The lab erupts in a giant fireball and the entire trailer collapses with a roar as the rain pelts my back. I can’t keep going much farther. But I can see Mikayla get out of the car before my vision starts to dim.
And then I’m on the ground, staring up at the stormy sky as she screams my name.
“Austin!” Her rough, rasping voice helps keep me from passing out, and her fingers trail over my cheeks. “Oh God. You could have died…”
Groaning triggers a coughing fit, and she helps me sit up and passes me a bottle of water. After two sips, I croak, “Corey,” and Mik tears up.
“He’s alive,” Isaiah says. Li sobs into his shirt as he rubs her back. “But the guys who took us hit him really hard.”
Poachers. Jeep. Shit. Pushing to my feet, I scan all around us. “Where are they?”
“I don’t know.” Mik’s voice cracks, and I wrap my arm around her waist and help her limp over to the Land Rover. “As soon as I started driving away from the lab, they took off.” Tears tumble down her cheeks, carving trails in the soot and mixing with the rain. “They could have killed…all of us.“ She hiccups, shaking her head, and I pull her close.
“I know, sweetheart. But I’m okay. You’re okay. And we’re going to get everyone to the hospital.” But that doesn’t console her. She’s starting to shake now, the beginnings of shock, likely, and I have to calm her down. “Breathe for me, Mik. Long and slow. Can you do that?”
She nods, and once I help her into the passenger seat, I stumble around to the back of the Land Rover and open the lift gate. “We need to keep Corey as still as possible. Isaiah, can you sit back here with him?”
“I don’t…Li…”
“I’ll be okay,” the young woman says and swipes her hands over her cheeks. Isaiah helps me maneuver Corey into the back, then climbs in with him, sitting next to the unconscious man and holding his head still. Corey’s chest stutters with each breath, and his right leg, hip, and arm are covered with burned patches of skin. I check his pulse. Rapid and weak. He’s in full shock—or heading there pretty damn quick.
Grabbing my rucksack, I pull out a bottle of water and then shove the pack under Corey’s legs. I fix Isaiah with a hard stare and force as much command into my tone as I have left in me at this point. “Take off your shirt and tear it into strips.” To the kid’s credit, he doesn’t ask any questions, just pulls the blue tee off and starts ripping. “Pour some water onto the strips and lay them over the burns. If he stops breathing, tell me immediately. Got it?”
The young man nods.
We’re all dragging ass, but I climb into the driver’s seat and turn to Mik. “Tell me you’re all right, sweetheart.”
“I’m okay.” She clutches her inhaler like it’s life itself, and her mouth opens and shuts twice before she can force her next words out. “Drive. Please. I don’t ever want to see this place again.”
I throw the Land Rover into gear and floor it towards the main road. The ride is rough as shit, but what we all need right now is medical treatment. As quickly as possible. Once we reach asphalt, I reach for Mik’s hand, thread our fingers, and hold on tight.
As long as those assholes who hurt her are still walking free, I don’t know that I’ll ever be able to let her go.
Chapter Fifteen
Mikayla
The past twenty minutes are a blur of terrible images I’ll never forget. Seeing my students, my kids, tied up, gagged, terrified. Smelling the alcohol in the air. The blood. The flames racing towards Li’s bound feet. I didn’t think. Dropped the crutch, grabbed the small knife Austin gave me, and fell next to her, hacking at the duct tape.
The fire extinguisher wasn’t where we always kept it. The smoke was so thick, and it burned my throat, my lungs. I curse my asthma. Even now, my lungs are close to seizing, and I clutch my inhaler in my free hand, ready just in case I can’t fight it off any longer.
We’re all coughing, and the scent filling the Land Rover—burnt skin, the alcohol soaked into Li and Isaiah’s clothes, and blood—is too much. I roll down the window, forcing myself to breathe as slowly as I can.
Austin shifts his hand to my thigh.
“I’ll be all right,” I manage. “Just…”
“Don’t talk unless you need to. We’ll have time for that later. According to the GPS, the nearest hospital is still a little more than twelve kilometers away.”
The concern in his voice makes my heart hurt. I have to tell him about Corey. But he’s in full protector mode right now, and if he finds out one of my students tried to kill me, it won’t matter that Arturo and Martín decided to kill Corey along with the others.
“If I ever find those shitstains, I’m going to turn them inside out.”
The look on his face when he’d said those words… He’s not a man who jokes about violence. Not with what he’s seen. Though he’s only told me a little, his eyes practically scream the horrors of his past.
I watch the mountainous trees turn to flatland grasses, and we speed up. The air’s less humid here, and we’ve left the rain behind, making it easier to breathe. Stealing a quick glance at this man who saved me—who saved all of us—my eyes water, and I blink hard to stop myself from crying.
“Mik? You okay?” he asks, so softly I don’t think the others can hear. Not with Li still coughing from time to time and Isaiah talking to Corey, urging him to wake up.
