Yellowstone Heart Song

by Peggy L Henderson

  Zach sprang up from his seat when Brad called his name. Aimee didn’t move. She sat quietly in the corner of the room, watching and listening. Brad, still wearing surgical scrubs, extended his hand to Zach.

  “Well, he made it through surgery. The next 24 hours are going to be critical, and . . . ” his voice trailed off when he spotted her.

  “Aimee? What are you doing here?”

  “Waiting to see how your patient is doing,” she said.

  “Do you know him?” Brad asked.

  “Yes,” she said while looking straight at Brad. He seemed a bit confused, but turned his attention back to Zach. “No vital organs were badly damaged, but there was a lot of internal bleeding. He’s had several blood transfusions, and we need to monitor him close to make sure the bleeding is stopped.” His eyes kept finding Aimee while he spoke to Zach.

  “When can I see him?” Zach asked.

  “He’ll be in recovery for a while. When we move him to ICU, you can speak to him.”

  Aimee darted out of the room. Brad called to her, but she ignored him.

  “He just went into recovery,” Jana emerged from the recovery suite. “He hasn’t woken up yet.”

  “I need to get in there and be with him when he wakes up,” she said urgently.

  “Follow me.”

  A nurse stood adjusting an IV line on Daniel’s arm when Aimee and Jana walked in.

  “I’ll take it from here,” Jana said.

  “Thanks,” the nurse gave Jana a grateful look. “I really need to use the restroom.” She hurried off.

  For the first time, Aimee stared at the patient in the hospital bed. Her hand went to her mouth again, and her eyes filled with tears. She almost didn’t recognize him. His hair framed his face in matted strands, and a week-old beard covered his handsome features. A white hospital sheet concealed him from his torso down, the tops of a bandage visible. Spots of betadine and dried blood still splattered his chest.

  “Daniel,” she whispered softly.

  Jana stood by silently as Aimee took hold of Daniel’s limp hand and held it gently.

  “Daniel, if you can hear me, it’s me, Aimee,” she put her head close to his face. Daniel began to stir, his arms coming up defensively to his face.

  “Shh, shh,” Aimee tried to calm him. “You have to lie still, Daniel. It’s okay. I’m right here with you.”

  Daniel opened his eyes with great effort, and blinked against the bright lights.

  “Aimee?” His voice was barely audible.

  “It’s me, Daniel,” Silent tears rolled down her cheeks. “Please don’t be afraid. I know when you wake up everything will look very strange to you, but you have to trust me. Everything we’re doing is to help you live, okay?” She sat on the hospital bed and cradled Daniel’s head between her hands, her forehead resting against his. His hands came up slowly to feel her face.

  “I thought I lost you.” His voice sounded weak and hoarse.

  “Never,” she whispered, her heart beating wildly.

  “Aimee? What the hell is this?”

  Her head shot up and she straightened at hearing Brad’s voice behind her. Daniel fought the anesthesia to wake up.

  “Let me guess,” Brad finally sneered, “that’s your Montana woodsman.”

  Jana turned to face him. “Don’t make a scene,” she whispered to him. “You took a Hippocratic oath, remember?”

  “You can’t be serious!” Brad gave Jana a hard look. “I’m not going to hurt my patient, but you’ll have to excuse me that I’m not doing the happy dance to see her with another man.”

  “Leave them be.” Jana looked meaningfully at Brad. “Please.”

  With a snort, Brad turned and left the recovery room. “Page me if you need something,” he called over his shoulder.

  “Thank you once again, for coming to my rescue.” Aimee breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Where the hell am I?” Daniel said weakly, trying to wake up from his drug-induced stupor.

  “I’ll tell you everything, Daniel, but for now just lie still to let your head clear, okay?”

  Daniel tried to sit up, but stopped and groaned in obvious pain.

  “I told you to lie back,” Aimee ordered, pushing his shoulders down. “You’ve been stabbed several times, and those wounds are going to split open again if you don’t stay still.”

  Daniel did as he was told, and grimaced. “Did you sew me back up?”

  “No.”

