Chapter 73: Little Riot.

When I step fully into the bathroom, my heart nearly stops.

Lysander is on the floor.

He’s sitting with his back against the side of the bathtub, his long legs stretched out in front of him. His head is tilted slightly to the side, his eyes half closed.

He looks.....Deathly pale.

For a man who always seems completely untouchable, he suddenly looks frighteningly human.

Then I see the blood, there is a pool of it beneath him.

Blood has soaked through his shirt, spread across his abdomen, and stained the floor beneath his body.

"Shit. Shit. Shit."

I drop to my knees beside him.

"Lysander."

His eyelids lift slightly.

"You’re losing a lot of blood."

"I can see that."

Of course. Of fucking course he still has enough energy to be sarcastic.

I glare at him.

"Do you have a first aid kit? Where is it?"

"My doctor will be here soon," he says weakly.

"You won’t be here long enough for your doctor to arrive with the amount of blood you’re using."

His eyes open a little more.

"You’re deathly pale and losing too much blood. Where is the kit?"

He takes a slow breath.

"Under the sink."

I immediately get up. I turn toward the sink and take one step then my foot slips on the blood.

"Ah!"

I go down hard. My hands slap against the bloody floor, and my cheek nearly smacks into the tiles.

For a second, I just lie there then I push myself up.

I don’t have time to care.

I scramble toward the sink, yank open the cabinet, and find the first aid kit shoved toward the back.

I grab it.

Then I stand and turn on the faucet. There’s blood covers my hands. Somehow, I’ve gotten it across my cheek too.

I quickly wash myself off, watching pinkish water spiral down the drain.

My stomach twists as I grab the first aid kit and rip it open.

Gauze.

Antiseptic, bandages, gloves.

I grab the gloves and snap them onto my hands. Then I search through the kit for anything that can help close the wounds.

I find a suture kit.

Thank God.

I hurry back to Lysander.

"Move your hand."

He looks at me through half-lidded eyes.

"What?"

"The cloth. Move it."

He has one hand pressed firmly against his side, holding a cloth against the wounds.

The cloth is completely soaked.

His shirt is worse. It’s practically drenched in blood.

"Move it," I repeat.

He slowly removes his hand, I take the cloth away and freeze.

There are two wounds and they are both deep and ugly.

Both still bleeding.

My stomach drops.

"What the hell happened to you?"

He doesn’t answer.

"Lysander."

"I’m fine."

I stare at him.

"You are sitting in a pool of your own blood."

He glances down.

"Still fine."

I roll my eyes.

"Men are idiots....egotistical idiots,"

I grab the antiseptic.

"This is going to hurt."

He looks at me.

"You’ve said that before, little riot."

My hand freezes. The antiseptic bottle nearly slips from my fingers.

Little riot.

That name takes me straight back to that night.

The rain.

The apartment, the injured man I’d found, the stranger I’d helped.

Lysander.

My eyes slowly lift to his face.

"You remember?"

His gaze meets mine.

"I remember everything."

My heart gives a strange little kick.

I thought he didn’t, I thought that night had disappeared from his memory.

Apparently, I was wrong.

I force myself back into the present.

"Yeah," I mutter. "Well, this is going to hurt a little more because I don’t have time to leisurely stitch you up."

I prepare the needle.

"You’ll bleed out before I’m finished if I take my time."

He watches me.

"I don’t expect you to be a little bitch about this."

My eyebrows shoot up.

"Excuse me?"

"Just stitch the fucking thing up."

He closes his eyes.

"It can’t be that hard."

Oh.

So that’s how he wants to play this.

Fine.

I press the needle into his skin and his entire body tenses.

A sharp breath escapes between his teeth.

I don’t stop.

One stitch, then another.

I work quickly, there isn’t time to be gentle, every second matters.

The wound pulls closed beneath my fingers as I tighten each stitch.

Lysander’s jaw clenches and his hands curl against the floor but he doesn’t make another sound.

Good.

I pull the next stitch through. A little tighter, maybe a little more painfully than necessary.

Because who exactly is he calling a bitch?

I move to the second wound.

This one is worse and much deeper. I clean the blood away as quickly as I can before starting again.

"Hold still."

"I am."

"You’re moving."

"I’m just breathing."

"Then stop doing that."

His mouth twitches.

Even half-dead, he finds me entertaining.

I continue.

The bathroom fills with the quiet sounds of my breathing, the faint dripping of the faucet, and Lysander’s occasional sharp inhale.

In. Pull. Tighten.

Rinse and repeat.

My fingers begin to ache, my shoulders hurt and my gloves are covered in blood but I don’t stop until the final stitch is secure.

I tie it off and finally lean back.

Done.

I stare at the wounds then at him.

And suddenly realize what he did.

That bastard.

He called me a bitch on purpose, he knew I’d get angry, he knew I’d want to prove him wrong.

And because I was too busy being offended, I stopped thinking about the fact that every stitch was hurting him. He’d made it easier for me to hurt him without feeling guilty about it.

"Son of a..."

I look at him.

His eyes are closed.

"Lysander?"

Nothing.

My heart drops as I lean closer.

"Lysander?"

Still nothing.

I quickly press two fingers beneath his nose.

A faint breath touches my skin, i close my eyes for a second as relief floods through me.

He’s breathing. He just passed out.

I sit there for another moment, watching his chest rise and fall.

Then the bathroom door suddenly swings open.

I look up as Jeremiah rushes inside.

His eyes immediately land on his brother.

"Fuck."

Behind him is a man carrying a medical bag.

The doctor.

Jeremiah drops beside Lysander.

"What happened?"

I don’t answer cause I don’t know shit.

The doctor immediately kneels beside him and starts examining the wounds.

I stand slowly.

My knees ache from kneeling on the hard bathroom floor.

I peel off the gloves and toss them into the trash.

The doctor looks up at me and I stare back.

"You should be faster next time."

Before he can answer, I turn and walk out.

I glance down at myself. Blood covers my nightgown, my hands, my arms.

There’s even some smeared across my cheek from when I slipped.

I sigh.

All I want now is a hot shower.

I walk toward my room hoping he survives.