Heat Race - Tanya Chris Page 0,83

Miller had given them look like a toy. She arrived like a commander taking charge of a battle scene.

“I’m all right,” he told her when she ordered him to lie down. “Better check on the rest of them.” He wasn’t sure what condition the men scattered around him were in, but he’d heard enough moans and pleas for help to know they weren’t all dead.

“Ambulances are on the way,” Alice said. “A whole caravan of them. What the hell happened here? Miller was vague.”

“Gee, I wonder why.” Jasper’s sarcasm earned him a reproving look from his mother.

“Miller and his posse came to destroy the house,” Saul told her. “To tell us to move on, I guess. But I got in their way.” He ended his sentence with a yelp when Alice prodded his ribs.

“Gotta see what’s broken,” she said unapologetically. She was a warm woman, but not one inclined toward pity, which Saul appreciated at the moment. Pity might break him. He looked up at Jasper, needing to borrow a little of his strength, and Jasper pushed some love through the bond that was better than painkillers. Not only did his own pain ease, but the negative vibrations racing back and forth along the bond slowed, as if everyone had received that dose of reassurance.

The sound of sirens, barely discernible at first, grew louder, The first vehicle to arrive brought Jack Henry and Elias with it. Jack Henry scrambled down the incline, dodging the fallen bodies without giving them a second glance to slide to his knees at Saul’s side. He was teary, anxious, and dressed in clothes Saul had never seen before. Something out of the studio’s costume chest, maybe—a sparkling pink tunic, beneath which he only wore tights.

“I’m gonna be okay,” Saul promised when Jack Henry looked up at Jasper with trembling lips. Now that the four of them were together, he knew it was true.

Alice sat him up to wrap a bandage around his ribs, and Jack Henry leaned into him to help keep him upright, pressing kisses against his bloody spots as Alice tsked about germs. Elias hovered over her, monitoring her every move as if he suspected her of malpractice, while Jasper monitored Jack Henry, watching him carefully. He seemed to be in one piece, and those tights really showcased the lean beauty of his legs. Saul figured he must be on the mend because he couldn’t take his eyes off them.

One ambulance after another arrived, but Saul kept pointing the EMTs to the fallen men surrounding him.

“Maybe Saul should see a doctor,” Elias said nervously.

“That’s what the mayor said about you,” Jack Henry said.

Saul must still be loopy because he didn’t understand why the mayor would want Elias to see a doctor, but he knew one thing for sure. “I’m not sleeping in a hospital tonight.” He and his mates needed each other.

“My mom knows a thing or two about mending uber-alphas who’ve suffered the consequences of their stubbornness,” Jasper assured Elias.

“I’ve been bandaging Jasper’s hard head his whole life. He might not have gotten himself into so many scrapes if he’d had to bear the consequences of them.”

“Saul’s not an uber-alpha though,” Elias said.

“Heals like one.” Alice produced a curved needle and what looked like very thin thread. “Now, you hold him still,” she said to Jack Henry. “If he jumps, he’s gonna mess up my handiwork.”

Saul steeled himself for the sharp intrusion of needle through flesh. Those men had near killed him. Nothing Alice could do would hurt half so much.

JASPER

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

By the time his mother had finished sewing up the gash in Saul’s head, the field had been cleared of Jasper’s carnage. A train of ambulances departed, crammed like paddy wagons with multiple bodies apiece.

Focus on what needs to be done next. That was what he kept telling himself because he felt like he was about to come apart. He was dressed in the few shreds of clothes that’d survived his shift. Jack Henry was dressed like a circus act. And Elias was bleeding in almost as many spots as Saul. The house was a powder keg of spilled gasoline, waiting for a spark to set it ablaze, and even if it didn’t go up in flames, Jasper wasn’t sure he could ever live there knowing Saul had almost died to save it.

He carried the mattresses down from the loft and over to the cabin. The cabin’s closed-in feel would be welcome tonight, allowing them to shut out the world and hunker