“Hard to tell in the dark. Hey, Opp, how bad is Sup bleeding?”
My fingers stall on the keyboard in front of me as my backstraightens like I’ve just had a string attached to my head yanked on. “Sir, who is the victim?”
“Sup. Superintendent Xander Macomb from the Sky Ridge Hotshot crew,” the man says distractedly. I feel the blood rush from my head and I feel faint. “We had them called in to help after it spread to the surrounding forest area.”
I’m barely listening. I try to keep typing, but my brain has given up all functioning. And then my phone is buzzing next to me, Cal’s name scrolling across the screen.
“Sir, hold on one moment,” I manage to whisper, and then I call over to Laurel, who just walked in. “Laurel, I need you to take over.”
“Teddy, you look like you’ve just seen a ghost! Are you alright? Is it your kids?” she asks, striding over to me. She yanks the headset off my head and places it on her own, then pushes my chair aside. “Go. Whatever it is, I’ve got this.”
I swipe my phone off the desk and stand, stumbling as I answer my brother’s call. “Cal?”
“He’s fine,” my brother says, though it doesn’t calm me in the slightest. Panic is coursing through me, making my limbs feel both like they weigh a million pounds and like they’re filled with helium at the same time. I’m outside and rushing to my car. “He’s ornery as fuck and that mug looks a little less handsome than it did this morning?—”
“Callahan Woods, don’t you make this into a joke right now,” I snap, my throat closing as tears well in my eyes. “How bad?”
He sighs, and I can only imagine the way he’s rubbing the back of his neck right now. There’s a lot of noise in the background. “It’s not great. His right forearm got tangled pretty bad when he landed along with his side. His face got a couple decent slices. Ambulance just got here, but he’s ornery as hell and is refusing to get in.”
“You tell that man to get into that fucking ambulance andthat I’ll meet him at the hospital,” I whisper hiss, making Cal chuckle.
“Hey, your woman says get your ass in the ambulance,” he calls over.
To which I then hear over the din of other voices, “Teddy? Sweetheart, I’m okay!”
I fight back the sob that is pushing at my throat as I drive toward Bakersfield Hospital. “Tell him I will believe that when I see it for myself.”
“She says you’re a lying sack of shit.”
I hear Xander’s answering laugh, but then it’s choked off by a pained groan. “Cal,” I choke out.
“I know,” he whispers, and I let the tears slip down my cheeks. “I know, Ted.”
“Tell him I’m on my way and that he better be, too.”
“I will,” he says gently, and then we hang up.
I’m a nervous wreck waiting in the parking lot of the hospital’s emergency department, and when I see the flash of the ambulance lights pulling in, I’m out of the car and sprinting across the parking lot before it’s even stopped. The doors open and I see Scottie and Matthew before my eyes fall on Xander on the stretcher inside.
His shirt has been cut off of him and his upper body is bare, but white bandages criss cross over his abdomen and completely cover his right forearm and hand, and in one spot it’s blooming red with blood as it seeps through. White butterfly bandages are keeping several cuts on his face closed.
“Ohmygod,” I whimper, my fingers flying to cover my lips. “Xander.”
“Hey, beautiful,” he says, smiling over at me as they unload him from the back of the ambulance. His face is taut with pain, his lips thin. He’s paler than ever, which worries me. They start wheeling him inside the doors and I follow, my hand finding his unbandaged left hand. I squeeze so tightly I worry belatedly I’mgoing to hurt him, but then he squeezes back. He grins wryly, bringing my fingers to his lips as we walk. “This isn’t the date night I had planned for us later.”
I can’t stop the choking laugh that escapes me as I look over him entirely. “You’re incorrigible.”
“I really didn’t need all this fanfare,” he quips lightly. “I could have just wrapped it and got back to work.”
Scottie blows out a snorting laugh, rolling her eyes. “That flap of skin hanging off your arm says otherwise.”
“It’s fine,” he mutters, though his lips thin again as they transfer him from the stretcher to a freshly made hospital bed in the emergency room. “No big deal. Just super glue it and send me back out.”
“You’re not funny,” I whisper, tracing my eyes over every inch of him, dragging his dirty, soot-stained hand to my lips. His skin smells like soil, smoke, and diesel fuel, a combination of scents that will more than likely forever link my brain to Xander.
“Rookie mistake is all,” he mutters, though his eyes are soft as they meet mine. I know he’s trying to play this down like it’s no big deal, to comfort me. “I promise you, sweetheart, this is nothing. I’m fine.”
“Well, just humor me, please,” I whisper against the backs of his fingers, tears stinging my nose. I fight against the tears; he doesn’t need to see me be a complete basket case over something that probably isn’t that big of a deal.
