She avoided looking at Tansy. Jonas knew why. She might say she understood why Tansy sat across the table from her, smiling and offering friendship while planning to uncover every secret Camellia had the entire time. That hurt whether Camellia wanted to admit it or not. He just wanted to catch his woman up and take her out of there. Ryland’s hurt was raw and unrelenting, and it was bleeding into all of them, including the sadness that pervaded the room.
Jonas tightened his hand around Camellia’s. Already he could feel their connection. It felt as if they even shared the same blood rushing through their veins. Hot. Alive. He looked down at the top of her head. All that silky hair. Thick. Wild. So Camellia. She tilted her head back so that her eyes met his just for a moment, and he could see the mischief there. That look was for him alone, and his heart clenched.
In spite of the tension in the room, he grinned at her. “You got this.”
“We do,” she corrected.
They took up positions on either side of Kaden’s cot. Jonas chose the side Tansy was currently occupying. She still retained possession of her husband’s hand, but Jonas forced her to move farther down toward his hips. Ryland stood by Kaden’s head, one hand on his shoulder, more, Jonas thought, to steady himself than Kaden. Gator stood beside Camellia to aid her if she needed it. He had a bottle of water close as well as a cloth.
Camellia laid her palm on the bare skin of Kaden’s ribs, and this time, Jonas followed suit. He wasn’t prepared for the rush of heat that seemed to be generated not just from Camellia but from inside of him as well. Those billions of star-shaped neurons inside of him looking like starships spread out, flooding his system with fast-moving chemicals that snapped and flashed red, filling him with energy and vitality.
He was used to his vision patterns changing from animal to bird to human, but now, his vision was morphing into something else, something he’d never experienced before. He nearly yanked his hands away from Kaden. He was so closely connected to Camellia, he could see the same sparkling red liquid moving in her veins, see the same vision changed in her gaze. She accepted it so calmly, so easily, that he breathed away his instinctive resistance and just let the change take control.
That was the most difficult thing of all for him, giving up control. He was, out of necessity, the most controlled person there was. He had to be. And he knew, were it not for Camellia, he would have stepped away.
She was steady, her gaze fixed on Kaden’s body, and when he followed suit, he found himself looking past the flesh right inside to the organs. This time, however, it wasn’t through her eyes but through his own.
“The bullet is turned at such an odd angle, Kaden,” Camellia said softly. “It’s lodged sideways and tipped slightly. Part of it is embedded under the organ, where it’s impossible to see. That’s the tricky part. I don’t know if that part is shredded or intact. I’m going to push a little natural liquid antibiotic all around the bullet and see if I can loosen it and float it out of there very gently. You have to let me know if anything hurts or changes the way it feels in any way at all.”
Jonas wanted to see her face, the concentration there, as much as he wanted to watch the procedure. She was magnificent. Insanely so. She had control of the fluid moving through every vein. Every synapse. Coming in from every direction. From her. From him. Like the floodgates of a dam. All moving into Kaden. Nutrients. Vitamins. Antioxidants. The body’s natural antibiotics.
How are the fluids being delivered?
Our hands. The pads of your fingers. Of mine. I need to concentrate.
“What are you saying to him?” Kaden asked.
“You’re very sensitive to the slightest rise in energy,” Camellia observed. “I need to concentrate; that’s what I was telling him.” There was the littlest bite to her voice that warned everyone in the room to back off and leave her alone while she worked.
Gator reached over with the cloth, distracting Jonas so that he looked up, blinking to clear his vision. Tiny beads of what appeared to be sweat dotted her forehead. Jonas wasn’t certain it was sweat. The healer in her was strong, and she called various elements in the blood she manipulated. She kept her gaze fixed on the bullet, maneuvering the fluid around it in an effort to float it with extraordinary gentleness.
The bullet actually lifted minutely, and Jonas’s breath hitched. She began to work it gradually, almost indiscernibly, back and forth. The movement was so subtle that, at first, Jonas wasn’t certain she was actually doing anything but waiting to see if the damaged bullet responded to the fluid.
He stared at the projectile, willing it to move, so that when it appeared to wiggle the tiniest bit, he was certain he was simply seeing things. More fluid trickled around the breached cavity, tipping it upward just a little. The fluid leaked under the organ where the bullet was hidden.
Kaden didn’t make a sound, nor did he shift position, but Camellia’s gaze jumped to his face. “Talk to me, Kaden. Did that hurt?” Her voice was low. Calm. Steady.
Jonas felt the small rush of adrenaline pouring into her system, belying that soothing tone.
“No. But I felt something, almost like a scratch. It didn’t hurt. It was a little uncomfortable because it was unexpected. It’s moving, isn’t it?”
“I don’t want you to move around,” Camellia said. “The tip is still embedded where I can’t quite get to it. I’m trying to work it out. You’re being very patient with me.”
How much time had gone by? Jonas didn’t know. It didn’t seem like very long, but when he made himself actually look at the others in the room through his own vision, he realized Camellia had been working patiently at moving the bullet for well over an hour. She was pale. Swaying on her feet. She had a look of utter determination on her face.
“It moved,” Kaden said decisively. “Can you yank it out?”
Camellia’s soft laughter eased some of the tension in the room and relaxed the knots in Jonas’s shoulders. “It doesn’t quite work like that.”
The smile faded from her lips, and a look of absolute concentration took over her expression again as her gaze dropped to Kaden’s body. Jonas followed the trajectory of her eyes. He could see the fluid around the bullet getting a little thicker so that the metal seemed to float upward. Once again, it moved gently, barely, a tiny seesaw back and forth. Every fifth or so movement, there would be a gentle tug on the bullet, and then the back and forth would start again.
When Camellia had started, the bullet had been mostly hidden by the liver, but Jonas was certain he could see much more of it now.
“Camellia.” He breathed her name in awe. “You’re backing it out of there.”
She didn’t reply, didn’t look at him, but a brief, triumphant smile flirted with her mouth. “Shh. Don’t jinx me. I have to go slow.”