Chapter 41
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
SHORT
Ihadn’t stopped to thank the New Mexico crew, who’d ridden through the night to save us.
My only thought was on getting to Bronwyn and Trip to check they were okay.
Waiting outside while they were opening the door?
Pure fucking torture. And then when I’d seen them safe and sound, I’d felt like falling to my knees in relief.
Although while the adrenaline had been racing through me, I hadn’t thought about how the gunfire would have been triggering for Trip.
It’s only now that I realise the noise would have been terrifying for anyone.
Trip must have been petrified. I’m so fucking grateful to see him looking relatively unscathed and wearing headphones, which I presume had helped him.
When he’d run to me, calling me Dada over and over, well, that damn near slayed me.
But we’ve injured men downstairs, and I’m filled with guilt as I hadn’t even waited to see who was wounded or dead before I had to find my woman.
Her before my brothers. What the hell was I thinking?
But when she assures me she’ll treat them the best she can, I know I can excuse myself by explaining my rush to get to her was only because I was focused on getting the injured medical attention. Yeah, who am I fucking kidding?
Now the noise has stopped, and Trip’s been reassured I’m alright – luckily, he doesn’t notice or, if he does, doesn’t realise the significance of the blood leaking down my sleeve.
What is obvious is that the poor kid is tired, probably coming down hard from the overdose of adrenaline he’d received.
Paint’s sister seems okay with staying up here to watch over the children.
Although her daughter tries to make out that she’s ready to party all night, even I can see her eyelids are heavy.
Satisfied Trip’s in good hands, Bron doesn’t hesitate to accompany me down the stairs.
As we descend, she quickly explains their plan to block the door and escape through the window should it have come to that.
I gather, though she won’t admit it, it was the resourcefulness of my woman who came up with that plan.
Fuck, she’s made of so much more than she takes credit for, and I can’t wait for her to fully bloom, grow her wings, and take flight – as long as it’s me she always comes back to.
And Words’s mom? Well, she can go and suck eggs if she thinks I’m losing my woman to her son.
“What have you got for me to work with?” Ignoring how tired she must be herself, Bron’s all business as we enter the clubroom, which looks worse for wear, glass everywhere from the smashed windows and overturned tables and chairs. It’s also crowded.
“Medical kit’s in the kitchen,” I tell her, then try to make my way through the throng.
Suddenly, the VP’s right in front of me. He’s carrying both our first-aid supplies and his own medical bag, which he’d cobbled together. He was a medic in the Army and has treated our injuries before, when they weren’t severe enough to summon professional help.
“Bronwyn,” he addresses her directly. “Those with minor injuries are waiting in church, but there are a couple outside I’d like your opinion on.”
Bronwyn heads straight for the door, but I pull her back. I feel the need to prepare her. “There are some bad sights out there,” I start.
“Short, I heard the fucking shots, and can see most of the Kings alive and walking around. I suspect you killed all the bad guys. I doubt they just turned tail and ran home.”
Saint’s eyes catch mine, and he gives me a chin lift. Despite the urgency of the situation, I have to smirk. He was the one who’d told me life with the Kings was not for the likes of her. Now she’s proving him otherwise.
Outside, Bron averts her eyes from the corpses as she picks her way around them, following Saint. When he crouches down, she’s right there beside him, looking down at Tempest in the beam from Saint’s flashlight.
“Bullet to the left side of his chest,” Saint tells her grimly.
Gently, she examines the sergeant-at-arms. “His pulse is weak and thready. It’s beyond my skills, Saint. He needs a hospital.”
“Fuck,” Saint exhales. “Yeah, thought you’d say that.
Doubt even Doc would have wanted to treat him here.
” To me, he asks, “Can you go and get the prospect to bring the truck around to the front? We’ll have to take him in and hope the hospital buys the ‘he accidentally shot himself’ excuse again.
” As I walk off, I see him patting Bron’s shoulder, and can just make out his words.
“This way. There’s another man down over here.
” He walks about ten yards further around the clubhouse.
Prospect. As I obey the VP’s instruction, I realise he’d said it in the singular.
Fuck, does that mean Heathen didn’t make it?
Unless he’s walking wounded, which is unlikely, as he was on the frontline when the attack started.
