Claire was painfully aware of every movement, and sound, his body made. Her fingers felt something wet at the back of his head. She held up her hand. Blood. He groaned but didn’t gain consciousness. “Help me roll him onto his side. We need to stop the bleeding.”
“Yeah, we don't want blood all over the car,” Megan said.
“I was thinking more along the lines of the guy bleeding out and dying on us.”
“That too.”
“Do we have anything we can use to stop the bleeding? Do we have a first-aid kit in the car? We need to dress this wound. He’s bleeding a lot.”
“I think I have something. Be right back.” Megan ran for the car.
Claire caressed the man’s face. “It’s going to be okay. You hit your head. I don’t think anything else is damaged. Don’t worry, we’ll take good care of you.”
“Got something,” Megan called out breathlessly. She collapsed in the dirt beside them. “Here.” She thrust a box of tampons and a pair of red tartan tights at Claire.
Claire stared at them for a minute. “What the heck am I supposed to do with this?”
“They’re absorbent. Tie them to the wound with the tights, then voila, no more bleeding.”
Claire rubbed her temples.
“Have you got a better idea?” Megan demanded.
Unfortunately Claire didn’t, and the guy was still bleeding out in front of them. “Okay, hold them in place while I fix these to his head.” She pressed a row of tampons to the wound, then Megan held them to his head as Claire fixed them in place with the tartan tights. The tights wound around his head several times before she secured them by tying a bow on his forehead.
They leaned over him.
“Is he still bleeding?” Megan said.
“Shine the light here and I’ll check.” To her relief, there was no fresh blood. “We’re good. It’s stopped.”
She gently placed him back on the ground and stood. The women stared at him. From the neck down the guy was a badass wrestler for WWE. From the neck up he looked like a five-year-old had played doctor with him.
“The bow’s kind of cute,” Megan said. “Makes him look less intimidating. I’ll get the car.”
Megan reversed the car up beside Claire.
Claire looked at the huge man, then back to the tiny car. “I think he may be bigger than our car. We’ll never squeeze him in the back. We’ll have to put him in the passenger seat. His knees will be up around about his ears, but he won’t notice. Guess there’s an upside to being unconscious.”
Megan nodded, then pushed the passenger seat back as far as it would go. They looked down at the unconscious man.
“We should probably have kept up those yoga classes,” Claire said. “This is going to take muscle that I just don’t have. You grab the feet; I’ll take the arms.”
Megan held his feet, which were clad in black running shoes. Claire grabbed hold of his hands, noticing how massive they were compared to hers. She looked at her sister. “On the count of three, we lift him and get him to the door. From there we can lever him up into the seat.”
“Got it.”
“One, two, three.”
They strained. They grunted. They pulled. He barely moved an inch. Red-faced and panting, they stared at each other.
“Is he made of frigging rock?” Megan said.
“Solid muscle. Trust me. I felt it.” Claire rubbed the back of her neck while she tried to think. “Come over here—we’ll take an arm each and drag him to the car.”
Megan rushed to her sister’s side.
“Ready? Go.”