Logan’s gaze slides to me.
I move half a step. Not away. Aside. Enough.
Doc doesn’t thank me. Smart man. He steps in, sets his bag down, and immediately starts checking Olivia’s vitals. My hands curl into fists as he touches her wrist, then her neck, then lifts one eyelid with careful fingers. Every point of contact crawls under my skin.
Necessary.
I hold that word in my head like a blade. Necessary doesn’t mean I like it.
Emma appears in the doorway, Brooke just behind her. Mac hovers farther back without Knox now, face tight with worry. Logan gives them a look, probably telling them not to crowd. They don’t.
Doc works fast. “Breathing’s shallow but present. Pulse slow, not dangerously yet. Pupils sluggish. Could be sedative. Could be cocktail. Any syringe?”
“Blaze has them,” Logan says.
“Get them in here.”
Logan turns his head. “Blaze!”
“Coming, coming,” Blaze says, jogging in with the bag. “I love being summoned like a golden retriever with evidence.”
Doc snatches the bag from him. “Stop talking.”
“See, everyone keeps saying that tonight.”
Doc studies the syringes through the plastic, then looks at Logan. “I need clean surface, light, and someone calling my hospital pharmacy contact.”
“She going to hospital?” Emma asks softly.
“No,” I say.
Every eye moves to me.
Doc glares. “You don’t get to make medical decisions for her.”
“She was targeted.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
“She wakes first.”
Logan steps in before Doc and I turn the room into another fight. “Can you stabilize her here?”
Doc looks back at Olivia, jaw tight. “If this is what I think it is, probably. But if her breathing drops, I don’t give a damn whose claim is on the table. She goes.”
Claim.
The word moves through the room even though Doc didn’t say it like gossip.
Emma’s eyes soften. Brooke’s sharpen. Mac looks at Logan.
Logan looks like he wants to burn the whole clubhouse down and start over with better men.
Blaze whispers from the doorway, “Did I miss a claiming? Because usually there are snacks.”
Hammer, somewhere behind him, says, “Blaze.”
“What? Tension’s thick. I’m helping.”
