30. Ava

THIRTY

AVA

When Uncle Sam led me through the house, it was like walking through a war zone. I couldn't keep count of the bullet holes. No matter how hard I tried to keep my eyes trained on my feet, I could still make out the bodies of men and women, riddled with bullets and sprawled on the ground. Most were hunters, but some were my father's men.

Sam limped ahead of me. He hadn't been shot, but he must have twisted his ankle or knee during the battle. I could hear screams and shouts ahead of me.

Sam hurried on, and we walked into the foyer where my cousins LJ and Chris were lifting Dad up onto a makeshift gurney that consisted of a door that had been pulled off its hinges. Blood oozed down Dad's arm, dripping off his fingers. There was a blossoming red patch on the far side of his chest, right beside the plating of his body armor. There were a half-dozen dents in the vest. The armor had saved him from the full spray of bullets he'd taken and it looked like only one had gotten through. His eyes were closed and his chest rose and fell in a halting way that didn't look good.

I pressed my hands to my face. "Daddy?"

He was out, not even registering my voice.

A gentle hand rested on my shoulder. I turned to see April. She was looking at him with the same worry that was filling my heart.

"Come on!" LJ shouted. "We gotta get Uncle Gio to the hospital. Fucking move!"

He and Chris hauled my father outside and loaded him into the waiting van Uncle Mike had pulled around to the front of the door. More dead bodies were scattered across the grass. Already, even with the battle barely over, Dad's guys were dragging the bodies away. Dad had the local police paid off, for the most part, but someone might have heard the gunfire and show up any minute. They had to get rid of the hunters. They'd probably dump them in some mass grave at the edge of our property.

I couldn't care less what happened to them. They'd come here to kill my family, to take and possibly kill me, and the rest of them were out attacking Blayne. If Dad's guys wanted to piss on their bodies, I wouldn't care.

Mike sped off to the hospital. Sam and April came with me in the back. Luis and my cousins stayed behind to organize the disaster that was the house and take care of the bodies. Luis said he'd meet us at the hospital once everything was handled.

The whole way there, I gripped Dad's hand. Every few minutes, I felt his fingers twitch. I told myself it was him trying to squeeze my hand. Tears streamed down my cheeks, but I kept myself under control. Freaking out wouldn't help him.

We pulled under the big overhanging portico of the emergency room, the tires squealing. Sam and Mike leaped from the car and screamed for help. In seconds, a crew of doctors and nurses descended on the van. Dad was whisked away on a real gurney and April led me into the ER.

We crowded in behind the team working on Dad. A nurse started pulling the Velcro straps of the armor apart. She looked up, horrified. "Is this a bulletproof vest?"

"Just work on him," Mike snapped.

"You need to leave," a burly male nurse said.

"The fuck we do!" Sam said, pressing his chest into the nurse's.

If Sam scared the nurse, the guy didn't show it. He folded his arms across his chest. "Sir, let us work. Go to the waiting room. We'll let you know how things go."

"Come on," I said, touching my uncle's arm. "Let them do their job."

Grudgingly, Sam and Mike escorted April and me to the waiting room. We sat and I stared at the walls, shell-shocked. April sat beside me, rubbing my back to console me. It filled me with guilt. Her mate was out there. God knew what was happening, yet she was here, comforting me.

Thirty minutes later, one of the doctors came out to update us. "Your father is heading up to the surgical floor. We stabilized him. The bullet passed through a lower rib and into the lung. It exited out his back. There's damage to the lung and one of his kidneys. We won't know the extent of the injuries until we operate."

"Is he gonna make it?" Mike asked.

The doctor sighed. "It's difficult to tell. There could be internal bleeding. A lot could go wrong. Blood clots, heart failure. I can't give you an answer. We'll let you know when the surgery is over." With that, he turned and hurried back through the door that read No entry .

I clamped my hands together. I was on the edge, ready to fall off the cliff. Stay calm, stay calm, it's gonna be okay, I told myself. Sam and Mike looked pale and worried. I had to keep my head. If I thought the worst, I'd slide into the abyss.

"Help me!" The big bellowing voice exploded from the front door of the ER. I recognized the voice.

My head snapped up, my eyes wide with panic. Tate stood in the door, his clothes spattered with blood and the fists at his sides clamped so tight, his knuckles were white.

"We need help!"

A heavy boulder settled in my stomach. The look on his face was one of intense fear and horror.

