Page 20 of Piece You Saved

In that second, I know whatever reluctance he had about going through with this is gone. Whether he’s now fully taken in Aden’s condition, or he and Dariel were having some kind of silent argument while Harley was distracting me, I don’t know. But he’s doing it.

He’s going to bite Aden.

I tilt my chin up and shake my head. “I’m not going anywhere.”

His brow furrows in a frown. “Angel—”

I plant my feet and stiffen my spine. “I said, no. I’m not going anywhere.”

I’m not sure why he’d even want me to go. He must’ve noticed the state of my neck.

Does he think I don’t know what needs to happen now?

A low chuff that could almost be a laugh drags my attention over Kade’s shoulder to Dariel, who’s still beside Aden’s bed. He’s eyeing the slow-beeping machine attached by a million leads and cables to Aden. I let the squiggly white lines running across the black screen distract me. When the machine stops drawing those lines, it means Aden has stopped breathing.

Is he trying to work out how to turn it off? Or just unplug it?

I glare at him, too, just in case he’s thinking about telling me to leave. “I’m not going anywhere,” I say. “So you can keep your opinions to yourself.”

Dariel refocuses on the ventilator machine. “Stay. Go. Makes no difference to me. Kade, you need to do this now. I think I have this worked out.”

A furious beep erupts from somewhere down the hallway, making me jump. Is someone else in a battle for their life? Three nurses and a doctor dash past our room in a flash of flapping white coats and bright scrubs. I watch them through the glass of the closed door. None of them is Harley. And then the hallway is silent again.

“What if someone comes in?” I ask as I cross over to the door and turn to press my back to it. Luckily, Aden’s room doesn’t come with a window, so the only way a person would see what was going on in here is through the glass I’m blocking.

In the seconds it took me to get to the door and turn my back to it, Kade lost his sweats. My cheeks burn, and I point my eyes at the white ceiling before I can see anything too exciting. Now is most definitelynotthe time for that.

“This won’t take long,” Kade says with enough of a smile in his voice that I know he knows exactly why I’m staring at the ceiling instead of him.

I tell myself not to look at him, but my gaze darts to him, anyway. The way it always seems to want to.

He crouches on the floor and white fur ripples across his back. I suddenly remember the three things that can happen to a person when a shifter bites them.

They become a shifter.

Their body will reject the change, and they remain perfectly ordinary. Like me.

Or they die.

Theydie.

“Kade!” My voice is sharp and higher than I thought it would be.

Kade stops his shift to peer over his shoulder. “Angel?”

I struggle to control my suddenly racing heart. “Rylan…” I clear my throat. “Rylan said not all people can be turned. That… what if he dies?”

“Aden is strong. He’ll survive this,” Kade assures me, flashing me a quick, confident smile.

I don’t smile back. “But what if he doesn’t?”

“He will,” Dariel says.

“But if he doesn’t,” I prompt. “He’s already hurt. What if…” My fingers find one of the many grooves and scar tissue on my throat. “What if he’s like me and it doesn’t work?”

Dariel turns from the machine and stares me right in the eye. “You don’t know Aden the way we do. He’s a survivor. He’ll make it.”

There’s no hint of doubt in his voice. There’s not even a trace of it reflected in his eyes, and it’s impossible not to believe him. Iwantto believe him. But maybe it’s the alpha in him, this compulsion to listen to a born leader.

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