Blood Vow (Black Dagger Legacy #2)(28)

“One more. I promise you, just one more.” She brushed back the bangs and kissed Bitty’s forehead. “Hold my hand. Come on. Squeeze as hard as you have to.”

“I can’t do it … please, Mommy … help me.…”

Sobs racked the little girl’s body, making the hospital gown seem as if it were caught in a breeze, and Mary began to cry, too, the tears rolling down her cheeks and dropping onto the thin mattress of the table.

Sniffling, praying for strength, utterly lost, Mary made a mental note that the next time someone looked at her and told her that she had all the answers, she was going to kick them in the ass.

“Havers, can you give us …”

As she looked up, she found the physician and his two female nurses standing back. And the look he gave her was so full of compassion, it was nearly impossible to reconcile it with what she knew he had done to his sister Marissa.

But no one had ever faulted him in his profession.

“Let’s just breathe,” Mary said to Bitty. “Come on … breathe with me.…”

The MRIs had shown that the girl was at risk of catastrophic deformity when she went through her transition. For vampires, their growth pattern to maturity was compressed into the singular explosion that occurred during their change. It was as if, in the human parallel, a fourteen-year-old became twenty-five physically in a matter of six hours.

In Bitty’s case, there were a series of subtle, and not so subtle, curves in her long bones because of the previous fractures. And Mary had noticed them, but hadn’t really dwelled on the reasons for them or their implications. The issue was that when that explosive growth happened, those deformities were liable to separate completely, snapping because the force of the expansion would be off-angle.

The end result? Amputation. Of all or most of her limbs. Because for about six months after transition, the bones in vampires were not capable of fusing breaks.

The decision had been made to fix them now.

And Bitty had made the choice. She didn’t want to come back in a month or a year or two years or five years to get it done. Nothing was going to change and there was no reason to have the prospect hanging over her head.

But this was just too much.

“I can’t, I can’t … I can’t do this.…”

Mary couldn’t agree more. She couldn’t do this anymore, either. Too much. Tapped out. Over the threshold.

Yes, there was a larger goal here, but they’d done enough. Hadn’t they?

“Can R-r-r-r-rhage come in?” Bitty stammered.

“Absolutely. Do you want the others?”

Anything to have this work.

“No, because I’m crying.” Bitty sniffled. “I’m not brave.…”

“Oh, yes, you are.” Mary blinked back more tears. “Sweetheart, you are the bravest person I know.”

There was a tradition in vampire culture whereby the males of the species were not a part of medical interventions for females—and there were times when Bitty’s modesty had been compromised out of necessity. Now, though? All bets were off.

Mary wasn’t even going to ask Havers for permission. They needed something else to help the girl finish this.

“I’ll get him,” Doc Jane volunteered.

Rhage came in and Mary couldn’t help it. The second she met his eyes, she choked up so badly, she couldn’t breathe. And typical of a bonded male, he went to her first, hugging her tight, whispering something in her ear the words of which did not register, the strong, steady tone of which meant everything.

And then he was all about the little girl, his face losing color as he looked down at Bitty, his hands shaking as he reached out and pulled her into a hug.

A lot of medical people rushed forward, and Mary tugged him back. “Her arms and leg need casts still. Be careful.”

Rhage laid the girl back down as if she were made of glass.

“I’m not brave,” Bitty moaned up at him.

“Yes, you are,” he said, brushing her hair back. “You’re so brave and I’m so proud of you and I love you very much.”

They talked for a spell, and then there was a pause.

As if sensing the time was now, Havers said gently, “Just one last one. And then you’re all finished.”

Rhage’s brows sank down low, and Mary knew without asking that her hellren’s fangs had descended and the protective part of him was considering ripping the doctor’s throat out. But that was instinct, not logic.

She stroked Rhage’s arm. “Shh, it’s okay. One more and this is over.”

“One more …” He rubbed his face. “We can do this.”

Rhage nodded at Havers, who was looking apprehensive. And then the medical staff stepped up to the table again.

Bitty’s pelvis was strapped down again and her opposite leg was likewise immobilized. What Havers had to do was grip the thigh and apply pressure until there was a snap. And then he had to pull at the knee until he visualized correct alignment through the skin—something that was relatively clear given how painfully thin and under-muscularized the girl was. An X-ray would be taken to ensure that all was as it needed to be and then the casts would be put on so that the bone regenerated and reconnected itself correctly.

The break and alignment was so primitive, so brutal, that in the midst of all the high-tech machinery and state-of-the-art everything it seemed below the modern standard of care. But there was an undeniable mechanical side to the body, and this was nuts-and-bolts stuff—and again, Mary had to give Marissa’s brother credit. He’d done this a number of times for his patients before, and he’d been quick, decisive, and gotten it right with each of Bitty’s limbs.