A Gift of Time (Tassamara) (18 page)

“Nat? Everything okay?”

The sound of Colin’s familiar voice, the warmth and the worry, sent a rush of relief flowing down her spine.

“Colin, good, you’re there,” Natalya said, keeping her voice as calm and steady as if she were issuing orders in the emergency room. “I need you to send a deputy to the house—one in uniform.”

“A deputy? What’s going on?” His tone sharpened, instantly concerned.

“Someone—I think—I can’t tell…” Natalya inhaled and then exhaled as slowly as she could bring herself to. She should have organized her thoughts instead of worrying about what the boy was up to. “I think my foresight’s coming back. There’s a boy at my door, maybe with company.”

“And you think he’s trouble?”

“He’s connected to Kenzi, I’m sure of it. But he claims his grandfather’s car broke down while they were on their way to fish on the lake. He’s asking to use my phone.”

“Fishing? This time of day?”

Natalya felt her lips turning up. She loved the way Colin jumped to the same conclusions she did. Back when they watched television together, they’d always liked guessing the culprit in their favorite shows. “That’s what I said.”

“All right, I’m going to need to put you on hold to call in. But stay on the line. Don’t hang up and don’t let go of the phone.”

“Got it,” Natalya answered.

“And don’t open the door,” Colin ordered.

Natalya rolled her eyes. Did he think she was stupid? She had no intention of opening the door. But as the line went quiet, she heard a jangle of breaking glass followed by a crash as the glass fell to the ground from the room behind her.

Natalya whirled.

A thin brown arm was reaching through the window of her kitchen door, feeling around for the interior lock.

Natalya yelled, “Don’t you dare!”

She lunged for the knife block next to the stove, grabbing the smooth handle of her biggest chef’s knife. She didn’t know what she’d do with it—it wasn’t as if she would slice up a kid, not even one who smashed her window and tried to break into her house—but maybe she could scare him off. Him and the grandfather she had yet to see.

But as she spun to face the door, the kid screamed. “Oh, shit. It hurts, it hurts. Mac! Mac! Travis, help me!” His hand withdrew from the window as abruptly as it had appeared.

Nat dropped the knife and the phone. The red on the shards of glass still caught in the frame told the story. Without hesitating, she leaped to the door, fumbling with the deadbolt, finally yanking the door open.

“You idiot,” she scolded him. “What did you think you were doing?”

His left hand clutched his right forearm, blood spurting from between his fingers. She took it in with one quick glance, then darted back inside and grabbed a clean dish towel from the drawer by the sink. She hurried back out again.

“Sit,” she ordered, pushing his shoulder until he folded onto the porch steps. “Arm up.”

He was moaning, rocking slightly, muttering “oh, shit, oh, shit,” under his breath. He didn’t move to obey her, still holding his arm, so she crouched in front of him.

“Arm up,” she repeated herself. “Elevate to slow the bleeding, pressure to stop it. You’re going to be okay. Let me help you.”

He blinked at her, brown eyes framed by dark lashes looking imploring. “I need Mac.”

“Is he around front? I’ll get him, but let’s get the bleeding stopped first.” Natalya lifted his arm gently. He’d hit the radial artery. Fortunately, the laceration wasn’t long, although it was deep. She pressed the dish towel against his forearm, holding it firmly in place even as he winced away.

“Not a he,” the kid said.

Natalya barely heard him, most of her attention on his arm. She’d need to check if he’d gotten glass in the cut. They’d need to clean it out. He should get a tetanus shot and maybe stitches. “Are your vaccinations up-to-date?”

“My what?”

“Shots?” she asked him. “Does your mom take you in for checkups?” His clothes were well-worn, t-shirt faded and blue jeans dirty. For plenty of families in Florida, routine health care was a luxury item.

“Ain’t got a mom.” He sniffled. Natalya guessed he was trying hard not to cry, and estimated his age a year or two downward. Eleven, maybe.

Thudding footsteps sounded from the side of the house. Natalya glanced that way as another boy rounded the corner. This one was older, a teenager, maybe sixteen or seventeen. He had the lanky look of a boy spurting into adulthood, with long legs and arms that looked too big for slender shoulders to carry.

“Mitchell, what did you do?” The boy skidded to a stop next to them.

“Learned how stupid it is to try to break into people’s houses,” Natalya said with a bite in her voice, as she rose, bringing the younger boy’s arm up and over his head.

“Never hurt myself before,” Mitchell protested.

