Page 37 of Reckoning

Tate reached out until he felt her beside him, trying to focus on anything but the pain. “You’re doing good, honey. Real good. Just wait until the storm passes before you leave the shelter. Promise.”

“I promise,” she said, trying not to look at how much blood he was still losing. Tate…my Tate…please don’t die.

Chapter 7

The silence after the roar of the storm was so abrupt that it was startling. It felt like they’d been waiting forever, when it was only minutes inside the shelter. The rumble of thunder was now a distant echo of what it had been. Rain was still falling, but the wind was gone, still wrapped up in the swift-moving storm.

Briar flashed the light at Tate. He’d quit talking a few minutes ago and she needed to get help. She kept checking for a pulse, knowing if he died, it would break her in a thousand pieces. He had a pulse. That’s all she needed to know as she shoved the lever up to unlock the door, and bolted out into the utility room, only to realize her cell phone had no service.

She was about to go for help when she thought about their landline and ran to the kitchen. She caught a glimpse of herself in a mirror as she picked up the phone, only then remembering she’d given up half of her clothing to keep Tate from bleeding out.

The moment she heard the glorious sound of a dial tone, she called 911.

A few blocks down, the sheriff’s department was in shambles, but they still had a roof on the building, and everybody on duty was scrambling to answer the frantic calls for help.

And then Briar’s call went through.

“911. What is your emergency?”

“This is Briar Lowe. I need an ambulance ASAP at 440 Anderson Road. Tate Bandy was injured in the storm. He has a huge shard of glass stuck in the back of his leg, and another shard in his shoulder. I put a tourniquet on his leg during the storm, but he’s lost a lot of blood. Please hurry. The front door is unlocked. We’re in the aboveground storm shelter in their utility room.”

“I’m dispatching them now,” the dispatcher said.

“I have to go,” Briar said, and hung up.

As she was running back through the house, she saw one of his T-shirts hanging on a doorknob, grabbed it, and put it on as she dashed back into the shelter and dropped back beside him.

“Tate, sweetheart…help is on the way.”

In the few moments when he didn’t answer, she forgot to breathe, and frantically felt for a pulse. It was still there. She rocked back on her heels, trying not to cry. A cool head was needed. She could cry later.

Tate roused just enough to whisper, “Don’t leave me.”

“Never,” she promised, and then grabbed hold of the screwdriver in the tourniquet to keep it from slipping. It was only then she realized that she was kneeling in his blood.

* * *

The blessing of a small town was that it didn’t take long to get anywhere within the city limits. Within a couple of minutes, the siren on the ambulance alerted her they were en route. She heard it pulling up in the front yard, followed by running footsteps on the porch, and when she heard the sounds of men shouting as they came into the house, she knew they’d been saved.

“In here!” she called. “We’re in here!”

Seconds later, she was ejected from the shelter to give the emergency crew room to work. She stood as close to the open door as she could get to hear what they were saying, watching intently as they worked to get an IV established then started a drip. After that, they loaded him facedown on a stretcher, moved him out of the shelter, then took off through the house.

“Can I ride with him?” she asked.

“Sorry, Miss Briar, but it’s against the rules,” an EMT said. “The south side sidewalk is clear enough of debris. You can’t drive there, but there are no downed power lines in that area. You can see him after we get him in ER.”

“Yes, okay,” she said, and watched them carrying him to the ambulance, then driving away in the rain.

Her cell phone was in her pocket, and Tate’s had gone with him. But they were both useless, and both of their parents needed to know what had happened.

She ran back into the kitchen to the landline and, after rifling through a couple of drawers, found a little notebook with Abel Bandy’s cell phone number. Her hands were shaking from the adrenaline rush as she lifted the receiver, punched in the numbers, and waited as the call began to ring.

It rang and rang without being picked up. She was desperate to get to Tate, but his parents had to know. Then, finally, she heard Abel Bandy’s voice.

“Hey, son, what’s going on?” Abel asked.

Briar was trying desperately not to cry, but he sounded so much like Tate over the phone that it was hard to focus.