Tribes of Man: The Beginning [Tribes of Man] (Siren Publishing Classic) (22 page)

“What happened here?” the woman asked. Gideon realized it was the same one from the school shooting. He wondered if she remembered them.

“Someone shot her. He was across the street in the house, and he shot her.” Gideon knew enough to stay back out of the way, but Raina’s continued silence in his head was difficult to handle.

A uniformed police officer walked up just as Gideon said that. “She was shot by someone in the house that is currently on fire?”

“That’s the one.” Gideon turned his attention back to the EMTs. They had attached an IV and stabilized Raina to put her on a stretcher. “She’s pregnant.”

The EMT made a note on the chart. “We’ll let them know in Emergency, but our first priority is her life. The baby is secondary.”

Gideon felt the lump in his throat. “I understand.”

He followed the stretcher down the steep driveway toward the ambulance. “I’m riding with you.”

The EMT must have remembered him well, because she said, “You can ride, Gideon, but you have to stay out of the way.”

“Wait a minute,” the cop said. “I have some questions.”

“I’ll answer them,” Eric said, making Gideon suddenly grateful that he was there. “He needs to be with his fiancée.”

Gideon looked at Eric. “Thanks, man, for everything.”

He climbed into the ambulance and wondered what the hell had just happened. And where was Kristano?

Gideon had been to the Saint Anne’s Hospital Emergency Room several times in his life. He remembered the waiting room to be crowded with sick, miserable people waiting their turn to be seen by the overworked ER staff. When he followed Raina’s stretcher off the ambulance, he was told to wait in a smaller waiting area. The only people in the room were an older woman and a man who looked like her adult son. The woman was crying softly, while the man held her. Every once and a while he’d murmur to her, “He’s strong, he’ll make it.”

When Gideon first came into the room, they looked up at him with hope, as though he might be the doctor come to give them news. They immediately took in his bloody clothes and tortured eyes and went back to their private vigil. Gideon sat on the cold vinyl seat and looked at the doorway, waiting for the doctor to give him news. About twenty minutes later, a doctor came down the hallway. He was rubbing his eyes. Gideon stood up abruptly. He knew he was looking at a doctor who was preparing to give bad news.

The other couple, alerted by Gideon’s change in posture, also stood up. The doctor stepped into the room.

“I’m looking for the family of Silas Miller.”

The woman stepped forward, eager, still hoping for good news.

“Mrs. Miller?” At her nod, the doctor led her to a seat. “I’m sorry. By the time they got him here, his heart was too damaged.”

Both Mrs. Miller and the younger man started to cry.

“Did he—did he suffer?” the man asked.

Gideon always wondered why someone would ask that question. Even if the person suffered, the doctor is going to lie. Besides, why would anyone want to know the truth?

“No, once he was unconscious, he slipped peacefully away. I’m sorry for your loss. I’ll have Nurse Maybee bring you some paperwork.” The doctor got up and headed for the door, not sparing Gideon a glance.

Gideon grabbed his arm. “Doctor, I know you didn’t work on her, but is there any way to find out the status of Raina Kallan?”

“Gunshot victim?”

“Yes. I don’t mean to be a pest.” Gideon knew that his calm tone would make it easier for the doctor to help him.

“I don’t know the status at this moment. I do know that she was stable when I passed by the trauma room a few minutes ago. I’ll see if there’s anyone available to update you.”

“Thank you.”

After the doctor walked away, Gideon watched the drama unfold in front of him. When he was in uniform, he worked for six months in the division that alerted families to accidents and deaths. It was the only time when he was on the force that he truly hated his job. He’d have taken boring traffic detail over notification duty anytime.

The nurse brought some paperwork and led the other couple out of the room. Gideon figured that they wanted to see the body.

A few minutes later, nearly an hour after she was brought in, a doctor came to give Gideon her status just as Eric came into the waiting room.

Gideon hugged Eric. The men had bonded over Raina’s blood.

Eric was followed closely by a young doctor. “Are you here for Raina Kallan?”

“Yes, I’m her fiancé, Gideon McConnell. This is Eric Bevan, a friend of ours.”

