Wild Side (Rose Hill, #3)(100)

I smirk, pushing my tongue into my cheek as the crowd laughs and cheers. The mom jokes just never get old.

“This belt is back where it belongs. Willy isn’t here tonight to see me wearing it, but when he’s done licking his wounds in whatever hole he crawled back into”—the crowd shouts, and I know he’s creeping up behind me—“you better believe I’m going to rub his smug little face in—”

A chair cracks me against the back, and I stagger forward, pitching the mic from my palm as I reach for my lower back with a look of agony on my face. The crowd noise reaches me on a delay, but I can hear their shouts. It never fails to drive me onward. “Came back for seconds, did ya?” I shout at Will, right before he clocks me with a high kick of his own.

Eager little fucker has been practicing.

I swipe a hand over my cheek before dropping and rolling under the bottom rope, seeking a reprieve at the side of the ring. I double over, which fans in the crowd shout at me not to do. But this is the plan. This is what we walked through.

I stand up just in time to see Will has left the ring and is standing on the banister next to the announcer’s booth. From a standstill, he backflips toward me. He’s supposed to twist in the air so he’s horizontal, and I’m going to catch him and turn the stunt on him.

I can tell midair that he’s misjudged the jump and taken off too early. I move back, trying to cover for it, to give him more time. But we collide harder than necessary, and when I fall back, I hit the edge of the metal stairs at an awkward angle. My mid-back takes the full brunt of his two-hundred-twenty-pound body.

A hot blaze of pain hits me hard and fast, and then it’s gone. Lights flash in my eyes when my head follows, hitting the ledge on the way down.

I crumple with him on top of me. I try to roll away… but my legs don’t seem to respond.

Will whispers, “Fuck, sorry. You okay?” as he gets up.

Dread chokes me, and words don’t come.

But I do manage to wiggle my pinky finger.





CHAPTER 44


Tabitha





THE TV CUTS TO A COMMERCIAL BREAK—ONE THAT LASTS far too long—and I’m left staring at the screen, slack-jawed. An invisible fist clenches around my throat and won’t let go. To the average viewer, this is your average commercial break.

But the way Will rolled to his knees over Rhys and dropped his head low to talk to him was…not for show.

I reach for my phone and pull up our messages. His I love you too hits me like a ton of bricks, and I force myself to suck in a deep breath. He’s fine. Probably concussed or something. I feel myself slipping into a familiar mode—survival mode—where I convince myself that everything is not as bad as it seems.

A call from Erika in the middle of the night? Most likely a butt dial. But I’d still get out of bed and search for her around town.

That eerie sense of calm settles over me. It’s a defense mechanism, but it hasn’t failed me yet. Except to make me a completely unemotional automaton who gets shit done.

I fire off a text.

Tabby: Checking on you.

Then I wait. Ten minutes pass, and I stare at my phone the entire time. I tell myself it hasn’t been that long. He could be showering. One of their medical staff could be checking him out. Then I give in to the brewing panic.

Tabby: Can you drop me a line when you get a sec? I would settle for an eye roll emoji.

Ten minutes turn into twenty, and I stand. Twenty turns into thirty, and I pace. And then the forty-minute mark hits, and a growing sense of nausea takes over. I clutch my phone in one hand and keep the other slapped over my mouth.

Finally, the phone rings, and a photo I snapped of him wearing only a towel lights up the screen. His head is tilted, and he looks irritated, but the subtle tilt of his lips tells another story.

I answer in a heavy rush of breath. “You scared the shit out of me.”

The line is silent, and I pull it away from my ear to check that there’s still a connection.

“Rhys?”

Then I hear a voice. But it isn’t Rhys.

“Tabitha? This is Will.”

Everything in me goes cold. I know in my bones that something is wrong, but I ask anyway. “Will? Why?”

“Rhys—” His voice breaks, and all the cocky surety I see in the ring isn’t here right now. He sounds young and terrified. “I think you should get to Anaheim. He’s on his way to the hospital. I’m going to follow. I’ll keep his phone on me.”

Everything feels numb, but I move anyway.

“What’s wrong?” I ask simply, as I march up the stairs.

“I…” He sighs, and his voice shakes. “I don’t know. He…he said he couldn’t move his legs.”

I freeze on the steps and feel as though I’ve been sucker punched in the stomach. Winded. “So I don’t know. They strapped him down right away. All he kept saying to me was Call Tabby.”

Fuck me. This poor guy sounds like he’s crying. I spring into action, hustling up the stairs and rifling through my closet.

“Okay, Will. You did good.” I toss clothes into a backpack, wondering if I should pack for Milo and then wake him up too. “I will be there. Can you please text me which hospital?”

“Yeah. Okay…” He trails off, sounding distraught.