“There! Ten o’clock,” Reagan shouted as she reached for her rifle.
Carter’s eyes went to where Reagan had said the shooter was. In the shadows of the woods, the muzzle flashed with a second shot. Carter didn’t think. He leaned across Reagan, shoving her to the ground behind him before falling back on top of her. At once a hail of gunfire erupted. Everyone with a gun except Carter and Reagan were shooting. Carter rolled over so he was chest to chest with Reagan and covered her head with his arms. Then, as fast as it started, it was over. Ryan, Matt, and DeAndre ran with guns drawn to where the assailant had fired. Carter looked down at Reagan, his eyes narrowing as he looked her over.
“You’re bleeding!” Carter cried out as he sat up to find where she had been hit. “Where are you hurt?”
Reagan’s face was white as she stared at him. “It’s not me,” she said as a tear escaped her lashes and ran down her cheek as she pressed her hands to his hip.
Carter watched in slow motion as Cy yelled for Ava, who had sprinted toward them. It was then he felt the burning. Looking down, Carter saw blood pouring from his pelvis and over Reagan’s fingers.
26
“Call an ambulance!” Ava yelled as she dropped to her knees.
“No use. The hospital is thirty minutes away,” Luke told her through the smeared blood on his own face. “Get him in the SUV.”
Cy, Porter, and Parker instantly went to grab him, but Ava stopped them. “There’s too much blood,” she said, talking to herself.
Carter didn’t know what that meant. All he knew was it burned, and he was starting to feel lightheaded. His mother and father grabbed one hand and Reagan held onto his other as Ava ripped his shirt up to his navel and quickly pulled down his pants a couple of inches.
“There,” she said to herself, taking in the bullet hole before digging into her bag.
A little old lady in a purple tracksuit looked over him. “Looks like it nicked the femoral artery. It needs pressure. Lots of it,” she told Ava.
Ava nodded and pressed a thick pad of gauze hard on the wound. Carter saw stars as pain exploded. “Hello, young man. You’re going to be fine. My name is Agnes, and I’m going to hold pressure while this nice young doctor gets the back of the SUV ready for you. She’ll need a couple strong people so she can switch off applying pressure. It’s going to hurt like the dickens, but you’ll survive.”
“Priest,” Carter said through tightly clenched teeth.
“No, I’m not a priest. I just know a thing or two about healing,” Agnes told him, pressing her hand immediately to the wound as soon as Ava pulled her hands back. Ava began barking orders, and Carter saw people running around, but it was taking all his power to focus on not passing out, to pay attention to what they were doing.
“No, I need a priest to marry us. Right now.”
Reagan shook her head as tears trickled down her determined face. “You are not going to die. Do you hear me?”
“I know I’m not. I have my wedding night to live for. But right now I need to know you’re my wife. I want that more than anything,” Carter said, his voice starting to grow weak as his energy began to wane.
“I’d be honored to marry you both,” Kenna said, wiping tears from her eyes. She looked to Reagan who nodded. “I know I’m not Father Ben, but a judge can still get the job done.”
“You, the scary-looking one,” Agnes said to someone off in the distance, “get a blanket so we can move him. And for goodness’ sake, you can put that dog down and help us carry this young man to the car when it’s ready.”
Carter looked to his soon-to-be wife. Behind Reagan stood Riley, Piper, and Aniyah with worried looks on their faces and tears. “I told you we were going to get married today.” Reagan smiled and leaned forward. He felt the coolness of her tear-drenched lips on his cheek as he reached up and cupped her face.
“I know I already asked you, but I’ll ask again. Reagan, will you marry me right now? Even though our future is uncertain, being your husband is all I want. I love you, for better or for worse, and I think this qualifies as worse. Say yes, Rea.”
“Yes.” She nodded as she kissed him again. Her lips trembled as she brushed them against his. “Just promise me my honeymoon.”
