Saving Sara (Alaska Blizzard Book 5) Page 3

  “What if I get Taz for you?”

  She shook her head. “I’m really scared. I’ve never been in an earthquake before.” Tears squeezed out of her eyes.

  “Hey, come on, don’t.” He scooched himself down so he was sitting close to her, using the edge of his T-shirt to wipe her tears. “I’m right here and not going anywhere until I figure this out.”

  “Woof!”

  “Come here, buddy.” He held out his hand to Taz, who came over and started licking Sara’s face.

  “There’s my good boy.” She used one hand to gently pet him.

  “Let me see if I can get cell service,” Aaron said, pulling out his phone.

  Still nothing.

  “Okay, I guess it’s up to me and Taz to get you out of here.”

  “O-okay.”

  He got to his feet and looked around. “I have to get some stuff out of the Jeep. I’ll be right back.” He jogged out to the front room where Merlin immediately flew to him, landing on his arm.

  “Hey, big guy. I have stuff to do. What’s up?”

  “Are you a pretty girl?”

  Aaron rolled his eyes. “I sure am. Now you stay—” He tried to put the big bird down but it clamped down on his arm with its claws, holding on tightly.

  “Dude, if we go outside are you going to fly away?”

  “Go fuck yourself.”

  “Fine.” Aaron didn’t have time for this and walked outside, hoping Merlin would stay put. He unlocked his Jeep and opened the back hatch, digging out gloves and a blanket using just one hand since Merlin was on the other. He had a road flare somewhere and he was going to put it out in the street just in front of the clinic, which might entice a passerby to stop and help. He didn’t know what else to do, short of driving all the way to either Sergei’s or Kane’s house.

  He set up the flare and then went back inside, Merlin still firmly perched on his forearm.

  “Will you sit here on the chair and wait for me?” he asked the bird, who merely fluffed his feathers and cocked his head as Aaron gently settled Merlin on the chair.

  “I’m talking to a fucking bird,” he said under his breath as he went back to Sara. She was dozing again and that seemed like a bad idea so he made some noise as he pulled on the work gloves and put the blanket under her head like a pillow, hoping the gloves would give him some leverage with the cabinet and the pillow would make her a tiny bit more comfortable when he woke her up.

  “Go fuck yourself! Go fuck yourself!” Merlin started to scream and Aaron paused, looking around.

  “Hello? Is anyone in here?” This voice wasn’t Merlin’s.

  “In here!” Aaron yelled. “Someone is trapped and I could use another pair of hands.”

  3

  A couple of teenage boys came in looking overwhelmed and a little freaked out. Merlin was cursing a blue streak now and it would have been funny had the situation at hand not been so serious.

  “He’s calling out a warning to his flock,” Sara whispered. “Which is me and the animals, to let us know strangers, which means danger, are here.”

  He smiled down at her. “He’s a good watch-bird.”

  “He is.”

  With the help of the two teenagers, they got the cabinet up, but Sara was in bad shape. There was a lot of blood and when Aaron tried to move her, she shrieked from the pain.

  “I think one of your legs is broken,” he whispered. “I can’t leave you here—this building isn’t safe.”

  “Okay.” Her eyes met his. “Do what you have to do.”

  “I’m sorry, hon.” He lifted her as gently as he could, wincing as she struggled not to cry out. “I’m going to put you in the back seat of my Jeep, okay? Then we’re going to the hospital.”

  “The animals…”

  “I’ll do what I can.” He had no idea what he was going to do with an entire veterinary clinic full of animals. He knew from hearing her talk about her job that the veterinarian she worked for kept a handful of them as pets, boarded them for people when they went out of town, and of course, some were there because they were sick or having a procedure done.

  “Merlin is new,” she whispered. “His owner just died and there’s no one to take him. He’s a little aggressive…” Her voice faded as Aaron slid her into the back seat. “I’m getting blood on your seats.”

  “Don’t worry about that. Do you want me to grab Taz and bring him with us?”

  She nodded. “And Merlin.”

