He nodded and tilted his head to look at Ford. “Think we can take over from here?”
She tightened her grip on Ford’s limp fingers. Feral, protective.
“Crazy-ass shit happening around here, but we’ve got you now. We found the med clinic. Pam needs to take him there. Fix him up.” He looked her over. “Then it’s your turn.”
“Okay.” She managed to push herself to sitting, not letting go of Ford until Jameson forcibly removed her fingers one at a time. With palpable urgency, a group of her friends carried Ford away and she felt his absence like a missing chunk of her heart.
Once he’d gone, reality came back to her, so fast she had to close her eyes.
When, finally, she could open them again, she stared at her feet. God, were those holes in her boots? Her eyes climbed up her legs. Blood, all over her Carhartts. Ford’s blood. She swallowed. Or maybe that man’s. The one she’d beaten to a pulp.
She let her head flop back against the wall, put her hands flat on the floor, and breathed through a long, deep heaving wave of nausea.
“Wanna get cleaned up?”
She blinked.Probably should.
Someone else approached, the steps slowed. Angel focused on the boots first, then slid her way up to the face, which came into focus slowly.I know her.Oh, right. Donna. A scientist, from Burke-Ruhe.
“Hey, Donna.” She worked hard to smile and possibly managed it.
“Angel, honey.” Donna squatted. “Grab my hand?”
It took a few seconds to focus on the woman’s hand. No blood there. It was warm and soft against Angel’s chapped skin.
“Let’s get you a shower.”
They lifted her between them somehow.
“Stink that bad, huh?”
“Nah. But you look like hell.”
“Thanks, Don—” She tried a step and stumbled, but they were there to catch her, arms around her waist, under her armpits.
“Any of this blood yours?” Donna asked.
She shrugged. Crap, that hurt.
“You in pain?”
Frostbite, blisters, chafing, missing skin. None of it was worth mentioning. “Head…shoulders…” A laugh cramped her chest, made her double over. “Knees and toes.”
“Right.” She caught Donna and another woman exchanging a look. They led her, not straight to a shower, as promised, but to a medical facility, where a group worked around a bed.
“Got another patient, Doc.” They helped her onto a bed.
“No,” Angel tried to protest, batting at their hands, but nobody seemed to hear. Or care.
“Be right over once I’m done here.”
They made her lie back.
“Ford.” Her mouth flubbed the name, so she licked her cracked, swollen lips and tried again. “Ford. How’s Ford?”
“He’ll live.” That was Pam talking. Or maybe Donna. Angel couldn’t quite open her eyes enough to tell. “You done good, Angel. Really, really good.”
Somebody patted her shoulder, someone else unzipped her undercoat. She tried to hold it closed.
