Toy Soldiers (Helford #1)

(8) Saved

When I came to, I was in fresh air, and someone was kneeling over me.

“It’s alright,” the paramedic immediately tried to assure me, raising his hands in surrender when he saw the panic in my eyes. It must have faded away, because he went back to inspecting my hand, a kit sprawled out before him. “You’re okay—you made it out just in time before the ceiling collapsed. Are you feeling alright? Is there an aching in your head, your chest? Your throat must hurt, huh?”

“My throat,” I croaked, and then cleared my throat. “My throat has been better. My feet hurt, and so does my hand. The one that you’re holding.”

“You were burnt by the flames,” he explained to me as if I didn’t understand the premise of fire, but I pinched my lips together against a retort, the exhaustion weighing down in my bones like a million pounds. I flattened myself into the ground, unable to hold myself up, my breath still coming in huskily and burning my throat but none of the pain was overwhelming. I closed my eyes, forcing my lungs to breathe and my heart to beat, assuring myself that I was alive.

“Keep your eyes open,” the medic’s voice broke through my calming thought process, and I groaned. “We cannot risk you becoming unconscious if you have a severe head injury.”

“Where is he?” I asked. The medic looked up from wrapping my hand, his eyebrows pulling together.

“Where is who?” he demanded back, and a small burst of dread and panic made my stomach sick, because I couldn’t fathom the thought of Jonathon DuPont burning.

“Where is the boy that I came out of the room with?” I clarified, distress uneven in my voice. “Where is he, do you know? Where is someone that will know?”

“Oh, I know of him,” the medic said, nodding his head calmly. I wanted to snap at him for his composure, but I knew that wasn’t very sane of me, and I had to stay sane. I took a deep breath, counting my heartbeats as the man continued. “I don’t know exactly where he has gone, but it cannot be far.”

I looked to my left, catching sight of a vast number of fire trucks and hoses still drenching the burning building—it couldn’t have been that long, then, by the look and strength of the frame. I shifted over and glanced the other way, past the ambulances, but there were too many people milling about and getting checked out that it was hard to tell one from the next. I glanced into the crowd and wondered if Rian was there, wondered if he was looking for me.

I looked back at the medic, and he finished wrapping my hand, setting it down lightly on my stomach before looking up at my face. “We might have to bring you to the hospital, Mademoiselle; the cuts on your feet might very well have glass embedded into your skin that we cannot see, and it would be wise not to have them in there when the skin heals over.”

“I understand medical procedure,” I snapped back at him sourly, growling as I forced myself to sit up, propping myself up with one hand. My head swam but I gazed out and into the crowd, still looking for the boy that I had saved. “Do I have to go now or could I go—?”

“You cannot stand on those feet,” he told me firmly, but I was not in the mood or mindset to be bossed around. I raised an eyebrow challengingly. “They are still too sore and need to heal, and it would be best not to push any glass still embedded there in further.”

“Well, it’s probably a good thing that I don’t have much of a respect for authority,” I replied, heaving myself up to my feet and stumbling for only a moment before I regained my equilibrium and plowed on, bypassing the commands of the medic to come back and to sit down. My feet throbbed painfully but I limped into the crowd of ambulances, looking around for one person in particular.