Page 22 of Where Broken Wings Fly

Without another word, he purses his lips and stalks from the room. The front door slams again so hard, it rattles the glass in the room’s huge bay window.

Lola sighs. “That temper of his will get the better of him someday.”

“It usually does.”

We’re all too familiar with Killian’s intolerance for the human race. That man’s an erupting volcano with very brief periods of calm. Even those are few and far between.

His family is usually on the receiving end of his infamous temper and sharp tongue, although he’s very for beating the shit out of any intruders with his bare hands too.

“Let’s go see Doc,” Lola says tiredly. “I’ve sent everyone else home for the night.”

Placing my empty glass down, I gesture for her to go ahead. They set up in the massive family kitchen out back, giving them space to attend to our newest arrival.

The minute we walk into the brightly lit room, the scent of fresh blood hits me. I nearly gag. It’s so thick in the air, you can taste the copper droplets of death on your tongue.

“Needle,” Doc orders his wife.

He’s crouched over a semi-naked, spread out body on Lola’s dining table. Taking the needle in hand, he begins to sew the oozing gash on the woman’s forehead where she hit a rock. Rachel and Miranda watch with terrified expressions.

“Gauze and antiseptic, Rach.”

Setting myself up in the corner with an increasingly queasy Ryder, Lola and Albie step closer to the table to watch. They command the room with wordless authority as the two elders present.

Rachel and Miranda pass the remaining equipment and slink backwards to make way for Lola to move closer to our guest. She’s sweeping her eyes over every inch on display, but her expression doesn’t betray a thing.

With a final stitch, Doc snips off the suture and smooths gauze across the woman’s forehead, turning his attention back to her bare torso. They sliced the blouse from her body, revealing her mottled midsection.

Letting my gaze trail over her, my mouth goes bone dry. She’s covered in dark bruises, the purple and green splotches reigning chaos across her flesh. Lola stares down at her with a blank expression.

“How bad is it? Will she live?”

Doc sighs, pushing blood-smeared spectacles up his nose. “We’re out of the woods. She had fluid in her lungs, so it was touch and go. The other injuries are treatable.”

He gestures down at the hollow needle protruding from the woman’s chest, with blood and fluid sprayed around the entry sight. Ryder makes a quiet heaving sound as he looks away, his tolerance finally failing.

“These bruises look pretty bad,” Lola observes.

“She’s been severely beaten.” Doc gently probes the woman’s ribs while frowning. “She was bandaged up when we undressed her. Must’ve been nursing the wounds for a while.”

“How the heck did she get here then?”

Albie shakes his head. “It’s a hard trek up the mountain and down into the valley by foot. We found her a couple miles from here.”

“Talk about determination.”

“That one word for it.”

Albie has been Lola’s right-hand man since her husband died a few years back. He’s the closest confidante and aide to our formidable leader. Any problem in the town, him and Killian are the first ones on the case.

But while Albie provides a level-headed perspective that keeps things running smoothly, Lola thinks with her heart over her brain. She’s actually an incredibly kind woman beneath the bravado. Her home belongs to everyone.

“You see the prints?” Doc lifts a limp, bloodied hand.

Identical to her daughter, this woman has had her fingerprints brutally burned off too. No identification would be possible if the police caught up to her. Whoever did it to her knew what they were doing.

“She’s here for a reason. I don’t know what,” Lola muses aloud. “I know we don’t like outsiders, but this poor creature has been through something horrific.”

Deferring to her authority, we all wait for her decision. If she wants these two gone, we’ll dump the woman back in the woods where we found her, even in this state.

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