  Daniel raised his head to look around, a frown forming on his face.

  “Where the hell are we?” he asked again.

  “We’re in a hospital,” Aimee answered.

  *****

  Daniel’s forehead wrinkled. “Hospital? How did I get here?”

  “Would you just be still! I’ll explain later. Everything is going to look very strange to you, but you have to wake up fully before I can explain everything. Don’t freak out at the tubes in your arms and everywhere else.”

  “Freak out?” Daniel glanced down at his arms and chest.

  “It’s what you’re about to do. And don’t pull on that! It’s a needle in your arm that is putting fluids in your body.”

  Daniel stared at his arm, then back at Aimee.

  “Your father brought you here when you were trying to commit suicide with those Blackfoot,” Aimee offered in the way of an explanation.

  *****

  Daniel struggled to clear the fog from his mind. There was something he should be remembering, but his brain would not function properly. He’d never been this drunk before.

  “Jana, come meet Daniel.” Aimee turned to her friend, then faced him again. “Daniel, this is my best friend, Jana Evans. I think I’ve mentioned her to you before.”

  “I’ve heard a lot about you, Daniel,” Jana said cordially. “And I have to say, Aimee was not exaggerating one bit.”

  Daniel gave Jana a hard look. The woman in front of him wore the same type of clothing as Aimee. Her hair was darker than Aimee’s and shorter than his own. Where the hell was he?

  “What the hell is going on?” he asked. His eyes darted from Jana to Aimee, to his strange and unnatural surroundings.

  With a serious look on her face, Aimee said, “No more half-truths, Daniel. Your father and I are going to tell you everything.”

  “What’s my father got to do with this?” His mind was trying to tell him something, but it stayed just beyond his reach, and each time he thought he had a grasp on what he should remember, it vanished again.

  “We’ll explain everything,” Aimee repeated, then added, “and you’ll finally know the truth about me, too.” She smiled weakly.

  Daniel tried to focus on her face, still trying to clear his foggy mind. Suddenly it came to him, as his bleary eyes took in the strange lights and surroundings. Unfamiliar noises everywhere pounded in his head. Aimee was from the future! Aimee had lied to him. Used him. Deceived him. Comprehension suddenly dawned as to his whereabouts. He closed his eyes again, trying to shut out the reality of his situation. His father must have brought him to the future. Daniel wished he had left him to die.

  Chapter 23

  Daniel struggled to clear his mind. He couldn’t focus his eyes or ears. Strange sounds echoed in his head. His eyelids felt heavy, and his vision was blurred when he did manage to keep his eyes open. He just wanted give himself over to sleep, but his deeply ingrained instinct to be alert at all times prompted him to fight the sensations.

  He felt as if someone had beaten him over the head several times while coming out of a drunken stupor all at once. He had never felt this weak before, and his surroundings were surreal. Too many strange noises that he had never heard before pounded in his head, and the bright lights shone in his eyes, nearly blinding him. For a fleeting moment he thought that perhaps he was dead. He dismissed that thought immediately. If he were dead, he wouldn’t be feeling any pain, and right now his gut was on fire.

  Those damn Blackfoot had gotten him good. Five warriors had co
me out of nowhere. He took two of them out with well-aimed arrows. He disposed of another attacker with his knife, but the other two got the jump on him, and he was stabbed several times. His father had caught up to him at that point and shot one. He didn’t remember anything after that.

  All he knew was that he hadn’t been able to think straight for a week prior to that incident. He had come back from checking his traps, and Aimee was gone. Her pack and all her belongings were missing as well. Everything except her moccasins, sheepskin coat, and the deerskin dress. He couldn’t believe she would just leave without letting him know. An icy fear had gripped him. Aimee had been acting out of sorts for weeks, but never had she indicated that she wanted to leave.

  His father’s tale came back to him full force. The memory of that conversation flooded his mind, the memory of how his world and everything he had believed to be true shattered apart. Traveling through time. Aimee was from the future. She was no different from Emma after all. Another lying white woman had deceived him. Only this time it was worse. He had lost his heart to her.

