Jacob's Ladder (24 page)

Someone was lighting flares and placing them behind the wreckage, moving far enough away that I couldn"t see them in the mist. Maybe if they burned brightly enough, it would stop people from just speeding headlong into the crash.

“It"s all right,” I told her. “I"ll stay here with him for a while.” The man behind her said, “That isn"t a good idea.”

“My ideas rarely are,” I agreed. My head was swimmy; the sensation of being underwater instead of wrapped in an intense fog was worsening.

“You really should—”

“I"m staying,” I said, tight-lipped. “It will be all right. Get to safety and flag down the EMTs for us the minute they arrive, all right? I think my brother"s going to need to be cut out of the car.”

“Go,” my brother tried to shout, but it didn"t sound too fierce. “
Go
.” St. Nacho’s 3: Jacob’s Ladder

137

“And miss your face when they use that big saw on your Lexus? Never.” I could tell Dan was in pain, yet I wanted to keep him talking to me. I couldn"t bear to see the light in his eyes go out, even to escape his pain. I was too scared he wouldn"t come back to me.

“Tell me about everything else. Legs?”

“Peachy.” He shot me a killing glance. “When we get out of this, I am going to use them to kick your ass.”

More faces peered curiously at us as they passed the car, and I began to wonder how many people were involved. How many cars? How many were injured or killed?

“You can try,” I told Dan. “Weren"t you just telling me this morning that I need professional help and I shouldn"t be a doormat?” He laughed weakly. “You picked a fine time to stand your ground.”

“I agree completely. What about those legs? What do you feel?”

“Not much.”

“Dan—”

“No, it"s not that. I"m not really… I don"t feel much of anything. That"s probably good.”

“Or not,” I said grimly.

He reached for me with his free hand again, and I focused on that for a while.

We sat there clinging to one another, listening to the
drip, drip, drip
from the Lexus"s cracked radiator and the noise from a couple of radios. Farther from where we sat, we heard the sounds of pain. A man moaned over and over. Someone was crying. I became aware of the sound of a car horn going off at intervals like an alarm, probably triggered when the car was disabled in the crash.

My heart stuttered in my chest when I caught sight of more luminous balls of light in the fog—headlights—heading our way. Deliberately, I let out the breath I was holding. We had no more air bags to deploy. We were crushed between two cars. It was a foregone conclusion that when this car came our way, if it saw us and was unable to stop, it would crush us further. It was inevitable. And my brother was on the side that would take the worst of it.

“Fuck, Danilo. More cars.”

He sighed. “I see them.”

“It"s…torture, isn"t it?” I said. “The waiting.”

“Yes.”

“I love you.” I told him. “I wish—”

“Me too, man. I love you too. You"ll be fine, Jakey. No matter what, you know?”

“No,
Dan
—”

“I took care of some things with my lawyer a while ago when Bree and I first hit the skids…”

138

Z. A. Maxfield

No
. “Don"t talk like this is it.”

“I don"t have time to be delicate. Buy your bakery,” he told me. “Get a house and find your man. Live happily ever after. Promise.”

“Dani—”

“Promise me.”

I didn"t answer. Those fucking lights were coming, but they were crawling, so slowly. Hanging in the mist like fucking ghosts were walking toward us holding lanterns. It was enough to drive me out of my mind. My heart rocketed inside my chest, and I wanted to scream,
Just do it already, just fucking do it
, so it could all just be over.

But then I heard it. The grumbling purr of a fire engine. Hope ignited within me like someone had lit a match.

“Danilo, I think it"s emergency services,” I said, but when I looked, his mouth was slack, and his skin clammy. “
Dani
!”

I put my hand on his neck and found his pulse weak. “Jeez.” I turned to the window when I heard someone approaching. I could hear police radios, and there was the sound of men"s voices. Orders and replies. “Hey,” I called out to them. “Hey, can I get some help? Can you help me?”

If being the world"s most egregious
nudje
would get me some action, then that is precisely what I planned to do. I banged on the window so there was no doubt where I could be found. “Help me, please! My brother is pinned, and we can"t leave the vehicle. He"s going into shock!”

I heard the heavy clomping approach of metal-reinforced bunker boots, and when I turned toward the sound, Cam"s face dropped into view just outside my door, where my tissue lady had been standing what seemed like hours before.

