Page 34 of Volatile King (The Kings of Wayward Academy #6)

T heo

“Ren, look at me. Ren,” I said, grabbing a hold of her as she looked around like she couldn’t see what was in front of her.

My heart was racing faster than it ever had while I was on a bike. I knew there was a chance that coming by here would jog a memory, but I’d never imagined that it could do this to her.

She grabbed her head as Mr. Genovese’s men ran over.

“Theo?”

“I’ve got you. You’re okay.”

She didn’t struggle, but she was jerking around like her body was reliving what I could only assume was the crash. I held her tight to help her feel grounded and to make sure she didn’t run into the road or something else I couldn’t anticipate. Keeping her safe came first.

Her head fell back, and then she pitched to the side. I clung to her as she lurched toward the ditch.

“Ren? I’ve got you. If you can hear me, it’s going to be okay.”

Her eyes slowly turned to mine, but then her legs gave out, and I caught her before she hit the ground.

“Dad,” she suddenly yelled. “No! Dad,” Ren screamed and then blacked out.

Picking Ren up, I directed the guards.

“We need to get to the hospital now.”

We ran across the road, and I hopped into the back of the waiting SUV, holding Ren to my chest as the driver closed the door. She was twitching and mumbling, but there were no coherent sentences.

“What about your motorcycle,” the second guard asked as they floored it and drove around my parked bike.

“Can you put it on a trailer and take it to the house?”

He nodded and spoke into an earpiece.

I smoothed Ren’s hair back from her face and ran my thumb over her cheek. Fumbling with the pocket inside my jacket, I managed to pull out my phone. As soon as the facial recognition was accepted, I hit Nash’s number.

“What’s wrong,” he asked without a hello. “One sec.”

“Mr. Collier, put your phone away…where are you going?” I could hear one of the teachers in the background.

“Okay, I’m out in the hall.”

“Ren was having a rough day, so I took her for a ride. We were passing the spot of the accident, and she dissociated.”

“What does that mean,” Nash asked.

“It means her memories may have come back, or at least some of them. She was yelling for her dad, but then she blacked out. I’m on the way to the hospital with her.”

“Fuck, is she okay?”

“I think she will be, but I’m not taking any chances,” I said.

“On my way.” The phone clicked in my ear.

A minute later, her eyes began to flutter open.

“Theo?”

“Just lie still, we’re on our way to the hospital,” I said. She squeezed her eyes closed and buried her face inside my open jacket. “Is the light hurting your eyes?” She nodded.

“Here.” The guard in the passenger seat pulled the sunglasses off his face and handed them back.

“Thanks.”

Ren put them on, but even with her awake, the lingering fear still had me in a chokehold. My hand moved up and down her arm to help her feel grounded.

“You’re safe. Everything is going to be fine. I’m right here with you. Just try to relax,” I said as we turned down the street toward the hospital.

It didn’t take long to reach the emergency room. The guards hopped out and opened the door for me.

“Can…walk,” Ren said, but I shook my head.

“Nope, you’re not getting your way this time,” I said, getting out with her in my arms. She didn’t argue and held onto my neck, telling me she wasn’t up for the fight.

As soon as the nurse saw us at the admitting station, she got up and waved us through to a room.

“We got a call that you were on your way,” she said. I nodded. It was either Nash or Mr. Genovese. It really didn’t matter who, as long as she was seen right away. “Doctor Boyd is in the hospital today and has been paged.”

“Thank you,” I said, and noticed the two guards had followed us and were now outside the examination room door.

Nash was an asshole for lying and hiding shit from us. And I really hated that Ren still didn’t know what Nash had pulled, but I had to admit that having the extra backup was a huge bonus.

After laying Ren down on the bed, I sat beside her and linked our fingers.

“Accident,” Ren said softly as she reached for the sunglasses and slowly pulled them off her face. Her eyes found mine, a shimmer of tears barely contained. “Accident.”

“Just wait until the doctor gets here,” I said, leaning over and kissing her forehead. I closed my eyes and tried not to think about how close we’d just come to disaster.

“Ren, you’re back. What happened,” Doctor Boyd asked, walking in and squirting sanitizer from the dispenser on his hands as he spoke.

“Accident…car…Mom cold…water scared…Dad…scream…breathe no…dark,” Ren said.

Boyd looked at me.

“I don’t know what she means,” I said.

Ren took a deep breath, frustration written all over her face.

“We were out on my motorcycle, riding down a road, when Ren told me to stop. She got off and looked around, but then went into some sort of trance before she blacked out.”

“I see,” Boyd said.

Ren tugged her hand away from mine and started to sign. Unlike earlier, when she was calm, the movements were not as clear and were in the wrong order. I had to piece the sentence back together as she went.

“She said that she remembers two accidents.”

Ren nodded.

“Two? Can you tell me when they were?”

Ren closed her eyes and signed more slowly.

One when I was young. I don’t know my age, but we were in water. The other on Halloween.

I translated for the doctor as we went through his questions.

“Okay. That’s good. What do you remember from Halloween?”

Jesus, she’d been in two accidents and remembered neither until now. How much trauma could one person endure? Every little detail she recalled seemed to hurt her, and as much as I wanted Ren to remember, it pained me to see her suffering all over again.

O nce the doctor was done asking questions, he told her to rest, and she almost immediately fell asleep.

I heard Nash and the rest of the guys before I saw them, their shoes loud as they echoed down the hall. Getting up, I closed Ren’s door, and they stopped just short of me.

“I filled them in on what you already told me. How is she,” Nash asked.

“She remembers Halloween. But she has also been dreaming of another accident, which seems to be a repressed memory from when she was a kid.”

“Not to be a dick, but what were ya doin’ with her out on a motorcycle?” Myles crossed his arms as he glared at me. “She hasn’t even been out of the hospital a month.”

“She was having a rough day. We were going slow and had escorts,” I said, his accusatory tone putting me on the defensive.

“Aye, and what would ya have done if she had this…” Myles pointed at Ren’s door. “Episode thing when she was still on the bike? What if ya were still movin’? What the fuck were ya thinkin’?”

He just had to say out loud what I was already thinking. I kept picturing her falling off the bike and hitting her head.

“Theo wouldn’t purposely put Ren’s life in danger,” Liam said, defending me.

“And yet he did,” Blake said, and I glared at my brother.

“Enough. Fighting isn’t going to help anyone. Yes, it was dangerous. But if Ren has her memories back then, maybe it’s for the best. We can just be thankful that she is safe and that nothing more serious happened,” Nash said, shocking me.

Of everyone, I thought he would be the one to want to put me through a wall.

“Where is the doctor,” Nash asked.

“He said he would be back shortly. Ren is sleeping.”

“I’m going in to see her.” Myles walked by me, glaring the entire time.

Fuck…what the hell had I been thinking?