“What took you so long?” Dawson managed, his voice rough, his breath still catching in his chest.
“Just having breakfast. What were you thinking, running after him without backup?”
Yeah, story of his life. “Wrong place, wrong time.”
Deke smiled. “Right. Good job.” He held out a hand to help Dawson up.
Shoot, but he couldn’t take it. He grimaced. “I’m going to need more than that.”
Deke raised an eyebrow but glanced at Flynn, and then he got on one side, and Flynn the other, and Dawson got his good leg under him.
And now he was an invalid again as they dragged him to Flynn’s SUV.
“Get him to the ER in Copper Mountain,” Deke said to Flynn. Then to Dawson, “We’ll take care of Conan.”
Conan. Which meant Mars, tattoo-face, was the one still at large.
Keely wasn’t safe until Dawson found him.
He put his leg down, trying to walk on his own, and stumbled.
“Stop,” Flynn said. “Sheesh.”
“Mars is still out there.”
“Yeah.” They reached the SUV, and Flynn opened her back door, like he might be a child. “There’s a BOLO out. He won’t get far.”
The darkness of it all settled in his chest.
Barking made him lift his head. “Is that Caspian?”
“I know you left him with Shasta, but when I stopped by the sheriff’s office, he was losing his mind. I had to bring him back with me.”
Someone had attached a lead to his collar, and now the dog jumped out, circling him, the lead on the ground.
Flynn picked it up as Deke helped him into the back of the car, and he slid in, his leg on the seat. Flynn opened the back, and Caspian jumped in but shoved his face over the seats.
“Hey, buddy.” Dawson rubbed the dog, still holding the bloody scarf to his face. But it seemed the bleeding had slowed. Now his face just throbbed.
He closed his eyes, pain shutting him down, and he lay back, his arm over his eyes.
And of course, Caspian scrambled right over the seats and lay smack on top of him, a blanket of comfort.
He put his hand on the animal’s head.
Flynn got in. “You okay?”
Not even a little.
Flynn started up the SUV. “Oh goody, the dark funk is back.”
His jaw tightened, and he said nothing.
Maybe it had never really left. Because clearly there was no light left to fight it.
Outwardly,she would survive.
Keely hopped off the exam table in the ER of the Copper Mountain medical clinic as the male intern handed her a cold pack.
