Page 4 of Angels & Whiskey

Instinct took over as I aimed, firing my gun and praying we didn’t get hit with bullets as we stood in the open desert with nothing to hide behind. As we fired back, Cochran and Stone tended to our downed soldiers.

“Heads down, keep firing!” I barked.

Pop. Pop. Pop.

“Watch Cochran’s and Stone’s six, Woodring!”

Pop.

“Move, move, move!”

Pop. Pop.

We continued to fire. I didn’t know how many enemy troops there were. I couldn’t see with all the sand in the air, but we kept firing until the wind wasn’t blowing and we saw all of the enemies down.

“Everyone good?” I asked. I turned around to see one of my medics down. I couldn’t tell who, but my heart stopped.

“Jackson!” I hollered as I ran to the downed medic.

When I reached her, I fell to my knees, flipping her over—Cochran.

“No!” I yelled, my heart pounding so hard that I thought it would beat out of my chest. Alyssa wasn’t moving and blood started to seep and stain her uniform.

“Fuck!” Jackson shouted, kneeling beside me.

“No!” I yelled again. This couldn’t be happening. This was Alyssa, the love of my life. She was part of my crew. The crew I was trained to protect and the one person I wanted to protect the most was down, her chest covered in dark red blood and not moving.

“Cap, we gotta get her in the bird. More enemies could be coming,” Jackson affirmed.

I was numb, unable to move. Alyssa was in my arms still not moving and barely breathing. I held her asking her to open her eyes …

But she didn’t.

“Open your eyes, Cochran.” I could feel the tightness in my throat as I fought off the tears that were building. Everything around me didn’t matter anymore. I only cared for Alyssa and she was shot—shot on my watch.

“Cap, we gotta move,” Jackson persisted.

“Put her in the bird so I can stop the bleeding,” Stone begged.

I hesitated for a minute, still looking at Alyssa. The severity of the situation hadn’t hit yet.

“Cap—”

“All right!” I picked her body off the ground, placing her inside the helicopter. We piled in and I removed her helmet. Her beautiful blue eyes didn’t stare back at me. Her smile wasn’t spread across her face like it had been thirty minutes prior.

Tears rolled down my cheeks. No one had seen me cry before. I was a soldier. I was an American hero. I was a fucking captain—I didn’t cry. But as my worst fear came crashing down around me, I lost it.

Tears trickled down my cheeks and onto Alyssa as she lay in my arms, her breathing diminishing every second. I didn’t care anymore. This was real and she was the love of my life. I wanted to go back to thirty minutes ago and prepare everyone for the ambush. I wanted to be the one in front of the bullet—not Alyssa. I wanted to save her.

We started to fly back to base, the tears still rolling down my face. No one said anything. Stone and Jackson worked on Alyssa while my other crew members tended to the original soldiers the best they could since they weren’t medics.

Alyssa started to cough up blood and then before I knew it, she stopped.

“Stay with me, babe,” I pleaded, brushing my fingers down her cheek.

I looked up to see Stone’s eyes fill with tears as she listened through a stethoscope, then she shook her head at Jackson, advising my gaze.

“No!” This couldn’t be happening. Alyssa wasn’t dead. We were going to get married. She was going to take my last name. I was going to wake up next to her every morning—I was counting on forever.

But we weren’t.

Alyssa died in my arms on the way back to base and worst of all …

I didn’t get to tell her how much I loved her.