Chapter Three: Safety
12:07 a.m.
Jose clutched Bella to his chest as he ran through the trees, his heart pounding rapidly in terror.
When he'd first taken her from the bloodsucker who had apparently rescued her from the other two leeches after they'd killed her parents, the child had appeared to simply be in a normal sleep, despite the lump on her right temple.
About five minutes ago, however, her low whimpers had suddenly stopped.
At first, Jose had just thought that she'd been having a nightmare.
But then the four year old had gone unnaturally limp and floppy as her skin, previously so close to his own temperature of 109.4, started cooling rapidly, sending the already frantic shifter into a complete panic.
If he hadn't been able to smell the underlying smell of wolf as well as the subtle change in her scent that signified her first phase, then he probably wouldn't be freaking out as badly as he was.
However, Jose knew for a fact that a shifter's normal body temperature usually ran from 108 to 110 and Bella's temperature seemed to be in the lower 100's-upper 90's and was still dropping.
For the little girl's skin to be so cold in the current situation was a very bad sign.
The shifter glanced down at Bella's motionless body and sped up, the child's head lolling lifelessly from side to side in the process.
Her russet skin had developed a slight grayish tinge.
If it weren't for the fact that he could hear her heart beating, no matter how weak and slow it currently was, he would have thought Bella was dead.
The large cabin where the pack lived came into view and Jose sprinted inside, yelling for Crystal, Bryan's mate and the Pack's official nurse before finally stopping, gasping for breath.
Walking into the living room, he gently laid Bella's too-still form on the couch, covering the unconscious child with a blanket just as Crystal raced into the living room, her face pale.
"Oh my...is that Bella?" the nurse gasped. Ushering Jose out of the way, she immediately set to work, poking and prodding the four year old while clicking her tongue.
Crystal hummed in thought and examined Bella's pupils before moving onto her pulse and breathing.
After about ten minutes, she turned around to face Jose as the rest of the Pack filed into the living room.
"The only thing wrong with her seems to be a bad concussion, resulting from a hard hit to the head," Crystal said, frowning thoughtfully.
"Unfortunately, though, it looks like Bella's in a coma and I don't know when she's going to wake up."
Jose blanched.
"Coma?" he choked out, praying he'd misheard as Bryan gently patted his back comfortingly.
Crystal just nodded sadly before leaving the room.
A/N So, Bella's in a coma!
(evil smirk)
I wonder if she'll be okay...