  “Hon, I can’t take a big-ass bird like that with us to the hospital.”

  “He needs to be looked after.”

  Their eyes locked. “Sara, I don’t know what’s going on around the city. Cell towers are down, there’s no way to reach anyone… I feel bad for the animals, but I have to worry about you first and get you to a hospital.”

  “There’s a cage for Merlin. He doesn’t like it, but you need to put him in or he might fly away and get lost.”

  Jesus. She drove him crazy with this stuff, but it was important to her and he genuinely felt bad for all the poor animals. “All right.” He jogged back inside and Merlin flew to him, landing on his arm. “Hey, big guy. You want to go to your cage?”

  “Go fuck yourself.”

  “Yeah, I know.” He spotted the monster-sized cage and walked toward it. Merlin immediately flew off in the other direction.

  Fuck.

  He didn’t have time for this.

  “Hey, would you guys see if you can put the cages right-side-up and lock the place up when you’re done? The front door is busted, but maybe rig something so the animals don’t get out? And I’ll come back after I take Sara to the hospital.” He looked at them, waiting, wondering if they would step up or just go on their way.

  “Sure thing, mister.”

  They started rooting around for materials and Aaron gave Merlin a dirty look. “You’re getting me in trouble with Sara, you know?”

  “Tweet, tweet, motherfucker.”

  Aaron raised his eyebrows. He and Merlin were going to need to work a little harder at communicating in the future. Assuming they ever saw each other again.

  “I’ll be back, big guy,” he said, whistling for Taz, who came running. He jumped right into the front seat of the Jeep, and Aaron got behind the wheel.

  “Did you lock up Merlin?” Sara asked, her voice shaky.

  “His exact response, and I quote, was, ‘Tweet, tweet, motherfucker.’”

  She snorted. “You have to come back after you drop me off, okay? Please?”

  “One thing at a time.”

  He drove to the hospital and was surprised to see no other cars or ambulances at the emergency room entrance. He parked the Jeep and ran inside, where he found a totally different situation. There were people everywhere, doctors and nurses running frantically.

  “I need help,” he said. “My friend was trapped under a heavy cabinet and I think her legs are broken.”

  “Coming.” A male nurse grabbed a wheelchair and headed for the exit.

  Aaron ran behind him, opening one of the back doors of his Jeep and catching Taz as he jumped out. “Sit,” he ordered the dog in a firm voice. Taz immediately dropped to his haunches, cocking his head curiously.

  With the nurse’s help, they got Sara in the wheelchair. Aaron put Taz back in the Jeep, cracking the windows and ordering him to stay before he ran after Sara and the nurse. No one asked about insurance cards or paperwork, merely wheeling her back and putting her on a gurney because there was no doubt she would need X-rays.

  Another nurse came in and started checking her vital signs, asking her questions about what happened, but Sara was barely conscious, dropping off to sleep and then jerking awake.

  “She may have a concussion,” the nurse said. “We’re going to get an IV going with some fluids and something mild for the pain until one of the doctors can see her, but we’ve got a lot of serious injuries today. It could be a while.”

  “If you can make her comfortable,” Aaron said, “I’d app
reciate it.”

  “Of course.” The nurse patted Sara’s shoulder and bustled out of the room.

  “Thank you for rescuing me,” Sara whispered. “But you don’t have to stay.”

  Ah, shit. They were back to the distance between them again. And it was all his fault. He still felt like an ass for the way he’d treated her after they’d had sex, but he didn’t know how to fix it and this didn’t seem like a good time to bring it up.

  “Hey, knock it off. I know things have been weird between us since last spring, but that has nothing to do with our friendship and whether or not I care about you.”

  “You don’t have to say shit you don’t mean because I got hurt,” she responded.

  “Look, we need to talk about…everything,” he said slowly. “But this isn’t the time. Close your eyes and rest, okay? I need to take Taz home to Jake and let Sergei and Dani know you’re in the hospital.”

  “And go get Merlin,” she whispered. “Please. He’s been really neurotic since his owner died and I was just making some headway with him. He liked you, I could tell. Or he wouldn’t have gone near you.”

