They forced the door of Brooke’s practice open, barreling in with Adam in their arms. Paul at his shoulders, Dan and Carlos at his middle, and Mercedes at his legs.
“What the fu–” Brooke jumped from her stool, nearly dropping her paperwork as they lowered Adam down onto the examination table.
“You have to help us,” Paul said. “He’s...been shot.”
“Yeah, no kidding. Take him to the hospital,” Brooke said.
“We can’t,” Paul huffed, leaving the others tending to Adam’s wounds, Dan now having resumed compressions. He grabbed his sister by the shoulders. “I’m so sorry, we can’t. Please.Please,help us.”
“Brooke,please,” Mercedes joined Paul’s side, clutching his arm in a death grip.
Brooke gulped, holding a hand at her throat and glancing between Adam and her pleading brother. “What have you done?”
Paul’s eyes glued to the floor. “We just—you have to help him, off record, no records.”
Adam begun convulsing, losing even more blood. It dripped off the table edges into shining pools on the white tile.
Brooke didn’t hesitate. “Okay, get Adam over here.” With her foot she loosened the stops on the surgery table and screamed for her nurses. Dan and Carlos backed away slowly as Brooke and her nurses rushed to tend to Adam, wheeling him away wielding scalpels and needles and shouting medical jargon she couldn’t understand.
Mercedes curled up in the corner of the room, her face pale and her head in her hands.
* * *
It had been hours but none of them spoke a word as they waited in Brooke’s office. Paul could barely breathe watching blood crust beneath where the table stood.
The creak of the door opening, and Brooke’s footsteps inside, were the only noises in the room. The others, still shell-shocked, remained seated, while Paul rose to his sister’s side.
“He’s doing okay,” she said. “Somebody missed his heart by less than point one of a millimeter.” Brooke gave him a knowing look.
The others released deep, deep breaths of relief. Like they had been holding their lungs the entire time Adam was being treated.
“I’ve patched up what I can, but he needs a more extensive surgery. He needs a hospital,” she said.
“He can’t go to the hospital here,” Paul said. “They’ll just kill him.”
Brooke nodded, understanding more than she should’ve. Understanding more than Paul would’ve liked. “I have a friend two states over, works at the hospital there. He will help you if I ask. It’s about an eight-hour drive, though…you can take him there.”
“Out of state? Really?” Paul dared a glance at Mercedes, tears running down her face that she didn’t bother to wipe. She was breaking.
“He needs surgery to remove the bullets. He’s strong enough to make the trip, but he won’t survive the next few days if you don’t get him to a hospital soon. A real hospital.”
One of them was going to have to leave. Skip town. Right after they’d all pledged loyalty to Dorian Blake...fuck.
Paul’s eyes shuttered as he looked over his friends. Adam had very carefully lefthimin charge. He fired the first shot. He pledged his loyalty. Adam had looked at him like he was entrusted with the team.
He may have shot Adam, but he wasn’t going to let him down.
Paul looked to Dan and Carlos, their faces hopeful. Still young and still brimming with possibilities that they might get out unscathed. Blake didn’t know them well enough to punish them yet. They, at least, stood a chance.
Then he looked to Mercedes, wearing a Neptune Club bar shirt like the one she’d had on when they first started to flee. She remained anonymous for now. But wouldn’t for long if she left and Blake found out why she’d spent weeks absent.
Paul had to be the one.
Blake already knew him. No matter what Adam bargained, or supposedly gave his life for, Blake knew Paul, and knew that Paul had betrayed him. He was as good as dead anyway.
“I’ll take him. Mercedes, give me the keys.” Paul’s voice was quiet but stern.
“No!” she said, storming across the room to face him. “I’ll take him.”
