Page 375 of The Tempted

Chapter Seventeen

The longest twenty-four hours of my fucking life but I was still going, still breathing, still fighting because I was a goddamn Knight and it was my duty.

I brushed my shoulders off and kept moving.

We arrived at the location and the shit was real bad, worse than I ever imagined. Jimmy had been shooting Blackie up with heroin, making him re-enact his wife’s death. Sick fuck. I hope Jack gave him everything he deserved.

Reina was gagged and bound to a chair and the both of them looked like they were knocking on death's door.

I ran to Blackie who lay lifeless on the concrete floor while Jack ran to Reina. She’d survive but our vice president barely had a pulse.

“He’s not breathing. What do I do?” I hollered over my shoulder at Jack who had untied Reina.

“Catch,” he ordered.

I dropped Blackie’s wrist and held my hands out to catch the vile and syringe he threw me.

“What the fuck is this?” I asked frantically.

“Naloxone, you need to inject it into his muscle and administer CPR,” he explained, grabbing his phone. “Riggs, do it! He’s going to die,” he bellowed.

I took a deep breath, unpacking the new syringe and popping the top off the glass vile of the Naloxone.

“I need an ambulance,” he barked into the phone before looking back at me. “Fill it to 1 CC,” he instructed.

I did as he told me, filling the syringe and ripped the shirt from his bicep. I felt around for the hardest piece of muscle, and without hesitation slammed the needle into his flesh and released the Naloxone.

I pulled the empty syringe from his arm and looked back at Jack.

“Now what?”

“Breathe for him,” he yelled.

It’s funny how you don’t think you’re paying attention to things, like the CPR lesson I took ten years ago, but I guess some shit just sticks with you.

“Ambulance will be here soon. Just keep doing it,” he said, glancing at his watch. “After two minutes he’ll need another injection.”

He dropped Reina’s hand and moved toward us, falling to his knees on the other side of Blackie and re-filled the syringe.

“Stay with me, brother,” he pleaded. “I need you breathing,” he added.

I continued to breathe air into him until Jack pushed me off, so he could give him the second injection.

“Is this shit going to work?” I asked, before he pulled the syringe from him again and I went back to breathing life into Blackie.

Don’t fucking die.

The paramedics arrived and pulled me off Blackie. They shouted things to one another, working vigorously to save his life, administering cardiopulmonary resuscitation. Jack informed them of the Naloxone we gave him and asked why it wasn’t working.

Because he was already in cardiac arrest.

They rushed him to the hospital, and I followed the ambulance with my bike so Jack wouldn’t have to leave Reina’s side. They rushed Blackie into the emergency room and forced me to wait in the waiting room with all the other helpless souls.

I had gone from taking life with my own hands to standing by as one was taken from me.

Standing by, helplessly as I depended on doctors to take care of my brother reminded me of Lauren and her decision to quit nursing school. I was just a biker, nobody’s hero, but the men and women in there trying to reverse the damage caused by Jimmy’s hand—those people were heroes.

Kitten.

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