He saw Riley doing CPR and knew that that wouldn't be enough. Andrew's heart was obviously shattered, the sniper's bullet having hit it at the exact spot to cause maximum damage. He couldn't feel an exit wound, which meant the bullet had to be lodged within the mangled flesh. Judd touched Brenna's cheek in a fleeting caress, his mind going at a hundred miles an hour. "Stop, Riley."
Riley raised a face strained white. "We have to keep going."
Judd put a hand on the other man's shoulder. "His heart is damaged. I need to fix it." He had never done anything like this, never even considered that he could. His job was to stop hearts, not repair them. But he knew the finest details of how the organ functioned - to destroy you had to know how things worked. "Breathe for him but don't touch his heart."
Riley didn't argue. "Do it."
The first thing Judd did was send a Tk shock to Andrew's shattered heart, starting it again, hopefully in time to keep his brain alive. As Riley bent to blow breath into his brother's lungs, Judd used Tk to keep that heartbeat going. Then he began picturing what needed to happen to the destroyed cells for Andrew's heart to beat on its own.
He'd have to reconstruct the damaged section from the cellular level up, putting the SnowDancer's heart back together like the most intricate of jigsaw puzzles. The problem was, some of the pieces were missing or too damaged to function. New pieces would have to be created from somewhere. Judd wasn't an M-Psy, but he could move things, make them change shape...smooth over scars by manipulating the cells. A child's trick given new purpose.
At no point during the operation did he stop thinking. He had to be absolutely correct about the precise degree of each and every cellular movement. One mistake and Andrew's heart would not beat after Judd stopped making it beat. That was an outcome Judd couldn't accept...because it wouldn't be only Andrew's heart that would break.
A slender hand clasped his shoulder at some stage and he knew it was Brenna. Her touch should have destabilized him, but it did the opposite. It anchored him. An abnormal reaction he'd have to consider later, when his mind had room for thoughts other than the methodical repair of a heart that had been blown to pieces.
"Jesus," Hawke whispered from beside Brenna, so many hours later that the light was starting to fade. The alpha and several others had arrived soon after Judd - she'd somehow gathered enough calm to call the den using Riley's phone. Hers lay forgotten in the car.
She knew what had caused Hawke's surprise. They could literally see Drew's skin shifting. At first, it had seemed an illusion, but then she'd realized her brother's horrific wound was disappearing second by slow second. Four hours into it, something metallic had pushed up out of the wound. The bullet.
Fingers trembling, Brenna had taken it as soon as it rolled free and handed it to Hawke, who'd wrapped it in a piece of cloth torn from the shirt he wore under his jacket. That had been an hour ago. Judd hadn't spoken or looked away from what he was doing the entire five-hour stretch, Riley had kept breathing for Drew, and Brenna had held on to Judd, instinct telling her it was the right thing to do.
Judd suddenly lifted his hands from Andrew's chest. "Riley, move." His voice was rough, holding the rust of disuse.
Riley broke contact and a bare instant later, Drew's body jerked as if an electric shock had passed through it. Brenna gritted her teeth, knowing that Judd had just tried to restart her brother's heart after stopping whatever it was he'd been doing to keep it going. But there was so much blood on Drew's chest! Her hand clenched on Judd's shoulder. He reached up to touch her fingers for a second, staining them dark red. "His heart is beating on its own. He's breathing."
Disbelieving, she came close enough to touch Drew's neck. His pulse beat strong and powerful. Shaking, she pulled out and used the edge of her own shirt to wipe away the blood. "Please." Please let him be safe.
Riley was the first to see it. "It's gone."
Then she saw it with her own eyes. The wound had ceased to exist. Under the blood, Drew's skin was pink and tender but it was unbroken. She turned to the man by her side. "Judd, oh, my God."
He didn't seem to be able to focus on her. His eyes had gone black at the start then slid back to normal near the end. Now, they were close to dazed. Worried, she pulled back from Drew. "Baby, what's wrong?" Putting her hands on his cheeks before she realized she had blood on them, she leaned close. "Judd, speak to me."
"Flameout." A single word and then his eyes went pure black again, the whites disappearing as before. Except this darkness held tinges of bloodred. It terrified her. She expected him to fall unconscious but he shook his head. "One hour."
"One hour." She remembered his disappearance after he'd teleported her during the hyena situation and made the connection. He had to be in a safe place within the hour. "Okay, okay."
Andrew coughed at that second and she switched her attention back to him, aware of Judd doing the same. After a few more coughs, her brother's lashes lifted to display familiar blue eyes. "What the hell happened?"
Sobbing, she kissed his cheek. He struggled to raise his arms to hold her but didn't seem to have the strength. "Hey, sweetheart. Come on."
"You lost a lot of blood." Judd's voice. "Full recovery will take time."
She broke away from Drew to hug Judd. "Hold on," she whispered in his ear, knowing he wouldn't want to display weakness in front of the others. "Can you walk?"
A small nod, but she didn't really believe him, not with the way his face was losing color. This was worse than at the cabin. She got to her feet. "Let's get them both inside."