Girlfriend Got Text From Marine in Final Moments

The girlfriend of one of the four Marines killed in Chattanooga received a text from him yesterday that she assumed was a joke. "ACTIVE SHOOTER," read the message from 21-year-old Lance Cpl. Skip Wells. "You are so weird," replied Caroline Dove. But Dove tells AP that she began getting worried when no reply came. "I love you," she texted after a few hours. Then, "Hon, I need you to answer me please." He never would, and Dove didn't learn for sure what happened to him until today.

Earlier, the two had exchanged happier texts on the news that Dove had booked a flight from Georgia to Chattanooga to see him for the first time in months. "Can't wait anymore," he texted her. "Yes you can honey," she answered. Back in Georgia, friends were still grappling with the news. “He was just a protector,” one tells the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “He looked at everyone with love. And he would go anywhere to protect anybody.” (More Chattanooga stories.)