Page 48 of The Unseen
S HAKEN TO THE CORE , N ICOLE SPRAWLED ON HER BACK ON THE floor, Lucas’s heavy weight on top of her. Rain continued to fall through the hole in the roof, putting out the small blaze; then the rain suddenly ended.
“Lucas?” But Lucas didn’t move. Blood oozed from a cut in the back of his head. More blood soaked through his cassock, where a six-inch piece of metal protruded from his back.
“Lucas!” Fear gripped her and she started to tremble. “Lucas, please wake up!”
Nothing. She could feel his heartbeat, feel his breath feathering against her cheek. “Lucas … please …”
Lucas groaned, and some of her panic eased. He lifted his head, then managed to straighten away from her and slowly shove himself to his feet.
Nicole followed him up. “You’ve been in-injured, Lucas.” Her voice trembled. “You have a piece of metal in y-your back. I don’t know what will happen if I … pull it out. We need to get you home and get you some help.”
Lucas swayed, then steadied himself. Reaching behind him, he took hold of the piece of metal and pulled it out. A gush of bright red blood followed.
“Lucas!” Nicole grabbed the cassock, where the sharp piece of metal had sliced it open, ripped it apart, then shoved the robe off his shoulders. “Please, honey, just hold still.”
Tearing off a piece of the rain-wet fabric, she folded it into a pad and wiped away enough of the blood to see how badly he was injured.
“It’s hard to tell, but the cut looks pretty deep. We need to get you home.”
Lucas didn’t argue as Nicole draped his arm over her shoulder and began to guide him toward the door. She wished she had her cell phone, but there was no place in an exorcism for modern-day inventions.
Lucas stumbled, but Nicole kept him upright. They made their way out of what was left of the cabin, across the screened-in porch, down the rickety wooden steps. He swayed as she led him along the path back to the pirogue, then helped him climb in and settle in the bottom.
The jeans and white shirt he’d worn under the cassock were red with blood, and her worry increased.
Her feet slipped on the slick, rain-soaked grass, but it helped her slide the heavy pirogue off the bank into the muddy water.
Nicole jumped aboard as the boat slipped into the bayou.
Grabbing the long pole, she plunged it into the water and began to push them toward the wooden dock on the opposite side.
Lucas stirred and tried to sit up.
“Please, Lucas. Just lie still and take it easy. We’ll get back to the Jeep and I’ll drive us home. Okay?”
His eyes drifted closed, but he nodded. She thought of Sean’s head wound and prayed Lucas wasn’t injured as badly. It occurred to her that she had been right to insist on going with him. He’d needed her. He needed her now. She felt the same sense of rightness she had felt before.
In minutes, they reached the dock. Working together, she helped him out of the pirogue, down the dock to the road where the Jeep was parked.
She settled him in the passenger seat. He had left the keys in the ignition and their cell phones in the glove box.
Nicole reached in and grabbed her phone to dial 911, but Lucas’s hand shot out to stop her.
“Hang up,” he said. “I’ll be all right. Just get us home.”
“You probably have a concussion and you have a bad cut in your back. You’re going to need stitches. We need to go to the hospital.”
“Just get us home. We can talk about it when we get there.”
She could see arguing wasn’t going to work. Nicole hurried around the hood of the Jeep and climbed in behind the wheel. It didn’t take long to make the short drive back to the carriage house.
Lucas seemed stronger by the time she helped him out of the vehicle, and they made their way inside. Nicole urged him over to one of the chairs at the breakfast table, and he sat down heavily.
“Let me call an ambulance,” she said. “You’re going to need stitches, at the very least.”
“Tomorrow,” he said. “Can you do a butterfly bandage?”
She glanced at the wound on the back of his head, which was still oozing blood, but had slowed to a trickle. Biting down on her lip, she hurried into the bathroom to wash her hands, then gathered gauze bandages, adhesive tape, peroxide, and a washcloth.
Returning to the kitchen, she found Lucas sitting up a little straighter. She wet the washcloth and sponged his back and poured peroxide over the gash. As Lucas had said, it wasn’t as deep as she had first thought.
“Have you had your tetanus shot?”
He just nodded.
She didn’t know much about patching up cuts and scrapes, but she knew she should tape both sides of the wounds together. When she got that done, she pulled out a big gauze square and taped it in place over the cut.
“What about your head?” she asked. “You’ve got a lump the size of an egg and you’re still bleeding.” She wet the rag and washed away the blood to get a better look. “You blacked out for a second, so you probably have a concussion.”
His lips faintly curved. “I’ve had some experience with this kind of thing. Head wounds always bleed like the devil.”
Nicole slanted him a look.
“I’m not seeing double,” he continued. “No fuzzy vision, nothing like that. Just a bit of a headache. I’ll be okay.”
“I don’t like it. Maybe I could get Dr. Marlowe to come over.”
Lucas caught her hand and brought it to his lips. She felt the warmth of his kiss against her palm, and her eyes stung. After all he had been through, she couldn’t stand to see him hurting.
He looked into her face. “The last thing we need is to be answering questions about how this happened.”
She hadn’t thought of that. She nodded.
“The good news is, we’re both okay and Simone is gone. She’s burning in hell, exactly as she should have been before, and she won’t be coming back.”
He pulled her down in his lap and she leaned against him, tucked her head into his shoulder. “Oh, Lucas, I was so frightened.”
He pressed a kiss on her forehead. “You were amazing. Even under attack by a satanic demon, you didn’t waver. I could feel your resolve, and it added to my strength.”
The tears she had been fighting welled in her eyes. She managed to keep them from falling. Lucas tipped her head back, turned her to face him, and very softly kissed her.
“Everything is going to be all right,” he said.
She nodded, the promise in his words washing over her, but the tears hovered close to the surface.
He kissed her again, a little deeper. “Do you think we could go to bed now?”
She swallowed. “I don’t think you should go to sleep, not until we make sure your head is okay.”
A slow smile curved his lips. “Maybe you can think of a way to keep me awake.”
An unexpected laugh hit her. There was no way they were making love tonight. Both of them were mentally drained and physically exhausted. Lucas was injured and likely had a concussion.
But Nicole appreciated his effort to lighten the mood.
She managed to smile. “You never know, maybe I can.”
Getting a faint smile in return, she took his hand and led him toward the bedroom.