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“See?” he grinned, slapping me on the shoulder. “It was really all for your benefit.”
“Yeah, you keep telling yourself that,” I said as I hobbled out of the room.
By the timewe got back to the hospital, I was in a shit ton of pain. The patch they put on my leg was only keeping me from bleeding out. Apparently, the urgency for Thumper to get back and check on Bree outweighed the minor detail of me being shot in the leg.
“Ow, ow, ow!” I shouted as I was shifted from the back of the minivan to the stretcher outside the hospital.
“Man, Cash is gonna be pissed. You got blood all over his leather seats,” Slider said, staring at the bloody mess in the van.
“Yeah, because the blood is the problem. Not the fact that I have a hole in my leg!”
“Sir, you need to calm down,” the nurse chastised. “Getting upset will only increase your blood pressure, causing you to bleed out faster.
“Oh, I got this,” Slider said, walking over and tearing a packet. He dumped the contents on my wound, clotting the blood instantly. “There.”
“You couldn’t have done that sooner?” I bit out.
“Sir, you can’t just pour powdered substances on a patient as they’re about to enter the hospital!”
Slider waved her off. “It’s okay. We did it all the time in the military. See this one,” he said, jerking the neckline of his shirt to the side, showing off a puckered spot on his skin. “That’s thanks to the magic of military-grade substances. Yeah, we’re mostly guinea pigs, but sometimes it turns out for the best.”
The nurse quickly avoided him, then started wheeling me inside. My leg was throbbing and my mood only soured at the thought of going into the hospital. I could have easily taken care of this at OPS. FNG was back, and he was great at patching people up. But Cash insisted I be brought into the hospital. I was pretty sure it was payback for me dropping my pants in front of him.
“The doctor will be in shortly,” the nurse said as she pushed me into a curtained-off area. “In the meantime, I’ll grab your vitals and make sure you don’t pass out for your girlfriend.”
If only that was a problem. “I don’t have a girlfriend.”
“Then who’s in the waiting room pacing a hole in the floor, sugar?”
I sat up straighter on the bed, staring at the doorway. It couldn’t be. How would she even know I was here?
“Does she have long blonde hair that cascades over her shoulders like a waterfall?”
The nurse peeked out of the corner of her eye, smiling at me. “Not sure. It was up out of her face.”
“But her hair was blonde?” I asked insistently.
“Sort of blonde,” she answered.
“Blonde like rays of sun or like a bad dye job?”
Her lips twitched in amusement, but I didn’t care. “Definitely rays of sunshine.”
“With blue eyes?”
She turned, putting her hand on her hip. “What kind of blue?”
“Like an ocean, so full of warmth that you feel like you’re getting a big hug every time you look into them.”
“Those are some mighty impressive eyes.”
“I know,” I sighed, dropping my head back against the bed. “She’s beautiful.”
“Well, I’ll send in Ms. Beautiful and Amazing in just a minute.”
“No!” I jerked upright. “I can’t have her seeing me like this!”
“Sir, do you know anything about women?”