Focus!
First step, get Kennedy into a comfortable position. That meant rolling him onto his back, elevating his feet, and making sure he was warm enough. It took her a moment, but she managed it. Even got a pillow for his head and a blanket to cover him. A shame to cover all that muscled glory, but conserving his heat was important.
Second, check his vitals. He was breathing, but shallowly. When she pressed fingers to his neck, she couldn’t find a pulse. But he was breathing, so his heart had to be beating, right?
She needed help. There wasn’t anyone of her own pack to call. They’d kill him immediately and then tell her father that she was disobeying orders. She looked at the detective badge still around his neck. She wondered if the man slept in it. She ought to call the police or 911 for an ambulance, but exhaustion like this was unique to shifters. The wolves had learned long ago that what hospitals gave for exhaustion didn’t help shifters. There was a nutrient or enzyme or something that shifters needed, and it wasn’t in normal hospitals.
She had to call the Griz. His own people would know what to do, but the moment she did that, her anonymity was shot. Worse, it would mean publicly picking a bear over her own pack. No way would the bears keep her secret. They had no discretion.
At best, she’d become a werewolf outcast. At worse, they’d kill her for the aberration. Either way, she’d have no power whatsoever in her pack. No way to stop her brother or the poisoning of Detroit. She’d already garnered a lot of support to end her brother’s influence on her father. She was close to a tipping point in numbers. But if she threw in with the bears, all of that would end. Worse, anyone who ever supported her would become suspect, and her brother would be vicious in pressing the advantage.
God, how the hell had it come to this? That she was choosing between a bear’s life and stopping her brother? She swallowed. She should let him rest and hope for the best, except he didn’t look like he was getting better. And every minute that she sat here with him was another moment that Hazel was left to manage on her own.
This was insane. She’d been raised from birth to weigh consequences, to check loyalties, and to never, ever betray the pack. Problems were managed from within, never from outside.
His breath rattled in his chest. Oh shit. That was bad. That wasreallybad.
She dashed downstairs to get her phone, her heart pounding in her chest. She hadn’t even consciously decided to act when she found herself already doing it. She snatched up her phone and started dialing. It was a stupid phone number, a leftover from the old Griz alpha, but maybe it would still work. It was her only hope because she didn’t know any other way to contact them.
1-800-THE-GRIZ.
A woman answered on the third ring.
“Hello?”
Frankie spoke low out of habit and because she was panting from sprinting back up the stairs. “Is this the Griz?”
“Yes, who’s this?”
“You have to come.” She rattled off the address as she set her hand to Kennedy’s neck. Was that a pulse? “I think he’s still breathing,” she whispered. Yes, there was a definite rise to his chest. Maybe. “It’s Detective Kennedy. Exhaustion, I think, from shifting too much. You know how to deal with that, right?” Wolves had an IV concoction specifically for that. Nutrients, calories, she didn’t know what all was in it, but it worked great for their teenagers. She didn’t have any of it here. “You have to bring an IV. He’s bad. He’s really bad.”
“What IV? I don’t understand.”
Frankie winced. Didn’t the damn bears know anything? “A nutrient IV for shifter exhaustion. Don’t you have doctors?”
“I’m sending an ambulance.”
“They can’t help!” God, just how backward were these bears? “He needs the shifter IV with the enzyme or whatever. He’ll die without it!” She was practically shouting at the end there, grabbing at the words that would most spur them into action. But the moment she’d voiced it aloud, she knew it was true. He was dying. Right there in front of her. His skin was ashen. There was more and more time between breaths. She couldn’t feel a pulse.
She knew what she had to do. Even if the bears had exactly what he needed, there wasn’t any more time. He was dying, and she had no choice. But, God, he was going to kill her when it was over. Assuming he survived at all.
“We’re on our way!” the woman on the other line said.
They wouldn’t get here in time. Not unless Frankie did what was necessary.
She thumbed the phone off. She’d need two hands for this. She waited a moment longer, scanning him from head to toe, praying that she would see signs that he was getting better. That he would hold on.
Was he breathing? Didn’t look like it.
She ran into the back bedroom and used her nails to dig up the floorboard. Even Hazel didn’t know this was here. A pouch with a vial and a hypodermic needle. The green goo in its injectable form. Earlier formula, thirty times more potent than what was being dumped in the water.
She knew the dosage. At least what it had been for her. So, with shaking hands, she inserted the needle and drew out the goo. She gave him a few more cc’s because he was a lot bigger than she was. Then she ran back to his side just in time to hear the rattle. The body’s last attempt to breathe on its own.
No more time.
She twisted Kennedy’s arm and injected it straight into his vein. Then she dropped the hypodermic to the side and started CPR.
“Come on, you stupid bear,” she huffed as she pushed down on his chest. She stopped and dropped down to his mouth. Was he breathing? She tilted his head, sealed her mouth over his, and breathed. Once. Twice. Back to chest compressions.
