Page 51 of Echoes of Temptation
“Scoot over here Knox,” Sophia says. “Maddy, look at me, honey. Alright Doc, what am I looking for?”
“Don’t shine the light directly into her eyes, Sophia,” Venom says, his voice slightly higher with a British accent. Doc’s come out. “Tell me what you see.”
Madaline gasps in pain for the second time and it pisses me off that I can’t be there to help her.
“She definitely has a sensitivity to light,” Sophia says. “Her pupils are dilated but one looks to be more pronounced than the other one. The one that isn’t dilated as much seems to twitch every once in a while.”
“Damn. With that and her slurred speech I’m thinking she has a Grade 3 concussion. Were you passed out at any time?”
“She’s shaking her head, but I think she might have been for a few seconds,” Sophia says. “I called her name several times when the car stopped before she responded.”
“Knox,” Doc says. “What about you?”
“Just my neck,” he says. “I’m sore from my belt, also, but nothing too bad. How can I help Maddy? Do we need to wrap Sophia’s leg?”
“Is she bleeding?” Doc asks.
“No,” Sophia answers. “My skin is raised from where the bone is pressing against it. I’m pretty positive it’s broken.”
“The best you can do until we can get there is try not to make it worse,” Ghost tells her. “Do whatever you can to avoid putting any weight on it. Pops has a lock on your location now and we’re about to head out.”
“As for Maddy,” Doc adds. “Don’t let her fall asleep. She’s going to have a hard time concentrating and may seem a bit confused. For now, if you can get her some water that would be a good start.”
“The truck stopped,” Knox says. “We’ve only been in here for ten minutes.”
“What’s your charge on your phone, Little one?” Blaze asks.
“Eighty-three percent,” he says. “I just took it off the charger this morning before we left.”
“Hide it,” Steel says. “We’re putting our side on silence this time. Keep yours open.”
“Here, Maddy,” Knox says hurriedly. “Everyone, back to where you were and pretend you’re still out. Give it five minutes and wake up, but slowly.”
There’s a rustle of noises and then silence.
“Can we track his phone?” I ask as Steel mutes our side.
“Michael’s working on it from the air,” Viper says. “He says that once he has the cell towers mapped out then we can layer the signal from the necklaces on top of the cells signal and get a better location. It won’t be long.”
“In the meantime, gear up,” Ghost says. “King, I want you to take point. You have more experience tracking someone down. Colt, stay back with Ma and Pops. Everyone else, get ready for war.”
“I’ve sent the GPS pings from the necklaces to Michael,” Pops says, walking into the room. “He has it down to an eight-block grid. It will still take hours to search but Michael is hacking into some traffic cameras and searching for a semi that happened to be near the crash.”
“Tell him that Knox said they were initially hit by a black SUV,” Steel says. “Either they moved vehicles or the SUV will be following or leading the semi.”
“Got it.”
“We head out in five,” I announce. “I want us to head towards the location grid that way we’re closer when Michael has a better place for us to look.”
“They’ve stopped moving,” Michael says through Pops phone. “Are you guys still in contact with Knox?”
“We’re still connected to the call but everything is silent on their end,” Venom says.
“The next time you talk to him have him share his location,” Michael tells us. “It will give us an exact address. But, he has some damn blocker on his phone and I can’t access it. Smart fucker.”
“Let’s go,” I say heading toward the door. “My fingers are itching to put a bullet in some skulls.”
“Colt, keep the line open,” Steel says handing him his phone. “I want to know everything you hear.”