  For a moment, he ceased his struggle to open his eyes. Instead he focused on his pain - the physical pain in his gut, not the pain in his heart. His head pounded as if a herd of bison bore down on him, the dizziness threatened to overtake him. His insides were molten fire. He refused to lie still, however. He needed to find his father, to get away from this place. He needed to get back to the world he knew, even if his entire existence had turned out to be a lie.

  *****

  Aimee tensed. At first, he seemed relieved to find her beside him. Now, he acted withdrawn. She realized he needed to fully wake up, but he obviously remembered what had transpired back in his time. Was he thinking about his conversation with his father?

  “Daniel?” she asked hesitantly.

  “Where’s my father?” he rasped.

  “He’s . . . he’s waiting to see you,” Aimee stammered. Tears threatened to spill from her eyes. She recognized his sudden anger. It was all her fault. She had lied to him all this time, and his reaction was exactly as she’d feared.

  “I wish to see him now.” Daniel’s voice sounded more forceful. He tried again to rise to a sitting position. Jana quickly moved to his side, and she and Aimee both tried to push him back down.

  “You have to lie still, Daniel. It’s too soon after your surgery,” Aimee pleaded. Daniel fought against the pressure of their hands on his shoulders.

  “Get my father,” he commanded through gritted teeth, his cold stare piercing Aimee’s heart.

  “He’s going to reinjure himself,” Jana said. “How can he even move already?” She shot Aimee a look of amazement. “I’ve never seen anyone try to move so soon after abdominal surgery.”

  “I have,” Aimee said solemnly. “Daniel, you need to lay back and stop fighting,” she addressed him calmly.

  “Dammit, woman, go and get my father!”

  Daniel’s confrontational attitude and shouting brought a few more nurses to his bedside. One of them had a syringe in her hand, and injected its contents into the IV line in his arm.

  “Boy, he’s a fighter,” she commented.

  Aimee stepped back, watching in horror. The realization that she may have lost him all over again brought a crushing sensation to her chest. He threw a final accusing look in her direction before the sedative he’d been given made him slump back against the pillow. She sucked in a breath at the cold stare of betrayal in his eyes. Then they became unfocused again, and his lids drifted shut. His body relaxed against the mattress.

  Aimee collapsed onto a nearby stool and buried her face in her hands. She didn’t look up when Jana’s supportive arms came around her shoulder.

  “He’ll come around,” Jana whispered encouragement. “I can’t even imagine what this must be like for him.”

  “No, you don’t understand,” she shook her head. “I know what’s going through his mind. I lied to him and deceived him. He hates me now.”

  “The way he looked at you, even barely out of anesthesia, before he realized where he was tells me otherwise. Any woman would kill to have a man look at her that way. He’ll come around.”

  Aimee wasn’t convinced. She knew him too well.

  ****

  The pain in Daniel’s gut woke him sometime in the middle of the night. Or was it daytime? He had lost all sense of time. Too many strange lights shone everywhere, none of them sunlight. His mind fought against the effects of the drugs in his system.

  As his mind began to clear, he remembered again where he was. He raised his head and looked around. He saw strange contraptions everywhere. He didn’t even have words to describe them. He eyed the peculiar smooth thin ropes – were they ropes? – which seemed to be everywhere on his body. Some were a grey color, others were white. They were all attached to his chest, and one rope the clear color of water came out of his arm. The line went to some sort of water bag hanging from a shiny pole. Every time he tried to move, he felt a new rope somewhere on his body.

  “What the hell?” Daniel growled. He pulled away the blanket covering him, and the shirt hanging down just past his privates. Sure enough, there was a tube there as well! Daniel had had enough. He had never felt this trapped before. He pulled on the tube and felt a burning sensation, but he kept pulling until it was out. He was tempted to do the same to the rest of the lines attached to him, but he held off at the moment. He raised himself to a sitting position and slowly pulled his legs over the side of the bed, clutching at the bandage around his middle. White-hot pain shot through his insides.

