Arlo #2
Knowing she was more than capable of the task, I turned and grabbed the zip ties off the table and walked back to the hallway, forcing myself not to look at the blood on the floor or at Ward.
If I saw him, and he was bad, or he was.
..I wouldn’t be able to keep it together.
I already felt like anchors in my mind were coming loose, and everything was trying to float to the surface.
If I saw the worst of the worst right now, I would come undone and sink into my head, where I might just drown.
“Hold still,” I told Devon, not wanting to have to hurt him again, and bending down to grab his wrists.
I should have expected it when he sprang, slamming his fist into the side of my face, sending me reeling back.
He leapt forward, reaching out and hitting me again as one hand closed around my throat.
Spots formed before my eyes as I tried to push him off with little success.
I was already weak from the night’s events, and I could only try to hit him to drive him off, but his mouth was set in a grimace of rage and hate as he clasped his other hand around my throat.
I could do nothing; my attempts to push him off were feeble and useless.
The white spots turned black as I felt the oxygen leave my brain, leaving me faint, and everything sounded distant.
All I had done had been pointless; he was getting the best of me, and I couldn’t defend myself.
Maybe one of the others would be able to stop him before he got his hands on his gun, or perhaps they would be able to use one of the ones on the table.
A halo of light, growing brighter as the darkness I was drowning in expanded.
Some part of me, the one familiar with death, knew it was just what happened when oxygen was cut off from the brain for too long.
Eventually, the mind began to see things; hallucinations, and hormones flooded the body as it tried to do whatever it could to stay alive.
Except this time, it was pointless; no amount of hormones or desperation was going to save me. I had done what I could for my survival and the survival of those who meant the most to me. That had to count for something, right?
The halo disappeared, and I realized it must be the end.
My arms had dropped, so the last of my strength was going.
The shadow moved, and I was vaguely aware of a harsh sound before the grip around my throat relaxed.
My heart raced to life as I choked, coughing on the air I was sucking into my lungs as I tried to sit up.
My vision filled with light once more, and I saw Devon on his back, his head limply drooping to the side and blood matting his hair.
I peered up and blinked as I tried to get more and more air into my lungs. “H-hi, Mom.”
Matilda’s eyes widened as she hovered over me, her bottom lip trembling. “You’ve never called me that before.”
“F-first time for everything, I suppose,” I gasped out..
She dropped to her knees and yanked me to her, wrapping me in a hug so fierce I felt my watering eyes leak down my face. I hugged her back. “It’s okay, I’m...okay.”
“You almost weren’t,” she whispered fiercely in my ear. “You almost weren’t, oh, Arlo.”
“I’m…” my breath caught, and I stiffened. “Ward!”
“Marcus is looking after him,” she told me, but let me go as I fought to get out of her arms. “Go on, I have the ties. I’ll keep this one trussed up better than one of our turkeys at Thanksgiving.”
I ran around the corner and stopped as I saw Marcus bent over Ward, covering him with his body.
I was faintly aware of the red and blue lights flashing in the hallway behind me, but I didn’t care as I stepped forward.
Amelia was kneeling on the floor at Ward’s feet, her eyes filled with tears and her makeup a total mess.
Behind her stood Eric, his mouth a thin line as he stood with his hand on her shoulder, looking down at his only child with tears flowing down his face.
“Oh God,” I whispered.
Collapsing beside Marcus, I looked down at Ward and felt the breath leave me again. His shirt was soaked with blood, and his eyes were half open. His chest moved, and his eyes twitched. I allowed myself a momentary breath of relief, but I knew nothing was guaranteed.
“Marcus?” I asked softly.
“He’s...well,” Marcus said in a faint voice. “He’s alive.”
Alive, but nothing more.
“That bad?”
“A thread, I’m afraid.”
“Okay,” I said, leaning over Ward, stroking his face, and taking his hand. “Help is here, Ward. I don’t know how, and I don’t even care. But you need to keep going, okay? Hold on for a bit longer, and then you can let everyone do their jobs, okay?”
