I look across the room at Liam, who’s sitting with his head against the wall and a hand across his chest. He can barely breathe. Natalie is frantically trying to calm him, but without Ryanne here, there’s nothing she can do.
Ryanne was the glue in our group. She kept everyone together. I can already feel a rift forming between us. Tom’s angry. Bragden’s a bundle of emotions. He’s upset over Ryanne, mad at Enrique, confused over Incendia, and worried about his brother. Larkin and Kyril don’t know what to do. Larkin’s pacing the room, trying to remain calm. Liam’s dying. Natalie distressed, trying to help him. Emma won’t let David console her. Logan’s frustrated that, yet again, he couldn’t save her when she needed it.
Me? I can’t feel anything. It’s like my body has shut off and refuses to let me know my soulmate is dead. Liam gasps loudly and leans forward. We all turn and look at him, confused at the sudden change.
“Something’s happening,” he grunts. My eyes move back to Ryanne again. She’s lying on her back in the middle of the hotel room. Her dark hair is fanned out around her head messily from the fall. The contrast between her pale skin and dark hair is more apparent. The streak of blood that dripped out of her mouth has dried. The wound on her stomach is still bleeding onto the carpet.
Liam takes a deep breath. We all turn and look at him. He can breathe? He crawls away from Natalie and moves toward Ryanne. Something is obviously going on. When he nears her, Ryanne’s body begins shaking. What? Everyone takes a step forward, wanting to know what is happening. Her body seems to inflate with oxygen. She gasps and sucks in air and then starts coughing. More blood comes out of her mouth. She’s alive? The room is silent around me. How is this possible? Black liquid starts oozing out of the stomach wound. Logan pushes past everyone and tries healing her again. His hands give off a faint glow as he tries to close the wound.
I shoot up when I see the skin start to close. It’s working. I move Ryanne’s head so I can see her, but her eyes are closed. She still looks like death. I push her hair away from her face. Logan pulls his hands away and looks her over. She hasn’t opened her eyes, but she’s breathing. Small shakes still take over her body. How is she alive? She gasps again as her body goes still. I stare at her waiting for some sign of movement. Her chest begins to slowly rise and rise with each breath. She’s alive.
“I guess she really is too stubborn for death,” Emma says.
Tom hands me a wet washcloth. I move Ryanne toward me and clean the blood of her face, turning the white washcloth red. We’ll have a lot of explaining to do when we check out of this room. I lift Ryanne up and lay her down on the bed. She’s still so pale. Her body looks so fragile right now.
Turning around, I look at the room. “How is this possible? She was dead. You all saw it. Logan couldn’t heal her. How is she alive?”
Mr. Howick pushes off the wall and looks at me. “I’ve heard stories about when a person dies before their time, they are given another chance. In every person’s life, there is something they want to change, say, or do differently. Ryanne wasn’t supposed to die today, so she got another chance. I don’t know where she went or what she did, but she had to do something. If she wasn’t able to do it, she would have died permanently.”
“You couldn’t have mentioned that before?” I ask. It would have been nice to know that there was a small chance that she could come back from this.
“There was no point. It wasn’t a given that she would return. There was always a possibility that she wouldn’t have come back. Not a whole lot of people are willing to change that late in the game.”
“So what do we do?”
“Wait for her to wake up. There’s not a whole lot we can do right now,” Tom suggests.
“I hate waiting.”
*****
Opening my eyes, I roll over onto my side. I’m back at the hotel room. Alive. With a gasp, I shoot up. I’m alive. Colton jolts awake and gets into a defensive stance. When he sees me, he reaches out and jerks me to him, more forceful than necessary. However, that’s exactly what I need right now. I bury myself in his arms and cry into his shoulder. I did it! I made it back. His arms tighten around me when he feels my tears on his chest.
Burying his face in my hair, he starts murmuring something. I can feel his lips moving against my skin, but I can’t understand what he’s saying. Leaning back, I look up at him. “What?”
“Don’t you ever do that to me again, Ry. I love you so much. Don’t you dare scare me like that.” Before I can say anything, he crushes his lips to mine. I lean forward and kiss him back just as passionately. I know that I look like crap and don’t feel much better, but I don’t care. I almost died for good. I would have never seen him again. I thought that I would never get to see him again.