Scrape turned around from the passenger seat. “We can’t go sting in there, we don’t know how many they have or whether they are humans or werewolves. We need to stop a block away or so.”


    I nodded. “Good idea, I’ll drop half of you off before getting there, then drive by the front and park on the other side. I’ll cover the front with the truck. Snake, Scrape and Dagger work your way to the back. Crash, Trigger, you guys take the emergency exit, here’s the key.” I tossed him my master for the building. Keep the guny down outside, and no cuts,” I said. “Yell ‘DOG’ when you’re going in. Anyone who isn’t club, you take them down.”


    We worked out a few more details, but the n was sound. Five minutester I pulled to the curb and Scrape, Snake and Dagger jumped out, holding their pistols low and against their bodies. I drove past, noting the back gate to the driveway was open. “Fuck, they got in back,” I said. I dropped Crash and Trigger off, then turned around and parked across the street. I could see the two at the side door; I got out, my shotgun against my leg as I crossed the quiet street. I made it almost to the front doors, still closed and chained, when I heard “DOG.”


    I ran around the side through the gate to the back when I didn’t hear any gunfire. Scrape was kneeling by Doc, who wasying in a pool of blood in the hallway. He checked his neck for a pulse, and shook his head. “SHE’S STILL ALIVE,” shouted Crash from inside the surgery room. I went through the door, squeezing through the opening, and my heart sank as Trigger shook his head no.


    Vivian’s POV


    “I can’t help him with handcuffs on,” I said to Bruce as we were pulling on to the freeway. “His lungs are filling with blood. The bullets had silver in them, he won’t heal if I don’t get them out. He’s already having trouble breathing.”


    The leader, this Todd guy, was busy driving and didn’t even look back. “Bruce, move her cuffs to her ankles. If she tries anything, shoot out her kneecaps. Don’t fucking test me, Doc.”


    “I’m a doctor, asshole. This is what I’m meant to do, even if it means saving the life of someone I should want dead.” He uncuffed me, then put them around my ankles. I was still able to move around, and I opened my kit. “Cut his shirt off, pants too. Roll up the shirt and use it to apply pressure to his hip wound while I work on his chest.” He immediatelyplied; one thing about wolves, they followed the directions of someone in authority, and in medical cases, I was the authority.


    Travis started to scream as he pressed down on the wound. “Take the pain, man. We’ll get you fixed up.”


    I drew a sedative, making sure it was enough to knock him out. One at a time, I thought. I injected it into Travis’s neck, and he was out in moments. “I don’t need him moving around while I’m inside him,” I exined calmly. I put a heamp on and gloves, thenid out a scalpel, mp and retractor on a sterile towel I put next to him. Quickly making my incision, I started working my way down the channel created by the bullet. It had prated a rib, shattered his scap, then fragments had punctured his lungs.


    “I’m gonna be sick,” Bruce said.


    “Turn around then, but keep the pressure on that wound,” I told him. He did, which made my job even easier. I continued to work, keeping up a running narrative of what I was doing. When they stopped paying attention to me, I noticed we were in bumper to bumper traffic. Perfect.


    I reached in and removed the emergency sedative autoinjectors. They were werewolf strength, designed to knock out a feral wolf in seconds. I waited until Todd was moving again, then I turned and grabbed Bruce from behind. My right hand sped over his mouth as my left hand injected the dose into his carotid artery. He went limp almost immediately, and Iid him down quietly, his body over Travis’s legs.Text ? by N0ve/lDrama.Org.


    I couldn’t risk taking the handcuffs off, so this would be fun. Taking the second autoinjector, I pretended to work on Travis again, keeping up the narrative, until he had stopped in the traffic. I lept forward, plunging the needle into his neck.


    He tried to shove me off, but the passenger seat didn’t let him. I put the vehicle in park, then popped his seatbelt. He was starting to slump down. I grabbed him under the shoulder, pulling him backwards between the seats until he wasying next to Travis. I moved over to Bruce, finding the key and unlocking my cuffs.


    I was in the seat and buckled up again before the traffic started moving.


    Viper’s POV


    Vivian was gone. Snake ran up, panicked, confirming my fears.


    I walked back into the hallway, looking down at Doc’s body in the hallway. His shoulder had been torn up, he had bite marks and chunks out of his arms. His rifle was by his broken right arm. “What do we do? We can’t exin this kind of death.”


    “Snake, go get the truck and pull it in back.” I tossed him the keys and he ran out. “Crash, Trigger, carry Kelly out back, set her on the grass by the dumpster. Leave Doc where he is, try not to step in the blood.” They carried her out, she looked bad.


