Page 24 of His Reward
The alpha in me fought to keep hold of Lucien. He was mine, my omega, and he was in extreme danger.
I forced myself to let sense take over and to give him to the crew who rushed in to do all the things that I couldn’t. I didn’t back away, though, even though I should have been focused on fighting the fire, not on the life of one person. He wasn’t just one person, though. He was my omega.
I struggled out of my gear as fast as I could, letting it drop and leaving it as I raced forward to see what the paramedics were doing. Without the protective visor, I could see Lucien’s body much more clearly. Whatever had happened in there before I’d reached him, he’d sustained burns up one side of his body and across part of his face. His robe had burned away, exposing the now angry red flesh of his left thigh, part of his arm, part of his left side, his shoulder, and the left side of his jaw. His left ear was an ugly blossom of charred flesh, and his hair had been singed away.
“Is he alive?” I demanded as the paramedic team worked to give Lucien oxygen and to cover the exposed, burned part of his skin with packets of stuff that I should have known more about but didn’t.
The team ignored me as they worked, which was only right, but aggravated me all the same.
“We need to get an IV going,” one of them said, all business.
“Second-degree burns,” another said, giving me the feeling I’d missed the first part of their sentence.
The only thing I knew about second-degree burns were that they were extraordinarily painful.
“My son!” the man who’d approached me before called out, rushing in and pushing people aside as he did. “What’s happened to my son?”
The one thing I could do to help my omega was to stop his father from interfering with what the paramedics needed to do. I turned to step into his path, blocking him from Lucien.
“Let the paramedics do their work,” I told him, grasping his arms, since he was trying to get around me.
“What happened to him?” Lucien’s father asked, trying to look around me to get a glimpse of Lucien. “Is he hurt? Can he still skate?”
The question hit me all sorts of wrong ways. The best I could do was to give the man the benefit of the doubt.
“He was trapped in the corridor,” I said, sounding surprisingly calm, considering how shaken my alpha was. “He was shielded from the worst of the fire by part of the wall that fell and was protecting him, but he’s still badly burned.”
“How badly?” a woman asked as she ran up behind Lucien’s father. She was dressed in a skirt suit, and I immediately guessed she was press.
I wanted to shout at her and tell her to go away, this was no place for journalists. Lucien’s father had other ideas, though. His eyes widened and met mine for a split second before he whipped around to face the woman.
“Lucien was caught in the heart of the fire,” he told the reporter like a pro. “He has been severely burned. If not for the valor of this brave firefighter, he would surely be dead.”
“You rescued Lucien Monteverdi?” the woman asked me.
“I—”
“Yes, he did,” Lucien’s father answered before I could. “Based on the directions I gave him of where to locate Lucien. My son is alive because of my quick thinking.”
That little bit of false information shocked me out of anything else I might have said. The man wasn’t really trying to take credit for the rescue, was he?
“What condition is Lucien in?” the reporter asked. “Has he sustained life-threatening burns? Will they affect his skating career?”
I was incredulous all over again. How could these people think about skating at a moment like this?
“We need to let the paramedics do their work,” I said, to the reporter, but especially to Lucien’s father. “Burns like Lucien’s can be life-threatening.”
Even saying that had my alpha roaring with rage.
“We’re taking him to the hospital,” one of the paramedics called out. “Are you coming with us?”
I turned, assuming they were talking to me. I was his alpha, after all. But they were addressing Mr. Monteverdi. Of course they were. Because Lucien wasn’t actually my omega.
“Yes, yes, I’m coming,” Lucien’s dad said, jogging sideways a few steps toward the ambulance, which Lucien had just been loaded into. He turned back to the reporter and said, “You have my number. Call me for a statement in a few hours.”
Rage as hot as the burning building beside me filled me. How dare the man think of giving interviews when Lucien’s life might be on the line?
The worst thing was that there was nothing I could do about any of it. I still had a fire to fight. My job wasn’t done. I scooped up the gear I’d dropped earlier and raced back to where the rest of my crew was now manning the engines, spraying thickstreams of water onto the burning arena. I had to focus on the things I could control.
