Third-person P.O.V
The sound of her body crashing against the grass-clad ground is muffled by the obnoxious cheers emitted by the over-hyped-up teens that are witnessing the fight amongst the two mafia-born.
Still oblivious to Astoria's condition the fight prolongs with no definite winner in sight. The metallic smell of fresh oozing blood permeated the air, as streams of scarlet liquid trickle down their faces.
"What the fuck is going on here!" Two identical voices yell, in despair as two bodies immerge from the crowd.
While Lorenzo grabs a hold of Jack's arms, Lucas does the same with Alessandro, and with much difficulty, they manage to break up the fight. Lorenzo and Lucas take a moment to assess the damage done to both, while Jack and Alessandro continue to glare daggers at each other.
"Where's Astoria?" Alessandro questions, his green orbs scanning the crowd frantically yet he finds no signs of her.
"She was standing right there like five fucking seconds ago," Jack remarks, snapping out of his anger fit and joining Alessandro in search for his sister.
Worry infuses with the already present tension in the air with every passing moment they spend in trying to locate their sister who lays limb on the dirty ground amidst the crowd of intoxicated teens.
Alarmed by the situation all four boys push past the crowd frantically searching the crowd for her familiar electric blue eyes. "I'll check inside," Lucas declares, sprinting towards the now trashed mansion.
While the crowd doesn't make their task of finding Astoria any easier by constantly getting in their way, it takes all of Jack's willpower and restrain not to pull out his gun and shoot each and every one of these assholes that get in the way.
Alessandro maneuvers his way through the sweaty bodies until he reaches the spot, he last saw his girl. And right enough he spots her, but not in the condition he expected.
Rushing to her side, he crouches down beside her and placing her limp head in his lap he gently pats her cheek, yet receives no response from the unconscious girl.
Wasting no time, he gathers her in his arms with the utmost care, "found her!" He calls the attention of the other two who snap they head in his direction and rush towards him in less than a heartbeat.
With urgency-fuelled strides, he proceeds towards the mansion without waiting for her brothers—who soon catch up with him. "What happened to her?" Lorenzo questions in worry.
"Don't know, found her unconscious over there," Alessandro replies curtly his eyes refusing to leave her peaceful face.
"Her hands are cold," Jack notices which intensifies their worry urging them to get her inside faster.
"What the hell happened?!" Lucas exclaims just as the three of them enter the mansion with an unconscious Astoria.
"Not sure, just call Seb and tell him to get here quick!" Jack commands as Alessandro and Lorenzo take her upstairs to her room.
"It's locked," Lorenzo remarks twisting the doorknob with more force than necessary.
"Check her pockets," Alessandro suggests.
Nodding at him Lorenzo delves through her front pockets, only to turn out empty-handed. "Check the frontier pocket," Alessandro says, referring to the tiny pocket extra pocket.
"Got it," he announces producing a single silver key from the tiny almost unnoticed pocket.
Unlocking the door, he pushes it open allowing Alessandro to get in with ease. Laying her down gently on her grey sheet-clad matters, he visually inspects her head for any visible signs of trauma, yet finds none.
"You guys have a lot of explaining to do." Declares Seb's familiar voice coming through the door with Jack and Lucas in tow.
"How long has she been out for?" He questions the four teens while he claims his spot beside her searching for the cause of her state.
He snaps his attention back to the four guilty teens when he receives no reply to his question. "You've got to be fucking kidding," he cusses.
"We need to get her to the hospital immediately," he concludes worried that a lot of time has already been wasted.
"She'll freak out if we do," Jack remarks.
"For that, she'll have to be awake, which she won't if she doesn't get medical help immediately," Seb snaps at the irresponsible brother.
"Why are her lips turning blue?" Lorenzo points out nervously, his gaze fixed on her now ghostly pale body.
"We need to move, now!" Seb pronounces and before anyone has another say, Alessandro once again gathers her in his arms and proceeds towards the door much to Jack's annoyance.
A warning glare from Seb is enough to stifle any protest stage by any of the three Santos, while he holds the room door open to facilitate Alessandro in getting out.
