Chapter 89 Waiting In The Light

• Rachel POV
• The wail of the ambulance siren cut through the chaos of the city, a piercing cry that matched the panic clawing at my chest as I sat in the back, my hands gripping Bonnie’s limp fingers. The paramedics worked with practiced urgency, their voices sharp and clinical, monitors beeping in a frantic rhythm that drowned out the world beyond the vehicle’s walls. Bonnie lay strapped to the stretcher, her face pale, blood matting her dark hair from the cut on her forehead, her chest rising and falling in shallow breaths. The sight of her, so still, so fragile, tore at me, a visceral reminder of the accident—the screech of tires, the sickening crunch of metal, the car flipping with Bonnie trapped inside.
• My tears fell unchecked, hot against my cheeks, as I whispered her name, willing her to hold on, to fight. The ambulance smelled of antiseptic and metal, a sterile contrast to the acrid tang of gasoline that still lingered in my memory from the wreckage. My backpack, slung over one shoulder, pressed against my side, the weight of the evidence against Celine a guilty secret that burned in my mind. Had this been her doing? Had she known we were digging into her crimes, sent someone to silence us? The thought was a knife, twisting with every beep of the monitor, but I pushed it down, focusing on Bonnie, on the need to get her to safety.