Doc Featherstone's Return (7 page)

“Scarlett, you don’t want to do this. We’re friends, remember?” Ash tried, even though he knew it wouldn’t work.

She let out a hiss and he could hear her sliding
out of bed. “I don’t have any friends. All I had was Blue, and they killed her.”

“They had to. She was trying to kill you.”

“She would have never done that to me, she loved me.”

Yeah, it was official. Scarlett had taken a dive off the deep end, and she wasn’t coming back up for air. The scary part was she was planning on dragging Ash down with her.

Ash turned around and let out a little yelp of shock when he saw that she was only feet from him. Worse yet, she had a wicked-looking dagger in her hand.
Now who in the hell was stupid enough
to give her that? Wasn’t it rule number one when
dealing with unstable people not to give them anything
pointy?

Just as Ash was about to give up all hope, he heard the sound of footsteps coming. Turning, he saw Kallen walking into the room, but he was looking down at a chart, so he didn’t notice the confrontation until he was almost smack dab in the middle of it.

The Hyena looked up, his eyes wide with shock and perhaps a healthy dose of fear. “What are you doing out of bed, Scarlett, and why do you have a weapon?”

Scarlett’s response was to swing the weapon in an arch. Kallen jumped back, but not in time to stop being caught. Blood sprayed everywhere,
some of it hitting Ash in the face.

Ash expected Kallen to fall to the ground.

Instead, he staggered back and put himself in a protective position between Ash and Scarlett.

Holding a hand over his stomach, which was now covered in blood, Kallen said, “You’ll have to go through me to get to him.”

Drake, a large Tiger shifter who had both legs injured in the last battle, let out a roar of protest and lunged forward to help only to fall to the ground when his legs gave out under him. Other patients began to yell for help and throw things at Scarlett, which she easily batted away. She took one more step forward and slashed Kallen again with her blade. This time, he fell to the ground and didn’t get back up.

“Now, there’s nobody to protect you,” she smiled wickedly down at Ash.

Left with no other choice, Ash tried to shift. To his shock and amazement, it worked. He managed to call forth his Hawk. It only lasted a few moments, but it allowed him to miss the killing stab that was coming his way.

He landed on his feet and even managed to walk a few steps before his legs gave way and sent him falling hard on his face. He then began to army crawl away as fast as he could. His goal was a code blue button that would call all the staff to the infirmary.
She was on him fast, her blade going into his leg. Ash let out a scream of agony before he managed a weak kick. She laughed at his futile attempts to defend himself. “You are so pathetic.

They should have culled you a long time ago.”

The doors to the infirmary burst open and Featherstone came running in, Shane, Ackley, and Tatum hot on his heels. The latter three had their guns out and at the ready.

It’s about damn time,
Ash thought, even as he continued to crawl away.

Remembering how he was able to walk a few steps before, he grabbed onto a nearby counter and pulled himself up. It hurt his stab wound like hell, but he didn’t care. All he wanted to do was put some distance between himself and the bitch.

Using the counter for support, he began to slowly shuffle toward the others. It was a slow, agonizing process, but Ash was determined, so he didn’t give up. Not even when his entire body began to tremble and sweat.

Featherstone met him halfway and caught Ash just as he was about to collapse. While Ash wanted to push him away, he was too weak, besides he had to get help for Kallen.

“Kallen, she stabbed him a couple of times.

He’s by my bed,” Ash rushed out.

“How did you get away?” Featherstone asked.

“I shifted. I was only able to hold it for a
second, but it was enough to get out of the bed.”

The doc let out a low curse. “We need to see what the shift did to the bullets inside you.”

“No, take care of Kallen first. He got hurt trying to protect me.”

Doc pushed a button on the wall that would summon all the hospital staff. It had been what Ash had been trying to crawl to before Scarlett had stabbed him.

“Scarlett, drop the blade,” Shane said as he, Ackley and Tatum surrounded her.

