"Go home, Chris," I said. I pulled at Dex and after another tense moment, he finally came away with me. He walked ahead of me, making me practically run to keep up with him as he stormed out into the parking lot. Was he so pissed he was planning to leave me here? I hadn't done a single thing wrong. He climbed on his bike and revved the engine. I half expected him to tear off without me, but he waited. He was a brick wall of pent-up rage as I slid behind him and held on.
I wanted to shout to him not to make a bigger deal about Chris than necessary. He wasn't even a former boyfriend. He was just someone I dated a couple of times. Dex knew I had a life before he rolled back into town. It's what he'd told me to do when he pushed me out of his life all those years ago. Still, I hadn't intended for my life to get thrown in his face quite like that.
Ten minutes later, he rolled into the Wolf Den parking lot and cut his engine. I climbed off the bike but he stayed stock still, white knuckling the handle bars. I walked up to him but he kept his gaze straight ahead.
Billy, Sly, Tiny, Sawyer, Colt and a couple of the prospects came out of the bar at that moment. They'd either all woken early, or more likely hadn't gone to bed yet. They were laughing and joking about something and started to head over toward us. Sly saw Dex's posture and put a hand up to stop the rest of them. He gave me a quick nod and the group of them stayed near the doorway.
"Dex," I said. "Let's go inside."
"You go ahead," he said and I didn't like the tone of his voice. "I need a minute."
I sighed. "Thank you for not making a bigger scene back there than you did. Chris was out of line and I appreciate you showing some restraint."
"I can't fucking stand the idea of him touching you ... of anyone touching you ever again." There was no inflection in his voice and I recognized the barely contained rage behind it.
It was in me to try and joke him out of his mood, but something about his eyes stopped me. Whatever turmoil brewed behind them, Dex looked deeply hurt and it gutted me to know I could cause that kind of pain.
"Let's just go inside," I said again, putting a light hand on his upper arm. "The sun's coming up and I'm hungry. And I've been on my feet all night and I want to eat breakfast and go to bed with you."
Dex peeled his fingers off the handle bar and threw his leg over his bike. He didn't move to embrace me or put an arm around me as we turned toward the Den. He looked over my shoulder toward Sly and the others. He was coiled rage; his biceps twitched and veins popped out of his forearms.
Sly shot him a questioning look and Tiny stepped forward. Dex wouldn't put his arm around me but Tiny threw one around Dex. Sly gave me a wink. We were the two people in the world with the most experience dealing with Dex McLain when he was in a mood to brood. I figured I was in for a long day.
A car pulled up behind us and I turned to look over my shoulder when the world stopped. My body knew what to do before the next moments truly registered with my brain. Dex took a little longer. They all did. At the first pop! pop! Dex froze. I had already dropped to my knees. I saw hair fly up on the side of his head as a round whizzed by.
I might have screamed. I don't remember. I rolled and crawled on my elbows behind the dumpster. Dex was right behind me. He shoved me to the ground, laying his body over mine as the next deadly volley sprayed overhead.
Then it was as if the sound got sucked out of the world and my ears buzzed. I had no heartbeat, no breath and all I knew was the smell of blood.
Chapter Eighteen
Dex
Ava moved before the rest of us. I became aware of a queer expression on Tiny's face as Ava dropped to the ground at my feet. I went toward her and through a spray of blood as Tiny's chest exploded. He crumpled to the ground.
There were shouts. Screams. A haze of bullets that lodged in the door, shattering windows before me. I threw myself over Ava but she'd already taken cover behind one of the dumpsters. Then it was over. I got just a glimpse of the black van as it sped off toward the mountains.
Pagano. Hate-fueled rage heated my blood. With my bare hands, whatever the consequences, I would murder that man. But now, there was Ava.
"Go!" I shouted. Sawyer and Colt got to their bikes and tore off after the van. Sly, Gunner and Curtis ran toward their bikes but stopped when they saw Tiny lying lifeless and gray across the threshold of the Den.
"Call an ambulance!" Sly yelled and I moved off Ava. I didn't think she'd been hit but we were both covered in blood. Her face held a blank expression, like she was seeing something behind her eyes different from what was in front of her. It lasted for only a moment, then she sat up and laid her hands flat on my chest.
