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“Khaos, we have to go.”
My dad tries pulling on my arm, but I shake him off.
“Boy, you—”
“I can’t!” I shout at his face before lowering my voice for my sleeping princess. “She’s scared to be alone.”
I’m not sure when he leaves, if he leaves, all I can focus on is Kota.
Wiping the hair away from her pale face, I talk to her.
“You’re supposed to have my babies. You don’t know that but I do. We’re gonna have a daughter one day. A little girl that’s just a tiny bit of me and a whole lot of…” My body shudders, making my breath catch. “You. She’s gonna be perfect, just like you. The best this world has to offer. So if you don’t want to fight for me, fight for her. Fight for our daughter, Silver. She can’t exist if you don’t. I need her to exist, okay? I do. But more than that, I need you to exist. I need you here with me. I need to wake up next to your beautiful face every morning and fall asleep with my nose in your hair every night.” I inhale that hair now. “You wanna see unwavering, Kota? I’m not letting you go. I never fucking will. Come back to me.”
Uniforms flood the foyer, then I’m being pulled away. I keep going though, promising to wait for her. As long as it takes, I’ll be here. I’ve got forever. Just wake up. That’s all she has to do is wake up.
Come back to me, Kota.
Come back.
Everything hurts but from a distance. It’s like there’s a picket fence barrier, with pain just on the other side, slowly seeping through.
I should stretch. It’s been a while since I performed, so if I’m this sore after last night’s game, I need to make some major improvements.
Lifting my back off the bed, I’m hit with a debilitating wave that has me sinking back down.
“Ow!” I cry out.
“That’s what you get for moving.”
What is my mom doing in my room?
Oh, God. That means she knows about Khaos’s renovation project.
I crack one eye before immediately closing it due to the intense brightness. Did she open my curtains? Why is it so bright in here?
A couple flutters of my lashes later, I’m opening both eyes, finding—
Machines and tubes and a different kind of curtain. There’s also a beeping I didn’t notice until this moment.
So…not my bedroom.
I whip my head to the side, then wince, both at the discomfort and the laptop looking back at me. I’m in the hospital and she’s working.
“Mom?”
She peeks over it, her eyebrows pinched together. “What?”
“Um.” I swallow. “What am I doing here?”
“Recovering from surgery.”
“What kind of surgery?”
“Shoulder. For the gunshot. Honestly, Kota, how do you forget that?”
Gunshot. That one word brings everything back up. The home invasion, the calls, the confrontation, the execution. Attempted execution anyway, because I managed to get in front of Khaos in time.
Khaos.
