Page 44 of Coveted

She emptied both pitchers giving drinks to the people in the dining room before heading back to the suite with a cup for the child. It had only been a few minutes, but she didn’t like leaving her alone for so long. The swaying had stopped, and Alana could feel how fast the ship was moving, but she worried it wouldn’t be fast enough.

The room was eerily quiet to contain four injured people, and when she noticed the girl’s eyes were closed, Alana’s steps quickened. She dropped to her knees beside the couch and was relieved when the child blinked and looked up at her.

“It hurts.”

The soft rasp broke her heart, and as the child started coughing again, Alana had to fight back fresh tears.

“I know. I’m so sorry. We’re trying to get you to someone who can make it better.”

Alana hoped she wasn’t giving the child false hope. As she helped the girl sit up enough to sip the water, she wished she could do more, and she tried to think of what they had in theroom to help. She was about to climb to her feet to get a rag to wipe the grime away when she felt the bump of the hopper landing.

The hiss of the outer door opening seemed loud in the silence of the room. Rough breathing and the occasional distant cough were lost beneath the sounds of boots clomping into the ship, and she stood just in time for the first team of people to spill into the room.

Either accidents were more frequent than she’d have guessed, or it was something these people trained extensively for. The first one in the door called out the number of people needing carried as they moved straight for the straps on the bed. Alana took a step forward to release the ones on the couch, but another person beat her to it, as yet another checked on the child.

A pair of burly alphas and betas entered for each patient, loading the kids onto stretchers and maneuvering them out the door before Alana could even shake off her surprise and offer to help. She found herself in an empty room in a matter of minutes, the sound of boots and coughing fading before Regis appeared in the doorway.

“Come buckle in. We’re heading back.”

Chapter Twenty-Four

Vax

The rumble of rocks falling blended with cries of fear replayed in his ears as he raced into the mine. Smoke floated near the top of the shaft, but he kept his head ducked and pulled his shirt over his nose, trying to repress the memories.

Phantoms screamed in his ears, their pain echoing over the sounds of coughing, his brother’s voice loudest among them.

Vax hated the mines. Couldn’t stand being beneath the ground that had taken his family from him. It was why he’d taken up Leir’s offer to leave the mines and help in other ways.

But he couldn’t stand by as his people suffered.

The sound of machinery reached him as he pushed deeper, eyes burning as the smoke grew thicker. He had no idea what could have happened since there was no active drilling supposed to be going on except at the new mine, and there was little else besides hitting a pocket of gas that would cause a fire.

People tricked past him, heading in the other direction either under their own power, or being carried out. Clenching his jaw as he passed more stumbling bodies, Vax took turn after turn, following the trail of people until he reached the collapse.

He was glad to see the smoke seemed to be thinning, the initial flash likely burning itself out in moments and leaving nothing else behind. Luckily rock and dirt weren’t flammable, and once the gas was released there were no flames left.

“How many more?”

He had to yell over the noise of hammers as workers braced the ceiling above the collapse. There was a gap at the top of the pile of boulders blocking the shaft, but it was too small for an alpha to fit through, and trying to move the rubble without the braces in place could bring more rock down on their heads.

The miner he stood beside turned his head to look at Vax, whites showing around his eyes, pupils narrowed with the stress.

“We don’t know.”

They always kept track of how many people were underground, and the first thing they did in an accident was count how many made it out.

“How deep does this shaft go? Where are the plans?”

The slope of the ground beneath him seemed strange. The main shaft and all mining shafts were kept flat, with ramps in specific locations connecting one level to another. It was planned out methodically so no matter where you were in the mine during an accident, you knew which way to go to get out safely, yet he’d gone down three levels and stood in a tunnel sloping up, but in the wrong direction.

“We don’t know. This tunnel isn’t on the plans.”

Ice poured through Vax’s veins before being overtaken by rage. There was only one explanation, and there were few people who could have arranged the drilling of a new shaft without approved plans without someone noticing.

His growl was drowned out under the noise around him as the last of the braces were hammered into place and another miner stepped forward with a scanner. The scanners worked great in most mines, showing where gas pockets and different mineralswere, but the crystals mined on Farcon 1 refracted the lasers used by the scanner and made it difficult to get a clear picture. It was why they always did multiple scans from different directions and used a program to read the results and map out areas safe to drill.

“There’s still stress over the right side of the tunnel, about a click deep. Can’t brace it from here, so we’ll have to be careful.”

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