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He tried to figure out what was happening, but another coughing fit racked him.
“Bro, you’re so fucked up.”
Kru squinted up into the eyes of Clinton Fuller. No…it was one of Clinton’s sons. Landon. Landon, the one that sucked at loading the truck for Cadence. Landon Fuller.
“Geez,” he murmured as he lifted Kru’s arm up off his torso. “Hey, you’re going to be all right.”
“Cadence,” Kru choked out.
“Right behind me, driving like a bat out of hell to get to you.”
Landon’s eyes were like hard shards of glass as he opened up the plastic box beside him and rummaged around. “What fell on you?”
“Yarder and a grizzly.”
“Which grizzly?”
“Gunner.”
Landon’s blond brows arched up, and he shook his head as he pulled supplies out.
“Can you tell her something?” he asked. He didn’t have a lot of time. The edges of his vision were collapsing in.
“You can tell her yourself.”
“Dude, please,” he choked out.
Landon was working on his torso, torturing him with whatever he was doing. “Say it fast. I don’t like this shit.”
“Tell her I had control.”
Landon’s eyes cast quickly to his, and then away. After a second, he nodded curtly once. “I’ll tell her.”
****
Cadence fell out of the truck, hit the ground hard, and bolted for the front door. She was numb. Terrified. That was the longest drive of her life. Above, there were a trio of ravens, and in the woods, she could hear a bear roaring. Was it Gunner? Was it Lucia?
Her door was wide open, and she could see Landon’s back. He was leaned over Kru.
She sprinted inside and fell to her knees beside him. His eyes were closed.
Lucia had been right. There was blood. It painted her floors.
“What is it from?” she asked Landon as she cradled Kru’s head.
“Claw marks everywhere, but it’s the internal stuff that is the problem. He got crushed. He said it was a yarder. Cadence, do you understand what a yarder is?”
Horror took her words, because she could imagine the enormous machinery. She’d grown up in Damon’s Mountains. Logging was one of the main occupations here. “Why did you say it like that? In case you can’t save him?” Her words came out angry.
Landon had blood all over his forearms, and his face was somber. He slid her a bright-eyed glance. A snarl was rumbling from him.
She remembered what Willa had said about dominant males hurting unconscious dominant males. She leaned forward and snarled her lips over her teeth as she uttered, “You won’t hurt him, or I’ll hurt you.”
“My bear likes the blood. I do not.” Truth.
Landon handed her a rag and a tube of something that stank. “Pack this in the claw marks up here and stop the bleeding. His body can’t heal this much at once. I need the claw marks fixed.”
Cadence froze as she took in how mangled Kru really was. It was too much. It was too much, right?