“Nothing in this world can stop me from spending forever with you,” Carter swore as Agnes pushed. When she did, it didn’t appear to hurt as much as when Ava did it, even though the old lady seemed stronger than Ava. Her hands were steady and warm. The heat from her hands soothed him as Ahmed, Cy, Porter, and Parker reached for his left side and rolled him slightly. Cade and Annie worked to slip a blanket under him before they grabbed his right side and tilted him again to situate the blanket fully underneath him.
Ahmed, Cy, and Porter took one side of the blanket. Parker, Will, and Cade took the other. Together they lifted Carter off the ground. He grimaced as they lifted him into the back of the SUV Luke had pulled up next to them.
Inside the SUV, all the seats had been laid flat. Luke and Annie worked together to pull Carter’s legs up far enough for his head to not be hit by the tailgate. Then Annie jumped from the front and Gemma and his mother took the front seat. His father, Cy, Porter, and Parker crammed into the SUV surrounding him. Ava instantly went to work with applying pressure as Reagan kept up a steady stream of encouragements.
“Call it in, Agnes,” Luke ordered out the window as he backed up. “And Vilma, get the clerk to call me. We need a marriage license.”
As Luke took off, Parker, Cy, and Will held Carter down so he wasn’t jostled as the SUV cut across the uneven ground toward the road. And when Luke hit the main road, Carter heard the throttle to the souped-up SUV open wide. The roads were windy, but that didn’t seem to slow Luke.
“Hang in there, son,” his father whispered as he held his hand.
His mother was on the phone with the Moonshine Hollow County Clerk. She put her hand over the phone and leaned into the front to talk to Luke. “If she emails you a scan of the marriage license, can you print it in your SUV?”
“Yes, ma’am. I have an in-car computer and printer,” Luke answered as he sped faster down the highway.
“Hold on,” Kenna said to the Moonshine clerk with frustration. “Will, give me your phone.” Will handed the phone over to his wife as she called the Keeneston County Clerk.
“I need Carter’s driver’s license and Reagan Davies’s license faxed to the Moonshine Hollow County Clerk in Tennessee, immediately!”
Kenna took a deep breath. “This is an emergency wedding! There is no time to place a bet. We need that information sent now!” Kenna let out a long breath. “Thank you.”
She hung up with Keeneston and put her phone back to her ear. “Did you get it?”
Cy leaned forward so Carter could see him as Ava switched off pressure with Porter. “You did this on purpose, didn’t you? Had to be the hero so I wouldn’t cause a scene at the wedding. Good plan, Carter. I respect a man with a bullet wound. Especially a man who saved my daughter’s life. Plus, now I have something to lord over my brother, Cade. He’s always going on and on about Nash being a badass, but today you took the title.”
Carter would have laughed if it weren’t for the pain. Instead he smiled at his soon-to-be father-in-law. That was the most meaningful thing Cy had ever said to him.
“Here they are,” Kenna snapped as she turned the phone to Carter and Reagan. “Can you see them?”
“Yes,” came the voice over the phone. “Is that blood?”
“Didn’t Vilma tell you it was an emergency?” Kenna snapped.
“Oh, my. Okay. Carter Ashton, do you swear all the information on this form is correct?” Carter listened as she rambled off his place of birth, his address, his wish to marry Reagan, and so on.
“I swear,” he told her as she repeated the procedure for Reagan before agreeing to sign and email the marriage license.
“I’ll bring the original to the hospital where you can sign it again and then I’ll immediately fil
“Switch,” Ava ordered she took over applying pressure to his wound.
In less than five minutes, Reagan had her hand in his and Kenna was saying the words Carter had longed to hear. “Carter, do you take Reagan to be your lawfully wedded spouse? Will you love, comfort, honor, and protect her; forsaking all others to be faithful to her forevermore?”
Carter squeezed Reagan’s hand as she smiled down at him. “I do.”
Kenna and his mother sniffled as the short ceremony continued. “Reagan, do you take Carter to be your lawfully wedded spouse? Will you love, comfort, honor, and protect him; forsaking all others to be faithful to him forevermore?”
“I do,” Reagan smiled at him.
