Page 60 of Beware of Dog (Lean Dogs Legacy #6)

Last night had been fun, a good weeknight barbecue. But tonight? Wild.

When Devin drew her out onto the parquet dance floor set up on the grass, he informed her, “I’ve told your young man not to drink too much so he doesn’t disappoint you on your wedding night.”

“Dad, gross!”

She danced with all of her brothers. Some of it was easy swaying with no footwork. To no one’s surprise, Tenny had Fred Astaire moves and she could barely keep up with him.

Ian had ballet training, elegant and light on his feet, but his large hands were careful on her, and he towed her patiently through the steps.

Shep couldn’t dance at all, but she was happy to lay her head on his chest and listen to his heart beat steadily as they shuffled along at the edges of the dance floor.

Around nine, Raven caught her attention and pulled her to a quiet patch of grass, along a string of lighted flower garland. “You’ve been eyeing the trail up to the cabins for a good half-hour now,” Raven said, grin knowing.

Cass dabbed at the sweat on her forehead with the back of her hand. Her rings caught the light, and made her smile. “I’m exhausted . God. It’s lame, but I just want a nap.”

Raven chuckled. “It’s been a long day. But. I wanted to tell you: the girls and I slipped up to the cabin earlier to spruce it up a little.”

“Oh no! What did you do?”

Raven shrugged, faux casual. “Just added a little romantic atmosphere.”

“Shep will hate it.” She surged forward and hugged her sister. “That’s wonderful. Thank you.” She squeezed tight. “For everything. I love you.”

Raven kissed her cheek. “I love you, too.” She pulled back, and tears sat bright on her lashes, but didn’t fall. She smiled. “Which is why I absolutely won’t make the two of you run the birdseed gauntlet. When you get the chance, take your man and slip away, alright?”

Cass nodded. “ Thank you .”

The chance came about twenty minutes later, when Shep escaped her brothers and was pouring a drink at the folding table buffet set up against the split-rail fence that separated lawn from forest.

“Hey. You wanna leave?”

He set his drink down untouched. “Fuck yes.”

When she reached for his hand, he snatched hers up, and took off up the path at a jog. Cass lifted her skirt with her other hand and laughed as she tried to keep up.

Shep’s cabin was one of a dozen such scattered up the long, gradual slope that rose steadily behind the house.

It was an ambling, picturesque bark chip path, a pleasant walk during good weather when she was wearing boots or sneakers.

But it was cold, the air sharp in her lungs, and she was in heels, and the way seemed much farther in the dark.

Halfway there, amidst the tree trunks and the oil-spill shadows, she tugged his hand and said, “Wait, wait,” hand pressed to the stitch in her side.

“Shit,” he said, and stopped, and swung around to check on her. “Sorry, baby, you good?”

“Yeah.” She laughed. “Let me catch my breath a sec.”

“Miles started talking about Dungeons his tongue slipped between her lips and she gripped his cut in both hands and opened her mouth; made a breathy, encouraging noise that he swallowed.

A laugh bubbled up in her throat, and ruined the kiss.

Shep pulled back, smiling, and pressed their foreheads together. “What?”

“We’re married.”

“Yeah. I was there.”

“Shep, we’re married .”

“ Yeah .” He tipped her head with pressure from his thumb, and deepened the angle of the next kiss.

Oh, he was so good at that. He was—

Crack. Crack. Crack .

The pain registered first. A bright hot jolt through her chest, just under her collarbone. And then she understood what the noise was. Gunshots.

Her hands slipped off his chest, though she didn’t want them to. She tried to warn him: someone’s shooting . But all that left her lips was a dull murmur.

“What?” Shep was yelling. Why was he yelling? “Baby. Babe. Cassie . What… what the fuck ?”

It’s okay , she wanted to say. Darling, it’s okay .

But she could say nothing, and then all was dark.

~*~

Shep heard the chopping whump of helo blades. He recalled the smoke of the marker, the stench of blood and cordite, the acrid scent of a person’s insides.

The flashback reared up, potent and vicious.

And then he was back in the moment, though it made no sense, and Cass was swooning, and there was blood, so much blood, and he couldn’t, he didn’t—

“Cassie!” he screamed.

His brain split into two. His awareness of what unfolded next took on two narratives.

