Chapter Seven
Nylora pulled up at Skip’s place, and he snorted when he settled behind the computer.
“Were they pissed when they realized you were pregnant and climbing over jagged metal all shift?”
“You could say that. I have been ordered to cease work the moment I feel so much as a twinge from my occupant.” She grimaced. “It would have been fine until they started getting questions about the woman who flew through a hospital. I caught shit for that one as well.”
He chuckled, and their first call came in. She drove out, lights and sirens.
“I fucking hate it when folks play with allergies.” She straddled the teenage boy in the ambulance and kept his heart and lungs beating with short lunges. She had one of Myor’s songs playing in her head as she kept going while Skip closed the doors and got driving.
She rattled off the status, the vitals, and the look of the young man who was due to become a wolf any day.
The slightly older boys had mocked him by giving him a wolf-out tincture, but it had contained wolfsbane, and the young man was deathly allergic.
Literally. They had used up all the supplies to get his heart going, so Nylora was doing it manually.
“How far out are we?”
“Three minutes to arrival.”
Nylora looked at her patient and saw some fur rippling over his cheeks. “Have an XIA team meet us at the hospital. He’s turning.”
“Shit!” Skip put the call in, and Nylora kept going, thankful that she had strapped him down across his shoulders and hips.
They were racing his shift, and he was going to come out hard. All the adrenaline they had shot him up with was going to kick in.
“Time!”
“Sixty seconds. What’s he doing?”
“He’s looking at me. It isn’t a good look.”
The patient was starting to fight the restraints, and the extended muzzle was beginning to snap.
“Are they there?”
“Waiting.”
“Okay, I am going to make a dramatic exit. Ditch when we stop.”
Skip slowed, and she got ready to jump. The tethers were starting to tear under stress.
She knew he was going to begin thrashing after her the moment he was loose, and she dodged his left hand while she grabbed the release, opened the door, dived over the men waiting, hit the ground, and rolled as the roar of fury filled the ambulance.
She hissed at the road rash and focused on healing her skin while the agents got into the vehicle and dragged the patient outside. She sat and waited.
Heavy cuffs were put on him while Skip told the hospital staff everything they had jacked into the guy.
When the werewolf was subdued, one of the team members came by to help her up. “Are you okay?” Demuel examined her arm for damage.
“Yup. That happens more often than it should.” She chuckled. “We also get a lot of black eyes.”
Outrage filled his gaze. “What?”
“Yeah. Patients get combative.” She leaned over. “Skip. We good?”
“Yup.”
“We need a new gurney. The straps are shot, and I am not playing psycho roulette all night.”
Skip nodded. “We will head back and switch it out.”
She flexed her hand, and Demuel took it in his, and to her surprise, he kissed her palm, and healing ran through her faster than she could manage it. She chuckled. “Thanks, Bonehead.”
He grinned and kissed her forehead. “Off you go.”
“Thanks. See you later.” She patted his cheek and headed back to the ambulance.
Demuel walked back to his team, and they grinned at him and ribbed him about his attentiveness.
It was a very strange shift. She ran into Jennel’s team, the team with Benny, Neekil and his guys, and finally, as they finished their assisting of someone on the docks who had pierced two fingers, Solor was dealing with a drunk kraken who wanted a fight.
When all the tentacles were bound with connected bands, the suspect was heaved into a transport, and Solor was washing his hands to get the slime off. He saw her and laughed. “Good evening, Medic Mills.”
“Evening Agent Stomp.”
He chuckled. “Busy night?”
“Yup. Two hours until breakfast. I have already taken Skip by the taco truck twice. Thankfully, the two lunches that folks packed for me are holding me up.”
A band of magic moved over his body and cleaned off the kraken slime. “Wouldn’t do to let that soak in.”
She chuckled. “No. We keep a few changes of clothes in the rig for when we deal with merfolk.”
He paused. “You change in there?”
“When we have to. Usually, we just do it next to it.” She smiled and glanced back at the ambulance. “Well, I have to get going. Have a fun night.”
He kissed her forehead. “See you shortly.”
“Yup. I am expanding my breakfast order. Fair warning.”
He chuckled. “Not a problem. Give us a text when you are heading to the diner.”
“Okay.”
He gave her a small hug, and she returned to the rig and got behind the wheel.
Skip was catching up on the paperwork. When she was ready, there was a ping, and they got a call.
She hauled ass to the fall off a roof while assaulting a neighbour’s holiday decorations.
