***
When I woke up, I couldn’t yet open my eyes, but heard William’s voice whisper from somewhere in the darkened abyss.
“Genevieve, You have to wake up.” William’s whispers were stern. My guess was I didn’t open my eyes quickly enough, because he resorted to shaking my arm, and I cracked my eyes open a tiny bit, but they closed again quickly.
When I was finally able to my eyes, the whiteness of the room made it hard for me to focus. The bright lights directly overhead didn’t help either. William was standing beside me wearing a blue scrub shirt, which confused me even more than I already was.
“Where am I?” I tried to sit up but my arms were like limp spaghetti.
“Whoa now.” William smiled crookedly. “You lost an awful lot of blood.” He pointed to a pole on the other side of the bed. It had two bags of clear fluid, and a half empty bag of blood. My eyes followed the tubes, which lead to both of my arms.
William leaned down close to my face. “As soon as this bag of blood is empty, we have to go,” he said gravely. “It’s not safe here.”
I closed my eyes and thought about what he’d said, and it all started coming back. We were at a picnic when a pack of werewolves attacked. I couldn’t believe that I, Genevieve Labreck, said werewolves. No matter what I wanted to believe, that’s what they were. What I couldn’t wrap my head around was why some of them had attacked us, and the others had protected us. It just didn’t make sense. I could see them fighting over us, but not for us.
My eyes shot open when all the lights went out. It was pitch black for a moment and all the normal electronic sounds of the hospital had stopped. As the emergency lights flickered to life, I saw William unhooking the still half full bag of blood from the i.v. pole.
“What are you doing?” I asked perplexed even further.
“They tracked us.” William spoke with a sense of urgency. He help me slide off of the bed.
“Who?” I asked, frantically searching his eyes for an answer.
William stopped moving and stood very still. He appeared to be listening to something and didn’t answer me. “They’re coming.” He kneeled down and slipped my sock and boot back onto my injured leg.
“I’m so tired, William.” I winced when I pressed my foot onto the floor.
“We have to go now!” He pulled me close, so I could lean on him. “When I open this door we have to move quickly. If something happens, keep moving. Take the stairs down to the side entrance. Help is waiting there.”
I looked at William through my tears, trying to understand what was happening. He smiled at me, but it wasn’t his usual cheerful grin.
“Ready?” He asked, pushing a few loose strands of hair behind my ear, and tucking the bag of blood into the neckline of my hoodie. I nodded, and he threw open the door. I guess I expected to see mayhem in the hallways, but it was actually quiet. Only a few nurses moving patients up and down the hall.
“The stairs are at the end of this hall.” William said, walking quickly, bracing me so that I barely had to put any weight on my injured leg.
Unfortunately, we didn’t make it to the stairs. The door to the stairwell flew open and William pushed me into a room, and eased the door closed behind us. He leaned me against the wall while he rushed across the room to the window.
“What are we going to do, jump out the window?” I whispered nervously.
William pulled the pillow from the empty bed and placed it against the window. “Turn your head.”
As soon as I did, I heard the sound of breaking glass. I promptly opened my eyes and William was already next to me, and gently picked me up.
“Close your eyes.” I watched his eyes turn completely black. Before I had time grasp what was happening he ran to the window, and leaped with me in his arms.
I closed my eyes somewhere in mid air. I felt us hit, but it wasn’t anything like I had expected. We were three stories up, and even with the added weight of William holding me, he still managed to land on his feet. Adrenaline raced through me and my whole body shook.
I must have passed out again, because one minute we were on the ground running and the next minute we were racing away from the hospital in the back seat of a truck with two of Luna’s brothers, Joseph and Joshua.
“Where are we going?” I raised up and asked William.
“Somewhere with people who can keep you safe,” Joseph blurted from the front seat, and then looked over his shoulder glaring at William.
I saw William’s eyes start to turn dark, and knew he was getting angry. I reached into his lap and slipped my hand into his. He gave me a sidelong glance, but held his jaw tight. I brushed it off and smiled at him.
Joshua, who was driving, readjusted his rearview mirror so he would have Genevieve in his sights, then he turned to Joseph. “Lay off, Bro, he’s only trying to help.”
The level of testosterone in the truck was so high I thought they would pull over any minute and have a pissing match. I tried to ignore it by going to my ‘happy place’, but that didn’t even help.
Finally I’d had enough. I sat tall, folding my arms tightly across my chest, and screamed. “Will someone please tell me what is going on? I swear this place makes even L.A. seem mild, and “normal.””
Joseph turned toward William and scowled. “You haven’t told her?”
“When should I have done that, Joseph?” William shot back sarcastically. “When I was running with her in my arms, hoping she wouldn’t bleed to death? Or, when I was saving her from the clutches of Zane and his clan at the hospital just now?” William glared furiously at Joseph. Joseph’s eyes narrowed and he held William’s stare.
“Uh… fellas. I’m right here.” I waved my hand in between them. “How about one of you fill me in on just what exactly in the hell is going on!”