April leaped to her feet. "Tate?"

Tate spun and saw April and me. His already-pale face went nearly gray as his eyes fell on me.

Doctors and nurses ran toward him. Behind Tate, Jared burst through the doors, Miles cradled in his arms. Miles, awake but hurt, was holding his leg and wincing. A belt was tied tightly around his thigh. Another wound oozed blood at his shoulder.

"Tate?" April called out, her voice brittle. "Where's Steff?"

As an answer, Steff exploded through the doors. His face was red and blotchy, eyes bloodshot. Blayne lay limp over his shoulder. His arms and legs dangled like a marionette with its strings cut. My jaw dropped when I saw the bright red patch of blood on his shirt and the dark little hole right below his collarbone. As bad as that looked, the most horrifying thing was the knife buried in his side, the handle bobbing as Steff carried him.

"Please, God!" Steff screamed. "Help him! My brother! Help my brother!" He sounded like he was on the verge of madness.

I stood jerkily, my feet numb as I walked toward the scene. Nurses were calling for help, alarms were going off, orderlies were running with gurneys. Shouts, screams, and blood. So much blood.

My legs took me toward them. Steff's eyes, searching the room frantically for help, saw me then. His look of shock gave way to sorrow, then his face crumpled. "Jesus Christ! Fuck! Tate! Get her out of here. Don't let her see."

Tate's massive arms wrapped around me, his broad chest obscuring my sight of the scene. I let him push me away for a few seconds, then the dam that had been holding my emotions back shattered. I slammed my fists into Tate's meaty chest. My small fists were ineffective against the giant of a man.

"Let me see him! Let me see him!"

"Ava, honey, no. You don't want to see that."

I hauled my arm back and slapped him, tears streaming down my face. The madness of grief consumed me over. "Why didn't you protect him? Where were you? What were you doing?" I bellowed into his face as I slapped him again and again.

Tears sprang to his eyes and he shook his head in confusion. "I…we tried…it happened fast. He…he saved Steff's life. I–I'm sorry."

From behind Tate, a nurse called out. "Move! I lost the pulse. He's coding. Get him back to the trauma room. Hurry."

Tate turned to see them wheeling Blayne down the hallway. I was able to catch a glimpse of him as he went by. Blayne's face was the color of wet ashes, his eyes half-open, only the whites showing. A small female nurse was straddling him as he rolled by, frantically pounding his chest.

I had a flashback of Liam lying on my floor, his face slowly going slack as his life bled away. Blayne looked exactly like his brother had all those years ago.

As the gurney vanished around the corner, what little strength I had left vanished. All that was left was sorrow and an agony so deep I didn't know if I could ever come back from it. The two men I loved more than anything in the world were dying.

I slid to the ground, slipping from Tate's grip. I bit into the skin on my hand as tears streamed down my cheeks. Then I screamed. A long wailing screech that sounded like I'd already lost both of them.

Five days. The hardest five days of my entire life. Dad and Blayne had been fighting for their lives for almost a week.

I was sitting beside Dad's bed, holding his hand while he slept. He'd finally been released from critical care the day before and I'd been allowed to visit him. I was sitting there, crying. I didn't know how I had any tears left. It seemed like that was all I'd done for the last week.

As bad as Dad had been injured, Blayne's injuries were more severe. His heart had stopped four times. The knife had punctured his intestines and clipped his liver. The bullet had hit a major artery in his chest. He'd lost seven pints of blood. The doctors seemed almost confused, not understanding how he had survived. Tate and Steff had told me it was probably due to his being a shifter. They didn't heal like superheroes in comics, but they did heal faster than humans and were much harder to kill.

Still, it was touch and go. They couldn't give us an estimate on when or even if he would wake up. He was in the ICU, intubated and in a medically induced coma so his body could recover.

Miles had already been discharged. His leg wound hadn't been serious. The shoulder injury had been superficial, but he did have a concussion. He'd been knocked out when he'd fallen from the gunshots. He would be fine.

I was happy, but also a little bitter. Why couldn't Blayne be fine, too? Why did this have to happen?

The sound of my father's heart monitor sped up. I looked over at his face and saw he was awake—awake for the first time since he'd been admitted. He looked tired, but also sad.

I stood and faced him. I wanted to hide my sadness, but he was my father. Who else could I be honest with?

