I slowly cut his t-shirt from his body, peeling the pieces away; his wounded shoulder was a little more difficult, but I managed to get it all.
By the time Adam had returned, Cole was bare-chested and all pieces from the t-shirt had been removed.
Adam sat the case on the table and I opened it, grabbing a syringe and a bottle of anesthetic.
I grabbed a pair of gloves and put them on, before taking a needle out of its plastic.
“What are you doing?” Cole asked hesitantly.
“Trust me,” I replied softly.
I then inserted the clear needle into the anesthetic bottle.
I wiped an area clean just above the wound and inserted the needle; I did this four more times around the wound.
I then opened a bottle of salt water and began to clean the wound.
Then I ripped open a new pair of long medical tweezers from a plastic pack.
I slowly moved the tweezers into the wound.
“Feel that?” I asked Cole.
He shook his head.
I nodded mine and continued.
It wasn’t easy removing a bullet.
One, because the bullet doesn’t stay in a solid form; it explodes, leaving pieces everywhere.
It took me a while to get the job done; the room was in complete silence.
I forgot about the others in the room, so I was surprised when Tyler spoke up.
“You’ve done this before,” Tyler stated.
I gave him a quick glance as I continued to now sew Cole’s wound closed.
“Yeah.” I replied.
“I didn’t feel a thing,” Cole said in disbelief.
I lightly wiped an alcohol wipe over the now-sealed wound.
“Told you to trust me,” I advised and shot him a small smile.I couldn’t remember the last time I had smiled at any of my brothers, but, right now, I was finding myself giving Cole a smile, but a small one.
“Thanks,” he mumbled.
I placed a bandage on the wound and taped it in place. I then finally wrapped a large white bandage over the wound and around his chest and back, repeating this process until the bandage roll ran out.
“Done,” I said and let out a low sigh.
This brought back so many memories of Blake.
I handed Cole a bottle of prescription painkillers.
“These will help with the pain. I will clean the wound in two days.”Again, that small smile was on my face. I turned my attention to closing my case back up. “It was deep, so don’t do any heavy lifting and try to rest or you will rip the stitches.”