“From this day on, and every day after shall be shared together as one. The highs, the lows, the best and the worse, Reagan and Carter will spend each day forth as partners, best friends, and husband and wife. By the power installed in me by the Commonwealth of Kentucky and with permission from the State of Tennessee, I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may now kiss your bride.” His mother smiled as emotion flooded her voice.
Reagan leaned down and placed her lips on his. Their smiles connected their kiss with the promise of forever. Carter would face whatever came next, knowing he was married to the woman of his dreams.
He signed the marriage certificate and then watched as Reagan did so. Porter and Parker signed as witnesses and then it was complete. They were officially married.
“Next,” Ava said gently as she smiled at them. “Get the gauze and twist the end so I can pack the wound.
Cy got ready to apply pressure. The second he had everything ready, Ava pulled the bloody gauze packing out and shoved the new one into the wound. Cy’s hands immediately applied so much pressure Carter groaned. Lights flashed behind his eyes from the pain.
“Is that punishment for marrying your daughter, Dad?”
Cy chuckled. “No, this is me keeping you alive so you can be a husband to my daughter.”
“The bleeding is slowing. Keep the pressure up.” Ava told him, looking down at the old blood-soaked gauze. “That’s good. You’re doing really well. The bleeding hasn’t stopped and won’t until after surgery, but at least we have a chance to make it to the hospital before you need a transfusion. We already know you can move your feet and arms, so there’s likely no spinal cord injury. The location of the bullet tells me that it most likely nicked your femoral artery, causing a small leak and fracturing your pelvis. Once you arrive at the hospital, you’ll head into surgery. But we’ll be right here for you as soon as you get out. How are you feeling?”
“Lightheaded and weak. I feel as if I’m floating,” Carter told her.
“It’s from the blood loss. You’re lucky it wasn’t a tear in the artery. You’re close to hypovolemic shock. Luke, how much longer?”
“We’re twenty minutes out now. And I can probably make it in fifteen since I’m getting onto the highway and out of the mountains.”
“Make it in fifteen,” she ordered Luke. “Hang on, Carter. Let me check you over.”
She felt his head and arms and listened to his heart and breathing. “You’re still good. You’re heart rate is high, but not too high. And your breathing is still strong. If your heart rate increases anymore or your breathing turns shallow, I’ll do a person-to-person transfusion if anyone here is a universal donor.”
“Okay,” Carter told her as Reagan bent to rest her forehead against his.
“Where should we go for our honeymoon? Someplace where we can walk the beach and you can show off your scar? You know the old saying that chicks dig scars, right?”
“Anywhere you want to go. Tell me about where you’d like to go,” Carter told her. As Reagan talked, Carter spent the time memorizing every freckle on his wife’s face. The way her nose slanted and the fullness of her lips. He traced her hand with his fingers, cherishing the feel of her hand in his. If this was all the time they had together, he was going to savor it.
Carter felt his breathing growing shallow. He grew thirsty and felt cold. He wasn’t going to make it. He heard yelling. His father and Cy were yelling at him to come back. He heard crying. His mother was crying out his name. “Fight for us,” he heard Reagan say. And then he heard nothing at all.
27
“We’re here!” Luke yelled from the front seat.
Reagan continued to talk quietly into Carter’s ear praying he’d hear her. He’d lost consciousness one minute before they arrived, his breathing was so shallow that Ava had started breathing for him. Even though the bleeding had slowed, he’d lost so much blood over the past twenty-plus minutes that his body couldn’t handle it and was shutting down.
The tailgate was flung open and people were there. Before Reagan was ready, she was kissing her husband of fifteen minutes goodbye as they whisked him through the ER door and took off at a run toward surgery.
“We have limited blood supply on reserve here,” a nurse said to them. “If any of you want to be donors, follow me to be tested and to donate.”
Kenna and her mother took Reagan’s hands in theirs as they all followed the nurse. Porter and Parker quietly brought up the rear as Luke reassured Will and her father they had done all they could, and Carter was in good hands at this small hospital between Knoxville and Chattanooga.
“Are you the wife?” the nurse asked Reagan as she led her back to get her blood drawn.
