Page 16 of Forever After Fall

“It already flew out.”

“Did it get you?” My hands are already on the backs of her bare legs, searching to see if there are any other cuts. We’re going to have to wash them all out. Get her to a clinic as fast as possible. Rabies is fatal if it’s not treated.

I can’t lose another one of Debra’s daughters. Not when I’m actually here this time and can stop it.

“No. I don’t think so. The cuts are from my fall. I pulled the overalls down to check on my knee and stumbled over them into the tub like a klutz. God! How many times am I gonna be naked in front of you in a week!” She’s tugging them up around her knees and thighs before I can stop her.

“Let me look!” I demand, flashing her a glare as I glance up at her. Her face is bright red, and her focus is fully on the state of her dress. Or undress, as it were. I don’t give a shit about her clothes.

“No! This is humiliating!”

“Fuck humiliating. You could fucking die, Bristol. I need to see if it got you.”

“It didn’t get me through the denim!”

“You don’t know that. Have you had the vaccine?”

“Yes, I’ve had the vaccine. I root around in old homes and barns looking for antiques for a living. You don’t think I’ve encountered a bat before? I just didn’t expect it to come flying at my face when I tried to let it go. I thought maybe it was dead from the way it was hanging on the drapes.” She buttons one strap of her overalls, and before she can get to the second, I snatch her from her spot in the tub. A soft gasp of air leaving her lungs is the only sound she makes at first, too stunned to say anything else. I’ve got her halfway down the stairs before she speaks again. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Taking you to the inn.” It’s closer than the ranch house, and every minute counts if we’re getting her cleaned up. “I’ll have Grace give me a room, and we’ll get you cleaned up. Then you’re going to the clinic. You need a booster. Maybe the other thing. The antidote. Whatever the fuck they call it.”

“Oh my god. You are—I don’t even know what you are right now. Overreacting, for starters. I’m fine.”

“We’re not taking chances. You can do that on your own time, all you want. But right now, this is my project. My site. I make the calls. And the call is that you’re letting me administer first aid, and then I’m taking you straight to the clinic to get looked at.”

She opens her mouth to protest and then closes it when she sees the determined look on my face.

Thank fuck. I don’t want to have to keep arguing with her. I just need to know she’s okay.

“You don’t have to do this. I can do it.” She shoos me toward the door as she unsnaps the button on her overalls and toes out of her shoes once we’re at the inn.

“If it’s all the same, I’d rather look myself.”

“I’m going to have to strip down to my underwear. Is that what you want?”

“With all due respect, I don’t think you have anything I haven’t seen before.”

“Well, you haven’t seen mine.”

“Fair enough, but I’ve had my hands all over yours, so I don’t think we’ve got a lot of secrets left between us at this point. Keep the panties and the bra on. I doubt he bit you through there,” I instruct, and she cedes the ground. I can tell she’s worried herself but doesn’t want to let on for fear of distressing me more. As if that’s fucking possible. I’m so focused on the task at hand that I couldn’t give a shit about her lack of clothes. I just want her to be okay.

“How do you know it’s a he?”

“What?” I ask as I begin scanning her arms for bites or scratches.

“You said he bit me. It could have been a she. Maybe she was having a bad day, and I made it worse by disturbing her peace. I can understand her getting bite-y under those circumstances.” She steps out of the overalls but lets me finish checking her arms before she goes to shrug out of the short-sleeved shirt she has on under them.

“And if it was a he, it’s inexcusable?”

“I didn’t say that,” she says as she pulls the shirt over her head, her hair cascading out of it and down her back again.

“It was implied.” I drop to my knees as she turns in a slow circle, my hand guiding her on her hip as I check her stomach.

“Well, maybe you’re just extra sensitive given how bite-y you are today.” She leans over the sink to turn the water on.

“My peace has been thoroughly disturbed,” I answer her honestly but absently as I ghost my hands down her left leg, noting the bruise and the gash there she claims was from the fall before I move to the right. The scrape is bloody, still seeping from where she’s torn the flesh, but it’s not very deep, thankfully.

“I can tell,” she responds bluntly. “I think you’ve said more words today than you normally say in a month.”