Camden Reyes (Cam) POV:

The world was chaos for all of my bandmates, and I had no idea how to help them.

Sirens split the night open, their red and blue pulses strobing across twisted metal and broken glass from our tour bus. The air reeked of scorched rubber, spilled fuel, and that kind of metallic scent that clings to the back of your tongue, making the scene taste as bitter as it looked. My heartbeat still hadn’t stopped racing since the gut-wrenching screech of the bus, the loud crash as the bus hit the barrier, or the suffocating silence that followed after.

Evan had pulled- actually, to be more accurate, tackled a pedestrian out of the street with seconds to spare. Rowan had snapped afterward at some parasite with a camera. Mara was shouting orders over the noise, keeping police and paramedics focused while reporters swarmed like vultures. And Ash… Ash was already in the back of an ambulance, the ghost from his past unconscious behind the oxygen mask as the paramedics shut the ambulance doors and raced off to the nearest hospital.

And me?

I’d done what I could. Called it in the second, the bus had crashed. Gave dispatch the location that was not far from our hotel and the number of casualties. I guided the first responders when they arrived, pointing them toward the injured, grounding myself in the habits my mom drilled into me before I became a famous guitarist.

I walked that path once, paramedic school, training shifts, late-night ride-alongs with not enough pay. In another life, maybe I could’ve been helping with a trauma kit instead. Maybe Dad would’ve seen that version of me. Maybe he’d still be here.

But the ambulances were gone now, swallowed by distance, and everyone followed because Ash had gone with the ambulance to ensure his ex was alright.

And I was still standing at the accident scene, hands hanging uselessly at my sides, fingers twitching for something they couldn’t fix while I answered questions from the detectives. The twisted shell of the bus stared back at me, silent and accusing because I hadn't seen anything important. I had been halfway through the hotel door already at the time, so all I had seen was the moving bus and the crash itself. Ash had said the brakes were cut, and that's the only reason I knew why the bus had moved at all.

Useless. Again.

A while later, I started to walk toward the hotel. The press were still barking questions from behind the police tape.

Suddenly, I heard a sound that fractured my spiraling thoughts and made me pause mid-step.

A fragile, broken sob from a narrow service alley beside where the bus had been parked. My feet carried me into the dim, colder alleyway towards the sound.

And there you were.

Sitting on the floor against the brick wall, knees drawn close, your sleeve soaked dark with blood. You were a stranger, but you were also hurt, and I couldn't ignore that.

I was in front of you in no time at all.

“Hey… hey, are you okay, love?” I ask gently as I drop to my knees.

My hands, broad and calloused from years on strings, reached for your arm and pulled the fabric up even as you tried to pull it back.

The cut was deep, and around it, a red chemical burn.

That wasn’t normal.

My fingers tightened around your wrist, still gentle but firm. My heart thudded hard against my ribs as everything I’d ever learned collided in my head. A cut on the forearm like that was the kind of wound you’d see if someone tried to cut through a pressurized line, and the blade slipped.

Brake lines.

My breath hitched, and for a heartbeat, suspicion and dread twisted in my chest.

“What’s your name?” My voice came quieter now. “And how did you get this cut?”

A muscle jumped in my jaw. I hated the part that needed to ask because I always wanted to believe the best in people.

“Please,” I whispered, the word catching against the tightness in my throat. “My friends almost got hurt today. A lot of people did. We need to know who did this and why.” I plead while looking at the cut and burn on your forearm.