Hit List - Laurell K. Hamilton [60]
“I didn’t know you were this hurt, Blake.”
“You didn’t ask,” I said.
“The EMTs are almost here; go with Newman to the hospital. No one will think less of you.”
“I told you, Raborn, I don’t care what you think of me.”
Now I could read his look; it was angry. “You just won’t give an inch, will you?”
Edward came up behind Raborn and said, “It’s not her best thing.” Raborn moved so he could see all of us. “She might get along better if she were a little more flexible.”
Edward nodded, smiling his Ted smile, as he tipped his hat back from his forehead, his P90 pointed one-handed at the ground. “She might, but if she were more flexible she’d be screaming from the pain, instead of watching the woods, doing her job.”
Raborn seemed to think about that for a second, then just shook his head. “All you old-time hunters are stubborn bastards.”
I smiled at that. Raborn had to have me by at least a couple of decades, but I was an old-time hunter. Then my muscles tried to form a fist inside my arm and tear their way out. The pain broke me out in a light, sick sweat.
“You just went pale,” Stavros said.
I nodded, not trusting what my voice would sound like.
Matt and Julie, our EMTs from earlier, were carrying a stretcher sideways through the trees. Apparently they’d had to wait for us all. I’d actually expected the shift to have changed or something.
Edward said, “We’ve searched the woods. They’re not here.”
“Tell your partner here to go to the hospital,” Raborn said.
He gave Ted’s smile again and just shook his head. “I’ll take Anita where she lets me take her, but I doubt that will include the hospital.”
“There’s stubborn and there’s stupid,” Raborn said, “but she’s your partner.” He walked away from all of us, apparently too disgusted to stick around and see who went to the hospital.
Stavros looked at me, gun pointed at the pale light of the sky. “Too-rapid healing causes pain? I thought it just healed if you had lycanthropy.”
“It can,” I said, in a voice that was thin with strain, “but sometimes it does this.”
“Is the healing worth it?” she asked.
I nodded. “Yeah.”
The EMTs were here. Edward and I walked Newman to the ambulance. Edward also talked to me about the arm and the muscle twitching. “If it scarred that badly and you were human, I’d be worried you’d lose mobility.”
“That’s what they said about my left arm and the scar tissue at the bend, but as long as I hit the weights regularly I’m fine.”
He stepped on top of the log, not over. When you’re in the woods long enough you step on logs, not over, in case of snakes. It just becomes automatic so you can look before you step.
“The new one is a longer scar and involves more muscles and tendons.”
“What are you wanting me to do?”
“See if the doctors can do anything for it.”
“The EMTs said they’d cut it open and stitch it to keep it from scarring.”
“If you do that, then you can feed the ardeur and it’ll be all better.”
I gave him an unfriendly look as we followed the stretcher onto the road, and the morning light was suddenly more serious without the trees blocking it.
“I don’t like stitches,” I said.
He grinned at me. “No one does.”
“If I wimp out you’ll never let me live this down, will you?”
He grinned wider and shook his head. “Not if you lose mobility in the arm, and get us killed because of it.” The grin faded, and his eyes went serious. “I’ll hold your hand.”
I glared at him. “Oh, that’ll make it all better.”
“I don’t offer to hold hands with the other marshals.”
We had a moment of looking at each other, a moment of years of guarding each other’s backs, of being friends. I nodded. “Thanks.”
He smiled, but his eyes were still too serious for it. “You’re welcome, but save the thanks until after you finish cursing me.”
“Why will I curse you?”
“The rapid healing means drugs go through your body faster than