Apparently, someone had put them up too early, according to the goblin who hit the ground.
Nylora felt the blood dripping from her cheeks, and her body slowly began to heal itself.
Skip said, “Do you want to get that taken care of?”
“What? The cuts? They are healing.”
“Yeah, but we have been called for the night, and it’s almost our sign-off anyway. Can they heal before you go on the date?”
“Uh, no. But they should be clotted on the way there. That was a very powerful, very old goblin.”
“Can you force a healing?”
“No. I leave work like this all the time. What’s the issue?”
Skip was looking in the side mirror. “Because two guys in body armour are walking toward us.”
She was exhausted, so she sent a flash of healing through her, but her face had still been marked with three sets of claw marks. They weren’t going to fade before her next shift. Her fresh shirt covered the body marks, and the corset had done its job. Bump was fine.
“Is the file finished?”
“Yup.”
“Should I go out the top?”
“Funny. Just hop out. See how they react.” Skip stayed in the truck.
“Coward.” She grabbed her lunch bags and opened the door, sliding to the ground and slowly closing the door in the vehicle’s marked bay. She took a deep breath and turned toward the approaching agents. “Morning.”
Solor and Demuel froze in their tracks. Solor said, “What happened?”
“Hazard of the job. Angry seniors with claws are angry seniors.”
Solor looked at the marks. “Those are goblin scratches. Are they anywhere else?”
“All over my torso and one hip. He was particularly scrappy.”
Skip came out and explained. “He had a head injury, and they tend to make the elder goblins a little crazy.”
Demuel had walked up to her, and he was looking at the marks. “I will heal this, but we need to show Dem-rah.”
“What? Why?”
“He’s the goblin king, and he made the arrangements for the goblin community to receive care. He needs to see what one of his did to a responder.”
“He couldn’t have done anything.”
“No, but the other goblins should have kept your patient under control. That is what they agreed to.”
“Okay, if it’s political, we can go.”
Demuel took some pictures and then said, “Can you lift your shirt?”
“If this is what is passing for foreplay nowadays...” She shrugged.
The bags went to the ground, and she pulled the top off, showing her shredded bra and the exposed metal of the slashed corset.
She unbuckled and unzipped, pushing her cargo pants down to show off the cuts on her hip.
“I stopped being able to heal fully a few hours ago. Demuel’s booster actual bought me some time. ”
Demuel was taking pictures of the damage, and Solor was firing off a furious text.
She looked at Demuel. “Can I pull everything back on?”
He nodded as he arranged the images, and Solor’s phone got a series of texts.
She eased the waistband of her trousers over the open wound of her hip. And then she went faster as she pulled her shirt over her head.
“Dem-rah would like to see you to apologize.”
“Why?”
“His people, his responsibility,” Solor muttered.
Demuel snagged the bags and walked with her to the dark green SUV. They tucked her in, and she saw Skip by his car. He turned and waved, and she tried, but her shoulder stopped her.
“Why didn’t your partner help you at the scene?”
“He was dealing with the second patient. The one that my patient fell on.”
Demuel paused. “That is not what I expected.”
“I know. We need an extra set of hands at the best of times. For people who need help, patients can kick, punch, spit, and an amazing array of fluids can go flying. Ah, my job is amazing.” She chuckled as they started to drive.
Solor was driving, and he was pissed.
She was dozing a little, but she was still so hungry that sleep eluded her. When they pulled up to the taco truck, she breathed slowly as the smells hit her. To her shock, Solor said, “Remain in the car.”
“Why?”
Dem-rah opened the door and hissed. “Ah, Nylora, I am so sorry. You haven’t been by recently.”
“After my second month, everything I loved made me ill, and since I loved your truck most of all, I had to stay in the ambulance.”
Dem-rah looked at her. “He had six arms?”
“Yeah, those little ones coming out of his shoulders. They did most of the headwork; the others worked the body. I am very happy that Bump was protected by steel.”
He looked. “How far along are you?”
“Six months.”
“Oh. Who knows?”
“It is spreading fairly quickly as of yesterday.”
The old goblin nodded. “I am going to talk to my community. They should have been handling their own so you could administer care. What happened to him?”
“We got him restrained and took him to the hospital. His skull is cracked.”
Dem-rah smiled. “Did he have any other injuries?”
“Nope. You fuckers are sturdy as hell.”
He grinned, showing a lot of teeth. “Yes, we are. Pregnant fae are not. You should consider retiring for the remainder of your pregnancy.”