Rescuing Jenna - Anna Blakely Page 0,44

of ducking when a bullet slammed into the back of his left thigh. The impact threw him off balance, and he fell onto the road’s cool, rough pavement.

“Adrian!” Jenna’s terrified voice called for him from behind the car’s protection.

“Stay…down!”

Tires squealed in the background as Adrian reached for his gun…and came up empty. Fuck!

His pistol was locked in the rental’s glove box. If he’d tried taking it into the station, the metal detectors would’ve gone off, and he probably would’ve been cuffed and hauled off to interrogation.

Adrian hadn’t wanted to risk that happening, because if that had, Jenna would’ve been left alone. So he’d locked it in the glovebox before they went inside.

Have to get to her. Have to keep her safe.

Those words became Adrian’s mantra as he gritted his teeth and rolled to his stomach. He started dragging himself around the car’s back bumper. There was a truck parked behind him, which provided even more cover.

Pushing through the pain, he ignored the tiny rocks digging into his palms and uninjured leg and kept moving. He didn’t wonder how bad he’d been hit, or think that, given the impact he’d felt, the bullet may have hit his femoral artery, and he’d be dead within minutes.

The only thing he thought of—the only thing that mattered—was getting to Jenna and keeping her safe.

With the curb as leverage, he’d just started to push himself onto the sidewalk when he saw her. Bent over at the waist, Jenna was standing on the sidewalk between the two vehicles with an outstretched arm.

“Here.” She reached for him.

The fuck is she… “I said get down!”

“I am down, and you’re hurt. Besides, the car already took off. Come on.”

Rather than wait for him to get his ass in gear and move, she grabbed his hand with both arms and dragged him with surprising strength up on the sidewalk and behind the rental.

Letting him go, she immediately began to examine his wound. Adrian hissed a breath when her fingers came damn close to the place where he’d been hit.

“Sorry.” Her brow furrowed. “Shit.”

“Not exactly the kinda thing…you wanna hear…from a…nurse.”

Her emerald eyes found his. “Sorry,” she apologized again. “It just…the bullet’s still in there.”

Yeah, he’d figured that one out already.

Fuck. He’d almost forgotten how bad getting shot hurt.

Ben burst out of the station’s entrance. He spotted Adrian and Jenna almost immediately, and Jesus. By the look on the other man’s face, you’d have thought he was dying.

He wasn’t dying. Not today.

Not when he’d finally found something worth living for.

With two uniformed officers flanking Ben’s sides, the three men had their guns drawn, and they were running down the sidewalk toward them.

“You two okay?” The man in charge yelled.

“He’s been hit!” Jenna hollered at him. “He needs an ambulance.”

Christ, she’s something else.

Bullets had been flying around them and her hands were covered with his blood, yet she was calm as a fucking cucumber.

He would’ve fallen in love with her that very second, if he wasn’t already there.

“I’m…fine,” Adrian told them through his clenched teeth.

Jesus, he felt dizzy.

Quickly, before he did something ridiculously embarrassing like pass the hell out, Adrian gave Ben a rundown of what he knew.

“Black four-door…tinted windows…no plates.”

Using his department-issued radio, Ben passed the information along. The man then requested EMS on the scene.

Adrian was about to argue that it would be faster if Jenna just drove him to the hospital herself when the world around him started to spin.

Okay, so maybe fine was a bit of a stretch.

“Adrian?” Jenna’s soft palms cupped both of his cheeks. “Hey, stay with me, okay?”

He was. Or at least he thought he was.

Working to keep his eyes open, he saw Jenna reach for his belt. In a rush, she had it unbuckled and was pulling it free in seconds.

“’smuch as I like where you’re…going with this, sweetheart…there’s a bit of an…audience. Don’t ya…think?”

He wasn’t lying. The area was now swarming with cops and other department staff.

“Jokes? Really?” She slid the end of the leather strap between his leg and the sidewalk. “You’re bleeding all over the place, and you’re making jokes?”

“Just a…scratch. Ah!” He winced when she cinched the belt as tight as it would go, just above his wound. “Not like I’m…dying.”

Jenna gave the belt another tug—motherfucker, that hurt—before latching the buckle. Taking his face in her hands, her watery gaze staring back into his.

“You’d better not be.”

Getting weaker by the second, Adrian wrapped a bloodied hand around her tiny wrist and squeezed. “Not going…anywhere.”

Sirens blared in the distance. Minutes later,