Page 1 of Patch

Prologue

Lincoln/Patch

Twenty years ago

The headlights hit the wound and I knew it was bad.

High in the thigh, just inside the crease. Arterial. The blood came in pulses, not a steady flow. Every beat of his heart cost him a quarter-cup. Gunner was halfway across the bench seat, his back against the passenger door, his leg straight out. His eyes were open but the color had gone out of them. His hand pressed weakly against the hole. Not enough.

I pulled the truck over and killed the engine.

I’d been driving several minutes, and I’d spent the entire time telling myself it wasn’t the femoral.

It was the femoral. I’d seen one before, on a man who didn’t make it, and the way the blood came in pulses instead of a flow told me everything I didn’t want to know.

A tourniquet was the answer. High on the thigh, above the wound, cinched down until it hurt worse than the hole did. I knew that much. What I didn’t have was a tourniquet, or a belt long enough to make one out of, because his was under him and mine was holding my jeans up, and there was a hole in his leg that needed both hands.

So I’d have to pack it instead, and packing it meant pressure, and pressure meant I couldn’t drive and hold it at the same time. I had about two minutes to decide which one of those mattered more.

The phone showed no signal. The map showed a county road running east toward the highway, then the long haul south to County Medical. Sixty miles if I drove straight. Ninety if I fucked around.

I didn’t have ninety miles.

My hands moved before my brain caught up. Gunner. A hair over twenty years old, the worst singing voice in the state, but a guy who always had my back. I said his name out loud twice before I realized I was doing it.

The floorboard had a bag of new shop rags tucked under the seat. I grabbed one and tore it in half with my teeth. The fabric ripped clean. My fingers found the wound. Warm. Slick. The blood had already soaked through his jeans and pooled on the vinyl seat. I pressed the rag into the hole with my left hand. Gunner’s breath hitched. His head rolled back.

“Stay with me.”

He didn’t answer.

I reached behind the seat with my right hand and found the roll of duct tape. Army surplus. The good shit. I tore a strip with my teeth and wrapped it around the rag, circling his thigh three times, pulling it tight enough that my knuckles went white. The tape stuck to blood-slick skin and held. I tore another strip. Another. Gunner’s breathing changed. Slower. Shallow.

“Listen to me. We’re going to County. You hear me? County.”

I got him flat across the bench seat. His head against the passenger door, his legs across my lap. The wound was packed. The tape was holding. Blood seeped through the rag in a slow ooze instead of a pulse. That was something. Not enough, but something.

I started the truck.

Ninety miles an hour down a county road in the dark. No other cars. No houses. Just the truck’s headlights eating the center line and the engine screaming in second gear. I drove one-handed.

I talked.

“Bear’s cooking tonight. You know what that means. Either the chili or the brisket. Man can’t decide to save his life. Last time he made both and we ate for three days.”

Gunner’s eyes tracked. His mouth moved but nothing came out.

“Fox won the pool again. Fifty bucks on the Saints. Man’s got a gambling problem and the devil’s own luck.”

A breath. Shallow.

“Dread’s back from whatever mission Fox sent him on. You hear that? Dread’s back. Three weeks and the man looks like he’s been sleeping in a ditch.”

His chest rose under my hand. Fell. Rose again.

The cab smelled of iron and motor oil. Thankfully the rag was clean. But the blood from Gunner’s wound mixed with the smells in the truck. I cracked the window. Cold air hit my face and did nothing.

I didn’t look at the wound again.