He growls down at me, his gray eyes wild as he takes in my face, assessing my condition. A second later he lurches up and sprints away, disappearing like the wind. Two unfamiliar men in dark winter coats with earpieces in go charging past, guns in hand and I stare after them, blinking in shock. Mason’s several paces ahead of the other two, who look like agents, chasing another pair of figures who grow smaller in the distance. Mason’s longer strides have him closing the distance fast.
“What the hell just happened?” My voice is shaky, but I tamp down the fear just as I do during my shifts in the pit.
“Callie!” It’s Nina’s panicked voice that tears my attention away from the chase. She’s on her knees in the snow, pressing her hands against Wyatt’s chest where he lies on his back, eyes wide and breathing ragged. Her light blue gloves are stained dark with his blood.
Rushing to his other side, I push her hands away. “Let me see.”
I tear open his layers to find the wound, high up in the fleshy part of his shoulder, just above his right armpit. I sigh in relief. “It’s not close to anything vital. Here, keep pressure on it and I’ll call 911.” I yank off my scarf and roll it up, pressing the soft weave to the wound. Nina takes over, tears streaming down her face.
“Nina, I promise, he’ll be okay.”
I pull out my phone and dial, abstractly aware of a handful of bystanders gawking at us. As I relay the nature of the emergency, I stare off in the direction of the chase, stomach doing constant flips over whether I should worry about Mason too.
When I’m done with the call, I kneel down beside Wyatt again. “They’re on their way. Try to stay calm.”
He gives me a pained smile, but doesn’t seem as terrified as he was a few moments ago. “I’m good. Thank you.”
After a second’s hesitation, I ask, “They were after him, weren’t they? Is he going to be okay?”
Wyatt gives a hoarse laugh and nods. “There’s a price on his head. It’s why we have a detail on him. Fucker went after them, didn’t he?” When I nod, he grabs my hand and squeezes. “He’s a tough bastard. He can take care of himself. Plus he has backup.”
I can’t help but give a wry chuckle. “I know exactly how tough he is. I was sure the jerk died in LA three years ago. I didn’t even know it was him until I saw his scars and tattoo.”
Wyatt’s eyes widen. “No shit. You’re that doctor?”
Nina’s staring at me with a perplexed expression. “He’s that patient?” They both look at each other and laugh.
“He talked about me?” I ask in utter disbelief. That he’d thought about me enough to tell someone else is a surprise.
“You haunted his dreams. I never believed in fate, but you two might make me rethink the whole concept.”
Nina stares down at him, her face a mix of fear and adoration. “I believe in fate,” she says, her smile hesitant, but there all the same.
He grips her upper arm and pulls her down close. They kiss, then rest their foreheads together in a tender, private exchange that makes me feel like an interloper. Still, I can’t help but smile at how sweet they are together now, in a moment of pure turmoil, drenched in blood, overwhelmed by fear and pain. It’s definitely a side of Nina I rarely, if ever, see.
As the paramedics arrive and put Wyatt on a gurney to take to the hospital, I stare into the distance again, chewing on the inside of my mouth in dread over all the things that might have happened to Mason at the end of that chase. Those men wanted him dead, and managed to get a bullet into Wyatt by accident. The four of us were in a wild tornado of snowball throwing at the time, but the indiscriminate way they chose to shoot tells me they’re not afraid of trying again, regardless of where they wind up.
I’m so intent on staring in the direction Mason went, I don’t even notice when he slips up behind me a moment later and asks in a husky tone, “Are you okay, Doc?”
I whirl and launch myself into his arms, no longer able to bury the emotional morass churning inside me since he disappeared. Tears spring forth first, then a sob. He holds me so tight it hurts, but I don’t care. When I finally regain control a moment later, I pull back and punch his shoulders with both fists.
“Goddamn you! I was terrified you’d get shot too!”
“I’m a hard man to keep down, baby,” he says, his smile a sly tilt even though his eyes are cold steel as they look me over. Then he winces and looks toward the ambulance that drove all the way down into the park to retrieve Wyatt. “How bad is it?”
“It’s a flesh wound. He’ll be fine, but probably won’t be able to use his right arm for a while.”
His jaw clenches and his eyes go dark. “The fuckers were after me. He got caught in the middle. This shouldn’t have fucking happened. Not again.”
His knuckles crack, and I glance down to see fresh scuffs and bruises on his clenched fists, plus a fair amount of blood that I doubt belongs to him. I take one hand, forcing him to open his fingers, then thread mine through and squeeze tight.
“It wasn’t your fault. Either time.”
He swallows hard, but his shoulders settle and he drops his head. “Knowing that doesn’t stop the what ifs.” Then he spears me with a hard look. “This isn’t over, either. You ought to stay clear in case Delgado sends more men to kill me. I should have never even come to you. Being near me is just too fucking risky.”
“Delgado? Didn’t they say Amador was who sent them?”
He snorts. “Delgado’s the one
