5. Chapter 5
Holy hell! Holy hell! Holy hell! her inner voice hollered.
What had Sienna gotten herself into? Ryan was going to kill her for running off half-cocked if she didn’t die before then.
And that was nothing compared to what her brothers and Marcus would do to her.
But when Megan had told her that John was thinking about leaving, she lost all sense of self-preservation and took off on her own to confront him.
She sped up and waited for John to say something.
He’d gone quiet after her rant about the word huff.
She thought she’d been holding it together pretty well considering, but she spouted ridiculous things when she was anxious.
After a couple more seconds of silence, she glanced over to see John’s eyes were closed. She slowed down.
“John?”
He didn’t respond and she reached over and shook him slightly. Her stomach bottomed out when he listed to the side.
Do something! Veronica screeched.
“Calm down!” she yelled at Veronica, and if she was being honest, at herself as well.
She came to a stop and put her fingers against his neck and felt a heartbeat—thank God.
Sienna leaned over and checked in the glove box for a first aid kit, instead finding plastic cutlery and ketchup packets.
She pulled out her phone from her pocket and barked, “Call Adam,” before setting it on the seat so that she could keep both hands on the wheel when she started driving again.
The phone rang twice before Adam picked up. “Hey, Sienna. What’s up?”
“I’m with John. He was attacked at his cabin, and we escaped. I’m heading back to the clan house with him.”
“How bad is he hurt?”
“He has an arrow in his side, and he seemed to be fine until a couple minutes ago but then he passed out. Isn’t he supposed to be indestructible? Why is he unconscious?”
“There could be some sort of poison on the arrow. Marcus and Eric are here with me. Eric’s calling Dr. Murphy to come to the house. Are you okay?”
“Yeah.” Because the grumpy ass had stepped in front of her to protect her.
“Where’s Ryan?” Adam asked.
She hesitated for a moment before answering. “I came to see John on my own.”
“Are you being followed?” Marcus spoke in his no-nonsense head of security voice.
She glanced in the mirrors. “Not that I can see.”
“Okay,” Marcus said. “By the time you get here to the house, we’ll be on lockdown.”
She blew out a hard breath. “I’m not in my car. I’m driving a gray truck. I should be there in twenty minutes.”
“Got it. Be safe,” Adam said.
She could only imagine what he wanted to say. What they all wanted to say.
Sienna looked over at the unconscious male beside her and sped up. What if he couldn’t live forever? He was over four hundred years old and hadn’t died from old age, but that didn’t mean that he couldn’t die from being attacked.
What if the arrow was poisoned? She should have thought about that. The arrow that had injured Tessa had been poisoned, but since she wasn’t a dragon, it hadn’t hurt her. She wanted to kick herself for telling him not to pull it out.
And other than stopping and trying to do surgery on the side of the road with the plastic spork she found, she was better off getting him to the clan house.
She looked in her rearview mirror again and didn’t see anyone behind them. Pressing her foot down on the gas pedal in response to Veronica’s drill sergeant orders, she hoped to get to the house in fifteen minutes instead of twenty.
By the time the guard let her through the gate and she pulled up to the clan house, a small crowd had gathered outside.
Eric, Adam, Marcus, and a couple guards carried John toward the house.
Megan and Tessa surrounded her and checked her over.
“Are you okay?” Megan asked.
“Yes.” Sienna looked around. “Where’s Ian?”
“Dr. Murphy is upstairs setting up the room so that he can work on John,” Tessa said. “What happened?”
Sienna watched as the men carried John up the porch stairs and into the house. “I went to see John at the cabin, and someone shot at us. The selfless fool stepped in front of me and took the arrow.”
Megan rested her hands on her shoulders. “Sienna. I’m sorry that John’s hurt, but you could have been killed. He’s immortal, remember?”
Sienna shook her head. “He doesn’t seem immortal to me right now.”
“Let’s get you inside. You’re in shock,” Megan said.
Sienna headed inside and caught sight of the men at the top of the stairs. “I’m going with him.”
Before Megan and Tessa could protest, she took the stairs two at a time and entered the room just as several guards left.
John was lying on a stripped-down bed, and Dr. Murphy bent over him, checking his vitals.
“How is he?” she asked.
“Too early to tell. Marcus, can you take off his shirt?”
Eric stepped over to her. “Why don’t you go downstairs with Megan and Tessa?”
Nope. “I’m not going anywhere. I can help.” Sienna stepped to the side of the bed. “What do you need?”
Dr. Murphy nodded. “Wash your hands and then you can help me.”
She rushed into the bathroom and scrubbed her hands before heading back into the bedroom and stopping short at the sight in front of her.
Marcus had removed John’s shirt. He was bleeding from his side, but what caught her attention were the older scars. She stepped closer and stared at his chest. They were a tapestry representing a violent past, and it made Sienna’s heart hurt for him.
Dr. Murphy’s voice interrupted her thoughts. “I’ll need to get that arrow out of him as soon as possible.” He gestured toward the table with his supplies. “Everyone put on gloves. I don’t want anyone touching the arrow with bare hands.”
Sienna quickly pulled on a pair of gloves as everyone else did the same.
