have let my eyes drift all the way closed because my cheek stung as she full-on smacked me across it and barked my name in a panicked tone.

I peeled my lids open and tried to reassure her. “The devil doesn’t die, Key. He just goes back home.” Hell was always waiting.

Getting the words out took the last of my energy and I couldn’t fight the darkness that was waiting to drag me under anymore.

Chapter 9

Keelyn

It took two paramedics and a uniformed police officer to pull me away from the car. I was freaking out and not thinking rationally because Nassir had blacked out, and I couldn’t tell if his chest was still rising and falling. He was covered in blood and the car looked like a crushed soda can. He was too still, and if he wasn’t giving me hell, then I knew something was really, really wrong with him. I decided if I took my eyes off him and couldn’t touch him, he was going to be taken away from me forever, and that sent me into a full-fledged panic attack.

I was on my knees in the mud holding Nassir’s pretty, bloodied face in my hands and saying his name over and over again when help arrived. He stopped responding to me and I didn’t want to let him go, but the first responders thought I was in the way. The paramedics pulled me to my feet and handed me off to the cop as the fire department made their way down the hill carrying some kind of heavy-duty equipment that they were going to use to cut him out of the crumpled metal surrounding him.

“Is he breathing? I couldn’t tell if he was breathing.” I sounded frantic and kind of crazy, but the cop just kept hauling me away from the carnage up the embankment and toward where I had left the Honda parked askew on the side of the road. The lights from the sirens cast everything in an eerie light and I balked a little when I saw another cop putting a middle-aged woman in the back of a police car.

“Let the first responders get him out and then I’ll make sure to get you an update on his condition. It’s a shame. That’s a really nice car.”

I cut him a look and crossed my arms over my chest. The cop just lifted his eyebrows at me. “What? I’ve been on the streets since day one on patrol. I know all about Nassir Gates. Can’t say I’m surprised a deranged lady tried to run him off the road. Lots of people want a piece of him for one reason or another.”

I looked over at the hobbled SUV with the smashed-in front end and then over to the dejected woman in the back of the police car. I had no idea who she was, but she looked like the president of the PTA or a suburban mom. She definitely didn’t look like the type of person that would have a grudge against Nassir or be crazed enough to try to kill him.

“Who is she? Why did she run him off the road?” I asked the question but it was almost drowned out by the screech of metal as they started pulling the car from around the injured man. I went to bolt back down the hill but the cop grabbed my elbow and held me in place.