Wrong Place, Right Time (Solitary Soldiers Book 1)

by A. T Brennan

  “Help me!” she cried out as she rushed around the counter. The space was cramped and she wouldn’t be able to treat him in such a confined area, she needed to get him out into the open.

  She ripped off her scrub shirt and looked over to the man who’d been in the aisle as she pressed the shirt against the wound. She saw that he’d moved the elderly man so he was sitting up against the wall and was checking him. She was about to call out to him again when he gave the man’s hand a reassuring squeeze and then rush over to help her.

  “We have to get him into the open,” she said as she looked up at him.

  He just nodded and moved behind the counter. It took some manoeuvring, but between the two of them they managed to get the clerk out from behind the counter and lay him down in front of it.

  “Here,” he said as he pulled off his jacket and folded it up before putting it under the clerk’s head. “What do you need?” he asked as he looked at her.

  “You’re hit,” she said as she stared at his shoulder. She could see blood leaking down from under the sleeve of his shirt.

  He looked down at his shoulder and looked up at her. “It’s fine.” He shook his head and pulled out his phone and dialed emergency services.

  She noticed the large tattoo on his arm under his wound with the letters ‘USMC’ in it. He was a marine, no wonder he had the reflexes he did.

  She tore her eyes away from the tattoo and focused on the man in front of her. He was unconscious, and as she held her shirt over his wound she checked his pulse as she glanced at the clock. His heartbeat was slow and it was weak, but it was there. She wished she had her stethoscope, but she’d left it in her car so she had no idea what his blood pressure was.

  She heard the other man talking into his phone but blocked out his words as she looked the patient over for secondary injuries. When he hung up the phone he slipped it back in his pocket and pulled out a small folding knife and handed it to her.

  She gratefully took the knife and started to cut off the sleeve of the clerk’s shirt.

  “They’ll be here soon,” the marine said as she folded the knife up and handed it back to him. “Five minutes.”

  “Good. He doesn’t have much time. This will need surgery,” she said as she pulled the shirt away to look at the wound. It was bleeding heavily in short and quick bursts, and it wasn’t slowing down.

  “Arterial?” he asked as he stared at the wound.

  “The brachial.” She nodded as she started to feel above the wound. “I have to put pressure on it, try and stem the flow.” She had to almost stick her fingers in his armpit but she found the artery and pressed it down against the bone in his arm. When she had the artery pinched she kept her grip on his arm and used her other hand to hold his arm up off the ground to try and elevate the wound as much as she could. When she had a firm grip on both his artery and his arm she scooted closer and used her knees to help prop his arm up.

  “What about a tourniquet?” he asked as he looked at her.

  “This high on the artery it wouldn’t do much good. It would be more likely to throw a clot.” She shook her head. “Don’t touch him,” she cautioned as he reached over to help her.

  “What?” He paused, his hands stopping halfway to her.

  “You’re not wearing gloves,” She nodded to the blood around them. “Try not to get any more on you.” The wound was on her side, so while she was pretty much kneeling in the blood and both her hands were covered, the other man only had a little bit on his pant leg and his hands were still clean.

  “You’re not wearing gloves and you’re elbow deep in his blood,” he pointed out.

  “I made a choice,” she said wryly. “But you need to keep yourself safe.”

  He just nodded and let his hands drop. “Can I help without getting blood all over me?”

  “His legs. Can you hold his legs and ankles up, bent at the knees? We’ve got to keep the blood flowing in his body.”

  He nodded and moved down, sliding one arm under the man’s knees and the other under his ankles as he lifted both of them so his legs were at a ninety-degree angle with his feet up.

  “What’s your name?” she asked as she looked up at him.

  “Tyler,” he said after a pause.

  “I’m Kenzie.” She gave him a small smile. “You a marine?” she asked as she nodded to his arm.

  “I was.” He nodded. “Are you a nurse?”

  “I am.” She nodded. “Any experience in field medicine?”

  “More than I like to remember.”

  She just nodded and glanced at the clerk. The bleeding had slowed considerably, but he was starting to look very pale and the amount of blood around her was worrisome.

  “Hey kid.” She looked over her shoulder at the boy who was now sitting up. He wasn’t crying, but he was staring at them and it looked as though he was going into shock. “Kid,” she tried again when he didn’t answer.

  “Yeah?” He slid his gaze to look at her face and she could see he was terrified.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Brad.”

  “Brad, can you do something for us?” she asked kindly. She needed to get him moving and focused on something else before he went into shock.

  “Yeah.” He nodded and sat up a little straighter.

  “Can you go and check on that gentleman’s wife?” She nodded to the door. “She should be in a car outside. Can you go and make sure she’s safe and she’s okay?”

  “Yeah.” He nodded.

  “Can you bring the man with you?” she asked, just then realizing it would probably be best to get both of them away from the blood and the scene in front of them. “Just take him outside to check on her and wait for the police to come?”

  “I can do that.” He nodded and his composure seemed to come back now that he had something to focus on.

  They watched as he stood up and headed over to the elderly man. It took a moment to help him to his feet and he started to lead the man out of the store.