“Oh, you make a habit of this?” Her fingers pressed tighter on the towel and the boy yelped. “Sorry,” she said, loosening them slightly but still keeping the pressure on. Blood was seeping through the towel, a stain slowly beginning to grow.

“Shut up, Mitchell.” Worry put lines on the older boy’s face that belied his age. “Did you find Mac?”

“Didn’t get a chance. She was on the phone.” The jerk of his head at Natalya made it clear he was referring to her.

“We gotta find her and get outta here.” The older boy moved as if to shove past them and up the steps.

Natalya shifted to block him. “Oh, no, you don’t.”

“Lady, you don’t want to get in our way.” The grimness in his voice, like the lines in his face, didn’t belong there.

“Your friend here needs to go to the hospital.” Natalya stood firm, but she couldn’t resist a glance toward her bedroom window. Mac? Could they be talking about Kenzi?

“My brother,” the boy corrected her, touching the younger boy’s shoulder with a possessive hand.

Natalya’s eyebrows rose. The older boy’s skin was several shades darker then the younger boy’s brown. She supposed it was possible they were related, but it seemed unlikely. Maybe half-brothers? Or loyal step-brothers?

“He’ll be fine as soon as we find our sister,” the older boy continued.

Natalya’s lips parted in surprise—could Kenzi be related to these boys?—before she pressed them together and scowled. “He’ll be fine as soon as he gets stitches and a tetanus shot. Where’s your grandfather?”

The older boy grunted, but Mitchell gave a quiet whimper.

Natalya put her free hand on his cheek to comfort him and said, voice gentler, “It’ll only hurt for a minute or two.” The stain on the towel didn’t seem to be growing any bigger. The blood must be clotting, the bleeding slowing.

“Not if he catches us,” Mitchell mumbled, his eyes down. A tear clung to his eyelashes and then trickled free.

“Yeah, which means we need to get outta here.” The older boy tried to stare Natalya down but she didn’t budge.

She only had to delay these boys another ten minutes or so. A deputy would be on the way. And since she’d dropped the phone, a whole slew of them might be on the way, lights flashing and sirens blaring. Colin would be doing his version of freaking out, which probably still meant barking orders and moving fast.

“Mac! Mac!” The older boy abruptly bellowed, loudly enough that Natalya flinched, tugging the younger boy’s arm. He groaned.

“Quit yelling,” she snapped at the older boy, annoyed at her own reaction. “You’re not going anywhere.”

For a second, his hands clenched into fists and his shoulders hunched up as he glared at her. Then his shoulders dropped and his fists uncurled. “I’m real sorry about this, ma’am,” he said with unexpected politeness, one hand sliding behind his back.

The gun he was holding when he slid it back out looked ridiculously large.

Hell.

Natalya’s heart was pounding again. Here it was, the danger she’d been anticipating. She had a momentary flash of realization—she didn’t much care if this boy killed her, but it would break her heart if he hurt Kenzi and she could have stopped him. The thought was clarifying. She didn’t shift her position.

“The police are already on their way,” she said, keeping her voice soft. “Killing me will destroy your life. There’s no way you’ll get away with it. And it won’t help your brother.”

“I don’t want to kill you,” the boy said, his voice much too steady, his hands too tight on the gun. “I just want my sister.”

The back door flew open and Kenzi burst out, her arms stretched in front of her as if she were going to hug the boy. Or push him off the steps, Natalya realized, as Kenzi skidded to a stop next to her and glared at him, making a shoving motion with her hands without touching him.

“Mac!” Both boys exclaimed at the same moment, the younger one with relief, the older one with surprise.

They spoke over one another, as the older boy said, “We’re here to rescue you,” while the younger one said, “I got cut, Mac. It’s bad.”

Natalya couldn’t let go of Mitchell’s arm. The bleeding might start again. But she put her other arm out, blocking Kenzi from going any farther. “Go back inside,” she ordered, her throat tightening with fear.

The little girl stamped her foot and shook her head, making wide motioning gestures with her hands.

The older boy relaxed, a half-smile lightening his stern look. He let the gun drop to his side. “Ya gotta talk someday.”

Kenzi stamped her foot again.

“Yeah, whatever.” He nodded toward the younger boy. “Fix him up, we gotta get outta here.”

Natalya didn’t move, her mind racing. Kenzi had a name, a weird one, more appropriate for a truck. Kenzi had brothers, apparently, although genetics had played some odd games if they were full blood relatives. But what in the world did they think they were doing?

