Page 15 of Prey

I shake his hand off my arm and snort, continuing out the door. Pushing the button to open the garage, I swing my legover my bike and make it before the door even opens all the way, ducking under it on my way out. Kadi is only a few seconds behind me.

Well, he’s gonna have to wait a while because I’m not stopping till I’m damn good and ready. I didn’t put my helmet on before I left but I don’t care. At this point if I wrecked and cracked my head open it would probably be a good thing. There haven’t been many times in my life that I thought my dying would just be better for everyone around me. But there have been a few.

I used to cut myself as a teenager. Kadi’s mom caught me one day. I’ll never forget the look of pain in her eyes when she realized what I was doing. They had me admitted for a few days to talk to someone. Though it really did no good. No one will ever make me think what happened to my parents was out of my control.

I still have scars on my arms but I’ve covered them with tattoos over the years.

They shoved me into the crawl space under the floor. We had prepared for this, so I knew what to do. But they were always supposed to go with me. I watched them until I couldn’t watch anymore, until it was too dangerous to stay, and I crawled the rest of the way out and ran to Kadi’s house.

I should have run and got help, but all I could do was watch them fight for their lives just to die anyway. All to make sure I was safe. They were true mates too. Fated love.

I’m just so tired.

Tired of being alone, tired of hating myself for not being able to protect my parents or being able to save them. Now my best friend is mated to one of the people I hate the most in the world. But do I really hate her?

My body shakes with rage, hurt, and pain and I feel tears on my face as I ride.

I’m crying?

Anger boils inside of me and I pick up the pace, going close to a hundred, while Kadi tries to catch up behind me. The wind whips my long curly hair around, having come out of the tie a way back. A large chunk of my hair suddenly sticks to my face where it's wet and I miss the corner and my bike starts flipping.

KADI

I watch, helpless, as Ethan’s bike begins to flip end over end. Racing toward him, I park my bike and run to where he lands, taking my helmet off as I go.

He isn’t moving.

Whipping my phone out I call for an ambulance and kneel on the ground next to him. He looks broken. There’s a large gash on the front of his head. Blood is everywhere. One of his arms is broken and I don’t like the way his leg looks. No road rash thankfully, as he bit it at the curve in the road, but there are large boulders here and he hit a couple of them when he was flipping.

“Hello, nine-one-one what’s your emergency?”

The operator’s voice sounds tinny in my ear, like they are far away, or maybe I’m just in shock seeing my best friend like this.

Clearing my throat I say, “There's been an accident. Highway 74 West, just a couple miles out on the right hand side, mile marker 17. One motorcycle. He flipped about five times and is still unconscious. Head wound, broken arm, and possibly leg. Lion shifter.”

“I’ll get someone right out to you, just stay on the line with me until they get there, okay?”

We have a special unit that comes for supes with healers instead of paramedics. Their healing powers don’t work on humans. Only other supernaturals. So, they get the paramedics and we get the healers.

Each race of supes has their own type of healers. They’re the same race but separate offshoots. Witch healers can work on anyone. Shifter healers can only work on other shifters.

I swipe his hair out of his face, unsticking the chunk from over his eye. Was he crying? Is that how this happened? Ethan, Ethan, what the hell man? I knew this was all going to be hard on him, but it kinda seems like he may have spent all night stewing on this. Me telling him Shasta is my mate was probably the straw that broke the camel's back.

Great. This is basically my fault, though it’s his fault in a way too. He knows better than to ride with no helmet. That’s why he always grabs one. The one time he doesn’t, this happens. Something isn’t adding up here.

“Sir, they’re about five minutes away, just hang tight. How’s his pulse?”

Putting the phone on speaker I lay it on the ground next to me. I very gently turn Ethan onto his back so that I can check his pulse. Being a shifter, something like this usually won’t kill us, but we can be knocked unconscious just like anyone else, though it doesn’t last long.

Gods dammit, what the hell was he thinking? His pulse isn’t very strong but it’s not super weak either so I can breathe a little easier.

“It’s midrange, I guess. Not strong but not weak. He just isn’t waking up.”

“What’s his name? I’m going to let the unit know so they can try to get him talking after they get there.”

“Ethan Lejon.” I make sure to spell and pronounce it correctly so that they aren’t calling him Le John. “It’s pronounced Le-yon,” I tell her. I hear a gasp on the other end of the line. She must know who he is then.

“O-okay, got it. They’re almost there sir. I’ll let you go now and relay this over to them.”

---