“Yasha.” He frowned and pulled the door open. He knelt in front of me, using his gloved hands to smooth down my shoulders to my arms, very much like you would soothe an anxious horse. Then he grinned. “You should have called first to see if I already had a date.” He turned and shouted instructions to someone, then pulled me forcefully from the car.

“I can"t leave. Dani"s hurt; his arm"s caught somehow. He said he"s stuck.”

“You"ll do as I say, or I"ll have Officer Andy shoot you.”

“I can"t—”

Cam gripped my shoulders gently—for him anyway—and I winced. “I promise you I"ll take care of your brother.” I was shaking my head, but he caught my chin. “I will. You"ll see, but later. Let me and the guys do our job, all right? Like you said about that other time, when you needed to just step aside.” I clenched my teeth because I thought they were beginning to chatter. “In Tel Aviv.”

“Sure.” Cam smiled at me. “Whatever. Right now I gotta do my job, Yasha, okay?”

St. Nacho’s 3: Jacob’s Ladder

139

“Yes, I"m sorry.” I shot a glance back into the car, at my brother, so still and pale, but breathing. I could see that, and I allowed myself to be led to the side of the road, where the EMTs were setting up a triage area. “Please take care of him, Cam.”

A look of tenderness came over Cam"s face as he glanced past me. “You bet, Yasha. Like he was mine. All right?”

I took one last look back at the Lexus. It was horribly crushed between a passenger sedan and a heavy-duty pickup truck. I could just make out the flashers on the fire engines. The EMTs had parked their truck on the side of the road and set up tarpaulins, which they seemed to be using to sort casualties.

“Jeez,” I whispered to no one in particular.

“Sir.” Gloved hands reached for me.

I turned to find JT"s warm green gaze on me. The look in his eyes went from indifferent concern to surprise to panic in a nanosecond. “
Yasha
?”

“I—”

“I thought you were in LA.” We both looked back toward the massive wreck on the highway. His fingers tightened on my wrists reflexively, I thought, jerking when he comprehended what, exactly I"d been through.

“My brother,” I whispered. I couldn"t tell if he heard me over the noise.

“Is he…?”

“Cam"s taking care of him. His arm is pinned.”

He took my arm and began to pull me toward one of the tarps. “I have to do triage, Yasha. I have to take care of people here according to their needs. There are ambulances on the way.”

“My brother is still out there.”

“Cam will get him out safely and bring him to me here.”

“He"s hurt.” I sat down where he told me to sit, next to a man with cuts on his face and my tissue lady. “His arm—it"s caught, and he can"t—”

“Trust me, Yasha. Let me do my job. Cam will bring him to me, and I"ll take good care of him, all right? Just like I"m taking care of you here, okay?” My throat closed over with emotion and shock. Between the first crash and the fear of the second, I"d given little thought to my own injuries, but the pain was becoming insistent in muscles tightened by terror before the point of impact and wrenched hard in the ensuing collision, especially across my chest, where I"d been restrained by my seat belt.

“How are you doing? Anything barking at you?” JT knelt next to me. He wrapped a cuff around my arm to check my blood pressure. I know I just stared at it as though I"d never seen one before. After that was finished he held my head with one gloved hand while he irritated me by shining that little light of his into my eyes.

I wanted him to understand.

140

Z. A. Maxfield

His busy hands kept moving, kept fluttering over my skin. I flinched when he pressed on my chest where the seat belt had been, and his hand faltered. I looked up to find him peering closely at me. I wondered if he realized just how much his very brusque—albeit necessary and properly impersonal—inventory of my person was hurting me.

“Dan is all I have.”

JT froze. Very deliberately—even solemnly—he leaned over and kissed me, in full view of everyone there. Even in the fog he attracted a lot of attention. I caught sight of a few surprised faces before I closed my eyes and gave in to the urgency of that kiss. He pulled me into his arms then, running a gentle hand up and down my back.

He broke off the kiss to speak softly, but his actions were unmistakable. “No, he"s not all you have. You have me, Yasha. I"m so sorry I haven"t had the balls to make that really clear to you. I swear, if you only have a little faith in me I"ll never let you forget it.”