She kept her eyes steady on the older boy as she licked her lips. Directing her words to him, she said, “Seriously, your brother needs to go to a hospital. He hit an artery. He’s lost a lot of blood already.”

Kenzi pushed under her arm as she spoke. “Kenzi, please go inside,” Natalya added, voice almost a whisper. If the boys were here for Kenzi, they wouldn’t shoot her, she hoped, but as long as that gun was in the boy’s hands, the potential for accidents existed.

Kenzi ignored her, her small hands reaching up to touch Mitchell’s arm. Natalya’s gaze flickered down at her, then straight back up to the older boy. Priorities. She didn’t know what the little girl was doing, but she had to focus on the kid with the gun. For the moment, he posed the biggest risk. “I’m a doctor. I can help him if you let me, but you need to put the gun away first.”

“A doctor?” He lifted his brows in surprise, before lowering them in calculation. “A real one? Not the book kind?”

“Book kind?”

“You know.” He waved the gun impatiently.

Natalya couldn’t help flinching, her muscles twitching. She wished she knew more about guns. Did it have a safety? And was the safety on?

“The ones in schools. That write stuff,” he explained.

“I’m a medical doctor. The kind that takes care of injured people.” Technically, she was the kind that looked at pictures of injured people, but the boy didn’t need to know that.

Below her, Kenzi whimpered, a tiny gurgle of pain, as Mitchell sighed. “Thanks, Mac,” he said.

“Hey, hey,” Natalya protested as Mitchell tried to tug his arm out of her grasp. “You’re going to start the bleeding again. Stop that.”

But Mitchell was standing, pulling away from her, and she couldn’t step forward to follow him without tripping over Kenzi. Natalya looked down as she tried to hold onto the wiggly boy. Kenzi was swaying, her face white, lips almost blue. Startled, Natalya relaxed her grip and Mitchell broke free.

“Put pressure on his arm. Quickly,” she snapped at the older boy, crouching, her arms encircling Kenzi. “Kenzi, sit, honey. Put your head between your knees. What happened?”

Part of her attention was on Kenzi as the girl followed her instructions, but the rest was on Mitchell as he peeled the bloody dish towel away from his arm and dropped it to the ground. Natalya swallowed hard to stifle her gasp. Her arms tightened around Kenzi.

The gash on Mitchell’s arm wasn’t gone. But it had scabbed over, pink around the edges, as if he’d injured himself days instead of mere minutes ago.

Kenzi was breathing fast, taking in deep gulps of air. Her skin was cool to the touch, slightly moist. Natalya slid her hand down the girl’s arm, fumbling for her pulse as if she hadn’t taken a pulse hundreds of times before. Heartbeat fast, but no faster than that of the average seven-year-old.

Vasovagal syncope, a cool, calm part of Natalya’s mind diagnosed. Fainting at the sight of blood. Not too uncommon. If the girl lost consciousness, she’d need to lie flat to prevent a seizure caused by lack of blood to the brain. Nat should get her off the porch to avoid the puddles of the red stuff Mitchell had left behind.

A less calm part of her brain said, ha. The girl’s a psychic healer. And an amazingly good one. That explained Grace’s lack of burns and Colin’s survival.

Kenzi had her head down, but Natalya could feel her trembling. “Shhh.” She stroked a hand down the curve of her back, feeling each tiny vertebra under her fingers. “Shhh. It’s okay. Do you need to lie down? Shall we go inside?”

“Good job, Mac. But we gotta get outta here,” the older boy said brusquely. “Come on.”

Natalya felt Kenzi tense under her hands. She rested them on the little girl’s shoulders. “Kenzi’s not going anywhere.”

Kenzi lifted her head. Looking at the boy, she shook it, a firm no.

The boy stared at her, his brown eyes showing a hurt that made him look suddenly younger.

“She doesn’t know, Travis.” Mitchell poked at the scab on his arm as if testing how much it hurt. “She thinks we’re going home. Back there, I mean.”

The older boy—Travis, Natalya realized—took a deep breath and started talking at top speed. “We ran away. All of us. He beat up Jamie, locked him in the basement, ‘cause he wouldn’t say where you and Mary was. But we need you. Jamie’s hurt bad. Real bad and we can’t help. And if he finds you, he’ll take you, you know it.”

“No one is taking Kenzi anywhere,” Natalya said automatically, but the dread was back, the chill closing off her throat. She looked down at the top of the little girl’s head. She’d promised to keep her safe.