"Baby girl? Are you okay?" he whispered, his voice still weak.

I lost it. Tears and sobs burst out of me, and I leaned down to rest my head on his shoulder. I told him how scared I was that he was going to die.

He ran a hand through my hair. "I'm sorry. It wasn't supposed to be like this. I didn't mean to scare you."

Taking his hand in mine, I kissed his knuckles. "You came back. That's all that matters. You came back to me. You didn't leave me by myself."

"How long?" he croaked.

Gripping his hand tighter, I said, "Five days."

"Jesus." He shook his head slightly.

A few minutes later, the doctor came in to check his vitals. I moved to the side. After consulting the chart, the doctor nodded. "Mr. Francis, it looks like you are a very lucky man. As long as everything looks good and continues on this path, I think we can discharge you in a couple of days."

"Sounds great, Doc," Dad rasped.

Once he was gone, Dad's eyes slid over to me. "Cops?"

I sighed. "They've come a few times. They wanted to know what happened. Lilly Valley doesn't typically have three gunshot victims come in one day. Your brothers did a good job spinning a tall tale. Some of them don't believe a word of it, but your friends in the department got the gist. I think we'll all be fine."

He nodded. "And you said it was immoral to pay off cops."

"Just because it works doesn't mean it's not immoral."

He shrugged. "Say what you want. But it's much more fun out of jail than in jail." His face went serious. "What's been going on while I was playing Sleeping Beauty?"

Sam walked in at that moment. I didn't think I had the strength to talk about Blayne. I nodded toward my uncle. "Sam can tell you."

Sam's eyes brightened when he saw Dad was awake. "You old asshole. You're too tough to die."

"Enough flattery. How are things looking?"

"Cops are taken care of for the most part," Sam said. "There's a few questions still, but I think we're in the clear. We were able to clean up the house and the lily field. Lots of bodies. We dumped the hunters up in the woods behind the house. I rented a backhoe and dug a big pit. Tossed their asses in there. Our own guys? Well…we had to hide their bodies. We're gonna pay off their families. All we can tell them is that they died at work. We're gonna take care of them. Pay off a few houses, college funds, stuff like that."

"Tell me about the boy," Dad said gruffly.

Sam's eyes cut across the room to me. He cleared his throat. "Blayne isn't great. He came in with a severe stab wound and a gunshot wound to the chest. Multiple organ injuries. He lost…a lot of blood. I spoke with Tate Mills. He saw the whole thing. Antonio tried using some kind of special armor-piercing ammo on him. They found them in the gun after the battle was over. Even that couldn't penetrate Tate's dragon hide, though. He turned his attention to Steff James. Blayne saw his friend was about to get killed and charged Antonio. He distracted him, and that fucker turned the gun on Blayne.

"Blayne got a good shot in. Tore half of Antonio's face off with his claws before he got knocked out. Tate tells me Antonio stood and tried to stumble off while trying to hold his face together. Tate…uh…well, I guess dragon fire is really hot. There weren't even any bones left."

Dad nodded slowly. "Got what he deserved, the bastard."

Hearing Sam talk about what had happened to Blayne made it all seem to happen again in my head. Like I was reliving that moment in the ER when Steff had come in, holding his body. I had to clamp my hands together to keep them from shaking.

"How are we handling Antonio being missing? What about the survivors of his group?" Dad asked.

Sam nodded and sat on the stool beside Dad's bed. "We've got a few guys on our payroll in the FBI. Government knows about shifters. Obviously. They keep it under wraps to prevent panic. They also knew there was a hunter organization growing in power, but they couldn't pin them down. We made an, uh, anonymous call to one of our guys who's pretty high up the ladder. They found all the surviving members tied up in an abandoned grocery store three counties over.

"Our contact says almost all of them are showing signs of psychological exploitation. Said it's like what they see with former and current cult members. They're being evaluated. It's been difficult keeping that hidden. Detaining a few hundred people without it getting out to the media is not easy. There's gonna be a report coming out. Something the Feds cooked up to explain some of the rumors leaking out about Antonio vanishing. No mention of us, though."

Dad released a long sigh. "Good. I guess it's the best we could hope for. Are any of Blayne's boys around?"

Sam nodded. "Tate's down the hall. He's been here every day, waiting on the doctors to okay visitors for Blayne."

"I want to see him."

Sam left and Dad looked over at me. "Are you okay? I mean, seriously?"