  He looked around the strange room. Aimee lay curled up in a chair in the corner. Her chest moved up and down rhythmically in sleep. Daniel studied her for a moment. Something squeezed his heart at the sight of her. Her beautiful long hair framed her face, falling in cascades down her shoulders and over her breasts. He wanted to burn the sight of her into his memory, then quickly thought better of it and looked away. She had turned out to be nothing but a deceptive white woman after all. The ache in his heart that came with that knowledge overrode the pain in his gut.

  Daniel tried to stand, but felt a tugging sensation on his chest. He reached his hand under the shirt to find where the lines were attached. He jerked them off impatiently, then stood to his feet. The feel of the smooth cold ground beneath his soles was as foreign as everything else. He felt weak and his insides hurt, but he needed to be out of this bed. He discovered that the shirt he wore only covered his front, while his backside was completely exposed. What a strange world this was.

  An instant later, the door to the room burst open, and a woman came barging in.

  “What are you doing, sir?” she asked, a horrified look on her face. Daniel scowled. How had she known he’d gotten out of bed? And was the future made up entirely of females? He couldn’t recall seeing a single man anywhere. Was that why they all wore britches?

  Aimee stirred awake at the sound of the nurse’s voice, and scrambled off the chair.

  “What are you doing?” her voice sounded panicked as she rushed to his side and grabbed hold of his arm.

  “I couldn’t lie in that bed any longer,” Daniel growled.

  “He removed his leads,” the nurse remarked in an exasperated tone. She moved swiftly to his side to usher him back in the bed. A crunching sound made her glance down at the ground. “Oh Jesus, he pulled out his urinary catheter as well!”

  Daniel scowled, and Aimee giggled, holding her hand over her mouth.

  “Mr. Osborne, you need to get back in that bed so I can hook you up again,” the nurse said with a stern voice.

  “I refuse to have any more of these . . . things attached to my body,” he countered.

  “Can I have a few moments with him, Susan?” Aimee asked quietly. “I think the drugs are making him uncooperative, and I’ll try and calm him down,”

  “Okay, Aimee,” the woman said with a shake of her head. “I’d best turn off the EKG alarm at the nurse’s station. But make him see reason, ‘c
ause I don’t need Dr. Bigsby chewing me out in the morning.”

  “I’ll take full responsibility,” Aimee assured her. Facing him, she gently took his hand in hers. He flinched as if she’d burned him and pulled away. Aimee set her face determinedly.

  “If you don’t cooperate and lie back down, they’ll give you more drugs to subdue you.” Her tone sounded indifferent. “You’re a strong man, Daniel, but you can’t fight the medicines in this time.”

  He only glared at her.

  “Remember what I told Elk Runner? How he needed to lie still? Well, your injury is much worse, and . . . ” He wouldn’t let her finish. He tugged on her shirt at her waist, pulling her to him, and brought his mouth roughly down on hers. He couldn’t help himself. He had to taste her one last time. He abruptly released her again before Aimee had a chance to even respond.

  “You have to listen to me right now. You need to get back in that bed.” Aimee’s voice sounded labored.

  He refused to look at her, and reluctantly sat down and pulled himself into the bed.

  “Where’s my father?” he asked coldly.

  “He’s probably sleeping in the ICU family room. I’ll go get him.” She glanced over her shoulder once more and left the room, quietly closing the door behind her. He sank back against the pillow, clutched his side, and stared at the ceiling.

  *****

  “Leave us,” Daniel’s voice was still ice cold when Aimee returned with Zach in tow.

  Biting back the tears, her eyes darted from Daniel to his father. Zach gave her an apologetic glance, and nodded almost imperceptibly for her to leave the room.

  Aimee reached for the door handle, then turned to gaze one more time at the man she loved more than anything. “Please, Daniel, if you’d only let me explain . . . ”

  “No! I’ve heard enough lies!” Daniel lunged up from his position on the bed, but stopped short as he clutched his injured side. Grimacing, he groaned and slumped back against the pillow.

  Every cell in her body screamed to rush to his side, to implore him to listen to her, beg his forgiveness, but his reaction just now held her back. She didn’t want to be the cause of him reinjuring himself.