Shielding His Christmas Witness
Page 20
Juanita’s face was grave. “He’s got a serious head injury. There’s a laceration on his arm and cheek that need stitches.”
And they had no CAT scan machine, not here in the Playa del Oro mission clinic. “We’re going to need to move him to Puerto Rosado as soon as we can stabilize him. The hospital there can handle this.”
Jett was sitting up now. “I can take him up the coast in my boat. We have to get him and you out of here before the Three Stooges return.”
She bit her lip. “We’ll find someone to fly us. It will be faster.”
“No, it won’t. The airport is an hour away, and you’re going to have to pay a king’s ransom for a pilot, not to mention they’ll soak you for fuel.”
He was right, of course, but she wasn’t ready to admit that to him. “For now we’ll monitor his vitals, stitch him up and wait for the doctor to check him out. We’ll keep the doors and windows locked.”
“That is a ridiculous plan,” he snapped.
“I didn’t ask for your opinion.”
“I’m offering it, free of charge. You can’t stay here and...” Jett’s head jerked up. He made for the front door again and looked out. “Too late,” he said. “They’re back, and this time they’re not going to leave until they finish the job.”
There was a sound of shattering terra cotta, a baseball bat decimating the pots of bougainvillea on the porch. Then they began to batter down the door.
* * *
The bat struck so hard the walls shook.
In spite of the urgency, Jett admired the fire in Sarah’s hazel eyes, the firm tilt of her delicate chin as she’d tried to figure out how to save her patient. He attempted to shake off the ringing in his ears that had roared to life again when he’d taken on the thugs. Great. He’d finally overcome the seizures, leftovers from the grievous injury that had ruined his navy career and reduced him to being the dive master on a rinky-dink boat in Tijuana. Now the ringing was back.
He ground his teeth together. You’ll overcome this, too.
The next crack of the bat against the door sounded like cannon fire. Both women jumped.
Jett tried for what he figured was a reasonable tone. “We’ve got to get him out of here.”
“It’s not safe to move him. He might be bleeding internally,” Sarah said.
“He’s going to be bleeding externally, too, if we don’t move, and so will the rest of us.” Another pot shattered outside.
She trembled, the crown of her blond head barely brushing his chin as they hauled the kitchen table over to join the file cabinet. “Just because Marco sicced you on me doesn’t mean I have to take orders from you,” she fired off.
He tensed. “Marco didn’t sic me on you. He asked me to make sure you were okay during your missionary stint, and since I was in Tijuana, it was easy for me to make my way to this part of the coast for a while.” A partial truth. Even if his bank account hadn’t been down to his last hundred bucks, he still wouldn’t have taken the job so close to Sarah if Marco Quidel, his mentor and a protector to the Gallagher sisters, hadn’t asked him to. He wouldn’t let Marco down for anything. You’re a sap, Jett, for all your tough-guy moves.
One of the men was shouting now, whacking his baseball bat against the walls of the clinic as he looked for windows or unlocked doors.
Sarah went pale. “Will anyone come to help us?”
Jett braced himself against the next blow as boots began to smash against the flimsy door.
“Sorry, Sarah Gal. We’re on our own.”
Copyright © 2016 by Dana Mentink
ISBN-13: 9781488008771
Shielding His Christmas Witness
Copyright © 2016 by Laura Iding
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