I shook my head. "No. I don't think so. I'm glad you're okay, but I don't know what I'll do if Blayne doesn't pull through. Daddy, I'm scared."

Tate stepped through the door a few seconds later. His hulking frame pushed through the curtain that hid the bed from the door. "Mr. Francis," he said with a nod.

"Call me Gio. We've been through enough together to be on first-name terms."

"All right. Gio. What can I do for you?" He spoke to Dad, but his sad, weary eyes were on me.

"I want to make sure you and your families are all okay."

Tate shrugged. "My mate and kids came back. When I called and told them what went down, they wouldn't take no for an answer. Same with Miles. Celina couldn't get back fast enough when she heard he was hurt. Everyone is okay. Miles was only in the hospital for two days. Overall? We're okay. Physically. Mentally?" He looked back toward the door. I knew he was thinking about Blayne. "We've been better," he finished.

"Thanks. Go on, son," Dad said. "Be with your friends. I appreciate all you and your men did."

"Same for you. I don't know that we would have made it without your men there at the battle. Get some rest." Tate locked his eyes on mine. "Don't give up hope. Blayne's a fighter. He's not going to give up. I promise you, he'll pull through this."

The tears I'd been holding back finally spilled from my lashes and down my cheeks. I nodded, unable to say anything.

Tate, looking sheepish, ducked out the door. I had the sneaking suspicion he was holding back his own tears.

I reached over and took Dad's hand again as I wept. My father held my hand and said nothing. He let me do what I needed to do.

Two days later, the doctor said he could discharge Dad, but he'd be on bed rest for at least a week and then physical therapy for a month. The doc said he could resume his chemotherapy in a week.

"Thank God," Dad said when the doctor left. "I'm tired of this bed and the crap they call food here. It's awful. I can't wait to get a nice greasy cheeseburger."

"Nope. You didn't survive a gunshot wound to die of a coronary. We'll get something at least a little healthy," I said.

His shoulders slumped. "Hell."

I smiled. Hearing him grumble usually irritated me, but grumbling meant he was alive and getting better. I'd take a thousand days of grumbling and complaining versus the rest of my life without it.

That afternoon, a nurse came to help Dad get dressed and onto a wheelchair to take him to the car. As he nestled himself gingerly into the chair, Dad glanced at me.

"I know what you're thinking," Dad said. "You need to come home. You can't keep staying here. It isn't healthy, and all you're doing is punishing yourself. They know to call you if anything changes. I promise. Blayne would tell you the same thing."

Holding back another round of tears, I said, "I just wish they'd let us see him. It almost feels like he's already gone."

"Stop that. When he wakes up, they'll let you in to see him."

When. Dad said when , not if. I clung to that word, rolling it over in my head again and again on the drive back home. The more I said it, the more I tried to make myself believe that it was true.

Back home, I was shocked to see that the house was almost totally fixed up. It had been over a week. I'd slept, showered, and eaten at the hospital, not realizing they'd started fixing up the damage.

Marissa was there with a warm lunch for all of us. I was relieved to see she was fine and hadn't been injured.

The bullet holes had been patched, paint had been applied, bloody and torn carpets had been replaced. The house had the sharp smell of new construction. I gawked at it. The last time I'd been there, it had looked like something out of a Vietnam War film.

Dad ate like a man possessed, but I couldn't do more than pick at my food. My mind was on Blayne. How could I eat when he was fighting for his life?

The rest of the day, I tried to keep my mind off him by taking care of Dad. He went to bed early. I couldn't sit around with my thoughts, so I took a sleeping pill and went to bed at eight. Settling into a real bed after sleeping in a chair for a week felt like the height of luxury, and I fell asleep almost instantly.

The pill, the exhaustion, and the bed did their job. I slept for over twelve hours, waking only when the insistent blare of my cell phone tugged me out of a deep sleep.

I pulled the phone off my night stand. It was Tate. All remnants of sleep vanished and I sat up in bed, heart racing. Was something wrong? I didn't want to think about that. I answered before I could psych myself out.

"Hello?" I croaked.

"Ava?" Tate's voice sounded heavy with emotion. "Ava…he's awake."

My mouth fell open. Relief washed over me like ice on a burn, a salve on an exposed nerve. Never had two words meant so much.

I couldn't answer him. I wept sobs of happiness. Through the phone, I thought I could hear Tate crying, too.