"Are you hit?" she said; her voice was toneless. It held no fear, no alarm, just calm purpose as she lifted the flap of my vest and checked for wounds.
"I'm okay," I said. "What about you?"
She shook her head and sprang to her feet; her eyes were on Tiny. Her hands fluttered near her waist as if she were looking for something. "I need comm," she muttered, her eyes turning glassy for a moment before she seemed to come back to me. She was here, but there and it tore my heart apart. It was as if her nightmares of Iraq came back to life and it was all because she'd been standing next to me.
I would kill Pagano for her and for me.
She dropped to her knees and crawled over to Tiny. She pulled his shirt apart, exposing the great raw wound on his left upper chest. His skin was torn away in chunks and he seeped blood.
"I need you to call it in!" Ava shouted to Sly. "Get me on speaker with the dispatcher."
Gunner handed Sly his phone and he held it near her ear as she worked on Tiny.
Ava stripped down to her tank top. She wadded her t-shirt and shoved it over Tiny's wound, putting pressure on it. It soaked red within a matter of seconds. She rolled him slightly, checking for an exit wound. Not seeing one, she set him gently back on the ground. I knelt next to her, ready to do whatever she needed. Blood pooled and bubbled in the wound and Ava held her ear to his chest.
"Tiny!" she shouted. "You stay with me, okay? Help's coming." She looked behind at Gunner. "Go get me a clean garbage bag and Mo's first aid kit; hurry!"
I took Sly's phone from him and held it out near Ava's ear while she talked to the dispatcher.
"Tell them to prepare for a major trauma." She turned to me. "You know Tiny's blood type?"
"B positive," Sly shouted. "We sponsor a blood drive."
Ava nodded. "You hear that?" she yelled into the phone. "Tell them to be ready with at least four units, okay? I'm going to try and get a field dressing on him. How far out is the rig?"
I took over staunching the blood flow and handed Ava the phone so she could hear better. Tiny was still conscious but not by much. His breath was shallow and his eyes kept rolling back into his head.
"Don't you check out," I said to him through gritted teeth. "Ava's going to take care of you." He moaned a little but I knew he heard me.
When Gunner came back, Ava tore through the first aid kit and taped the plastic bag over Tiny's gaping wound. It seemed to help him breathe a little better but there was still so much blood everywhere. I knew the situation for him was pretty grim.
I don't know how long it took after that. There wasn't much Ava could do and I could read the desperation in her face. Then the sirens blared as the ambulance arrived. I recognized one of the EMTs. She'd called him Cal and he'd been on scene when Franco was brought in.
Ava shouted orders to him as they worked on Tiny. They put an oxygen mask over his face and Ava helped heave him on to the stretcher. Ava ran alongside it, holding an IV bag. Sly got to one of the cars and pulled up behind the ambulance so we could ride behind it. Ava tried to hop into the back of the rig but Cal stopped her.
"We've got him, Ava. You can meet us there."
She pushed back and said something. Cal grabbed her shoulders. "You've been on your feet for more than twelve hours," he said. "I said we've got this. You've done what you needed to do for him."
I came behind her and put a gentle hand on her shoulder. She trembled beneath my touch but finally nodded, letting Cal and the other medics lift the stretcher into the ambulance and swing the doors closed. I guided Ava to the back seat of Sly's Hummer and he peeled out before I got the door shut.
"How bad is he, Ava?" Sly shouted as soon as we made the turn for the highway.
I kept a tight grip on her. She seemed there but not there still. Ava's skin was like ice and she shuddered. Her skin looked so pale I worried maybe she really had taken a hit and the adrenalin kept her from feeling it. She put a hand up and shook her head, sensing what I was thinking.
"If they can keep him from bleeding out in the back of the rig, he might have a chance," she answered Sly. "His lung's collapsed."
"Ava, look at me," I said, not liking her ashen color one bit.
She held a hand out in front of her face and turned it, inspecting it like it belonged to someone else. "Shock," she said. "It's shock." She shivered next to me and I pulled her closer, trying to give her some of my body heat.
"How'd you know they were coming?" Curtis looked back at her. "I swear to God I thought those were firecrackers."