CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Callum had been here.
That was Apex’s first thought as he burst into the garage. All he had to do was take a deep breath and he could catch the fading scent of the wolven with the talented mouth and hands. The male had come for weapons, not medical supplies, however, and as Apex hit the trigger to send the toolbox off its seat, he prayed it wasn’t going to take him long to locate the first aid shit down among the parkas and other provisions.
Actually, he prayed that that wolven would suddenly show up again, although that was less about the needle-in-a-haystack stuff and more about just wanting to confirm for himself that sonofabitch was still alive.
With the stairs exposed, he jumped down into the bunker and ransacked the otherwise neat and tidy arrangement of everything. He was looking for something with a red cross on a white background to it—come on, there had to be a duffle, a box, a collection, fucking anything that could help someone with a mission critical leak.
Nope. He found ammo, booze, more ammo, guns, knives, ropes. Dried food. Water. Gasoline.
The more time passed, the rougher and more desperate his hands got until he was pulling parkas off hooks and sending them flying, the Gore-Tex birds failing to stay aloft in spite of how many feathers were stuffed into their quilted panels. And then he hit a lineup of steamer trunks, but he found only clothes that had long sleeves and lots of pockets—
The sting on his hand was like he’d clutched a swarm of yellow jackets, and he whipped his arm back out of the soup made of pants and long Johns. A quick check on his palm and nothing was bleeding, swelling or abraded.
Frowning, he scooped out the contents of the trunk—
The brown belt was on the very bottom, crammed into the back corner. Made of what felt like cowhide and with a hand-tooled buckle, it was a utilitarian object as exotic as a sock.
He had to drop it, the sensations were so uncomfortable.
As the length bounced and the buckle rattled, he looked over to the showerhead. The image of the body was still there, and he didn’t need a close-up comparison to know that what he had found by mistake was what had been used by the male to kill himself.
“Fucking hell.”
Bracing himself, he picked the belt up and put it back where he’d found it. Then he shoved the clothes back in, ignoring the fact that he’d messed them all up.
There’d be time later to fix that.
Maybe.
Up on his feet, he looked at the dead male. “You know where the first aid kit is?”
He didn’t expect an answer. He didn’t get one. The dead never talked to him, which was the good news. Just locking eyes with them was enough, fuck him very much.
Turning away from the shower, there was nothing else to go through.
Well, shit. Lucan better hope for a miracle.
As Nadya assessed Lucan’s thigh wound, she knew they were running out of time with him. The blood loss had slowed, thanks to a vampire’s natural healing capabilities, but it was not stopping. Not by a long shot.
“I need a belt.”
“Here.” Mayhem swiveled around and began undoing what was around his waist. “Take mine.”
She grabbed what he held out. “And a knife.”
One appeared right in front of her and she didn’t bother wasting time to figure out who had given it to her. She cut through the pants that Lucan had on, slicing most of the leg off. Then she pulled the fabric up the thigh, slipped the belt around the muscle, and tightened it until the flesh swelled up around the leather length.
Making sure the constriction was between the heart and the wound was critical, and Lucan was lucky that he hadn’t been hit any higher up. If he had been, there would have been no way to tourniquet the injury.
She looked at Rio. “He needs your vein.” As the woman’s eyes bulged, Nadya talked over the questions that were coming. “Yes, I know you’re a human, but he’s bonded to you. Your blood will give him a burst of energy because of the way he responds to you. It’s a quick fix, but it’s all we’ve got. We need him to hang on until…”
There was no telling when the “until” was going to arrive or what it was going to look like.
“I’ll do it,” Rio said. “Whatever he needs.”
The woman pulled up her sleeve and extended her wrist over her mate’s lax mouth. But Lucan wasn’t strong enough to bite. He’d taken a turn for the worse in the last two or three minutes, and it was doubtful that he was going to be able to break the skin, much less latch on.