Page 99 of Wherever You Are

He walks ahead of me and grabs car keys out of the bowl.

“What are you doing?” I ask, my voice softer.

“Playing Jenga,” he says, sarcasm on his lips. “I’m driving you to the goddamn airport. Unless you think you can make it there on your own.”

Right now, I feel like I can barely make it to the door. I’ll take this handout. As long as it gets me closer to Willow, I’ll take whatever I can get.

We drop Maximoff off at Ryke and Daisy’s, and then Lo exits the neighborhood. Paparazzi immediately tail us. The sun has set, and darkness clings to the sky. A cameraman hangs out of a Hyundai’s window and starts snapping pictures at an excessive rate.

Click click click.

Flash flash flash.

The bright light is blinding in the dark. It’s dangerous as fuck. Lo barely blinks, too used to it all, and he keeps both hands tight on the wheel. He’d probably be cursing them out if his kids were in the car.

“Pretty sure there has to be a law against that,” I mutter under my breath. I really don’t know if there is, but I’m just glad when his bodyguard’s security vehicle rides up and blocks the paparazzi van. We ride side-by-side with the Escalade.

Our car bumps over a pothole, and I grimace and try my best not to vomit all over Loren’s leather seats.

Fuck.

I have a high pain tolerance, built up over the years, but this is different. A part of me just wants to crawl into the fetal position and cry. Maybe then the pain will stop.

The stabbing in my stomach is a constant companion. The knife goes in and out. In and out and death seems imminent.

I’ll die after I see her.

I hang my head. Arms wrapped around my stomach. Lo doesn’t talk much as he drives to the airport. But I sense him glancing at me, and he slips out his phone at a stop light to text. Probably checking on his kids.

My head spins, dizzy from the pain and I blow out steady, controlled breaths.

The car starts up again, and when Lo turns the corner, I see the sign to Philly General Hospital. Ambulances pass us, and Lo pulls up to the emergency room.

“No, no, no,” I say quickly. “I’m fuckingfi…” I put my hand over my mouth to stop myself from blowing chunks.

Lo parks and quickly hops out of the car. Not sure when we lost the paparazzi but they’re MIA. His bodyguard and another big burly security guy flank him immediately.

“I’m not asking,” Lo tells me as he opens my door. “So either you get out of the car, or I carry you out.”

I don’t have the energy to reply. I’m half here. Half gone to the pain. I barely step onto the pavement before my legs buckle. Someone yells for a wheelchair. It all feels overly dramatic as hell, and I hate it. Too many eyes on me.Weak shit. I hear my brothers.

Fuck.

My head is off my shoulders. Up in the clouds. I don’t know how I enter the hospital, but someone shoves a blue plastic bag underneath my chin. I vomit.

“Yeah, we’re here,” Lo says, cell pressed to his ear. “They’re bringing him back now…” I lose time and focus. Lo squeezes my shoulder, I think. So I know he’s still here with me.

I’m on some hospital bed and the nausea has subsided enough for the pain in my stomach to come back full-force. I’m seconds away from curling into a tiny ball, and when a doctor comes in to check on me, I can’t say much but a few moans and grunts.

A nurse starts an IV, and I hear something aboutoxy. Maybe that’s just in my head though. Hopeful thinking.

All I know is that I can’t die here. Not without seeing her one last time.

Everyone leaves.

That’s when it starts getting easier to breathe. Only for some reason, I can only do it through my nose. Otherwise I feel like hurling again.

Lo watches me. “I don’t know if you heard—”