“Call Ezra!”
Dev is quickest to recover and overtakes us, jumping the stairs two at a time. As I burst through Harper’s bedroom door, he’s already got the sheets ready, and I lay her down gently. Her head lolls to the side as I start CPR, counting the compressions and breathing gently into her ice-cold mouth, willing her chest to keep rising. Ace whimpers from the doorway, but when I turn he has his phone in his hand, hitting numbers and holding it to his ear.
Gabe is slumped against the doorway, his eyes on Harper’s still frame.
“It’s too late,” he moans.
“Like fuck,” I snap, beginning a second round of compressions. We need to warm her up. We might be able to save her. But I need help.
Come on, love. Stay with me.
“Rogue, the compound,” Dev starts.
I cut him off abruptly. “We’ll never see her again. They’ll take her away.”
Harper’s chest rises slightly before falling, and I close my eyes briefly with a prayer of relief. Ace is rambling garbled information down the phone to his grandfather, and I grab it out of his hands, turning the speaker on. Ezra’s voice rings out, his gruff tones snapping instructions rapidly.
“Get warm water and cloths – lots of them. You need to warm her middle first, if you start with her legs and arms then it could push blood back to her heart and stop it. Lots of blankets.”
Dev is already running the bath in the next room, and I bark at Gabe to snap him out of his panic. “Get blankets!”
His hackles rise at my use of the alpha bark, but he doesn’t resist. I hear him ripping things out of the airing cupboard. He skids back in, dropping a bundle at the foot of the bed and running back out to get more.
Noises come from the phone. “I’m on my way. How long was she there?”
My throat closes. “We don’t know. Hours, maybe. Hurry, Ez.”
“Shit. Get those warm cloths on her now. Remember what I said about starting from the middle. Neck, chest wall or groin only. Slow dabs, no massaging or rubbing or you could take her skin off.” Gabe whimpers behind me as Dev bursts out of the bathroom. He grabs some bedding from the pile and starts ripping it into smaller pieces.
“I’m assuming she’s beta?” Ezra asks.
“Omega. Does it matter?”
There’s a split second of silence, Ezra’s surprise palpable but he recovers quickly.
“Have you bitten her?” I growl lightly and he shushes me with the authority of an older alpha. “Quit with the posturing, boy, this is important.”
“No,” I force out. Regret runs through me. I wish we had. I wish I’d bitten her at the first opportunity we had, making it clear that she belongs to us.
Ezra curses and I hear the honk of his horn.
“That would help, but we’ll make do. Forget what I said. She’ll need your body heat, all of you. That means all four, assuming she’s involved with the whole pack. Clothes off, cover her as much as you can,gently, and stay there. I’m about 10 minutes away. Leave the door open.”
The line goes dead. I start shucking off my clothes, growling at Gabe to do the same. When he’s slow to react, my scent rises in a dominating push, his eyes dilating as I shove my authority down the pack bond.
“Snap out of it, Gabe,” I urge. I pull him to me briefly in a quick hug, anchoring him to the pack. Devlin and Ace are already naked, Dev crawling onto the other side of the bed. I growl at Ace when he tries to take Harper’s other side and he shows me his throat, quickly dropping to the bottom of the bed. Gabe’s weight presses down on the mattress as he follows. I can feel my dominance leaking out of me, covering the room in heavy pheromones.
“Cover her,” I bark. They’re quicker to respond this time. Carefully, so carefully, I turn Harper gently on her side and pull her to me, pressing my cheek to her face, her body plastered to mine. The cold runs through me like chalk on a blackboard but I ignore it. Dev is doing the same on my other side, his head gently nestled against her throat as he inhales deeply.
I feel Ace and Gabe arranging themselves, our legs entangling with each other as our breathing settles, the iciness of Harper’s skin pushing deep into our bones. Glancing down at Harper, I see a slight tinge of color in her face.
“I think it’s working,” I say softly, and Ace lets out a whine of relief as Devlin shudders. We stay quiet for a few minutes as the cold slowly ebbs away and Harper’s skin warms. Her heartbeat thuds against my chest, slow and sluggish, buthere. We haven’t lost her. I hear the door bang downstairs and footsteps running up, glancing over my shoulder as Ezra appears in the doorway, breathing hard with his medical bag in his hand.
ChapterThirty-Three
Ace
Iraise my head slightly to see my Pa standing at the door. Rogue turns too, hesitating for a moment and glancing down at Harper before he nods my grandfather in. His instincts are riding him hard. I wasn’t sure if he’d get himself together downstairs. But he managed to pull himself back in time to take charge. Thank fuck he did, because none of the rest of us had been up to the task.