“Mr. McConnell, we’re taking Raina into surgery. The bullet is still lodged in her shoulder. The good news about that is that there was less risk of her bleeding out because there was no exit wound. The bad news is that we need to get it out and close up the damage. Our only concern is that she was shot on the left side, near her heart. I understand that no one else was hurt?”

“No, only Raina.”

“Was she standing behind something?”

Gideon looked at him quizzically, “No, why?”

“The report says that she was shot from under fifty yards away, yet the impact of the bullet indicates that it went through something, or someone, first. Frankly, this is the type of injury we see when the bullet impacts two victims with the same shot.”

Oh, shit. Kristano.
“No, it just hit Raina. Maybe the gun was malfunctioning?”

The doctor just shrugged. “I don’t know anything about that. We’ll just leave it up to the police to figure out. I just needed to know if we should be looking for any kind of foreign objects in the wound.”

“No, nothing except that it went through her robe.”

The doctor nodded. “We’ve accounted for that. She’s stable now. We’re taking her up to the OR and fixing the damage. Like I said, the operation is a little more risky because of its location, but the actual surgery itself should not be difficult. It’ll take about four hours. After that she’ll be surgical ICU until we know she’s stable.”

“Doctor.” Gideon hesitated, not sure he wanted to hear the answer to the question. “Is the baby still alive?”

The doctor put his hand on Gideon’s. Gideon tensed, expecting the worst. “Right now, that baby is strong. We’ve got a fetal monitor on it. However, we will not change our treatment of Raina based on the baby. Whether it survives is up to God at this point. You should prepare yourself for the possibility that the fetus might not remain viable.”

“Do whatever you have to do to keep Raina alive, but don’t forget about that baby.” Gideon didn’t even know about the baby until a little over an hour before, but he already couldn’t imagine losing it.

“We’ll do everything we can. Mr. McConnell, why don’t you make yourselves comfortable in the surgical waiting area? You’ll have plenty of time to go to the cafeteria or even head home and change before she’s done in surgery.”

“Can I see her before she goes in?”

“If you’d like, you can walk with her from the ER up to the surgical unit. Just be prepared, she’s unconscious and hooked up to several machines,” the doctor warned.

“Eric, I’ll meet you in the waiting room.”

Eric nodded.

* * * *

The Surgical Waiting Room was empty. Eric didn’t know how it was possible for it to be empty, but it was.

Eric couldn’t stop himself from reliving the day. He was so excited when he got up. Sure, the path he was on was dangerous, but it was also thrilling. He was ready to jump into it—find the other keeper and change the world. How hard could it be?

How stupid he was.

He was ready to defend himself and the others magically, but he never considered that the danger would be a real and tangible thing. A gun, shot by an expert marksman.

The pain from the wound was incredible. It felt like his arm was going to fall off. He could take on her pain, but he couldn’t heal her. She could have died while he was there, holding the agony at bay. She could have slipped away, taking away his physical pain, and taking away the life that beat under his hand. Eric couldn’t bear the thought of Raina dying. Such a bright light in the world, extinguished.

Gideon came into the room a short time later, pale and tired. “I called my brother on the way in. Bryce would be furious if he found out that Raina was hurt and I didn’t call.” He gestured to his bloody shirt. “I asked him to bring me a shirt.”

Gideon looked at Eric’s spotless shirt. It was the same one he was wearing earlier, but the blood was gone. “How did you manage to wash your shirt?”

“I didn’t.” Eric ran a hand over his shirt and blood appeared. He passed his hand over again and it disappeared. “Ain’t magic grand?”

Kristano walked into the room.

“Where the hell have you been?” Eric got into Kristano’s face. He was suddenly furious. Here was this all-powerful being, and he ran like a frightened girl when the action started.

“Did you think that Raina or that baby might need you? Did you think that maybe you could have stuck around to help?” Eric was nearly yelling.

Kristano took it all stoically.

“Stop it!” Gideon said sharply to Eric. “He didn’t run away.”

“Are you OK? Did you get what you needed to close the wound?” Gideon looked at Kristano’s chest. It was back to normal. Again, there was no blood on the front of him.

“I’m fine. I tried to find Jensen, but I couldn’t. I don’t know if Adder’s control cloaks him from me, but he was long gone.”

“Wait a minute.” Eric wasn’t willing to let go of the previous conversation. “What are you talking about, Gideon? What wound?”

