by Sophia Gray
The place was huge. And beautiful. It was clearly well built, and if Chip was the one maintaining it, he was doing a hell of a job. The front yard looked basic but tended. Even the damn windows looked clean.
“I met the only Chippendale dancer who lives in a mansion,” I muttered under my breath.
The man pulled to a stop just outside of the house and motioned for me to do the same. Putting the car into park and then popping open my door, I was surprised when I saw two men—not as tall as Chip, but as muscular—come out of the house, heading straight for my car.
“What are you—?” I began to ask, but the two men were already opening the door and pulling the poor man out from the back of my car. He groaned in pain, but I took that as a good sign. At least it meant he’d survived this far.
The men carried him into the house. I hurried after them, meeting Chip at the steps. “Who are these guys?”
Distractedly, he answered, “Friends. They crash here sometimes. C’mon, they’ll move him to the mudroom.”
I raised my eyebrows but said nothing. I just followed him through the house and found myself as amazed at the interior as I was with the exterior. Antique rose wood furniture. Paintings that looked as though they were somehow originals. A kitchen that looked like it belonged on one of those cooking shows. “Jeez, you live here?” I questioned as we briskly walked through the house.
He didn’t even spare me a backward glance, and when he spoke, it wasn’t to answer my question. Instead, he asked one of his own. “What do you need?”
“What?”
He made an irritated sound. “For Kato. What do you need to patch him up?”
Kato, the injured man, I thought.
Frowning, I remembered why I was here and what was going on. Normally, I was a little sharper than this. I tended to be so organized that a few of my friends and coworkers accused me of being OCD, but I wasn’t. I was just organized and focused. But right now, I was exhausted. The night had been long and brutal. Now I was trying to save a man’s life with no hospital and no doctor—just me.
“Plasma. Painkillers. Suture tools or, at the very least, super glue if the damage isn’t too extensive,” I rattled off. These were the things I needed, but I doubted he could get them. I was trying to find alternatives, but what alternative could you find for plasma? Blood? Great, I had no idea what blood type he was, and the chances of finding a universal donor at this time of night were slim to negative one thousand.
“Fine. I get you these things, you save Kato?”
I stopped abruptly and stared at him. Chip kept walking several more paces, then stopped outside of a half open door. He made another frustrated sound when he realized I’d stopped. “Well?” he demanded.
“I can’t guarantee—”
He waved me off. “I don’t care. Do whatever it is you’re going to do, and it’ll be what it’ll be. But standing there isn’t going to fucking save him.”
“I’m not a doctor,” I blurted.
I saw his jaw clench, like he was trying to keep from exploding. He sucked in a quick breath, then said, “So you might kill him?”
I winced. That wasn’t a thought I wanted to have, but yeah, that was more or less what I was suggesting.
“Which is nothing more than will happen if you just stand there running your mouth. So get in there. I’ll get you your shit.”
The urge to be defiant welled up inside me, but the need to save a man’s life tempered it. Despite his rudeness, I did as he said. He had me write down a list with the specific items I needed, then he shoved it into the hands of one of his friends—whom he treated more like servants or employees—and sent him scurrying off into the night.
I moved into the mudroom and found that it was set up like an impromptu triage center. There was a cot where Kato was currently lying, a sink with antiseptic soap, alcohol, and latex gloves. On a table to the side were bandages still in their packages, meaning they were sterile, and beside them sat an unusually thorough array of tools for the home of a motorcycle rider.
Frowning, I examined the tools.
A pair of nice scissors, like the kind you might get for hair cutting. Two pairs of forceps, which was a little stranger to find in a residential home. Three different sized scalpels. They looked just like the kind the doctors used in the emergency room where I worked. I skeptically admitted that there was a very slim possibility that maybe these things could be found in any home, though I doubted it. I had half a dozen pairs of forceps, though they were all used and no longer for surgery. But I was also a nurse, and I used them for mundane things like holding screws in awkward home repair situations or making homemade candles.
It was a hobby. I wasn’t very good at it.
That being said, I had a sense that there was something just a little off about all of this. It wasn’t that these things were hard to find or that they were set out like this. I could come up with explanations for that, but it was everything. Insisting I come here instead of the hospital. Sending a man out for materials that I wasn’t sure he could find with no questions. How everything in this room was set up like it had been used before as an impromptu ER.
You’re being paranoid, I told myself silently. And you’re wasting precious time.
I determined quickly that I would save Kato first, then wonder about that niggling sense of something being not quite right later. Hurrying to the sink, I washed my hands thoroughly and then snapped on a pair of the latex gloves. They were a little too big. For a man’s hands maybe? I wished I had a face mask, too, but I decided that it wasn’t that important. This room wasn’t sterile to begin with and neither were my clothes or anything else. I would have to just make sure that I was clean and careful. It was the best I could do.
