She refused to look up at Kai’s station to see how he was fairing. She was mad at him for suggesting that she back out. She was even more furious that he had tried to halt filming until he could investigate the threat. He had threatened to call the police again, and she had spotted him on the phone with the Officer who had completed the police report from the first letter.
Thankfully, nothing had come of it.
Kai was only trying to keep her out of harm’s way, and she could respect that. But she also didn’t like how it was seriously impeding her dreams. Ember had convinced herself that she wasn’t in any danger. No one was going to attack her on a sound stage when she was surrounded by other people and while cameras were rolling.
The letters had only threatened her, not the show. If her stalker wanted to quit the show, then he (or she?) should have stopped the show altogether. It’s what she would have done if she was unhinged enough to threaten someone’s life.
With a head shake, Ember vowed that she wouldn’t think of the letters again until after the competition. Then she would have a calm conversation with Kai about her expectations, her dreams. They could come to some sort of agreement on how to proceed. Maybe staying at a hotel, where the letter-writer couldn’t get to her, was a good idea.
There.
They would find a solution that wouldn’t mean giving up everything she had ever wanted.
Ember grabbed a spoon, dipped it into the batter and brought it to her lips. The taste was all wrong. It caught in the back of her throat. She cleared her throat, shook her head, and, with a clean spoon, she remixed the batter. Once she was sure it had been adequately mixed, she took a bit of it in the spoon and licked it clean.
The taste was bitter. Too bitter. There was something way off.
Damn it. I’m wasting time.
Ember coughed into her elbow, hoping to displace whatever the bad taste had been. She looked down at the batter, wondering which of the ingredients had gone bad. Nothing in there had expired. She was a damn professional. She always checked the expiration date before putting an ingredient into a mix.
This meant she had to start all over while tasting every ingredient for posterity’s sake.
It would seriously cut into her time, dragging her chances of winning the challenge so low, her heart skipped and clenched.
It would be okay. She could do this. She could definitely do this. All it would take is a bit of elbow grease, some calm, and a bit of baker’s luck. She had made souffles and loaves of bread at high altitudes with great success on her first try. She knew she could do this.
Taking a fresh bowl, Ember dumped the almond flour into a measuring cup before adding it to the bowl. She dipped a finger in the flour, bringing it to her mouth.
The strange taste was there. It made her throat close again. She coughed, but this time, the sensation didn’t ease. Instead, it began spreading from her throat to her stomach.
Something was wrong.
She coughed into her elbow again, blinking fast against burning tears.
The last thing she remembered was seeing Kai’s horrified face, then her head hit the ground.
Chapter Fourteen
Kai
Kai wasn’t sure how it happened.
He had felt the hair on the back of his neck raise as if a foe had entered the soundstage. He had looked around, scanning the vast room for the threat.
There had been nothing out of place. No one who didn’t belong.
But something wasn’t sitting well with him. He wanted to scream cut to force the competition to pause for a moment while he figured out what was wrong. It would make the production assistant and the director furious, but he didn’t care.
The feeling which was making his skin crawl could very well have been connected to the threatening letter Ember had received.
Kai was just opening his mouth to shout out a warning when it happened.
Ember was standing there, holding up her concoction. Then, she wasn’t. Her body crumbled like a sheet of paper onto the ground.
Without thinking, he burst into action, leaping over the counter to get to her. Even at a distance, he could tell that her heart rate had dropped quite low. Her cheeks had lost all color, and there was a thin sheen of sweat on her forehead. Her breathing was ragged. It was an effort to drag air into her lungs.
It looked like an acute food allergy reaction, like she had gone into anaphylactic shock. The problem was, Ember didn’t have any food allergies. He knew that for a fact.
“Everyone stay right where you are,” he growled out.
All of the bakers and the film crew paused, immobilized by the sheer terror and command in his voice. He took his cell phone from his back pocket and called for an ambulance. He knelt down onto the ground to gently place Ember’s head on his legs. She didn’t need chest compressions. She needed help breathing.
“Ember, love. You need to stay awake,” he crooned. “Open those beautiful eyes of yours and look at me.”
Ember remained inanimate in his arms as he began mouth-to-mouth.
The ambulance ride was a pain. The paramedic moved around the bus, working on Ember. Every time the man touched Ember, Kai had to suppress a growl.
His lion was going mad, ready to pounce. It didn’t matter to the beast that the EMT wasn’t the one responsible. The man was too damn close to Ember, who was in distress. It aggravated all of his senses. The only thing that brought him comfort was that the police had been called. They had locked down the studio. No one was going to be allowed in or out of the space until they gave their statement. Kai had called Marius, who would be making sure the cops sent all of Ember’s ingredients to be tested for trace evidence.
He couldn’t be sure, but he had an inkling that Ember had been poisoned. It was the only thing that made any sort of sense. The only thing she had eaten differently than him was the batter she had tasted. He had been watching her like a hawk while she got her baking ready, and he had seen the confusion on her face once she had tasted the batter.
He should have intervened right then.
He should have known that his mate wouldn’t have made a bad-tasting batter. She was too good for that.
Once they arrived at the hospital, Ember was taken into the ICU, and much to his anger and dismay, Kai wasn’t allowed to go with her. He wasn’t family. He told the nurse he was Ember’s partner, but she was unmoved. Ember’s emergency contact was listed as her parents, and only they would be given any information.
It wouldn’t do.
Kai took out his business card and dropped it onto the nurses’ station’s counter. He didn’t want to create such a fuss for these men and women who were already taxed enough in their demanding jobs, but he needed to see Ember. He had to be by her side, or his lion was going to burst through his skin and go on the tear.
“I’m the head of security for the studio where the incident happened. More than that, Ember is my partner. Girlfriend doesn’t cover it, but we aren’t married yet. You need to let me through to see her.”
The nurse, a petite woman with long red hair, sighed. “It’s against the policy.”
Kai looked around and dropped his voice low. “She’s my mate,” he told the nurse.
Her eyes got wide with understanding. He could smell the panther on her. She was someone’s mate. She would understand what was at stake for him.