  Shit. Just what he needed. A fucking macaw. “Sara, I don’t know the first thing about birds.”

  “Just for a day or so until I’m out of here, and then I’ll take over.”

  He wanted to protest, tell her that was ridiculous, that she probably had serious injuries that would keep her in the hospital for at least a few days, but he didn’t want to scare her. “I’ll see what I can do.” He leaned over and kissed her forehead. “I’m going to go get Taz settled and let everyone know you’re okay and then I’ll be back.”

  “Can you get my purse too? I’ll need some kind of ID for them to admit me.”

  He nodded. “Do you know where it was?”

  “Under the front desk.”

  “Okay. Take it easy. I’ll be back.” He walked out to the front desk and explained the situation about Sara not having any ID to the woman sitting there.

  “Just write down her name and phone number,” the woman said, “and we’ll take care of everything. A lot of people without ID have been coming in today. Some of the older buildings crumpled like accordions with this damn earthquake.” She shook her head. “Don’t worry about your girlfriend, we’ll take good care of her until you get back.”

  He opened his mouth to protest that she wasn’t his girlfriend, but merely nodded instead. “Thank you.”

  He went to his Jeep and got in, scratching Taz’s ears for a second before pulling onto the street. The house Sergei and Dani lived in had once been his. When his ex-wife had accused him of having an affair with his publicist and then had further lost her mind by trying to kill his publicist, he’d just wanted to cut all ties with her. He’d sold Sergei the house for almost exactly what they owed on it, leaving no profit for either of them. He made plenty of money playing hockey, though, and with his ex in prison, he’d just wanted to move on. Of course, that had led him to the next romantic disaster of his life, another situation he’d been trying to move on from.

  He didn’t want to think about any of that now. He needed to make sure Sara was okay, which meant taking care of those damn animals at the clinic. He’d often thought she was there alone too much, but it hadn’t been his place to say so. She loved working there and since she hadn’t gotten into veterinary school when she’d applied, she hoped a job like this would make a difference next time she tried. It was a lot of work, though, and he worried about the hours she kept.

  She was up early to get Niko off to school and then she would open the clinic four days a week. She’d pick up Niko from school whenever Dani and Sergei were traveling, feed him and get him ready for bed, and then do it all again. She spent almost every Sunday at the clinic by herself, feeding the animals they boarded and checking on those that were sick or healing from some kind of procedure. If Sergei and Dani were traveling, she’d bring Niko with her and they’d spend most of the day there.

  Aaron loved animals as much as the next guy, but it seemed that Sara didn’t do anything else these days, and it worried him. They weren’t talking much recently so it was hard to say or do anything. She’d been heartbroken when her application to veterinary school hadn’t been accepted last year, but after the initial disappointment, she’d acted like it hadn’t meant anything to her. Which told him just the opposite.

  He pulled up to his old house and winced. There was obviously some damage and he hoped it wasn’t as bad as it looked from here. Taz jumped out of the Jeep and raced up the sidewalk toward the front door, barking energetically.

  “Easy, boy. They probably can’t hear you from—”

  “Taz!” Dani opened the door and squatted down to greet the dog, rubbing his ears. “Hey!” she called to Aaron. “Did you find Sara?”

  He grimaced. “Yeah, I took her to the hospital. They were getting ready to do X-rays and stuff. She was pretty banged up.”

  Dani looked up with concern. “Oh, no. I wish there was something we could do, but we’ve got a mess on our hands here. Sergei’s dealing with a broken pipe, and he thinks he smells gas. I was just packing some of our stuff to go over to Kane and Hailey’s. Their house is okay but we have a lot of damage.”

  “Does he need help?”

  Dani nodded. “Maybe a little? Just to stop the water and make sure the gas isn’t leaking... What are you doing with Taz?”

  “Going to take him to Jake’s after I leave here, but I wanted to check on you guys.”

  “I appreciate it.”