What I really need is to get him a damn IV before he bleeds out.
But since there was no plasma, I decided I’d just have to start without it. After all, he was going to bleed regardless of what I did.
Undoing what I’d done before, I cut away the bandages so that I could clean the wound again. I wanted to get more of the debris out now that I could see better. I was going to have to make sure I didn’t leave any of it inside if I was seriously going to try and sew him up.
Oh, God, I can’t believe I’m going to do this. Although I prided myself on being calm in these types of situations, there was no denying how nervous I was. Yes, I was an RN, but that didn’t make me a doctor. The doctors and other nurses at the hospital would be the first to tell me that. But I was all Kato had just then. Once again, I had the sense that it shouldn’t be that way.
I grabbed several clean towels and a bowl. Filling the bowl with water, I soaked the towels and began the cleaning process all over again. This time I could see better thanks to the overhead light. I poured clean water over the wound, watching as it ran red to the floor. I saw pieces of metal now and winced.
I’d pressed them in deeper when I’d patched him up earlier, I was sure of it.
Grabbing the forceps, I used them like tweezers. I began to pull out the smaller pieces of metal as quickly as I could. I let them clink in the now empty bowl that I’d used for water. Most of the smaller pieces came out quickly. Maybe there were still some embedded in that I couldn’t see, but I wasn’t comfortable digging around in Kato for them. There was one big piece of shrapnel left, but it was deeper than the rest, and I didn’t want to tug it free until I had that plasma.
Assuming they can even find any, I thought gravely. I had little confidence in the endeavor.
When I’d gotten as much of the shrapnel as I could see, I cleaned the wound again, then dared to rinse it with alcohol. I used it sparingly, diluting it slightly with water first. I was again at the point where I couldn’t do more without proper tools, and it made me frown deeply. He’s going to die, I thought, my stomach twisting into guilty knots.
Just when I was about to patch him up again, knowing it wasn’t enough, the door burst open, and one of the men from earlier bounded in.
/> “Surgical needles, sutures, painkillers…” the man started rattling off as he unloaded his haul on my little table next to the patient.
My eyes widened as he not only pulled out the sutures and the meds—which I had the sinking suspicion were bought illegally—but also three bags of clear liquid. Plasma. My mouth dropped open as he continued to list off every item I’d put on his list.
Finally, when he was done, I turned to him and asked, “Where did you find all of this? And on such short notice?”
His dark eyes flickered towards the door. I realized that my Chippendale dancer was standing there with a sour expression. He gave a quick nod, and when the other man, the errand boy, turned to me to offer his answer, he said only, “A friend.” Then he disappeared before I could ask any more questions.
“Hey!” I said when he disappeared out the door.
“I got you what you asked for, now save Kato’s life,” Chip said in a dark, commanding voice that sent tendrils of both anger and need through me. He turned and left me there alone with my patient, wondering just who the hell these guys were.
Not wasting any more time, I grabbed the painkiller, which was in liquid form, and filled a syringe with it. I pushed aside the questions I had about where they possibly could have gotten it. I cleared Kato’s inner elbow, then found a vein. I injected it slowly. He was still unconscious, but at least he wouldn’t wake up in the middle of this screaming in pain.
Tossing the needle, I moved on. I set up the IV as quickly as I could, setting it up in the back of his right hand. I didn’t have a stand for the bag, so I pushed the cot to the side of the room where there were several coat hooks. I hung it up there and gave it a couple of squeezes to make sure it was flowing.
Finally, it was time to do the hard stuff, the stuff that was scaring the crap out of me. I had to sew up this guy’s middle.
I had to pull out the large piece of shrapnel first and did so on a single jerk. Blood started gushing immediately.
“Shit!”
I grabbed several of the sterile pads and wadded them up over the wound to slow the bleeding. I had to get him sewn up soon or it wouldn’t matter how much damn plasma I had.
You can do this, Jazz, you can do this, I told myself over and over again as I reached for the needle with shaking hands.
I had some practice with sutures, but it was minimal. Very minimal. Like, my friends at med school let me sit in on a few classes, and when they practiced outside of class, they let me try some. I was a nurse, not a doctor. I hadn’t trained for this, though I could do it in an emergency.
Swallowing harshly, I began.
The coarse threads tugged through the body disconcertingly. I tried to tell myself that it was just like sewing up a hole in a dress, but my mind wasn’t buying it. This was different. The skin tugged and pulled as I sewed x’s to hold it together.
I was sweating profusely, the beads dripping down my forehead and into my eyes. I kept thinking, I’ve got to save him. It was what kept me going, even when the flesh moved in ways that made my stomach churn, and my hand shook so badly that I had to give myself a moment before continuing.
I had to switch out the wad of bandages once to soak up the blood, but after what felt like an eternity, I finally had the biggest wound closed up.
