I’m in a hospital bed.
“What the fuck is going on?” I yank my hand out of hers. I hate to be touched, and she fucking knows it.
“You were in an accident. You’re going to be all right.” Aria’s voice is calm, as it always is, but her eyes darting over to Lukas tell a different story. She glances over to Lukas again and then flicks her gaze towards the door. “Go and find the doctor,” she tells him. He looks at me for a moment and then nods at her before disappearing from my view.
I turn back to my aunt. She looks so distraught that I almost feel bad for wrenching my hand away from her. Almost.
“What the fuck’s going on?” I ask her. Behind her, white blinds cover the window, but the sun is visible through the slats. The sun seems out of place to me. Like it shouldn’t be there right now, because just a few minutes ago I was driving Katie home in the dark. My head snaps back to Aria.
“Katie … where’s Katie?”
Tears start to pool and shimmer in her eyes as she grabs ahold of my hand again. I notice her eyes shift to the door and then back to me.
“Vandal … honey …” Her voice cracks, and she covers her mouth with her hand, struggling to compose herself. Aria is a woman that reeks of elegance and class. A famed romance author, she is never at a loss for words and always knows the right thing to say at the right time. I secretly admire her, and envy her sons for having such an amazing woman for a mother. Unlike the crack-whore who spat me out.
“Aria, where the fuck is my daughter?” The fear building in me is so intense that I can actually hear it. It’s a roar in my ears and in my brain, attempting to drown my own thoughts out of my head. “Where the fuck is she?” I scream at her.
She shakes her head, tears falling down her cheeks. “She didn’t make it,” she whispers.
No.
No. No. No.
“You tell me where my daughter is.” My voice comes out in a raspy, nasty whisper. My chest is heaving in and out uncontrollably, yet I feel as if I can’t breathe.
Lukas comes back into the room with a doctor and a nurse following him. I reach for my younger brother and grab his arm hard. “Lukas, where’s Katie? She’s in the waiting room, right? Out there? Can you bring her in here?”
The doctor steps forward. “Mr. Valentine, I’m so sorry—”
I interrupt him before he can finish. “I’m talking to my fucking brother.” I turn back to Lukas, and he’s slowly shaking his head. His hair falls into his face, but not before I see that he’s crying.
“Please, just bring her to me, Lukas … she’s gotta be scared … she’s okay, right?” My head is spinning and I grip the sheets, trying to ground myself. She can’t be gone. This is just like that time she wandered off at the mall and was lost for ten minutes. I felt this same exact fear then, but she came back. She’ll come back again.
“Vandal, she’s gone.”
“Shut the fuck up, Lukas!” I turn to the doctor, my pulse racing. The machines I’m hooked up to start beeping and flashing like a 1980s arcade game. “Just bring me my fucking daughter, please.”