Page 25 of Day of the Storm
Darrell continued. “I have first aid equipment in the rear seat of my truck. I’ve sent Shelby for it, and she’s grabbing my gear. I have spares.”
Daryn made a sound. “She’s with you? She’s ok? Was she hurt?”
“No. We took shelter together in the culvert.”
Daryn looked at him. “My friend Shelby trained with Darrell a few years ago. Search and Rescue. She’s not an expert, but she’s good.”
“She’s better than anyone else we’ve got now,” Darrell put out there, bluntly. “I just hope she can hold up for this. She’s inexperienced and this… it’s going to be traumatic. For all of us. No way out of it.”
Daryn nodded. “Shelby’s one of the strongest people I know. She can do this.”
“I don’t think we have any other choice. Then let’s do what we have to do.”
“I’m ready. Doc, just tell me what we need to do.”
Two lone security lights still standing flickered out above them.
Every light in the area that he could see went dark.The rain above cut out a good deal of the remaining light. And it would go dark in less than two hours.
They had to hurry.
And more storms could be coming.
“Darrell, here!” a woman said from behind Darrell.
Mike looked at her quickly.
He recognized her, all right. He’d interviewed her several times in a previous case until it was clear she knew nothing about what he’d needed. He winced as Daryn’s animosity made a bit more sense. Shelby… Jacobson, he thought.
They had pushed her hard, probably too hard. But they’d been convinced… no one could be left as much money as this woman had and been totally innocent of some wrong-doing.
None of that mattered now. Daryn was grabbing a large duffle bag with First Aid embroidered on the side from her friend. The other woman nodded. “It… it… it… isn’t much.”
“It’s all we have. If we find someone who needs more than what we can give them, we stabilize as best as possible and get them to the hospital,” Darrell said. He turned to Mike as a few dozen officers and personnel came around the back of what remained of the building, shouting. “You think you can organize some of those officers into transport teams to the hospitals? Keep track of who we find and send where.”He pulled a small clipboard and notepad out of the smallest bag, as well as flashlights and pens.
“I can do that.”
“Get another team together to go through where the Path lab would have been or forensics,” Daryn said. Her friend had hugged her quickly and now the two women were transforming right before his eyes. No tears, no panic, just resolve. Determination and strength he wouldn’t have believed if he hadn’t seen. “There may be supplies we can use to treat the wounded in that general area, and we had at least six people in that portion of the building besides me.”
Mike nodded, mind running over where others would be. If they hadn’t made it to the tornado designated areas. “Let’s do this.”
“We’re not stopping until we find everyone in that building,” Darrell said.“No matter what we find along the way.”
“Damned right.” Mike looked at the other man, standing next to Daryn. He knew the man would understand. “Becausemylittle sister is still in there. I’m not stopping until I get her out.”
Fear of how he would find A.J. threatened to choke him up again. Mike shoved it away.
Darrell nodded, grabbing a hardhat from another bag. He gave one to the other woman. “Let’s get to work.”
5
Daryn appreciatedMike Evers far more than she ever thought she would as the hours went on.
Even injured—and she’d taken two minutes to wrap a band of plastic sheeting that had been found in the rubble around his wrenched leg to stabilize it so the man could walk on it a bit more easily—he was as steady as a rock as Darrell and Shelby and the crews the two had organized started pulling people from the destruction.
Darrell was clearly in charge.
Shelby was his right-hand woman right now. Daryn saw her friend and her brother do far more dangerous things to save others than she wanted to think about.