His eyes twitched to fall onto me, and I saw him try to open his mouth, so I shook my head. “You keep that strength, don’t be a fool now. You stay with me, you hear me?”
Ward’s breathing was labored, and it wasn’t hard to see why, even with Marcus’ dinner jacket and hands pressed over the wound, I could see where the bullet had entered.
To my dismay, my knowledge of anatomy wouldn’t be denied, and I knew his lung had definitely been hit.
Without being able to look at him without something in the way, though, I didn’t know how much danger he was really in, or rather, how much danger his heart was in.
If his heart had been hit directly, he had only a minute or two, with or without professional help.
If he had taken a nick, his chances were higher but not guaranteed.
If it hadn’t been hit at all, then his chances of survival were so damn high with what I hoped was medical personnel showing up with the police.
I stared at Amelia, who looked so lost I actually felt a stab of pity for her.
Ward was her only child, and despite their differences, there was some love for him in her heart.
At the same time, what had she known of violence and danger?
There had been no way for her to control the situation, and now she was watching her child suffer through every breath, and there wasn’t a thing she could do to help.
Both Mother and governor were at a total loss.
“Amelia,” I said softly, pulling her attention to me. “Why don’t you go get the EMTs? If anyone here has a recognizable face and can get them in here quickly, it’s you.”
Her eyes looked around in a daze before she pulled her hands away from Ward’s legs, and I watched her take a deep breath.
The genuine despair and hopelessness in her face disappeared, and I saw the mask of the woman she was slide back into place as her mouth set firmly, her eyes narrowing.
Her hand adjusted her hair as she got to her feet and marched toward the hallway.
She wasn’t wearing her heels; they had apparently been lost during the debacle, and I was amused to find she walked with the same heavy, determined step she always did.
Clearly, her attitude existed with or without the power the heels gave her strides.
“Where is everyone else?” I asked as I stared down at Ward, holding his hand.
“Your mother busied me with Ward and was going to try to help the people locked in the back, which is where she probably is at the moment,” Marcus explained. “She was obviously distracted by whatever happened in the hallway.”
I let out a shaky laugh. “She was saving my life, that’s what she was doing.”
“That explains what I heard,” he said with a snort. “Sounds like her.”
“No!” I heard Amelia’s sharp voice crack like a whip, and I winced at the amount of ‘you’re an incompetent moron who shouldn’t be allowed to eat unsupervised, let alone do the job you’re supposed to be doing’ in her voice.
“Down that hallway, as I said the first time. My son is bleeding out on the floor, and you can’t tell your right from your left? ”
“It’s hard to argue with her,” Marcus said with a little laugh.
“They’re coming,” I told Ward, looking down and flinching when I saw how pale he had grown.
The only thing I could hold onto to keep me sane was the sparkle in his eyes as he looked up at me and how he gripped my hand.
It was just a flex of his fingers, but it was more strength than he would have been able to summon if he was too weak.
That, or it was the last surge of strength people got when they were right on the brink of death.
God, I hated how much my brain knew about death and dying.
Pushing that thought away, I got out of the way quickly as the EMTs rushed in.
Their focus was on Ward, but I could see the way they exchanged a glance as Amelia’s ranting continued in the background, now apparently unhappy with how slow the police were to get their hands on Devon.
I couldn’t help but agree with her. The professionals were here, and I desperately wanted them to take over.
Trying to deal with everything was exhausting, and I wanted someone with more knowledge and control to take over.
If that meant letting Amelia take her anger and helplessness out on people who didn’t deserve it, that was a price I would accept.
The EMTs descended on Ward in a heartbeat, talking into their radios and beginning to work on him.
I barely paid attention to what they were doing as I dropped into the seat I’d been sitting in before losing my mind.
All that mattered was that they got him out of here as soon as possible.
I couldn’t even think where the nearest hospital was, but I knew it had to be a decent drive away.
Every minute counted when someone was shot in such a vital place, and that clock was steadily ticking.
People died all the time on the way to the hospital, but the possibility of surviving existed.