Page 22

CHAPTER 21

Reed

M y body jolts awake at the sound of a gun being fired. For a moment, I don’t feel any pain. Running my hands down the length of my body, I search for who took a shot when I’m immediately hit with Noah standing about twenty feet away. My brow furrows together, confusion etching my brain as to why he would be that far away. I told him multiple times he needs to stay within two or three feet, especially at night.

It’s not until Noah’s knee gives out that I see his shoulder is covered in red; the blood drips down his arm onto the ground.

“NOAH!” I scream. I’m moving before I even realize it. I slide towards Noah, his eyes meeting mine—dazed and unfocused. “Stay with me.” I press my hands against his shoulder, his warm blood seeping through my fingers faster than I’ve seen.

“Noah, you need to stay with me,” my voice shakes as I very quickly begin to lose my mind. Except his eyes begin to close, the fight in his body seeping out.

“Fuck!” I rush towards my bag, ripping it open to fish out the medical supplies I keep. Finding the gauze, my hands shake as I tear the package open. Grabbing the sleeve, I rip his shirt down, needing to find exactly where the wound was. The moment I find it, I press the gauze to it, with one hand holding it down, I grab the extra shirt I have in my bag. Ripping the thing in half, I tie it around his arm. I pull it tight, knowing if he was awake he’d be fighting against me. Rolling him over, I curse under my breath when I find the bullet went straight through. I repeat the process until the blood is no longer pouring out of his body.

Adrenaline courses through me as I hoist his leg and arm over my shoulders in a fireman's carry. Climbing to my feet, I barely gather my bearings before I take off towards the cabin.

Noah didn’t know we were on mine and Ghost's property when he wanted to stop. I hesitated because thirty extra minutes and we would be at the cabin.

“FUCK!” I scream into the woods. If I had just made him continue walking, this never would have happened. He’s bleeding because we stopped. Because I let him stop.

Everything around me blurs as I pass by the trees, stepping over the line work that was put up to stop the dead. Sweat beads at my hairline, dripping down my face as I jog up the hill.

Nothing mattered to me anymore. Nothing but getting Noah to the cabin, hopefully alive.

The fear that he might be dead has me kicking myself into gear. I jump over tree branches, racing towards the small building that comes into view. The feeling of joy that I’m home doesn’t even hit me, not when I climb onto the porch and not when I shove my foot through the door.

I don’t stop moving until I’m placing him down on the kitchen table. Once he’s settled, I race towards our medical cabinet. Pulling out supplies, I’m back at Noah’s side and ripping more gauze open and placing the needle to the side. Untying the shirt from his shoulder, I remove the gauze, cursing when some more blood seeps from the wound. Replacing the blood-soaked gauze with the new, I slow the bleeding down enough that I start stitching his shoulder back together.

My hands tremble as I clutch the needle; bringing it to his skin, I thread it through. My breaths come in shallow bursts, urging me to move faster. Noah doesn’t move an inch as I work through the entrance of the bullet wound. Flipping him over, my eyes move back and forth from the exit wound to his stomach, watching his breathing come in unevenly.

“I’m sorry,” I find myself whispering as I pull the thread through the back of his shoulder. I hold my breath as I tie the knot. Tossing the needle to the side, I loop an arm under his legs and back. Lifting him up, I head towards my bedroom. Pushing it open with my foot, I lay him down on the bed before I head back out and grab the antibiotics we keep on hand. Wheeling the IV back into the room, I get everything set up before I stick the IV into his arm and tap it off.

I don’t think as I move mindlessly through the house, cleaning the table off of any evidence of Noah being shot.

I should have done better.

I shouldn’t have let us stop last night. We were right here. He could have woken up in my bed instead of being shot.

The slow burn in my chest, the faint but instant heat that I shoved aside while taking care of Noah, comes rushing back. My jaw tightens, my fist curled at my sides. Noah never should have been in that situation.

I could feel my pulse hammering in my ears, a sharp beat plunging my insides. But the more I push that anger to the side, the hotter it grows, spreading through me like a wildfire.

It’s my fault.

Noah being shot is my fault.

Before I know what I’m doing, I grab the nearest thing. Picking the chair up, I throw it against the wall, watching the wooden thing split on impact.

“FUCK!”