“Why? So you can lock me up? I don’t think so, Shane,” she replied with a crazed laugh.

“It doesn’t have to end like this, Scarlett. We can help you,” Shane soothed.

“Fuck you, Shane.”

With those final words, she took the blade and plunged it into her own chest. Ash watched in horror as she let out a small gurgling sound, then dropped to the ground, dead.

Shane rushed over to her, but Ash could already tell it was too late. As an assassin, Scarlett knew how to inflict a deadly blow, even if it were to herself.

Shane still checked her pulse before he looked up at Ackley and Tatum, “She’s dead.”

The assassins all went down on one knee and bowed their heads. Even though Scarlett had gone feral in the end, she was one of them, fought by
their side, had been their comrade. They would show her the proper respect.

Meanwhile, the other doctors and infirmary staff rushed in. They ran to Kallen and placed him gingerly on a cot, then rushed him to surgery.

Afterward, they came to take Ash to X-Ray to see how the shift had affected the bullet placement in his body.

On the way there, all the events came rushing back to Ash, and he began to panic. On instinct, he started to shift again, only to have the doc slap him across the face. “No more shifting until we know what’s going on inside of you.”

Ah, there was the doc that Ash used to know and love.

No, you don’t love him anymore, remember? You
hate him because he broke your heart. Don’t forget that.

Since there were a ton of people around, and Ash didn’t want to air their dirty undies for the world to see, he settled for giving Featherstone a filthy look. But at least the slap worked, because it calmed Ash down.

They wheeled him into the X-Ray room, and Ash held his breath while they did their thing. He was worried about what they would find. While he liked to think the news would be good since he had been able to stand and walk a few steps on his own, he knew one could ever be certain.

After what seemed like forever, Featherstone
came out with a huge smile on his face. “Good news. When you shifted, the bullets moved away from your spine. They’re going to be able to go in and take them out.”

“Wait, you’re not going to do the surgery?” Ash asked, surprised that a control freak like the doc would let anybody else run the show.

Featherstone frowned. “No, ever since I was wounded, my grip strength hasn’t been the same, so I can’t operate anymore.”

It was then that Ash realized that he’d never taken the time to ask the doc about his injuries.

Sure, he’d noticed that Featherstone walked with a limp, but Ash, selfish jerk that he was, hadn’t looked beyond himself to inquire about it.

“I’m sorry to hear about that,” Ash said sincerely. “I know how much you loved surgery.”

Featherstone shrugged. “It is what it is. You learned to adjust, so will I.” He patted Ash on the shoulder. “Get ready. As soon as they get Kallen out of the operating room, you’ll be going in.”

“Is he going to be okay?”

“Yes, he has some internal damage, but nothing that the surgery and a few shifts can’t fix.”

“What about me? Will I be able to walk again?”

Featherstone paused for a moment. “They’ll know more once they get in. We’re not for sure how much permanent damage was done to your spinal cord. While we do have better healing
abilities than humans, even we have our limitations.”

“Thank you.”

Featherstone cocked a brow. “For what?”

“Not trying to sugarcoat it for me. That’s what I always like best about you as a doctor. You’re always straightforward and tell the truth.”

No matter how much it hurts.

oshua never realized how hard it was to be on J the opposite side of the operating room door and in the family room until he was sitting there waiting to hear how Ash’s surgery had gone. With him were Isaac, Gregg and, oddly enough, Shane who seemed to have taken a liking to the Hawk.

Daniel, Dean, and Mitchell were there as well, as a show of leadership and support.

Finally, after what seemed like forever, Hana came out. She appeared tired, no doubt from doing back-to-back surgeries, but she had a smile on her face. “The news is good. No, it’s great.”

“You were able to take out the bullets?” Joshua asked.

“More than that, the damage to his spinal cord is going to be repairable now that they’re gone.

Given a little more time, he’ll be back to his old self,” she said.

Joshua felt as if a huge weight was lifted off his
chest. Ash would be fine. No longer would Ash pay a terrible price for saving Joshua’s life. His fireball could fly again.