“Kristano took the bullet first, you moron. Why do you think her wound looks like a secondary hit?”

Eric didn’t know what to say. He was ashamed that he jumped to the conclusion that Kristano ran. He should have known better.

Why should you have known better?
Kristano asked.
You don’t know me.

Kristano’s acceptance made Eric feel worse.

“How did you heal so fast?” Eric hadn’t been exposed to Kristano’s way of survival.

“I used magic to heal it, and then strengthened myself with blood.”

Eric got the sense that Kristano was trying to shock him. He refused to fall into it again.

Eric held out his hand. “Sorry, man. It just made me a little crazy to see Raina bleeding like that.”

“I checked on her before I came in. They just started, but things are still looking good.” Kristano touched Gideon’s arm.

Eric touched the other arm. “She’ll be OK.”

* * * *

The first thing Bryce saw when he walked into the waiting room was Gideon with blood all over him and Kristano and some other guy flanking him. Bryce’s gut twisted at the feeling that, once again, he was left out.

“Hey Gideon, any word?” Bryce had picked up a Box O’ Joe from Dunkin’ Donuts before heading over. He knew they’d need the coffee to be flowing constantly while they waited. He had a small stack of cups and a box of condiments.

“Nothing yet. I think she’s going to be OK, though.” Gideon came over and gave Bryce a hug. “She’s going to be fine.”

Although it was foolish, he felt better when Gideon said it. As his big brother, Gideon had always made sure that everything was going to be fine. He didn’t lie. If he said that Raina was going to be OK, she was. He let out a long sigh of relief.

Gideon’s arm was still slung over his shoulder when he introduced Bryce to the guy he hadn’t met.

“Bryce, this is my friend and associate Eric Bevan. Eric, my little brother, Bryce.”

Bryce held his hand out. He couldn’t figure out how it was that since this thing started a month and a half ago, his brother all of a sudden started bringing people into the detective agency. He didn’t think Gideon was getting paid to protect Raina, and if he was, it couldn’t have been much. How could he afford to keep hiring men?

“Eric is consulting on a side project. He was meeting me at Raina’s house this morning when she was shot,” Gideon answered his unasked question.

“And how did that happen?” Bryce asked, fierce. “I thought she was being protected.”

“You can’t protect against a sniper rifle fired from across the street. She was just standing in the doorway,” Gideon said. He sounded defensive, and he was rubbing his eyes. “It never should have happened. We should have taken the possibility of it into account.”

“You couldn’t have known,” Eric said. “Even with Raina’s prediction, you couldn’t have known.”

“Raina’s prediction?” Bryce questioned.

Kristano stepped into the silence caused by Eric’s blunder. “The other night she dreamed about a gunshot. It wasn’t a prediction so much as it was a prophetic dream. We all have them sometimes.”

Bryce relaxed. “True enough. Coffee, anyone?” Bryce poured himself some coffee and sat down to stare blindly at the television. Gideon and Kristano both paced the room like caged tigers while Eric toed off his shoes and sat in the lotus position on the chair.

They occasionally tried to chitchat, but no one was really able to keep up the effort. Kristano kept leaving to “check in,” and somehow he would come back with specific updates on how far along they were and how Raina was faring. Bryce figured he must have had a friend who could check on the status.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, a doctor in surgical scrubs entered the room. He motioned for everyone to sit.

“Raina came through the surgery very well. We’re going to need to monitor her for another two hours before we can move her into a regular room. Her prognosis is excellent. We’re going to want to keep her in the hospital for a few days, as much for the sake of the baby as for Raina’s sake.”

Bryce jerked.
Baby? What the hell.

“Give us about five minutes to get her settled, then one of you can stay with her. Are there any blood relatives here or the baby’s father?” the doctor asked, looking at his chart.

“I’m the baby’s father. Raina’s my fiancée. She has no other family,” Gideon said, not looking at Bryce.

“Good. Because of the pregnancy, you have the rights of a spouse to stay with her. The medical team gets final say on any medical decision that does not involve the baby. Frankly, I don’t think there are going to be any decisions that need to be made regarding her care. She seems to be very strong.” The doctor made a note on his chart before continuing. “The others can visit for five minutes an hour, one at a time. I’m guessing we’ll have her in a regular room by tonight.”