The steady pressure on the wound made her arms ache as his head lolled from side to side, another groan escaping him.
With a jolt, he awoke, throwing her off him with a shove.
“Ow, Shadow, watch it,” she groaned as she smacked into the undressed mattress behind her before she righted herself.
“A–Ava?” His voice, slurred and weak, sent a shiver down her spine.
“Yes, of course, it’s Ava. Who else would find you?” Shescrambled back to him, retrieving her blood-stained hoodie and pressing it against his abdomen.
He groaned, gritting his teeth as he tightened his fingers into fists, his breathing ragged.
“You’ve lost a good amount of blood, it looks like,” she said.
“No hospital,” he said through clenched teeth.
“No kidding. I called Doc.”
Sebastian flailed his head back and forth. “No.”
Ava clicked her tongue, arching an eyebrow at him. “Really? You’re shot and you’re going to argue with me that you don’t want Doc removing this bullet?”
“Ch-check for an exit wound.”
“I did. Why do you always think I regress to some level of utter stupidity when there is a crisis? Just lay there and stop insulting me while I save your life, okay?”
He moaned again, his legs shifting as he tried to ride out the pain from the bullet wound.
“You’re not going to pass out on my again, are you?” she asked.
He didn’t respond, and she flicked her gaze to his face. “Come on, Shadow, stay with me.”
He growled again before he swallowed hard, sweat beading on his brow. “H-How did you find me?”
“Oh, yeah, good story. You called me at the cabin, and I hacked into Alex’s system, grabbed his phone tracker, tracked your phone, and then followed the blood trail you left when you weren’t in the van.”
He panted for breath as he locked eyes with her.
She grinned at him, wiggling her eyebrows. “Smart, right?”
“Smart,” he said with a crooked smile.
Footsteps approached them, and she whipped her head inthe direction of the hall, her heart hammering. She snapped her gaze back to him. “Where’s your gun?”
He shifted his eyes to his left arm. She leaned across him and retrieved the weapon from the holster. “Don’t go anywhere.”
“Funny,” he groaned.
She rose to a crouch, inching her way toward the hall with the gun extended in front of her. As two dark, shadowy figures appeared at the door, she shouted, “Freeze! Don’t move.”
“Geez, Avs, put that away,” Alex hissed.
She dropped the gun to her side with a shake of her head. “Sorry, come in.”
“You told us to come, why are you pulling a gun on us?” Kyle asked as they hurried to Sebastian.
“Because you took forever. Where have you been? It’s literally like two minutes away.”
“Sorry, Julia has us practically on house arrest,” Alex answered, his features scrunching with disgust as he stared down at the bloody hoodie.
