Page 49 of Glorious Ruin
Without any warning, he launched a right hook that connected squarely with John’s face. The force of the blow was staggering. Anyone close could hear the sickening crunch of bone and cartilage. John’s head snapped back, his glasses flying off of his shirt and skittering across the floor as he dropped like a sack of stones.
The bar went dead silent. Every patron paused their night to look over as time seemed to slow to a crawl. John scrambled to his feet, still swaying as blood gushed from his nose, staining his white polo shirt a violent crimson.
“You fucking bastard!” he roared.
Lunging forward, he attempted to tackle Silas. They flew back, colliding with a group of people at the next table. Chairs got overturned, drinks were spilled, and within seconds the bar erupted into a full-scale brawl.
I acted on pure instinct. There were no thoughts given to cameras or possible consequences, I just threw myself into the fray. My arms flailed as I attempted to rip John off of Si as he tried to gouge out Silas’s eyes.
“Break it up!” Evan was there in an instant, his voice a roar as he grabbed a man who tried to jump on Silas’s back.
When I tried to yank Silas back by the waist, a stray fist flew by my face, grazing the side of my jaw. I clocked the source immediately, one of John’s friends, a thick-necked guy in a sports jersey who was itching for a fight. Without hesitation, I punched him in the stomach, the air leaving his lungs in a wheeze as he doubled over and left me an opening. Grabbing Si by the shoulder, I extracted my man from the pile and pulled him into my chest.
“Evan! We’re going! Now!” I yelled over the shouting and the sound of breaking glass.
Spinning violently, I finally caught sight of the girls huddled together near the dartboards. Their faces had gone entirely pale as they watched the fight progressfrom one drunken comment to a full-blown riot. “Outside! Now!” I hollered at them while frantically gesturing toward the door.
We managed to push through the crowd, thanks to a surge of adrenaline. On the boardwalk, the cool air hit my face, but I didn’t slow down. I grabbed Silas’s hand, his knuckles now slick with blood, and started running.
“Cal, wait!” April panted, but I didn’t stop.
I led us around the block to a narrow, dimly-lit alleyway that sat between a row of old houses and a towering hotel. It was a shortcut to the parking lot where we’d left the cars. We ran until the sound of the bar was nothing but a distant echo.
“Cal, I—”
I heard the panic in Silas’s voice immediately. I’d been pushing him ahead of me this entire time, but as I stopped to look at him, my heart sank. His eyes were wide, his pupils dilated, and his chest was heaving in a way that had nothing to do with running. He was staring at his hand, at the blood on his knuckles, and he was shaking violently. An uncontrollable vibration that started in his shoulders and moved down his entire body.
“Babe, I’ve got to get us out of here.” My own breath came in ragged gasps but my eyes were pleading. “I have no doubt that douchebag called the cops. He’s exactly the type to press charges. Even if he started it.”
Silas’s voice had my heart racing as his words came out in nothing more than a series of fractured syllables. “He wouldn’t…He–he is one… Won’t…fuck up…rep. Sheriff…he-he-he won’t.”
A small flicker of relief surged through me at the logic, but it didn’t last. Silas was sliding down the wall of the alley, his knees buckling under his weight. I caught him before he hit the ground, guiding him down into a crouch.
“I’m right here, baby. Breathe,” I cooed my voice as calm as I could force it to be. I squeezed his biceps, locking my gaze onto his. “You’re safe. We’re all safe. Evan, are the girls behind us?”
“We’re here,” Evan panted, standing guard at the entrance of the alley.
While my eyes were diverted, the sudden crash from the adrenaline rush hit Silas. He let out a grunted and guttural wail, clutching at his bad shoulder as he doubled in on himself. “N-no…my shoulder. It-it popped. I-I felt it,” Silas’s face face paled to a ghostly, translucent white.
My heart hit my stomach. This wasn’t just a panic attack. this was about to be a full-on spiral. In Silas’s mind, his shoulder was more than just a joint; it was the symbol of his failure. The very thing that had ended his first career and sent him into seven years of darkness. If it had truly popped… If it was damaged again…
“Silas, look at me,” I commanded, grabbing his face with both hands. “Breathe. Just breathe. It might just be a strain. You moved fast, Si. Don’t go there, yet.”
But he was already gone. He was back in the ring seven years ago, trapped in the silence and reliving the pain. He started to hyperventilate, his breaths coming in short, terrifying hitches.
“We have to move him,” Heather urged, her lawyer brain finally kicking in. “If the cops come and find us in an alley with a man having a medical emergency, it’s going to look worse. Get him to the sidewalk, at least, then we can say he tripped.”
I put my arm around Silas’s waist and hoisted him up. He was dead weight, his body trembling so hard I could hear his teeth chattering. We moved out of the alley and onto a side-street lined with restaurants. As soon as we reached the sidewalk, Silas slumped to the side, falling against the brick wall of a seafood joint and sliding down until he was sitting on the concrete. I dropped down with him, ignoring the curious looks from the people passing by.
“F-fuck,” Silas wheezed, dropping his head between his knees.
I wrapped my arm around him, pulling him as close as I could, shielding him from the world. “You’re safe, baby. I’m right here,” I whispered into his ear, my hand gently running through his hair, over and over. “I’m your anchor, remember? I’m not letting you go.”
Kissing his temple, I could feel the sweat sticky against his skin. The gazes from onlookers only adding to the terror running through his mind. We were two large,intimidating men huddled together on a sidewalk. We weren’t exactly blending in.
A man approached us, a younger guy wearing a dark navy pullover with “EMS” stitched on the chest. He must have been off duty at one of the nearby restaurants. “Hey, I’m a paramedic.” He crouched down a few feet away. “Everything okay? What happened?”
I looked at him, my internal alarms still screaming at the volume of a storm siren. “He’s having a panic attack. He was in a scuffle, and his shoulder got yanked. He’s had surgery on it previously, and he thinks he might have reinjured it.”
