“You drive!” He shouted while rounding the truck. Climbing into the back seat with Cassie, Archer slammed the door shut before carefully cradling her in his arms.
While Lucky drove like a bat out of hell, he called Logan to let him know what had happened. After that, the other man made another call. This one to Detective Knox.
Archer didn’t listen to the conversation filling his truck’s speakers. He was too busy pushing down on Cassie’s wounds to try to help stop the bleeding.
She was cold. So fucking cold. But thanks to his medical background, Archer knew that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. Given the day’s cool weather, and the fact that she’d been lying on the cold winter ground, the lower temps my very well be the thing that saves her life.
“Stay with me, Cassie,” he begged. “You’ve come too far to give up now. You hear me? You keep fighting!” Her image blurred behind a wall of tears. “You don’t die on me, you got it? Not today. You’re not dying, today!”
They reached the hospital in record time, and what happened next seemed like a dream. A horrible, terrifying dream he wanted desperately to wake up from.
He and Lucky rushed Cassie into the E.R. Staff immediately took action, getting her a gurney so they could start their own triage. Archer laid her gently onto the thin mattress, trying like hell to ignore the massive amounts of blood still escaping the wounds in her precious body.
Having filled in as medic for their SEAL unit a time or two, he knew the stats the doctors and nurses would need to know. Just as he had in the field, Archer began listing off everything he knew about her physical state.
And when he was done, the team of medical professionals raced away with the woman he loved, disappearing behind a set of swinging doors.
Minutes turned into hours as he waited on pins and needles to learn Cassie’s fate. His entire team was there. By his side.
Ready to have his back.
But if his worst fears rang true…if he lost her…Archer knew there’d be nothing his team could do.
“She’ll be okay, Arch.” Lucky gave his shoulder a tight squeeze. “She’s as tough as they come.”
“I never should have left her.”
Twice. Fuckingtwice, she’d been hurt and all because he hadn’t been there.
“Knock that shit off.” Van’s surly face appeared in Archer’s vision. “We all thought the danger was over when that asshat Yates confessed.”
“I should’ve been there.”
“Van’s right.” Chase stood with his back pressed against the hallway’s opposite wall. “It’s not like you can be with her twenty-four-seven.”
“Even if that’s all you want to do.”
That comment came from Logan, who understood all too well what it was like to fear losing the woman he loved. But he hadn’t lost Natalie. She was standing right here, beside her husband.
Husband.
That had been his big plan. To propose. Not right away, of course. But soon.
The way Archer had looked at it, they’d gone the unconventional route from the start. So why wait to start their lives together until enough time has passed to be deemed socially acceptable?
That had been his thought. It was why he’d already bought the ring. A ring Cassie may never get the chance to wear.
You’ll wear it, sweetheart. One way or the other, that diamond will be on your left hand.
He just prayed she was still alive when he slid it on her finger.
“I assume you’re all here for Cassandra Montgomery?”
Archer and the others perked up when a petite nurse with a round face and a friendly smile appeared through those swinging doors.
“We are.” He rushed toward her. “I’m…her fiancé.” The need to see her superseded any guilt he may have felt from lying. Besides if Cassie made it…if she survived being shot twice at point-blank range…he would be her fiancé.
As long as she’d still have him.