Chapter 7

Jenna ran for all she was worth, which wasn't fast enough. She really needed to work out more often. The guards on either side of her were barely breathing hard as they made their way toward the yard with sirens blaring in their ears. She'd just hung her purse in a locker and tied her running shoes when the alarm went off. She'd immediately followed protocol, locked herself in the staff room and called down to the main desk to relay her position. They'd called back within two minutes to let her know there was a medical emergency and she was needed in the yard. Thirty seconds later two guards showed up to escort her.

"Gang yard," one of the guards yelled over the earsplitting siren.

She nodded her understanding. Of course there was an injury in the gang yard, they were rarely anywhere else. The prison had struggled in separating gang from non-gang prisoners, so they'd finally cut the yard in half with a high fence. They'd even had to take away the weight benches and weights from the gangs because they were using them as weapons. Jenna ran toward the fence and was waved through by another corrections officer. The prisoners were laying on the ground face-down with their arms over their heads, fingers locked together.

Several guards stood over them with weapons drawn. Jenna slitted her eyes against the pepper spray in the air and covered her mouth and nose. Another guard took her arm and led her toward a man who lay face-up, sprawled on the ground. She kneeled next to him and gave him a quick look over. There were at least five stab wounds to his neck and chest. She checked his pulse. Faint. Erratic, gurgling breath.

One of the wounds was on his neck and gushing blood, probably nicked his carotid artery. She swiftly reached for gloves from her First Aid kit and pulled them on. He had several more stab wounds, though she was fairly certain the one to his neck was going to be what killed him.

"Dammit!" she muttered, grabbing a bandage and pressing it firmly against the neck wound. Each pump of his heart was one more beat toward the end of his life as blood trickled from his body. They were losing him fast.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

She glanced up at the guard at her back. "You know CPR?" she asked, knowing he would. It was a requirement for everyone at the prison.

He nodded.

"You're my second now," she said. "He's circling the drain. I doubt he's going to make it to the ambulance. Someone's bringing out the stretcher and resuscitation mask. We'll meet the ambulance at the front door and hand him off. If we lose him then I'm going to chest pump while you breathe for him with the mask, nice and slow, on my mark. Understand?"

He nodded and relayed the information to the others, then over radio getting the team at the front door ready for them. Using her free hand Jenna awkwardly pulled medical scissors out of her First Aid kit and started cutting away his shirt so she could see the damage. Oh Jesus. She wished she hadn't. Whoever had done this to him knew what they were doing. It was a miracle this man wasn't dead already. Jenna sat back on her heels and stared down at the mess of a chest with despair. Two stab wounds up under the ribs puncturing each lung, two to the stomach and the one in the neck. She was looking at a dead man.

The sound of a breath gurgling out from between his lips one last time coincided with the arrival of the stretcher. "We need to start CPR the second he's on," Jenna yelled up at her new partner. "I'll need two people on either side, lifting him. As soon as he's on, you put your hand over mine on his neck wound, I'll slip mine out, then press down hard. Put the mask over his nose and mouth and make sure it's sealed. Start pumping on my mark."

She looked around at the guards spotting a big guy that she was friendly with. "Dale! Can you lift me on top of him when he's up? I'll put my foot on the bar and you help me over."

The officers moved positions as she instructed, several of them replacing the ones that were guarding the prisoners. The last thing they needed was for a riot to erupt, and violence was usually a good excuse to start one.

In synchronization they hefted the injured inmate onto the stretcher while Dale grasped Jenna by the waist and lifted her until she was straddling the patient. Her hand was replaced on the neck wound.

"Okay go!" she yelled. "Is the ambulance here?"

"Not yet," one of the officers yelled back over the blaring siren. "ETA two minutes out."

She locked her fingers together and placed the heel of her hand against the bloody chest ignoring the wounds. She looked at the man holding the pump and nodded. "Ready and go," she said, he squeezed the pump slow and steady as he jogged beside the stretcher. "And again."

She began her chest compressions, bracing her knees against the patient's hips and sitting up to give herself more leverage. As they left the yard she looked up. One of the prisoner's had rolled his head to the side and was tracking the stretcher with sharp, deadly eyes. Enrico Garcia was watching her with chilling intensity as she tried to resuscitate the man she knew without a doubt he'd just stabbed five times.