Page 77 of Courting Danger

“You can’t pass out on us now,” Roan insisted. “We need to know what to do once the ladder is set up.”

“O-oh yeah, got it.”

Every word was hard and required way too much effort, just like keeping his eyes open, but he did it anyway, unwilling to let down his boy.

“Okay,” the butcher said. “Ladders positioned.”

“Mmm,” Danger murmured, struggling to recall what the piece was called that would let them open it. “Eyelet bar. Tucked in. Need to pull it out. The winding handle should be in a compartment attached to the motor. S-stick it through the eyelet. Should be easy to crank open so we can get the fuck out of here.”

He could hear the storm still ranging outside, but that was a problem he didn’t have the mental faculties to tackle at the moment.

“Where are we going to go?”

The voice sounded high-pitched and edged with panic, which was the absolute last thing they needed right now.

“What if the rest of the town is just as wrecked?”

“We’re not going to go anywhere,” the butcher said. “Everyone’s going to stay right here while me and three of the boys go for help. We’ll each head in a different direction. We can’t be the only ones who were trapped by the storm. We’ll go building to building if we have to until we can find a safe place for everyone. We just need to get the door open far enough that we can slip beneath it, then close it again to keep the storm out.”

“I’ll go east,” the manager said.

“And I’ll take west,” another voice replied.

“I’ll cross the alley and see what’s open on the other side,” another voice chimed in.

“And I’ll try across the street,” the butcher said, his voice sounding further away now.

He must have been the one climbing the ladder, Danger thought as his eyes fluttered. Maybe Roan would let him rest them longer this time.

“I-I think you should stay awake,” Roan said, gently stroking his cheek. “You probably have a concussion.”

It made the pain ease up some, though not as much as he would have liked.

“N-no probably,” he groaned. “That’s a guarantee.”

“You’re going to need stitches.”

“Sick of that shit.”

“I bet you are,” Roan said. “But now me and the pups can sit with you on the beach when Roan and Pope are in the water.”

“The universe is conspiring against me,” Danger groaned. “I was thinking of ordering a new wet suit.”

“Order it anyway,” Roan said. “Then you’ll have it when you can finally go back in.”

He paused, lips curving into a beautiful smile that helped Danger forget his throbbing skull for a moment.

“You might want to consider adding a couple rolls of bubble wrap to that order, too, with how accident-prone you’ve been recently,” Roan remarked, his smile growing as he gave Danger shit about his recent string of catastrophes.

“Might be…some truth to that.”

“I think Pope might agree.”

“A-already ganging up on me.”

“Only for your own good.”

The rattle of metal filled the room, a sure sign that the butcher had located the eyelet bar and hand crank. When a coldgust of wind made him shiver hard enough to rattle his bones, Danger groaned and sucked in a lungful of rain-scented air.