    I went back in to the surgery room, taking the hose off the oxygen regtor and opening the valve fully. As the big bottle depressurized, I lifted the cover of the incubator and wrapped baby Jennifer in a nket. She wasn’t breathing, she was blue, and I was crying as I wrapped her so her body couldn’t be seen.


    I walked out with her as Snake pulled in. I handed him the baby, then opened the back and pulled out the fuel can from the back. I ran back inside, spreading the fuel over the couches in front, trailing it back over Doc before tossing it into the surgery room. I got to just outside the back door and took a matchbook out of my pocket. Striking a match then setting the whole book aze, I tossed it into the gasoline trail.


    The oxygen-rich air caused the mes to burn much hotter than normal. “Crash, you were out getting lunch when you saw the back door open, Kelly was in the hallway, you pulled her out just before the mes came. Trigger, go somewhere and dial 911. Scrape, with me, let’s get the fuck out of here.”


    We pulled out, I could see the mes starting to push through the windows in front. We drove back to the clubhouse, knowing Crash would stay with Kelly, and Trigger would be stuck talking to the cops.


    Snake wasn’t talking, he was just holding the bundle to his chest, rocking back and forth as his sobs racked his body.


    We all felt like shit. A brother didn’t deserve to get burned like that, it wasn’t right, but it had to be done. It was the only way to protect DeWalt’s secret.


    A secret that ced our whole club at risk, and a secret that had gotten her wolfnapped.


    Crash’s POV


    I was holding Kelly in myp as we sat on the grass by the dumpster behind the old animal hospital. I had my shirt over the hole in her upper right chest, and a towel over the hole in her right shoulder. Viper and the others had taken off, and Trigger was out calling for an ambnce. “Hang on, Kelly, help ising,” I said as I rocked her gently.


    She was pale and coughing blood. Her breathing was strained, so I put her down on her good side, still holding the pressure on her wounds. She coughed hard, blood spraying the grass. “Come on, Kelly, keep fighting,” I said. “The kids need you. The Club needs you.” I prayed for the first time in years that she would be all right, that the help would get here in time.


    I could feel the heat from the building now, mes were starting to burn through the boarded-up windows and smoke was pouring out. I looked at the building, then where I was; if I waited much longer, the ambnce may not be able to get back to me. “Shit,” I said to myself. “Wrong ce to wait for the bus!”


    I shifted, picking her up so I could make the run for it. I could hear sirens in the distance, but I couldn’t wait. I kept close to the fence, ignoring the heat as I ran through the open gate and along the driveway that went along the side of the building. I could hear and feel the fire building, it was roaring now, consuming everything. I had just made it to the road when I heard an explosion; dropping to my knees, I used my body to protect her as the heat wave rolled over us.


    Trigger ran up just in time. “Take her,” I said. He picked her up and I ran alongside, holding pressure on her wounds again. We got about a block away and set her on the grass between the sidewalk and the curb, making sure no cars blocked us from view. He set her down, me directing her to her side again, and Trigger ran into the road to g down the help.


    The first to arrive was a police officer; he parked to block iing traffic, then grabbed his first aid kit. “What happened,” he said as he ran up.


    “Shot twice,” I said. “We pulled her out of the building before it went up.”


    He tore open some bandages and ced them over the cloths we were using, then used a roll bandage to hold them in ce. “Don’t you take off the shirt first?”


    “Nope, leave it on or you break up any clotting and the bleeding restarts,” he said. He called in the situation on his radio. More police were arriving, then an ambnce parked by us and the paramedics took over. “Who is she?”


    “Our buddy’s wife. He’s still in there.” He went to call that in, I stopped him. “He’s dead. The bastards killed him.”


    “Who?”


    Trigger stepped in front of me. “Don’t know, I saw them running out the back as we were walking back from the minimart. They had pillowcases filled with stuff in their hands. Probably hit the drug cab.”


    “We went in the back,” I said, “but the mes were already hot. I checked Doc, he was dead, he found Kelly in the surgery room. We barely got her out before the mes made it to the hallway. We couldn’t go back in to get him.” The EMT’s had just finished loading Kelly up. “I have to go with her,” I said.


    “Go,” Trigger said, “I’ll stay with them.” I followed them to the ambnce, they loaded her in and I jumped in after him. I watched and listened during the ten-minute drive to the hospital emergency room; I didn’t understand much, but I could tell they were worried. She had an oxygen mask on, an IV, and the monitor with her blood pressure was rming every minute or so.


    When we pulled up, they had me wait until they were out. The nurses wheeled her in, and I was left in the waiting room. I got shunted to admissions, I couldn’t help much there. The only person she wanted was burned in the fire.