“What?” he chokes out.
“Call 911!” I scramble for my purse, which is under the backpack. Throwing items randomly in the air, I realize time is precious. At best, I have a handful of minutes.
He frowns, then his entire face changes with dawning recognition. “You’re allergic?” Something more than standard surprise fills his voice, but I can’t parse it out right now, as my body begins to swell. His phone is out with breakneck speed and he’s dialing before I can answer.
My vision starts to blur. Unadulterated terror sets in. The list of steps to contain the sting escapes me, all drowned out by the mental chant of OMIGOD OMIGOD OMIGOD that won’t stop looping.
I lose track of time. Declan is speaking to someone and describing our location. Then he’s off the phone and I find my purse. He fishes through his back pocket, pants loose around his upper thighs, and he takes a moment to pull them up, snap, zip.
Then his hands are on me and he’s holding his wallet. Two condoms poke out.
“Seriously? Now is NOT the time,” I say. My voice is raspy and distant, like someone’s scratching a cardboard tube shoved up against my ear.
“Not that—here.” He hands me a foil packet of Benadryl, already torn open. I take the capsules and dry swallow them. I grab the tumbler of wine and, without any other option, I take a big swallow to make sure the pills go down.
“EpiPen?” he asks sharply. I recoil, even as my vision starts to pinprick.
“How do you know? And where did you get the Benadryl?”
“My brother Andrew is highly allergic, too. Wasps, in his case.” He’s tossing my tampons and old cough drops and receipts and makeup out of my purse with military precision and laser focus until he finds the EpiPen and hands it to me.
I pop the top off, but before I inject, another bee floats over. Looking down, I see the issue: we’re near a nest of ground bees. The blanket is literally on top of them. Leave it to me to make out with Hot Guy on top of a Nest of Death.
Declan follows my gaze and realizes it, too. He reaches around me just as I tighten my grip on the pen and slam it as hard as I can into my hip, but he nudges me and my aim falters as I bring my forearm down as hard as I can so the needle goes deep in me to administer the epinephrine I need and—
I inject him in the groin.
“God DAMN!” he shouts, springing to his feet and inhaling so deeply I fear he’ll pass out. One of us has to stay conscious, and at this rate it won’t be me. A sound like rushing water fills my ears.
The Benadryl isn’t helping, and that dose of epinephrine is the only thing keeping me from anaphylactic shock as I feel my breathing speed up, but my throat starts to narrow, as if Darth Vader has me in his grip and won’t let go. Declan is limping and huffing, taking deep breaths and making grunting sounds as he comes toward me like Wolverine on the attack.
I fumble for my purse and keep trying to say “I’m sorry,” but all that comes out is a strangled whooping noise. Declan grabs the purse from me and I can see the veins in his neck bulging, can watch his pulse throb in front of me as he pulls the cap off the second EpiPen, rolls me onto my stomach, pins me in place, and pulls my jeans down to expose my ass—
“What are you doing?” I rasp.
—and then slams the needle so hard into my butt cheek that the wind is knocked out of me.
The world goes dark, then light again as he scoops me up and begins running down the path toward the cars. He’s favoring the hip near where I injected him, but still moves with remarkable speed and agility. My head feels so heavy, and my arms and legs flop, even though I know I should be surging from the EpiPen’s contents. Maybe it’s the wine. Maybe it’s overwhelm. Maybe it’s impending death.
“I’ll get you there,” Declan says. “C’mon, Shannon. Stay awake.” That’s an order, the hard grit in his voice like being barked at during basic military training, but his voice strains with fear and a gentleness that tells me I have to listen to him.
“I’m here,” I mumble. He’s running hard and I can hear his heart pounding against my ear, pressed against his sweaty shirt. We’re more than half a mile from the parking lot and I hear a horrible wheezing sound. My weight isn’t a small number, and I feel embarrassed that he’s struggling so hard to breathe through carrying me. Yet he cradles me, mumbling something as he runs. All I can sense is the tumbling of air against his lungs and ribs.
If I could just move, I could stand and walk back to the lot. I start to resist, to try to help.
Then I realize the wheezing is coming from me. Not him.
He’s moving swiftly and with great power, and my throat stops swelling. This is how the EpiPen always works, like slamming the brakes on a car going a hundred miles an hour. For me, the relief comes in waves. First, the swelling stops, but it doesn’t recede. It just doesn’t get worse.
That’s what has happened now. I’m so tired, though. Exhausted and depleted, and it takes everything in me to stay upright in his arms so Declan can carry me. The ground becomes bumpy and he slows down, carefully navigating down a slope on the wider part of the trail. It’s dark, and insects buzz in my ear.
“Bees?” I mumble.
“No,” he says, his panting heavy from exertion. “Flies. But the two bees that stung you—” He’s huffing through a final sprint and I can make out a red flashing light in the distance.
Two. Oh. That’s it. I’ve never been stung twice like this. My eyelids feel like quilts covering my vision, and my lips tingle and balloon out. If only I could lift an arm and give him some help. I will it to move but it doesn’t. Nothing does.
I’m sorry, I want to say. Maybe I do. It’s hard to tell.
And then I fade out completely, remembering nothing more than the steady sound of Declan’s breath as he races me to safety.
Chapter Three
“Is his penis going to fall off?”
Mom’s voice floats into my awareness as a big, bright light blinds me. Am I in heaven? Hell? Somewhere in between? If Mom’s here, that narrows this down considerably. I’m either alive or in purgatory.
“Whose penis?” I mumble. “What did you do to Dad this time?” Someone squeezes my hand and I open my eyes slowly. They feel like wet wool blankets coated with glass shards, but I open them all the way anyhow.
Amy is the one holding my hand, and she looks so scared. “Not Dad. And don’t worry.”