  “Should he be walking around?” Tyler asked as he looked back at her.

  “Getting up and moving around is the best thing for him. It’ll get the blood moving, stop shock from completely settling in, and this way he’ll have peace of mind his wife is okay.” She looked back down at the man in front of her. “As long as he’s not hurt it’s fine.”

  “He said he wasn’t hurt. I managed to break his fall so none of him hit the ground.”

  “That’s good.” She smiled at him.

  He opened his mouth to ask her something when they both heard the sirens in the distance.

  Chapter Two

  It didn’t take long for the ambulance and the police to show up, and that’s when the pandemonium set in. The medics came rushing in and Tyler immediately backed off while they started to work with her to stabilize the patient and load him into the ambulance so they could get him to the hospital.

  It wasn’t until a police officer was coming toward her that she took a moment to look down at herself.

  She was covered in blood. Her pants were soaked with it, the soles of her shoes were slick with it, her hands were coated in it, and she had smudges of it all over her arms and her shirt.

  She just held her arms out in front of her and followed the police officer out of the store.

  There were three ambulances. One was just about to drive away with the injured clerk in it, the elderly man was sitting on the gurney in front of another one with a frail looking woman by his side, and the third had Tyler sitting on gurney in front of it as his arm was being taped up.

  “Are you injured?” the cop asked as he looked her over. She was covered in blood, but none of it was hers.

  “No.” She shook her head and looked down at herself. “I need to wash up.”

  “That bruise, that from this?” he asked as he nodded for her to follow him.

  “Yes,” she said as they walked toward his cruiser. He popped the trunk and handed her a pair of dark green scrubs and
an evidence bag.

  “Clean up as best as you can, bloody clothes in here, and then we’ll take your statement.”

  She just nodded and headed back into the store, making sure to keep against the wall as she made her way to the bathroom.

  The first thing she did after she locked the door was strip off her clothes and toss them into the bag. Then she set to scrubbing down her hands and arms with the very harsh smelling soap next to the sink. When she was satisfied that her hands and arms were clean she grabbed as much paper towel as she could and set to washing the blood off her legs. It took some scrubbing and a lot of rinsing but when she was pretty sure she was clean she stuck her shoes in the sink one at a time and rinsed off the soles.

  When she was as clean as she was going to get she pulled on the provided scrubs, glad they seemed to be made for a large man so they were plenty big on her. She pulled the drawstring tight and made sure the neck was pulled back so she didn’t expose too much of her chest and then grabbed the bag of bloody clothes and headed back out into the parking lot.

  As she stepped outside she saw the elderly man and his wife sitting in the second ambulance and the medics about to close the door.

  “Is he okay?” she asked the cop as she handed him the bag with her soiled clothes.

  “He’s fine, they just want to check him out,” he assured her.

  “What about the kid?”

  “We’re taking him to the station to wait for his mother to come and get him,” he explained as he led her to the last ambulance. They’d put the gurney back in the cab of the ambulance and Tyler was now sitting on the bumper looking a little anxious. “He’s a minor so we have to wait to talk to him.”

  “You okay?” she asked as she nodded to Tyler’s arm.

  “I’ve had worse. You?” he asked as he nodded at her cheek.

  “I’ve had worse,” she said softly as she looked at the cop.

  “We just need your statement, and to ask a few questions. Then we’ll take you both to get checked out.”

  “I don’t need to be checked out.” Tyler jumped up. “I’m not going to a hospital.”

  “Sir, you were shot,” the medic in the back interrupted. “That will need stitches and you’ll want something for the pain—”

  “Did you give me antibiotics?” he interrupted.

  “We did.” He nodded. “But only a loading dose.”

  “That’s all I need.” He shook his head.

  “But sir—”

  “I’m refusing treatment. I’ll sign whatever I have to.”

  “I’m not going either,” Kenzie spoke up. “I wasn’t hurt.”

  “Your face—”

  “Is a bruise, no need for a doctor.”

  “You came into contact with a lot of blood—”

  “I don’t have any open wounds and I washed it off. Getting tested now or tomorrow won’t make a difference. I work at Central Hospital,” she added. “I’ll deal with all of this in the morning.”

  The medic looked as though he wanted to argue with both of them, but he just sighed and started punching information into his electronic keypad.

  Kenzie turned back to the police officer and gave him her statement. He asked her and Tyler a bunch of questions and the medic had them sign that they were refusing transportation to the hospital before the cop told them they would be in touch. Neither of them were suspects and they didn’t have anyone in custody so there was no reason to bring them in. They were free to go.

  She looked around and it was then she noticed her car was still sitting at the pump next to a second car she assumed belonged to the elderly couple, but the only other car in the lot was beside the store, and she assumed that was the clerk’s car.

  “You didn’t drive?” she asked as she looked at Tyler.

  “Don’t have a car.” He shook his head.

  “Want a ride?”

  “I’m not that far.”

  “I don’t mind,” she said, giving him a small smile. “I think after what we went through a ride is the least I can offer you.”