The once hyped-up mansion flooding with intoxicated and horny teens is now empty with not a soul in sight other than the members of the Santos family and Alessandro.
A string of cusses leaves Jack's lips in response to the news delivered to him over the phone by one of his trusted men. "What now?" Lucas enquires while they continue their way towards the car hastily.
"She locked her guards in the panic room so they didn't chaperon her to the party," he grits out, his jaw set while clenched and unclenched his palm to control his anger.
Ignoring the ongoing conversation Alessandro carefully gets into the backseat of the waiting black SUV shifting Astoria's limp body into a comfortable position on the leather-clad seat.
Seb gets into the driver's seat with Jack in shotgun while Lorenzo and Lucas take another car, they zoom onto the freeway way over the speed limit. Running two red lights they successfully manage to get to the hospital in under five minutes.
Rushing Astoria inside Alessandro lays her down on the waiting gurney from where the doctors and nurses take over with these five following behind them.
"Sir I'll have to ask you to say here while the doctors do their jobs." The brunette nurse requests politely—stopping the five of them at the door of the room they just took her in—leaving their presence before they get the chance to stage a protest.
"Have you informed Xavier and the rest?" Seb questions a very worried Jack.
Fear bubbles within him at the at Seb's words, just the thoughts of telling Xavier about this is enough to let nervousness cloud this mind—not that he would let it show.
"No," he replies, his impassiveness masking his worry and nervousness.
"Then what are you waiting for?" Seb enquires further, a single brow quirked upwards.
While Jack's standing under Seb's scrutinizing gaze, Lorenzo and Lucas harbor terror within them, exchanging apprehensive glances, trepidation roll off of them in waves.
Uninterested by any of this Alessandro's gaze is fixed on the door behind which his girl lays under the care of qualified yet complete strangers. The small glass window etched to the polyethylene door of the room the only way he can see her.
"Either you call him and tell him everything that happened or I will," Seb threatens the three tensed teens leaving them to weigh their options.
Gulping down the last bit of confidence in him, he nods delving into his pocket to retrieve his phone. Hesitation evident in his posture his finger hovers over Xavier's number that is on speed dial for a fleeting moment before he taps it and presses his phone to his ear.
Desperately praying that Xavier doesn't accept his call, his heart sinks when he does. Moving away from the rest when he hears his voice from the other end, he sighs inwardly before mustering the courage to confess.
"We'll be there in a few," Xavier says with no emotion traceable in his tone before hanging up. And even though there is no trace of anger in his tone, Jack could feel his wrath and dreads every moment that brings him closer to facing it face-to-face.
"We are done for, aren't we?" Lorenzo mumbles as soon as Jack re-joins the group.
"You think?" Jack snaps back sarcastically.
"We're dead meat," Lucas affirms and the other two could not agree more.
"Whose great idea was this party anyway?" Seb enquires shifting his attention from the door to the trio.
"We had this planned for months," Lorenzo tries to justify.
"And with the recent event, you didn't feel the need to change them?" Seb retorts.
"I told you we should have just locked her in her room," Lucas grumbles earning a spine-chilling glare from all four of them, Alessandro's being the deadliest of the lot.
"You two to look like you need stitches." A nurse points out interrupts them pointing at Jack and Alessandro's beat-up faces.
"We're fine." They both decline simultaneously.
"That wasn't a suggestion," she replies unaffected by their rudeness. "So, you either come with me or—"
"Are you threatening us?" Jack grits out while Alessandro shifts his attention back to the glass window on the door.
Even though she's terrified by his tone and aura she refuses to back down, "listen to nurse," Seb interjects.
"I'm not going anywhere," Alessandro is quick to declare firmly.
"Neither am I," Jack adds.
"Well, too bad. You two either get your sorry asses checked or go home," Seb asserts leaving no room for discussion.
"I'm fine," Alessandro grunts, but Seb isn't hearing any of it.
"I prefer hearing that from a doctor," Seb replies. "So, you either go with the nurse or I'll have you sent home," he adds firmly.
"You can't do shit, we own this place," Jack retorts arrogantly.
"You may own it, but I run it," Seb retorts mirroring his tone.