As a person, as a man newly married, as a man in love with a woman who’d taken his hand and his name hours earlier, he watched his wife swoon and collapse; grabbed her, and wanted to scream.

Did scream.

How could this happen?

How could he get married, and walk up the hill with his bride, and then she collapsed, and spit blood in his face, and couldn’t speak?

The second part of his brain was a soldier, was someone who’d worked, mostly to good effect, but sometimes in vain, on men who’d been wounded in battle.

That part of him breathed in the scents of the desert, the panic of other men, and neatly cut his emotions away so that he could triage his patient. That’s what his wife was: a patient.

Someone had been shot.

A member of his company had been shot.

Blood was pouring everywhere.

Shep registered a few more shots, sharp cracks, the splitting of branches, and flung himself down on the forest floor on top of Cass.

A plan. He needed a plan.

First: stop the bleeding.

He pushed up on his hands, still low, and the moonlight painted Cass’s face nearly as white as her dress.

Her eyes were huge, lashes fluttering, lips twitching as she fought to breathe.

Blood marred her perfect wedding-day makeup, a bright ketchup splatter from jaw to cheekbone.

She was gasping, trying to speak, panicked and in pain.

“You’re okay,” he said, nonsensically. “I’ve got you.” Shocked by how calm he sounded.

He shrugged off his cut, and then fumbled with his shirt, tearing seams and buttons in his haste. He wadded it up and pressed it to the spreading dark stain on her chest.

But he needed real supplies. He needed his kit, back at the main house.

Another shot rang out, and he heard the whine of the bullet overhead.

He pulled his own gun off his hip and fired three blind shots into the darkness. Silence ensued.

With a curse, he holstered the Colt, then gathered Cass up in his arms. A bloody bridal carry totally at odds with the way he’d planned to lift her over the threshold of his cabin.

“Oh,” she whimpered, curling up, hands flailing uselessly.

“No, no, don’t move, it’s okay, baby, I’ve got you.”

Second: evac to safety.

He ran. Not elegantly, not as quickly as he needed to. Not safely: he had no backup, no brothers in arms there with M4s aimed at the enemy. He tripped more than once, and feared he would fall, but managed to press onward, drawn by the house lights through the dark.

Cass moaned, and gasped, and murmured the whole way. “Shep…Frank…what?”

“Shh, hold on, hold on.”

“It hurts.”

“I know, baby, I know. I’m gonna fix it.”

There were partygoers on the porch when he reached it, laughing, cups in hand, oblivious to him until he came charging up the stairs. Someone’s girlfriend turned and screamed when she saw Cass.

“Move,” Shep ordered. He searched for a familiar face, and, like a lifeline in the dark, found Tommy. “She’s been shot,” he said, “get your family. Clear out the dining room.”

“Holy shit,” Tommy muttered, but took off at a run.

“Jesus, man, Jesus,” Elrod said, hands waving around, beer slopping out of his cup.

“Open the door.”

“Yeah, okay.”

There was a moment, as he entered the house and rushed down the hall, that reality blurred. Bright lights. A tumble of voices. A buzz of activity.

And then he was standing beside the dining room table, beneath the bright glow of the rustic chandelier, and Raven was shoving serving platters and spreads off into the floor, china and glass shattering with sharp pops.

“Here, here, here,” she said, bare arms smeared with French onion dip, and he knew in that moment that she was the field nurse/second in command he needed in this instance.

Raven turned back, and he could see the panic in her expression, like anyone in war, but the determined set of her jaw, too. “What happened?”

The half of him that was a new husband, that loved a woman, that had just gotten married and was already thinking about honeymoon spots, wanted to scream.

So he called on the military man inside him, curt and brutal. “We took fire on the hill, on the way to the cabin. We—we were—I—”

Cass moved in his arms, and he tightened them on reflex.

“Put her down,” Raven said, and Shep realized he was on the verge of hyperventilating.

He laid Cass as carefully as he could on the now-empty table, apologizing, but her eyes were closed, and she didn’t respond.

Raven swooped in with a folded-up square of fabric—one of the linen tablecloths from outside, he noted, in the part of his brain capable of cataloguing needless details right now—and gently lifted Cass’s head to place it beneath.