Dr. Murphy picked up some instruments, and Marcus stood next to him, ready to assist. The doctor cut along his side and started to work the arrow out.
Sienna glanced up at John’s face, but he didn’t flinch.
She swallowed. Keep it together. Keep it together.
“Sienna, grab that small basin. I’m going to put the arrowhead into it as soon as I can get it out of him.”
She held the metal basin over John’s chest, trying not to shake. A minute later Dr. Murphy pulled a forceps from John’s side with the arrowhead at the end of it and dropped them both into the container with a metallic ping. Sienna turned and set it on the dresser.
“We’ve got a bleeder,” Dr. Murphy said in a much too calm voice for Sienna’s liking. That wasn’t a sentence that should have the same tone as “Nice weather today,” but doctors needed to hold their crap together, right?
“Sienna, grab that gauze and press it to his side.”
Sienna scrambled and pulled the stack of gauze and leaned over John and pushed it against his side.
“Good. More pressure. I’m going to stop the bleeding in just a second.”
Dr. Murphy had Marcus grab more instruments, and the noise around her faded as she looked down into John’s face. He appeared so peaceful right now and that scared her. Where were his frown lines on his forehead and his downturned mouth? He was too damn grumpy to die.
“He’s not going to die if I have anything to say about it,” Dr. Murphy announced.
Sienna blinked up at him. She must have said that last part out loud.
Dr. Murphy nodded at her. “Okay, move the gauze away, Marcus and I are ready.”
She pulled her hand away from him, and they got to work, Marcus handing the doctor different items as he operated on whatever was making him bleed so much.
Adam stood next to her. “Ian’s good at what he does. He won’t let the grump die.”
Yep. She had definitely said her last thoughts out loud.
After another couple of minutes, Ian and Marcus both took a breath.
“We stopped the bleeding. Before I close up the wound, I want to flush the area, especially if there was poison on the arrowhead.”
Marcus walked over to him with a squeeze bottle of clear liquid.
“I’ll need to test the arrowhead before we close him up as well.”
“Can I test it for you?” Sienna asked.
Ian nodded. “Okay. Eric, in my bag is a leather sleeve with two vials of liquid. Get them out and give them to Sienna.”
Eric set the two vials down on the dresser next to her.
“Pour the contents of the vial with the green lid on the arrowhead and tell me if there is any sort of reaction.”
Sienna unscrewed the cap and did as Ian said, holding her breath. She waited and waited a little more.
“Nothing happened.”
Ian kept working. “Okay, that’s good. That rules out several poisons. Now use the vial with the blue cap.”
Sienna glanced over at Eric, who stood next to her. She felt the slightest case of déjà vu as she unscrewed the cap and poured it over the arrowhead—until it started to smoke, that is.
“It’s smoking.”
“What color?” Dr. Murphy asked without looking up from John’s side.
“Purple.”
Ian did look up then. “Shit.”
Shit? Dr. Calm Cool and Collected just said shit?
“What is it?” Eric asked before Sienna could get the words out.
“They used Annakathan. It’s a dragon poison that’s been banned for centuries because it’s so deadly.”
Sienna’s stomach dropped as she watched the purple smoke circle the basin. “Step back, Eric.”
“The poison isn’t airborne. Just no one touch the arrowhead,” Dr. Murphy said.
Sienna pulled off her gloves carefully and placed them in the basin. She hadn’t touched it, but she wasn’t taking any chances with the others.
“Marcus, grab the other bottle and the large basin,” Dr. Murphy said. “We need to flush this wound out a second time. Adam, in my bag are some saline IV bags, get them out and hook them on the pole I have set up next to the bed. We’re going to need to get fluids into him ASAP.”
They got back to work, and Sienna tried to calm her breathing. She’d told him not to pull the arrow out. This was her fault.
Before she could drop further down the rabbit hole of guilt, a groan had her stepping toward the bed. John flinched and groaned again.
“Eric and Adam, move next to Sienna and get ready to hold him down if you have to. I need to finish cleaning this wound, and then I need to sew him up.”
Sienna leaned over when John’s head jerked to the side, and she placed her palm on his forehead. “It’s okay, John. You’re safe.”
He seemed to calm at her words. Ian nodded. “Keep talking to him, Sienna.”
She ran her fingers over his forehead lightly and knelt next to him, murmuring. She was rarely at a loss for words but very quickly ran out of things to say. She leaned closer and quietly sang a lullaby her mother used to sing to her, and that seemed to quiet John down even further.
Veronica decided to join the singalong, and not to be outdone, tried to harmonize with Sienna. She wasn’t sure how long she sang to him before Ian took a step back. “I’ve closed his wound and started the IV. I’m flushing his system with fluids.”
“What about an antidote?” Sienna asked.
Ian hesitated for a moment as if considering what to say. “There is no antidote.”
Hands settled on her shoulders to help her stand up. She glanced back to find Adam behind her. “He’ll pull through this, Sienna. Remember he can’t die.”
Adam’s words didn’t calm her, especially when she looked down at John’s pale face.
It was true that John couldn’t die a natural death. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t die a violent one.