Page 5 of Tiger Born

“I will,” she promised.

“I’m serious, Misty. I can be here in a few minutes, tops.”

“I appreciate you. Hey, Uncle Tim?”

He turned on the stairs, and there was a look of such understanding in his blue eyes. “I won’t tell anyone. He’s our secret.”

Misty offered him a tired smile. One thing about Uncle Tim? He was as honest as honest gets. If he said he wasn’t telling anyone, he would take a secret to his grave.

She nodded and he turned and disappeared up the stairs.

She leaned on the open door and stared tiredly at the other bedroom door down here. She’d stayed here so much as a kid. The other bedroom belonged to her, and she still stayed the nights over here when she was feeling really unsettled from the attack. He’d let her have this entire basement for whatever she wanted, but last night it had served as a makeshift emergency room.

The rustle of fabric brushed against her ears, and she turned to find the stranger’s leg moving. He grunted in pain, and winced, his eyes still closed.

He would for sure be feeling this. She didn’t have an IV drip to give him pain medicine, or access to the type that he needed, but she did have some pills left over from a surgery last year. She’d stayed here while Uncle Tim took care of her. She couldn’t exactly feed the pain medicine to the stranger in his sleep though.

“Fuck,” he ground out in his sleep, and slid his hand to his stomach. “Fuck!” he yelped louder and tried to sit up. He yelled out in pain and curled in on himself as she rushed over to him.

He opened his eyes, and for a moment she was frozen in his gold gaze. He looked…scared.

His eyes darted around the room, and a snarl rattled from him as the fear left his eyes and was replaced by hypervigilance. He scanned the room and seemed to take it in over a matter of seconds.

“Where am I?” he ground out.

“You’re somewhere safe—”

“Where?” he barked louder, shoving her extended hands away from him. He tried to stand but fell directly to the floor.

“What’s wrong with me?” he slurred.

“Sedatives. I injected them. You needed three times the normal amount,” she murmured. She might not have had the big pain meds, but she’d been able to make a first aid kit bug-out bag that was pretty damn thorough. Sedatives, she did have.

“What did you give me?” he slurred.

“Something to keep you asleep while I sewed your innards back inside of you, and also, do you understand how fast you heal? It’s insane. You were putting yourself back together while I was sewing you up. While I was sewing!”

He grunted and tried to crawl on his hands and knees toward the door. “We have to go.”

“What? You can’t move. You can’t go anywhere. You almost died!”

“Please tell me we aren’t in your house.”

“Well, I had to go to my house to get my first aid kit, and—”

“Tell me we aren’t in your house!” he demanded, his eyes flashing with fire as he looked up at her.

Anger pulsed through her. “Don’t yell at me and don’t talk to me like that. These hands—” she griped, “were covered in your blood a few hours ago. I shoved your eight hundred pound body into my car, and I fought a tiger to shut the door, and I drove you to my house, and left you in the back of my car while I was terrified running inside to get something to save you, and I got you to somewhere that is safe, and I stressed myself the hell out piecing you back together, and I have sat here exhausted for hours worrying over you, so don’t wake up and take your pissy mood out on me. I’m trying to help you.”

“I’m trying…to help…you,” he slurred, swaying on his hands and knees.

“How?” she asked, needing answers.

“I need the sedative to wear off, Misty. They’re coming.” Oh, his voice was really slurry now. He swayed hard and fell over to his side.

He knew her name. How did he know her name? She hadn’t told him.

“Who’s coming?” she asked, cupping his face as his eyes rolled back in his head. She slapped his cheek gently. “Who?”