“Yes,” Reagan said as her voice cracked.
“It’s okay, honey,” the nurse said soothingly as she set her down in the chair and tied the rubber tourniquet around her arm. “Your husband will be just fine. We’ve treated plenty of gunshots here. Hunters, ya know?”
Reagan nodded as the needle slipped into her vein. The nurse continued to talk, but Reagan didn’t hear her. Would she be a widow on the same day she became a wife? Tears began to push against her eyes, but she blinked them back. She’d cried enough. She was determined to be strong for Carter and the last thing he would want was her crying over him.
“All done, hon,” the nurse told her as she taped down a folded piece of gauze to the needle site. “Send the next one in. We’ll take everyone’s blood and have it typed and tested. Whatever we don’t use on your husband, we’ll save for the next patient in need.”
“Of course,” Reagan whispered. Talking seemed to take too much energy. But then her father was there with his arm around her as Will entered the room to donate his blood.
“Come on, Reagan. Come sit with me. Let me tell you about this one time I was shot,” Cy said, trying to reassure her.
Reagan took a seat in one of the uncomfortable chairs lined up outside the lab as her father slipped his arm across her shoulders and pulled her against him. “It was a long time ago in Russia,” her father started to tell her. Reagan may have heard it, but what she mostly heard was the steady beating of his heart as she rested her head on his shoulder. She felt the vibration of his voice and closed her eyes. She prayed. She begged. She pleaded with anyone and everyone to let Carter live.
“You poor thing, bless your heart,” Aniyah called out from the end of the hall as she ran surprisingly fast on her hot pink heels toward them. Reagan opened her eyes and sat up. Riley and her husband, Matt, were close behind, followed by DeAndre, Piper, and the Rose sisters.
“How is he?” Riley asked, taking the seat next to her sister as Will came out of the lab and Kenna went in. Reagan couldn’t talk. Instead the tears that had threatened to burst forward began to flow as she shook her head. “Oh, Rea.”
“He lost consciousness right when we got here,” their father told the newly arrived group. “They rushed him into surgery, and we’re all donating blood. He’ll need transfusions.”
The Rose sisters surrounded Kenna who sat stone-faced and pale. Did Reagan look like that? Probably worse after the crash and running through the woods for the past twenty-four hours.
“Reagan,” Ava said gently, drawing her attention away from Carter’s mother. Ava stood in front of her with blood still on her clothes—blood that belonged to her husband. “This is Dr. Monroe.”
Reagan looked up at the doctor, who seemed to be in his early sixties. His hair was still brown but had gray at his temples. He had round wire-rimmed glassed and wore scrubs. Fear strangled her voice as she responded, “Yes?”
He knelt down in front of her and clasped her hands in his. “I’m here to look you over, Mrs. Ashton. I heard you were in plane wreck and were hunted through the woods. It appears you have a facial laceration too.”
Reagan sniffed as her throat became restricted. “You’re the first person to call me Mrs. Ashton.”
“And I won’t be the last. Why don’t we go to X-ray? And while you’re there, I’ll peek in the operating room.”
Reagan nodded, and he held out his hand to her. She placed it in his, and he helped her from the chair. Her father made a move to stand but Reagan shook her head. “You all need to donate blood. I’m all right with Dr. Monroe.” As she left, the nurse came out and her father went into the lab to donate blood.
When standing, the doctor was the same height as she was. He had a gentle yet commanding presence about him that soothed Reagan. He talked calmly to her as they walked down the halls of the hospital and into the X-ray room. He pushed open the door and both she and Dr. Monroe froze at the sight of Ahmed arguing with the technician.
“I’m sorry, but I am not a veterinarian. I don’t know how to X-ray a dog.”
“I have a vet on the phone who will talk you through it. Katelyn, can you explain what to do?” Ahmed asked as Reagan saw her aunt’s face on Ahmed’s phone.
“I’m sorry, sir, but this will have to wait. Mrs. Ashton needs some X-rays and then we will see what we can do for this beautiful Vizsla. Great hunting dogs.”
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