"You sure there's nothing we can do?"
"Of course I'm bloody fucking sure," Prowler howled, his eyes flashing the deepest gold Dice had ever seen.
Dice barely noticed the two women running past him, crying with joy as they took the girl and the werewolf boy from Meredith's care.
"Lizzy!" the shorter woman exclaimed, hugging and kissing the girl while the other woman picked the little boy into her arms.
"Where's Maria?" Meredith asked, seeming to receive quick shakes of the head in response.
"Meredith, is there an operating room here somewhere?" Dice asked, tugging bandages out of his bag and shoving them under Price's hands so he could put more pressure on the wounds.
"I-I'm not sure … We can take him to my lab! If my research is there … Come on, we don't have time!" she said suddenly, practically breaking into a run past them.
Dice frowned, but sharing a look with Ryker and Prowler, they nodded and hoisted Price up between them. Rio was holding his rifle and he was the only one left of the squad with hands available to do any shooting. Not that it would do them much good if they did happen on any guards, considering the mass of civilians they had with them.
Meredith led the group up two levels to where the laboratories were. They moved as fast as they could and when they reached the right door, Dice was relieved to find it blown open. They moved Price inside and set him down on some countertops. Their path to the lab could be tracked by the trail of blood he'd left behind.
Meredith was rummaging through the shelves and cupboards in her lab while Rio stood guard outside with Ryker, keeping an eye on the two men as well. The two women – Amina and Sya, as Dice had understood from the few words they exchanged, had put the kids to sit in a corner and were now assisting Meredith in finding her whatever she needed to find while Prowler and Dice worked at trying to get what little blood Price still had to stay in him.
"What are you doing?" Dice asked finally, when it seemed like far too much time had passed.
In actuality, it had probably only been a few dozen seconds.
"I'm almost ready," Meredith said, looking up for a moment before peeling away from the work she and the other two women had been piling over.
She held a small vial in her hands with gray-looking crystallized powder, her hand shaking as she carried it over.
"Show me the wound," she said, her voice stern and calm now.
Dice pulled his hands away and Prowler did as well, with obvious reluctance. Prowler was as white in the face as Price was now, it seemed.
With a heavy hand, Meredith sprinkled the dust on both the entrance and the exit wounds. As if by magic, the seeping blood seemed to coagulate and stop, sealing the wound immediately.
"What is that stuff?" Dice asked, surprised.
"It's my research," she said, with the slightest hint of pride to her voice. "It'll help him, but he needs blood fast if he's going to survive."
"We need to get out of here," Prowler said, his voice subdued now, but the urgency still evident in his starkly golden eyes.
The original plan had been to swipe one of the helicopters from The Arctics, which Rowen had said were being kept in a hangar in the back of the compound. Now with their pilot taken out, that obviously was no longer an option.
Dice's mind worked furiously as he slicked a hand through his hair, suppressing a growl as pain shot through him from his several wounds. Before he could say anything though, a very familiar voice drawled in his ear.
"Did anyone call for backup?"
Dice spun around on the spot, finding Thor leaning against the doorframe with a lazy grin on his lips. His expression wavered only the slightest bit when he took in the sight of the blood and the civilians and the seemingly lifeless body of Price on the countertop.
"The fuck are y-" Prowler began, but Thor didn't let him finish.
"Come on, our ride is waiting upstairs," Thor said.
Dice's eyes narrowed, searching Thor's expression, unreadable as always. The damn sniper just winked and motioned his head toward the exit.
"Unless you wanna stay here, of course."
"Let's go," Dice said, forcing himself calm. "Ryker, come help us with Price."
He had a bad feeling about this, but anything was better than losing a squadmate and possibly everything else he cared about, stuck in the bowels of a damn Arctics' compound.
One look at his mate and the baby boy in her arms again confirmed that. He could deal with Thor, The Firm, The Arctics and whatever else life had to throw at him, as long as he could keep the two of them safe.
Twenty-Three
Meredith
Meredith stirred slowly in her sleep.
Every part of her body seemed to be experiencing mild aches and pains, but the comforting blanket of sleep left her little time to care for that. She yawned softly but then her eyes shot open immediately as she felt Dean roll on his side next to her.
Blinking the sleep from her eyes, she looked at the little boy in her arms and an immediate smile crossed her lips as she realized where she was.
Safe.
"Morning," Dice said gently, the makings of a smile in his voice. "You two have been out cold for a while."
Meredith forced herself up on her elbow, carefully so as to not awake the sleeping child next to her. She was in a cot in a The Firm bunker somewhere far (but not far enough) from the desert. Frankly, after she'd gotten into one of the helicopters waiting for her, the hostages and Shifter Squad Nine, she'd lost most of her interest toward where she was being taken.
Anywhere that wasn't controlled by The Arctics and where she had her baby and her man with her was good enough.
"How long did I sleep?" she asked.
"Must be fourteen hours now," Dice said with a shrug, followed by a wince that he almost managed to conceal from Meredith.
"How bad is it?" she asked, switching into caretaker mode in an instant.
Dice chuckled, leaning forward and over Dean to kiss her on the lips. It was a light brush, but that little kiss alone seemed to spark her with more energy than a dozen strong espressos could barely match.
"I'm fine. A medic looked me over, I'll be good as new in about a week. They didn't even need to take the bullet out, it should come out on its own during the healing process."
Dice rubbed his side absently. By the sound of his breathing, his lung had to be better now as well. Shifters made for excellent patients in that sense – if they survived the initial impact then odds were good that they'd come through whatever injuries.
Especially with a little help.
Meredith caught herself staring lovingly at Dean again, his cherubic face blissfully smiling in his sleep. This was probably the longest stretch she'd gotten to spend with her baby boy past the initial two months that they'd been together after he was born. She had so much catching up to do with him but every minute together reinforced that everything she'd done had been for the right reasons.
"Is Price okay? Did he make it?" she asked, realizing that she'd forgotten all about the rest of the world at the sight of her own happiness.
Dice nodded and it was like a stone was being lifted from Meredith's chest.
"We got him back in time, yeah. The medics said that your wonder drug was what did it. He wouldn't have made it on the chopper alive otherwise. Prowler gave a ton of blood for him and now they're both recuperating. It'll be a few days before he wakes up and the running theory is that his voice will never be the same after having a bullet go through his windpipe. But he's a tough dog, he'll fly another day."
"I'm so relieved to hear that," Meredith said with a sigh. "I was worried about him."
"Me too," Dice admitted quietly, frowning slightly at that.
"You seem surprised by that," she said, maneuvering herself on the hard cot which had seemed like the softest, most luxurious bed when she'd put her head on the pillow all those hours ago.