  Tyler just looked at her and slowly nodded. “Thanks.”

  “No problem.” She motioned to her car and they headed over to it. He waited as she unlocked the door and climbed in the passenger’s side. He glanced at the large box in the backseat and gave her a strange look.

  “You have twins?” he asked as she started the car.

  “It’s for a co-worker,” she said as she put the car in gear. “She’s having twins in a few months so we’re giving her a shower of sorts at work tomorrow.”

  “I don’t know which is scarier—having twins or what we just went through,” he mused as he leaned back in the seat.

  “Probably the twins.” She glanced at him. “You have kids?”

  “No.” He turned to look at her. “None that I know of at least.”

  She just blushed slightly and looked back at the road as she began to pull out of the gas station. “Left or right?” she asked.

  “Left,” he answered as he glanced down the road. “I’m on Warden Road, near Cypress.”

  “I think I know where that is.” She nodded. If she was right then it was only about ten minutes down the road. “Just remind me of the turns if it looks like I’m going to miss them.”

  He just nodded and looked over at her.

  “You have kids?” he asked.

  “No.” She shook her head.

  “Married?”

  “Nope.” She shook her head again. “Just me.”

  “Hmmm,” he said thoughtfully as he looked at her.

  Now that they were in the car together she was nervous. She wasn’t used to talking to men who looked and acted like him, and she wasn’t used to driving them around. She wasn’t nervous about him or what he could do, she was just nervous because she was a shy person and didn’t do well in one-on-one situations with people she didn’t know.

  He might seem gruff and a little arrogant, but her gut told her he wasn’t dangerous and he wouldn’t hurt her. She had no idea why she felt that. She knew nothing about him and unknown men usually made her nervous, but she wasn’t worried.

  “What?” she asked when he continued to stare at her.

  “Nothing.” He shook his head and looked out the window.

  He didn’t need to say anything, she knew what he was thinking. He was thinking that of course a woman who looked like her was single. It’s what everyone who saw her thought, he didn’t need to verbalize it.

  “You married?” she asked when the silence dragged on.

  He just snorted derisively and shook his head. “Not a chance.”

  She took a right turn and then continued to drive down the street.

  “Your arm okay?”

  “Fine.” He nodded as he looked at her. “Like I said, I’ve had worse.”

  She was about to ask if he’d been shot before, but caught herself at the last second. If he’d been a marine then there was a good chance he’d gone overseas and he could very well have been shot. The last thing she wanted to do was bring up those memories.

  “It really should be stitched,” she said as she glanced at him. “Those bandages won’t hold for too long and you could get an infection.”

  “I don’t do hospitals,” he said as he looked at her. “I’ve spent enough time in them.”

  “Oh.” She didn’t know what to say to that.

  His answers were curt and his tone was a little sharp, but he wasn’t exactly being rude, it was more brusque. He seemed to be trying to keep his emotions hidden from her.

  “Do you know how to stitch?”

  “Yes, but you said you don’t do hospitals,” she said as she took a left turn.

  “I have the stuff at home. Can you stitch it for me?”

  “You have a suture kit at home?” She glanced at him.

  He looked at her and nodded.

  “And you won’t go to a hospital?”

  He just shook his head.

  “Alright,” she agree
d, and even as she was nodding she was wondering what the hell she was doing.

  She was agreeing to go into a stranger’s home and stitch up his gunshot wound. It was true she was trained and she’d stitched up plenty of wounds, but it had always been in a hospital setting, not in someone’s house.

  “Right up here, halfway down the block.” He pointed to the intersection ahead of them and she put on her blinker. “Number twenty-nine.”

  She pulled up in front of the small house and parked the car. Tyler opened his door and waited for her to get out of the car and lock the doors. She followed him up the side walkway and waited as he unlocked the door on the side of the house.

  When he opened the door she was looking right down a set of stairs that led to the basement apartment.

  Shaking her head and wondering if she truly was crazy she followed him down into the apartment.

  “You look scared,” he said with a smirk as she stood in the middle of the apartment and kind of stared at him.

  “Not scared, more apprehensive.”

  “You worried I’m going to go all serial killer on you?” He smirked again as he went to the cupboard and pulled out a bottle of whiskey and put it on the table.

  “I wasn’t until you said that.”

  “Don’t worry, I’m not crazy,” he said over his shoulder as he headed toward a closed door.

  “That’s what crazy people say,” she called after him as she took a moment to look around.

  The place was small, it was essentially one room that had a small kitchen and a two person table where it would make more sense for a cooking island to be. There was a double bed right across from the kitchen and at the other end of the room was a couch against the wall with a television across from it. There was a small bookshelf crammed with things and several large plastic bins piled up in the corner of the room. It wasn’t messy or dirty, just small, and she assumed the only door lead to the bathroom.

  A moment later he came out of the room and she saw that it was indeed a bathroom. He was holding a small red first aid kit in his hand and she just watched as he walked up to her and handed her the kit.

  “What are you apprehensive about?” he asked as he grabbed the bottle of whiskey off the table and twisted off the cap.