“I’ll make it.”
I shifted, trying to find a position that didn’t make my shoulder scream.
Outside, the sleet had turned to snow. Heavy flakes rushed at the windshield, hypnotic and relentless. The world was turning white.
Just get me to Clare.
It was a prayer. I wasn’t a religious man, you can’t be, doing what I did, but I prayed to whatever was listening.
Just let me see her face one more time. Let me tell her the truth. Let me tell her I love her. Then I can burn.
Chapter 22
Clare
The door exploded inward.
I was on my feet before my brain caught up, medical kit half-open on the table, supplies scattered like I’d been preparing for this exact disaster. Because I had been. Every hour they’d been gone, I’d sorted and resorted the emergency medications, rechecked vitals equipment, rehearsed protocols I prayed I wouldn’t need.
Hellhound came through first, snow swirling around him like he’d dragged winter inside. Then Havoc, gasping, tactical gear dripping. Between them:
Xavier.
Convulsing. Violent, uncontrolled spasms wracking his entire body. His back arched, muscles locked rigid, skull thrown back at an angle that would’ve snapped a normal person’s neck. Hellhound had one arm under Xavier’s shoulders, Havoc gripped his legs, and they were barely keeping him from hitting the doorframe as they hauled him in.
“Get him on the table!” The command ripped out before I could think. “Now!”
They moved. The wooden dining surface groaned under Xavier’s weight as they laid him down. His body jerked, slamming against the wood hard enough I heard the impact over the storm raging outside.
Massive. Already well past the danger threshold.
“How long?” I was already moving, positioning his airway, tilting his skull. “How long has he been seizing?”
“Started in the car, since we left Geneva. Only intermittently, except for the last fifteen minutes.” Hellhound’s chest heaved, snow melting in his hair.
They had crossed into status epilepticus territory, the kind of seizure that didn’t stop, the kind that could cause permanent brain damage or death.
“Hellhound, hold him still. Don’t let him hit the wood.” I grabbed Xavier’s jaw, fingers positioning carefully to keep his airway open. His skin was burning up, fever radiating off him like heat from pavement. “Havoc, oxygen. Green bag. Move.”
Havoc lunged for the medical kit. I barely registered him digging through supplies because I was already counting, timing, watching Xavier’s chest for respiratory patterns between the brutal muscle contractions.
Xavier’s lids were open but rolled back, showing mostly white. Foam flecked the corner of his mouth. Every muscle in his body was firing at once, a brutal electrical storm shorting out his nervous system.
“Benzodiazepines. The vial marked Lorazepam. And a syringe. Now.”
My grip was steady. It had to be. I’d done this a hundred times in the ER, talked families through the terror of watching someone they loved shake apart. The difference was those patients weren’t...
Not the time. Focus.
Havoc slapped the vial into my palm. I drew up the dose, flicked the air bubbles out, found the muscle in Xavier’s shoulder. The injection site didn’t matter as much as getting the medication in fast.
“This’ll stop it. Thirty seconds. Just hold on.”
I pushed the plunger.
The longest thirty seconds of my life began.
Xavier’s body kept convulsing. His back arched off the surface, tendons standing out like cables under his skin. Hellhound cradled Xavier’s skull, protecting it from the wood.
