Inevitable Fidelity (Book 3 in the Original BOC Series) ✔

Chapter Thirty-Five

"Have a twenty-two year old male with an open chest wound. Stabbing---"

There was so much movement from the four paramedics hovering over Chambers' body lying on the stretcher inside the ambulance. One kept lifting his head and glancing up at a monitor while using his stethoscope in different parts of Chambers' bare chest.

"--kid's Bradycardia caused LOC--"

Nathan stood with the USWAT team idly off to the side, holding his daughter on his hip. He wasn't able to get too close to the ambulance since one of the females jumped off and held her arms out to them.

She kept shaking her head, apologizing that she couldn't let them near.

Looking over her shoulder at her coworkers, the woman turned back to look at Nathan and informed him and the others that due to the severity of his brother's injury, they were going to have to stay there and work on him.

Now they were all watching from afar, hoping the paramedics brought in would be able to save Chambers.

They'd all been so sure that he had been killed from the stab wound. With the heart condition Chambers was born with, all of them--Nathan included--assumed his heart gave out on him.

The main paramedic glanced up at the machine Chambers was hooked to, and a bead of sweat started to form. He looked back down, pressing the white gauze against the gash under his palm. His eyes were focusing on what he was doing with his other hand, reaching for a syringe and small glass bottle while raising his voice in a panic when the barely-there pulse they had found was starting to fade from the machine's quieting, "BEEP... BEEP...BEEP..."

"PT's obs are faltering! I need a 3ML cardiac syringe, STAT!" he ordered at his scrambling fellow medics.

Leaning over, the man scanned Chambers' face muttering, "Come on, kid... don't let go..."

He looked up, ordering again that he needed the syringe, that the patient's vitals were dropping too quickly.

Outside, Nathan and the others were tensing at hearing the panic in the man's voice. He stepped closer, holding Darla tighter to him as his eyes could only stay on his brother. It was nauseating to see his baby brother hooked up to a cardiac machine from the wires connected to his chest, the bloody gauze under the main man's hand a bright crimson until it was being switched again.

He was now more in a panic at hearing the man shouting for a specific heart medicine because his brother's heart rate was dropping too fast. Nathan swallowed, brows furrowed. He clenched his jaw, keeping his green eyes on Chambers' stone-still face.

"Daddy...?"

It was barely a whisper, but Darla was staring at the people in the big red and white van when she felt her father look at her. She looked away to meet his eyes and her bottom lip pouted.

"Chamby's gonna be okay... yes?"

Her opal eyes were no longer crying, but there was dirt streaked tears dried down her cheeks, her hair in a tangled mess, and her favorite pajamas were torn in certain places to accompany the dirt it had gathered up.

Nathan didn't want to lie to Darla, he didn't want to tell her that Chambers was going to be fine and the next he wouldn't pull through. Even though deep down in his heart, Nathan knew Chambers was strong enough to do so.

The kid was stronger than Nathan in so many ways, and this was one of them. Forget that Chambers had a heart defect... because that damn kid's heart made him stronger in ways that Nathan would never understand.

He reached up and pulled his daughter's head to his. He kissed her forehead, smiling a little. Nathan sighed, shaking his head, "I don't know, sweetheart... we have to wait and see okay?"