Page 104 of Anchor
He felt Reid’s heart tremble under his palms. It was a vibration, weak and faint. Beep. Then again.
Beth’s voice rose above the chorus of machines. “Pulse coming up. We’re at 38 BPM and climbing.”
Tuck didn’t allow himself relief. They were rewarming Reid slowly. The melted slush bled into the sponges under his arms. Tubes hissed. Heat coils pulsed under the wrap.
Reid’s body cavity steamed faintly under the lights. But now came the next battle. His blood needed to clot, and he had to hold on to what little blood he had left.
Across the sterile drape, Tuck saw Dr. Trevor Foley move to the head of the table, calm but with tension in his jaw. “ICP’s still rising. Pressure hasn’t dropped enough since the first burr hole.”
Tuck didn’t look up, but he heard it in the pause before the next order. “I’m going again. Opposite side.”
Beth sighed. “Do it now.”
Tuck watched Foley’s hands in his periphery as they cut, drilled, and suctioned. Bone and clot gave way under steady fingers. A second hematoma spilled dark and slow. Foley drew it out by digging with his finger. “Pressure’s falling.”
“Good,” came another voice, gruffer, steadier. Hunt Montgomery began fishing into Reid’s lower right abdominal quadrant.
Tuck glanced down. He noticed his shivers for the first time.
Hunt’s forearms were slick with blood, elbows deep in Reid’s abdomen. He wasn’t flinching, wasn’t snapping for tools. He just moved like the trauma was a puzzle and time was the enemy.
“I’ve got the hepatic artery leak clamped. Give me more suction now. We need to cauterize the margin, or we’ll lose the seal.”
The cautery flared. Tuck smelled it, burnt copper and charred blood. It caught in his throat, familiar and wrong.
Beth was back near him now, her gloved hands working in tandem with Pete’s. She leaned into the cavity, her voice tight but calm. “We’ve got visible clotting in the wrap. It’s starting.”
“Run CBC, coag panel, ABG now,” Pete said. “Let’s see where we stand.”
Beth nudged Tuck with her elbow. He didn’t budge. “Move,” she said again. “I need space to close.” Reluctantly, he shifted back half an inch. “Rotate out,” she muttered without looking at him.
“I’m fine.”
“You’re freezing.”
Tuck didn’t answer.
She looked at him then, just for a second. “If he codes again, I need your hands working. Go warm up.”
He gave a small nod. This was the first concession he’d made since Reid was cracked open. He backed away slowly, deliberately, a bit confused. Pete met him near the warming basin, already dumping heated gloves into a clean towel.
Tuck shoved his hands in. The heat bit like knives. Nerves lit up like flares. Still, he didn’t wince. He stared across the room at the body on the table wrapped in heat, wired to everything that hummed and beeped.
Reid was still here. That had to be enough.
Pete called to the floating nurse, “Get an IV into Tuck. Five hundred of warm saline and put a blanket around him. And get me a temp.”
“I’m fine,” Tuck called even as he shook.
“I’ll have her get a core temp and give the saline by enema if you don’t sit down and warm up,” Pete warned.
Across the room, near the surgical bay doors, Tuck saw Martin Bailey. The younger man stood stock-still. Flight grease streaked one cheek. He looked like hell, like the burden was still on his back.
Ian Chase stepped up beside him. “Let’s move. She needs to know.”
Martin’s eyes flicked once to the table, to Reid, and then he turned and followed Ian out. The door sealed behind them with a hiss.
Tuck turned back toward the table. His hands were warming. His body continued to shiver. But the only thing that mattered? Reid was still fighting, and so would he.