Damn, although if he is breathing, I’d be loath to admit it, but I liked that kid and thought he had promise.
“What’s going on out there?” Bullseye accosts me as soon as I walk in.
“It’s bad, Prez. Tempest needs to go to the hospital. He’s in a pretty bad way. Saint sent me to round up the prospect to bring the truck out front.”
Putting two fingers to his mouth, Prez whistles loudly. When everyone swings around, he directs his finger toward Knight. “Go back to Saint. I’ll handle it here,” he says to me, even though his attention is on the prospect approaching.
Running back outside, I find Saint and Bronwyn kneeling by Genie, who I can see from the floodlights still burning brightly, is lying in a pool of what appears to be his own blood.
“Yes, Saint, he needs the hospital as well. He needs a blood transfusion, and God only knows what damage that blade has done. I could stitch him up, but he could still be bleeding inside.”
“I’ve done an emergency blood transfusion out in the field, and Piston’s O negative. His blood will work on anyone.”
“And did the patient survive?” Bron challenges him.
Saint looks chagrined. “No, but he didn’t die from his wound. He died from infection.”
“Precisely the risk of doing that here.” She points her finger at Saint. “And don’t tell me we can take all precautions. However much we sanitise, the clubhouse won’t be a sterile environment.”
“Shit, you’re right.” Saint deflates like a pricked balloon, then spins around, spying the prospect approaching. He’s not on his own. Rattler and Winchester are accompanying him. “Brothers, we’ve got two to bus to the hospital.”
Of course, I help. Both wounded men are unconscious, which is perhaps merciful.
We’re trying to be as gentle as we can, but we’re not trained paramedics and have no proper stretcher.
Still, moments after the help had appeared, Tempest and Genie are loaded into the bed of the truck.
Rattler and Winchester offer to go with them, and on the way, concoct some cock-and-bull story to try to keep the cops at bay.
Or, as Saint suggests, just tell them the two brothers got into one, just them involved, no one else injured, and definitely no outsiders attacking the club.
Cops should be happy if they believe we’re trying to kill each other off, two less felons, in their opinion, to deal with.
Saint leaves them with just some final words, pointing his finger toward Rattler, then to Winchester. “One of you stays with them at all times, and when…” he breaks off and swallows hard, then tries to say more confidently, “When they come round, you make sure they’re both telling the same story.”
From the look of them, though, I’d say it would be a miracle if either woke up breathing, let alone speaking.
As the truck drives out of the broken gates and disappears down the roadway, I can see the shudder that racks the VP’s body.
Stepping up close, I tell him, “Know you want to go with them. Fuck, the whole club will. But brothers showing up en masse kind of defeats the narrative that two brothers just lost their heads about whatever excuse Rat and Win come up with.”
Saint raises and dips his head, showing he already knows that. He pulls himself together, clearly like me, for the moment shelving the thought we might never see the sergeant-at-arms or our tech guru back at the club again, or at least, not alive. “Best get to our other patients, Bron.”
I’ve never seen my woman in action at the hospital.
My only experience was when she’d become my private nurse.
But only seconds after we walk into church, where the walking wounded are assembled, I’m in awe at the way she takes control of the unruly mob, some standing, the rest sprawled out on chairs.
Quickly, she tells them to shut up and listen, and her unusually loud voice cuts through all other conversations, making me think she’s spent time in the emergency room, dealing with a roomful of Saturday night drunks.
“Freak, put down that beer until I’ve examined you. You might have a concussion.”
He stands and spins around so fast he drops said bottle, puts his hand to his bleeding head, and flops back down in his chair. Bron nods sagely as though her point has been made.
Then she starts her rounds of the patients sitting in front of her.
Piston has taken a bullet to his shoulder, his right arm hanging loose.
Words, who’d put on a good show for his mom, now leans heavily with his head on the table, holding a cloth to the bleeding wound on his scalp, which Bronwyn assesses is where a bullet missed his brain by a fraction of an inch.
Then, continuing her triage, she comes to Stalker, who’s bent double, clutching his stomach. Gently placing her hand on his shoulder, she eases him upright.
“No,” she gasps. “Stalker, you need to go to the hospital as well. You’ve taken a gunshot to your stomach.”