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They were in the thick of it this time, dodging bullets and grenades as easily and calmly as they’d once played dodgeball on the school playground. He’d thought they were in the clear and had been counting heads to make sure they hadn’t inadvertently left a man behind. It looked like they were all there. They were running for the chopper that was waiting to get them home and to some well-deserved R and R. He could see two guys kneeling on the aluminum floor, pulling the unit inside as other guys fired at the enemy that was closing fast.
As usual, the only guy behind him was the commander—he was always first in and last out. “Run, Greg! Move your ass!”
Greg put on a burst of speed just as he felt like someone had hit the back of his neck with a sharp stick to shove him forward. Only the stick burned all the way through from the back before he saw a burst of red spurting out from the front of his neck. Greg heard Oliver shout his name as his knees began to buckle, and he stumbled, falling face first into the hot sand.
“Not on my watch, Summerlin,” Oliver said as he somehow managed to scoop Greg up, throwing him across his shoulders in a fireman’s hold and sprinting towards the chopper.
Oliver must have jumped as they took off and several pairs of strong hands pulled them on board as the chopper banked hard and away. He could feel his life slipping away as he was dragged to the rear.
“Give him room to breathe,” ordered Oliver. “It’s not as bad as it looks.”
“Commander…”
“Leave him. I’ll get him cleaned up. Tell base our medic has been hit, and I expect the best surgical team standing by when we land.”
Greg’s eyes were glassing over, his sight narrowing and darkening. He wasn’t going to make it. He reached for Oliver. He needed him to understand it was okay and that he didn’t hold Oliver responsible.
“It’s okay, Commander. I know I’m dying. Make sure the unit is okay. Casey’s wife is about to give birth. Tell him not to mention my death…”
“You’re not dying, Summerlin. Like I said, not on my watch.”
The Commander’s eyes had turned from their normal dark brown to a golden hue with an ethereal glow. Greg couldn’t be sure, but it almost looked like his CO had put in one of those sets of vampire teeth, because there were fangs…
Present Day
The nightmare of his death as a human and rebirth as a wolf-shifter often left him shaking. But this time it wasn’t the dream; it was someone shaking his shoulder.
“Greg?” It was Oliver’s calm, cool voice. “Greg. We’re in the Hamptons. I need you to wake up. We need to have another of those ‘if I tell you too much, I’ll have to kill you’ conversations.”
Fuck, now what?