JT brushed the hair off my forehead and pressed a gentle kiss on my skin.

Then apologetically, he left me to help the next person.

I watched him. I took in every move he made, every gesture of comfort, every disarming smile, every frown as he went from one casualty to the next, efficiently caring for the people on the tarpaulin with me. Every so often he glanced my way or shot me a cautious smile. I caught them like a lifeline, using them to anchor myself between one moment and the next, until finally, I saw Cam and two other firefighters bringing my brother toward us on a backboard.

After my brother was free, everything was a blur, and it wasn"t easy to keep up. Eventually I ended up in an EMS rig—not JT"s—with Dan, who needed to get to the hospital quickly. Once there, once I established myself as Dan"s brother, all that was left was the wait while they stabilized him and sent him to radiology for his arm, which was going to take most of the night. It seemed that no one in the pileup had died, but several patients trickled in with injuries, from simple lacerations to compound fractures and one possible heart attack brought on by stress.

Dan"s arm appeared to have been broken extensively. From what I could see, he was awake and already badgering the nurses for his cell phone so he"d have a way to research the best doctors for the job of fixing it. I realized he was running on adrenaline and fear, free of the worst of the pain because of very effective drugs, but not at all out of the woods. It was almost dawn when I called and left a message for BreeAnna on their house phone but I didn"t know whether she would come. I didn"t have her cell number; I had never thought I"d need it. I wished to hell I"d gotten it.

I must have dozed off for a long while, because when I woke up, according to the clock it was nearly noon.

“Hey, is this seat taken?”

St. Nacho’s 3: Jacob’s Ladder

141

I looked up and found Cam looming over me. He peered down into my face with concern in his fine blue eyes. “No, sit. Take a load off.” He still wore his turnout pants, but he had shucked his coat and helmet somewhere. “That was a mess, Yasha. Thirteen cars and two big rigs.”

“I must have been toward the end.”

“The California Highway Patrol will figure that out. I just had to clean it up and get it off the road.” He rolled those big shoulders, and yep, he was wearing red suspenders, but they were draped around his hips. Some lucky boy was going to give him a rubdown later, I hoped. He looked exhausted.

“What a mess.”

“How"s your brother?”

“The arm is broken. They took him to radiology right away. They"ll bring in a specialist if they need one. He phoned his family physician, a friend, who is making calls on his behalf.”

Cam nodded. “I honestly don"t know how he was still conscious when we got there.”

“He can be a pretty determined guy. I"ve never seen him so calm. The wrong Livingston definitely went into the Tzahal. He"d have made a great fighter pilot or something. Nerves of steel.”

Cam"s brows came together in the middle. “He"ll need them. That arm"s going to hurt like fuck for a long time.”

“That"s—”

“They"ll take care of him. I"m here to take care of you.” 142

Z. A. Maxfield

Chapter Twenty-two

“How long since you ate?” Cam asked.

I shook my head. “I had coffee when we turned off the I-5, I think.”

“JT asked me to come here and get you. Said you"d need to shower and rest and eat, but he wanted to talk to his dad for a bit…” I remembered his kiss. “I guess.”

“Look, I could take you to the SeaView, but my place has a hot tub. It would probably help you relax.”

Since I had checked out with no real injuries besides a tremendously sore body, it didn"t seem to be a bad idea.

Cam looked me over when I got slowly to my feet, still carrying the laptop case he had taken from Daniel"s car before it had been towed off the freeway. He took it and put an arm around me. “Gotta hand it to the Lexus. It"s pretty safe. Your brother wouldn"t have even been hurt, but his arm got twisted between the seat and the door. That was kind of a freak thing.”

“I didn"t see it before you guys wrapped it. How bad was it?”

“It was a crush injury. He"ll need a good orthopedist and probably a lot of physical therapy. Is he right-handed?”

“Yeah,” I told him.

“Shit. He"s got his work cut out for him. What does he do?”

“He"s a concert pianist,” I said, deadpan. I could never have expected the response I got, not in a million years.

Cam"s face drained of blood, and his eyes flooded with tears. “Oh
fuck no
!”

“Whoa, Cam. Calm down, buddy. I"m sorry.
My bad
. I was kidding.” Cam scrubbed the heels of his hands over his eyes and took a deep breath.