"How long?" Alessandro questions shifting his attention to the waiting nurse for a fleeting moment.
"Depends on the doctor," she replies, "but a few minutes tops," she adds quickly as an afterthought.
"Let's go," he agrees after much thought, tearing his gazes away from the door.
While the nurse guides the two teens through the hospital all they do is glare daggers at each other. Taking note of their heated gazes aimed at each other, the nurses decide against taking them to the ER to get their stitches done and instead put them in separate rooms.
Xavier, Noah, and Jason arrive at the hospital within the next twenty minutes, coordinating with Seb they head straight towards the room Astoria is in. "What did the doctors say?" Jason directs his question to Seb.
"They're still working on her," he responds.
"Where's Jack?" Noah enquires in a controlled tone noticing the absence of his youngest brother.
"Gone to get stitches," Seb replies causing the three oldest Santos to frown in confusion.
"He and Alessandro got into a fight," Lorenzo explains vaguely when Xavier directs his interrogative gaze toward the twins silently demanding an answer.
Before Noah can grill them for more details Jack and Alessandro return just as the room door opens and a doctor walks out. Everyone's question imbued gazes instantly shifts towards the man in the dark-blue scrubs, who appears mortified as soon as he notices Xavier and Noah amongst the rest.
"We have managed to flush out the poison from her system, but it will take a while before she regains consciousness," he informs them with evident nervousness in his tone.
"How did she manage to ingest poison?" Noah wonders aloud.
"Someone must have spiked her drink," Seb offers as a possibility.
"I poured that drink myself and she hadn't let it out of her side since I gave it to her," Alessandro remarks earning a questioning look from the three oldest Santos'.
"And why exactly were you with our sister?" Jason questions, his overprotective brother mode kicking in.
"I agree with the boy, the quantity we found suggests that it was a slow-acting poison. She has been given small doses of it for a long period of time now," the doctor interrupts before Alessandro can have a chance to respond to Jason's question.
At the doctor's words, something clicked inside Seb's mind. "Jason's disappearance," he voices in realization.
"The day you disappeared, Astoria had fainted and we couldn't find the reason behind her fever," he explains taking note of Jason's confused expression and soon it hits them too while Alessandro looks at them in confusion.
"The dosage must have been too little to show up in the tox-screen," he adds.
"We will be shifting her to an overnight room and keeping her under observation for the next forty-eight hours," the doctor informs them before excusing himself.
"She's going to freak out when she wakes up," Jason remarks drawing their attention to their sister's phobia of hospitals and doctors.
"But taking her home right now isn't the best option either," Seb adds.
"Have them shift her to the same room as Liam," Noah suggests.
"That might be helpful," Seb nods excusing himself to make the required arrangements.
"You four," Xavier calls authoritatively pointing at Jack, Lorenzo, Lucas, and Alessandro, "we need to have a word," he asserts before making his way towards the elevator with the four of them in tow while a question still lingers in the air.
Who was feeding Astoria the poison and how?
Author's Note:
Hey, my lovely readers! I hope you enjoy this update because frankly speaking, I was a little hesitant to write this chapter. I don't know why though, but anyway I got it done and hope you like it.
So, moving on from that. Some of you must have already read it on my message board, but I'm gonna ask you again anyway.
Some days back I had this crazy dream which could play out to be a wicked plot for my potential next book. But here's the problem, I'm really nervous about writing it for mainly two reasons.
1) Staring a new book is really nerve-wracking, and my anxiety levels have been really high this past month. And I'm not sure if I'll get an audience for it or not.
2) It's a new idea I haven't seen anyone on Wattpad try yet, so again I'm hella nervous.
The basic idea of the book is really similar to WTB, genre-wise. Only thing instead of being a mafia sibling book it will be a wizard sibling book, with a crazy protagonist like Astoria (not exactly the same, of course) and overprotective brothers.
And like all my work there will be action, mystery, and drama and a steamy love interest too!
So I really want to hear you're thoughts on this. Will y'all be interested in such a book or not?
Anyway! Thanks for reading!
Stay Safe & Happy
And make me happy by sharing your thoughts on this chapter in the comments and by voting on it.
~Kia