“At least an hour,” Tegan answered him quietly from behind me. I nodded my agreement.
“Was she in the cold the same amount of time?” Eli questioned.
“Yes, in her car probably 10 minutes, on the ground covered in blankets for around 20, and then in the jeep covered until we got here,” I answered this time. Eli didn’t say anything else as he continued his examination of Zee. He felt along her left arm and her ribs on her left side. His face showed true concern for the first time. After he used sheers to slice her pants down the left leg, I could see the discoloration on her left hip.
“I brought my portable x-ray with me, but I can’t do MRIs,” he met my gaze finally as he talked. “I can’t tell you if her brain is injured. I know she needs surgery to fix this arm. Her hip doesn’t seem broken, but I’ll look anyway. She has several broken ribs. She is just on the edges of hypothermia. It’s a good thing you kept her covered.” With that the male walked out of the room.
“Who is he?” I turned to Jarren and asked. He didn’t cower under the anger I knew was showing through. The doctor pushed at my instincts and only Zee’s well-being kept me from doing something about it.
“He’s a lone wolf,” Jarren’s reply was calm. “I know him from his time as a medic in Iraq. He was bitten here in the states while working in an ER. He found me afterwards, but before you found me. He’s been living in Michigan for a couple years now.” I glared at him for a moment, but he didn’t seem willing to give me any more information.
I turned my back on him to pull a chair beside Zee. I needed to think about everything Jarren had said. He’d known a wolf was nearby our territory, but he failed to mention it. He kept Eli a secret and I wondered why. As I watched Zee’s chest rise and fall with each shallow breath, I decided it wasn’t important right then. If Eli could fix Zee, then I would wait to confront them both.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Zee
Beeping pulled me from my sleep. Annoying beeping that just didn’t seem to want to stop. Wondering what time it was, I cracked my eyes open, but shut them quickly at the bright sunlight coming in through the window. Wait…window? I opened my eyes again to take in the unfamiliar room. A large window with navy curtains pulled open was the first thing I saw. The view was of trees. Not the few well-placed trees that always seem to be planted around towns, but an entire forest of trees.
My eyes drifted along the log walls up above my head to the source of the beeping, a heart monitor. I looked down at my body, taking in the cast on my arm, the IV in my other hand. That’s when I realized how much my body was aching. I closed my eyes and searched my memory for how I’d ended up like this. I remembered working at the bar, talking to a man who asked about wolves… Alex! My eyes flew open and I tried to sit up. Sharp pain shot through my side and I fell back on the pillow with a harsh cry. The door to the room flew open and a man I didn’t recognize walked in.
“I suggest you stay still,” the man said as he walked over to my bed. He shined a light into each of my eyes for a moment while he talked, “My name is Eli. I’ve been taking care of you since Alex brought you here. Do you know your name?”
“Zipporah,” my voice was scratchy, and I cleared my throat. “Everyone calls me Zee. Where is here?”
“Alex’s house,” he responded as he glanced over a readout from the heart monitor. “Do you know what year it is?”
“2014,” I replied, and he nodded. He continued his work, pulling the sheet down to just above my hips. I was wearing a long white t-shirt that had to belong to one of the guys in the house. He pulled the shirt up and I stared down at my bandaged abdomen. He pulled my shirt down and then moved the sheet to reveal my naked left hip. I could see an ugly bruise covering my exposed skin.
“Do you remember what happened to you?” He seemed to approve of what he saw on my hip because his lips turned up a tiny amount before he pulled the sheet back up. Then he moved up to look at my head, and for the first time I noticed the tight feeling of a bandage around my head.
“I remember being at the bar, it had been snowing so the roads were bad,” I searched my memories, trying to find what happened next. Eli removed the bandage from around my head while I talked. “There was a man, he made me nervous…I can’t remember anything else.”
“It’s not uncommon for a person to forget things after a traumatic event,” Eli said as he looked at whatever injury I had on my head. “You were in a car wreck. The best we can tell, you were hit by a car that was pursuing you. The impact and the icy roads caused your car to spin off the road. You hit a tree on the driver’s side. The impact totaled your car and caused you numerous injuries. You have three broken rips on your left side. Your left arm was shattered and had to be repaired with surgery. You have a small fracture to your scull, along with a deep laceration that had to have stiches, and deep bruising on your left hip.”
“How long have I been here?”