  Aaron went into the house in search of Sergei and found him under the kitchen sink trying to stop the water pouring from somewhere.

  “Jesus.” He grabbed the flashlight Dani brought him and shone it where Sergei was working. When that didn’t work, he ran outside to turn off the main valve, effectively cutting off water to the whole house.

  “Shit.” Sergei was soaked and pissed. “This is a fucking mess.”

  “Do you smell that?” Aaron looked around. “There’s definitely a gas leak.”

  “Fuck.” Sergei threw up his hands. “I’m not sure how to turn off the gas. I never had a house powered by natural gas before.”

  “It’s over here.” Aaron led the way and they worked together to turn it off. “You’ll need to call the gas company because this could be dangerous.”

  “Yeah.” Sergei wiped his brow. “I’m going to dry off and change clothes and then we’re going over to Kane and Hailey’s. We can’t stay in the house like this.”

  “You go dry off and I’ll help Dani try to sop up the water in the kitchen.”

  They got most of the kitchen floor dry and Dani filled a bag with some perishables from the refrigerator.

  “Hey, Sergei?” Aaron called out quietly.

  “Yeah?” Sergei had just come back down the stairs.

  “Did you see this?” They looked down to see a solid crack in the foundation of the floor.

  “Sonofabitch.”

  4

  Sara dozed on and off after the X-rays were taken. The hospital was busy, and the nurses told her the doctors were swamped with patients who’d been more seriously injured than she was. She understood, but it was hard not knowing what was going on. She was still in considerable pain, even with whatever they’d given her, and now it was starting to wear off.

  “Ms. Chandler?” A harried-looking doctor came in, glasses perched on the edge of his nose.

  “Yes. Hello.” She looked up wearily. “How bad is it?”

  He smiled. “It could be much, much worse. Your leg is broken but—”

  “That doesn’t sound good.”

  “Well, no, it’s not great, but it’s not the end of the world. You’re going to need surgery to make sure everything heals properly, but the prognosis is excellent.”

  “Okay. What about the other leg?”

  “Nothing serious. You’ll need a few stitches for that gash in your shin, but you were fortunate not to break anything else.”

 
She groaned. “This is going to take a long time to heal, isn’t it?”

  “I’ve called for an orthopedic surgeon to come in and talk to you, because this isn’t my specialty, but I promise everything is going to be okay. We’re going to admit you because surgery probably won’t happen until tomorrow. I’ll make sure you get enough pain medication to be comfortable and by this time tomorrow, you’ll be feeling a lot better.”

  “Thank you.” She didn’t know what else to say so she closed her eyes as the doctor exited her room. This was a nightmare. How the hell was she going to manage with a broken leg? She had two jobs and both of them required her to walk and drive. How could she take care of Niko in this condition, much less work at the animal clinic? Just thinking about the situation made her want to cry, and she closed her eyes tightly to hopefully stave off the tears.

  “Hey.” Dani came running into the room, her long blond hair in a ponytail flying behind her. “There you are. Sheesh, no one knows anything out there.”

  “Hey.” Sara looked up. “What happened at the house?”

  “It’s a disaster. We have all kinds of damage—I don’t even know if you can fix a damaged foundation, but we’re not going to worry about that today. Kane and Sergei are grilling steaks and making dinner so we’ll just have to wait until we can get some kind of building inspector to check out the damage.” Dani told her as much as she knew.

  “I’m keeping you from your family,” Sara said. “You should be with them.”

  “Oh, shut up.” Dani laughed. “I’m with them almost twenty-four seven. And you’re my family too.”

  Sara was grateful for her friend’s support, but also frustrated. “Doc says I’ll probably need surgery.”

  “It’ll be okay,” Dani responded gently.

  “How am I going to take care of Niko with a broken leg?”

  “You’re not. We’re going to take care of you.”

  “You can’t. You work and travel with the team.”

  “I don’t have to. I can skip the first few trips, and the season hasn’t even started yet. Niko will be at school all day, and Sergei and I can work around whatever you need during training camp. His job is more important than mine so—”