“It’s a little bite. I’ll be fine.” He turns his arm to get a better look at the torn flesh. While he’s right, and it doesn’t look that bad in that the punctures aren’t ripping the skin, it’s not the damage from the teeth that are the problem.
“Artem, look at it. A raccoon attacks us on the porch in the middle of the afternoon? Look at his mouth, all the drool. He’srabid, Artem,” I say with force. “Come inside, we need to flush out the wound.”
He follows me into the cabin, and I point toward the bathroom. “We need to wash it. Do you have first aid supplies?”
“Of course. Under the sink.”
I find a blue box with a Red Cross printed on the top. Digging through the kit, I find a bottle of iodine and place it on the counter.
“Soap. Use a lot of soap, just keep washing it,” I direct him while pushing aside the bandages.
He picks up the bar of soap from the dish and lathers his hands.
“We need rubbing alcohol.” I crouch down, looking under the cabinet again when I hear his grunt of pain as he rubs the soap into the wound.
“Keep cleaning it.” I put the unopened bottle of alcohol on the counter and lean over him to see the wound. “The rabies virus sits near the wound at first, so you have to keep washing.”
He glances at me. “How do you know so much about rabid raccoons?”
“When I was little my mother put me in Girl Scouts.”
“They taught you about wild animals and treating injuries?” He lifts an eyebrow.
“No.” I huff. “The troop I was in was more concerned with the boys in school and bedazzling everything. So, I took the handbook and taught myself, and whatever the book didn’t tell me, I learned.”
I prod the bite marks. The bleeding has stopped, but the danger isn’t over. “We need to get to a hospital. You don’t have any medications in here other than ibuprofen.”
“Give me that. I’ll be fine.”
“Artem, did you not hear me? The raccoon was carrying rabies. You have to be treated for it. Medication at the hospital and probably antibiotics.”
“No hospital.”
“You stubborn Russian ass. This isn’t something you can fight with a gun. It’s a virus. Teeny tiny germs are right now setting up shop in your body.” I grab hold of his bicep, well as much as I can. My hand doesn’t even wrap all the way around. “People die from rabies, Artem. Is that how you want to die? From a virus araccoongave you?”
Playing to his ego seems to work.
“I’m not going to die from a raccoon.”
“If he passed the virus on to you and you don’t get it treated, yeah, you big baboon. You will die.” I grab hold of his chin in the same manner he does to me when he wants my full attention. “And there won’t be anything I can do to stop it. And then I’ll be stuck here all alone. Let me take you to a hospital.”
His nostrils flare. It’s as though the way this whole situation will affect me is more important than what it could do to him.
Die from a raccoon bite because he won’t go to a hospital—fine. Leave me stranded and possibly in danger—never.
Impossible man. I’m surrounded by impossible men.
“Fine.” He might choke on the word, he gives it with such tension. “But I’m driving.”
“This isn’t the way to the hospital.” Elana presses her hand to her window as I turn on to the dirt road.
We’ve been off the highway for half an hour; I guess she assumed we’d be heading into town. I let her have her assumptions.
“I told you no hospitals.”
“Dammit, Artem. You’re back to that?”
“We’re almost there.” I slow the car looking for the right spot. When I see the barely there green marking on a fallen tree, I pull past it and turn.