He brought the jug to her lips and she sipped, her restraint Herculean when she must want to drain it dry. Sighing, she sagged again, her eyes closing as she hmmmed, her breathing evening out. He freaked. She needed to stay awake, alert.
Alive.
“Tell me about your son Joshua.” He recapped the canteen without wasting a swallow on himself.
Her lashes fluttered open again. “Joshua’s my nephew. I came with my brother and his wife to help them with the paperwork for their adoption. They don’t want any legal loopholes. What happens to Joshua if they’re…?”
She bit her lip.
His brain raced as he swept the light along the rubble, searching for some signs of others—although there hadn’t been a helluva lot of survivors in the vicinity. All the same, he made sure they heard upstairs, by speaking straight into his mic as he asked her, “Where were your brother and sister-in-law when the earthquake hit?”
“They were in the street, outside the hotel. They left to buy lunch. They waited until Joshua was asleep so he wouldn’t miss them.” Her voice hitched. “I promised I would take care of him.”
“And you have.” He pinned her with his eyes, with his determination, the swath of light staying steady on her face. “Keep the faith. Hold steady and picture your family in one of the camps for survivors right now going nuts trying to find you.”
“I’ve read stories about how babies do better because they have more fat stores and they don’t tense up or get claustrophobic.” Her eyes pleaded with him. “He’s just napping, you know.”
The force of her need pummeled him harder than the spray of rocks from the jackhammered ceiling. The world closed in to just this woman and a kid he couldn’t see. Too clearly he could envision his wife and his daughter trapped in the wreckage of a crashed plane. Marissa would have held out hope for Tilly right to the end too, fighting for her until her nails and spirit were ragged.
Shit.
The vise on his brain clamped harder, the roar in his ears louder, threatening his focus. “I’m changing your IV bag now, so don’t wig out if you feel a little tug.”
She clenched her fist. “You must get pretty jaded in this line of work.”
“I’ve got a good success rate.” He didn’t walk away from tough odds. Every mission was do-or-die for him.
“About my foot…” she started hesitantly. “Am I imagining that it’s okay? Be honest. I won’t panic. I need to be prepared.”
“The mind does what it needs to in order to survive. That’s what you need to focus on. Surviving.”
Not that any amount of determination had mattered in the end for Marissa or Tilly. They’d died in that plane crash, their broken bodies returned to him to bury along with his will to live. A trembling started deep inside him. His teeth chattered. He dug his fingers into the ground to anchor himself into the present. Amelia Bailey would not die on his watch, damn it.
But the trembling increased inside him. Harder. Deeper. Until he realized… The shaking wasn’t inside, but outside.
The ground shuddered with another earthquake.
Chapter 2
Major Liam McCabe lurched as the ground shook under his feet. He grabbed the tractor beside him for support. Debris shifted below his feet, rattling all the way to his teeth. Rescue workers scrambled down the piles, carrying the male victim he’d just stabilized and extricated—a businessman who’d been trapped in his office chair.
Frantic wails filled the air from family members who’d been digging with shovels, even hands, in search of loved ones. A German shepherd jockeyed for balance on top of a shifting concrete slab.
He had to get off this oscillating pyramid of debris. Now.
His pulse ramped with adrenaline. Splaying his arms for balance, Liam tested for firmer ground. The structural triage report on this site had sucked, but Hugh Franco had been ready to tunnel in once Zorro barked a live find.
Liam looked left fast to check on team member Wade Rocha. Combat boots planted, Rocha balanced with the feed line tight in his grip�� the other end attached to Hugh Franco somewhere underneath the trembling hell.
Shit. Franco. Stuck below with his victim.
And just that fast, the earth steadied.
The demolished wasteland around him went eerily quiet. Sweat and filth plastered his uniform to his body, his heart hammering in his ears. Relief workers stood stock-still as if the world had stopped. But spirals of smoke affirmed the world hadn’t ended, just paused to catch a breath.
He exhaled hard. Adrenaline stung his veins. The tremor hadn’t been an earthquake, just another aftershock. Four so far today. Nerves were ragged, especially with the locals.
His headset blazed to life again with a frenzy of orders, questions, and curses from command center, along with check-ins from others on his team—Brick, Fang, Cuervo, Data, Bubbles—spread out at other potential rescues in the sector. But the most important voice was conspicuously missing.