“When can I see him?” Joshua asked.

“You can go in now. But, as you know, he’ll be a bit groggy.”

No sooner had she said the words, than Joshua was through the doors and making his way back to post-op. Gage was already back there with Kallen, who had made it through his surgery with no problems. Joshua would forever be grateful to the Hyena shifter for saving Ash’s life.

Joshua went up to Ash and leaned over the bed.

Brushing back his hair, he said, “Did they tell you the good news?”

Ash gave him a bleary grin. “Yeah, I’m going to be able to walk again. How wicked cool is that?”

Joshua laughed. He was already beginning to sound like the old Ash. “Very wicked cool. You’ll be able to shift, too. You’ll have your Hawk back, just like you wanted.”

“I missed it so much. Almost as much as I missed you when you were gone.”

Even though Joshua knew it was the drugs doing the talking, he still replied, “I missed you, too, every single day.”

“Then why didn’t you come back?”

“Because I was a damn fool. I won’t make that same mistake twice.”
Ash let out a high-sounding laugh. “No, because you have to find some nice female Bobcat to mate with. No boy Hawks for you.”

“I don’t want anybody but you, Ash.”

Ash rolled his eyes. “You’re just saying that because you think I’m too high to remember this conversation. Once I’m sober, you’ll go back to the way you were before. I’m not that high that I don’t know that.”

Joshua leaned down and lightly feathered their lips together. It wasn’t exactly how he’d planned their first kiss to be, but so be it. “If you don’t remember it, then I’ll just have to repeat it. While I was waiting for you during surgery, I decided something.”

“That the chairs in the family room are way too uncomfortable?”

“No, I decided that I don’t care what my family thinks. I want you, and if they don’t like it, then it’s their problem.”

“You’ll change your mind back again once I’m better.”

“No, I won’t,” Joshua said with dead certainty.

Ash patted his hand. “Yes, you will. Hey, will I ever get my
F
or
L
?”

Joshua shook his head. “No, but it’s not because you don’t measure up in my eyes. It’s because you’re my Ash. Just like the phoenix, who rises out of the ashes. No matter how many times you
get knocked down, you manage to rise up and keep on fighting.”

“Hmmm…when you say it that way, it almost sounds pretty.”

Ash then closed his eyes and fell back to sleep.

Joshua still spent a few more minutes by Ash’s side, caressing his hair and giving him the occasional kiss on his brow, before he said, “I love you so damn much, please forgive me.”

He then got up so he could go out to the others to tell them how Ash was doing. As soon as he went to the family room, he was met with questions.

“Is he awake?” Isaac asked.

“Can he really walk again?” Gregg added.

Joshua held up his hands. “He was awake for a while, but he’s sleeping again. You should be able to see him in the morning. He’s still pretty out of it. Yes, he will be able to walk and shift again. He was very happy about that. Before we know it, he’ll be out in the field with you guys again.”

Even as Joshua said those words, it felt like a punch to the gut. Just the thought of Ash being out on active duty scared the hell out of him. No, there was no way he was going to allow it. Ash would just work in the infirmary from now on. If he didn’t like it, then too bad. There was no way that Joshua was ever going to let Ash get hurt again.
Everyone filed out, but Shane who was giving Joshua a probing stare. “You made up your mind, didn’t you?”

“Yes, my family can go fuck themselves as you like to say. I’m not letting anything get between me and Ash.”

“Are you sure he still even wants you?”

Joshua pinched the bridge of his nose. “No, in fact, I’m sure that he’s pretty pissed at me still. I’m going to have some work to do to earn his trust back.”

Shane clapped him on the back. “I never thought I’d see this day.”

“What?”

“Where some itty, bitty Hawk would bring Doc Featherstone down to his knees. If it wasn’t so pathetic, I might laugh.” Shane stopped, cocked his head to the side, then continued, “No, I think I’m still going to laugh.”