Hell for Leather (Black Knights Inc. #6)(53)
He could hear them charging toward him, but he didn’t dare raise his head until he felt them draw near. Zoelner flew past him first, boots pounding, arms pumping. Ozzie was right on his heels, pistol locked and loaded, up and ready to fire. When Steady pulled even, Mac reached out and snagged his foot.
“La madre que te parió!” Steady bellowed in Spanish as he tripped, arms flailing, legs pinwheeling before his quick, operator reflexes kicked in and he righted himself.
“The dog.” Mac pointed to the animal, lying on its side no more than two feet away, its panting breaths fanning the dirt of the yard. “He may’ve just saved her life. Now you have to try to save his.”
Steady gulped as he looked down at the dog, his expression pitying. Then he nodded and knelt beside the animal.
Carefully, Mac pushed into a seated position, tucking his Glock into his waistband as he gathered Delilah in his lap. She was so still. So pale.
“Delilah.” He gently tapped a finger against her satiny cheek, taking comfort in its warmth. “Darlin’…you need to wake up, now.”
Nothing. Not one move. Not one whimper. His heart hammered hollowly against his ribs.
Letting his gaze slip down to her throat, he noted with intense satisfaction that her pulse was hammering there, and when his eyes slid farther down, to her chest, he wanted to crow with victory when he saw it rise on a shallow breath. Come on, darlin’. You can do it. Wake up.
“Hijo de puta,” Steady cursed, whipping off his shirt to press it to the wound in Fido’s chest. “I don’t know dick about canine physiology, Mac.”
“Just do your best,” he said, softly rocking the woman in his arms, murmuring to her as he continued to caress her dirty cheek.
And you know that soft, gooey center of his? Well, it was melting like a Hershey’s bar left out in the summer sun. Because not only was he witnessing what were probably the last moments of one very valiant dog—was that a goddamn tear in his eye?—but seeing Delilah like this…so limp, so quiet…was like watching a raging inferno sputter and die. All that fiery energy was just…gone.
He ran his hand over her head, trying to feel for bumps or for the warm wetness of blood. Had Mr. Timberlands hit her with something? With the hilt of his knife, perhaps? Was her brain even now swelling inside the confines of her skull, causing her to slip into a coma? But his searching fingers found nothing, nothing to account for the fact that she was still out cold. Dear God, I promise you that if you let her—
His prayer was cut off when her pale lids fluttered open, her green eyes dazed and disoriented. “M-Mac?” she whispered in confusion.
And, sweet Lord almighty, had he ever heard anything more wonderful than his name on her lips? If so, he couldn’t remember. “Yeah, darlin’. I’m here.”
When her gaze finally focused on his face, she slowly reached up to touch the dimple in his chin, the pad of her finger cool against his skin. She smiled bemusedly before her lips curved down in a frown. “Th-the man from Uncle Theo’s house…he’s here. H-he s-strangled me, and—” Strangled? The sonofabitch had probably cut off the blood supply in her carotid artery. It was a dangerous maneuver. Done incorrectly, it could end in death. The hairs on Mac’s arm lifted at the thought. “I think he—”
“Shh,” he soothed, brushing a lock of auburn hair from her forehead—noting how soft and silky it was. “I know.”
She swallowed, blinking in consternation. Then her expression changed, becoming alarmed. “Wh—” was all he managed before she sat up so fast the top of her head clocked him under the chin. His jaws slammed together and it was a wonder his back molars didn’t crack. “Ow! Sonofa—”
“Fido!” she screamed, scrambling from his lap in such an all-fired hurry that her hip smashed his nuts into the ground.
“Oomph!” He cupped himself and barely managed to keep from crumpling sideways. The pain shot up from his testicles to radiate out to all parts of his body. He broke out in an instant sweat, his stomach doing flips like it was auditioning for a trapeze act in the circus that used to roll through town when he was a boy. And he really feared he was two seconds away from hurling chunks…
Of course, he felt like a complete wuss when Delilah—barely having regained consciousness—scrambled over to Steady and Fido, holding a hand to her obviously spinning head, and asking, “Wh-what do I do? How do I help?”
Damn, she sure is something, he thought, only slightly distracted by the agony in his balls when his chest swelled with…what was that exactly? Pride, maybe? And, yessir, since he was in the admitting mood today, he’d go ahead and admit that he was good and goddamned proud to know her. This strong, independent woman. This paragon of wonderful, exasperating, disturbing bullheadedness. And sometimes, like now, he wished things could be different. He wished he didn’t know what he knew because, damn, he was sure tempted to take her for a ride. To let their relationship just play out until its inevitable, disastrous end. But, unfortunately, he did know how things would turn out. And that meant he also knew that the short-term pleasure wasn’t worth the long-term pain.
“Hold this!” Steady instructed, and Mac watched him press her hand to the T-shirt wadded against Fido’s chest. “I have to run and get my medical bag.”
Mac managed to cowboy-up and drag himself over to Delilah and the dog a second or two after Steady beat feet toward the house. Letting go of his throbbing nads, he helped her apply pressure to the wound and used his other hand to softly stroke Fido’s big, block head.