By the end, I was shaking pretty badly.
I went to the sink and washed up all over again. I changed my gloves and splashed cool water on my face, wiping away the sweat. I felt exhausted but hopeful. The worst part was done, right?
Washing up again, I grabbed a new pair of gloves, then went back to my patient. He was still breathing, and I was thoroughly relieved. At least he was alive for now.
Now that I had the worst—or what I thought was the worst—done, I moved on to the rest of him. I checked his legs for major abrasions and cleaned the small ones. From what I could tell, he didn’t have any broken limbs, though I had to pull a finger back into place and set it. I was grateful he remained unconscious for that.
After a long while, I was finally done. I couldn’t guarantee anything—he needed a doctor, not me—but he was better off than he’d been when I found him tonight.
I was just pulling off my gloves when the door opened again. “Well?” demanded an irate Chip.
I really need to figure out what his real name is, I thought in that half delirious way that comes from being really tired. “He’s alive. That’s all I can say right now.”
Mr. Chippendale dancer didn’t look thrilled by my answer. “Goddamn it. What do you mean that’s all you can say? Is he going to fucking survive or not?”
I tossed the dirty, bloody latex gloves into the trash along with wads of bloodied bandages and the remains of Kato’s shirt. I shot the irate man at the door an annoyed glance. “How the fuck should I know?” I said hotly. I was tired and stressed. My tolerance for assholes was notoriously low. I didn’t know if the man I had worked on tonight would survive. And dammit, I was even a little scared. “He’s alive. There’s nothing else I can do.”
The sexy man narrowed his eyes at me and stalked forward. A shiver ran through my body that was only half fear. I blamed my hormones and the fact that I’d been single ever since Devin. It was enough to make any girl irrationally attracted to a gorgeously built asshole, right?
I swallowed heavily, then wetted my lips.
“So what the fuck do we do now?” he demanded. Beneath all that anger and bravado, I thought I heard worry.
It softened me just a little bit. He’s worried about his friend, I reminded myself. I told myself that the concern was what was making him angry. Whether that was true or not didn’t matter just then. My voice was softer, soothing as I answered, “We wait.”
Chapter Four
Pax
Waiting was on the list of things I did not do well, right up there with being polite, gentlemanly, and soft. They were not qualities that were applied to me, and I was pretty damn proud of that, most of the time. But I did have a soft spot—my men. They were like family. Loud, drunk, obnoxious family nine times out of ten, but they were mine. You loved family even when you didn’t like them, and you protected them whenever you could.
And right then it felt like I was failing Kato on that front.
Jamie, the sexy little nurse with the hot rebellious streak, was finishing her cleanup. She looked completely drained—so exhausted that her brain was probably running on autopilot.
I felt a twinge of sympathy for her, right before I promptly squashed it. I was grateful that she’d helped Kato, and I was grateful that she was something pretty to look at. That was where my concern for her ended.
At least, that was what I was telling myself.
“What the fuck happened to him?” Alex, one of my boys, asked. “He looks like a tiger ate him up or something.”
I rolled my eyes at him. “You see a lot of fucking tigers out here, Alex? Wild ones roaming the roads, waiting for unsuspecting bikers to pick off?” My tone was harsh. Alex was only a kid, barely nineteen, but I couldn’t help it just then. Maybe it wasn’t fair to be a dick to the kid, but he needed to learn that it was rough ‘n tumble in a biker club or you didn’t fucking last. I had no interest in coddling. And I didn’t do apologies.
Still, I let go of an angry breath and said, “He’ll be fine. That’s the priority. I’ll figure out what happened when he wakes up.”
Alex looked worried. “What if he doesn’t wake up though?”
I acknowledged that very real possibility and admitted, “Then we do some digging.”
Alex hesitated, then asked, “Do you think this was just an accident?”
Shaking my head, I answered, “About as much as I think he was torn open by a tiger.”
“So what do you think happened?”
Honestly? I thought maybe it was an animal. But not the kind you found in a zoo. The Hellriders motorcycle club ran this area, but that didn’t mean we didn’t have people trying to contest that rule. The Chaos Disciples had come in
recently, trying to muscle in on our territory. I tried to negotiate, but when Diego, the leader of the Chaos Disciples, had all but spit in my face, I tossed that idea aside.
I won’t let anyone disrespect me.
That meant coming at them hard. Two of their guys were dead, three in prison, and four beaten to within an inch of their lives. Needless to say, the Chaos Disciples took this as a declaration of war.
Which it was. Unfortunately, it meant that nights like tonight were likely not accidental. I couldn’t shake the feeling that this was all planned somehow, and that Kato wasn’t just in some unfortunate accident.
To Alex, however, I just said, “I don’t start throwing out wild ideas until I know they’re right. Sit tight for now. Let me worry about the hard stuff.”
