by Becky McGraw
***
Brock was exhausted when he finally hit the main road into town. Most of his exhaustion was mental from replaying the damned argument with Melanie that he hadn’t been able to get out of his head since it happened. He thought he could forget up there, clear his head like the last time, but it was dull, lifeless place now without a scrap of joy, just like his life had been before she came back to town. Everywhere he looked she was there, but she wasn’t.
It was almost like she haunted the place now—haunted him.
To make matters worse, Brady got sick as soon as they set up camp, so Brock just gave up and headed back to town. He had to stop twice during the drive back to let him get sick on the side of the road, so it’s a good thing they left. He was even considering taking him to the emergency room because he looked that ill right now curled in a ball in the passenger’s seat.
Thankfully, he’d gone to sleep.
Brady swore he hadn’t eaten any gummy bears today, but it could be the lingering effects from the vitamins. He had a slight fever this time, though, and had never had that before so he was damned worried about him. He wondered if he could just stop by Melanie’s mother’s house and she could take a quick look at him?
She’d probably tell him to go fuck himself, and Brock couldn’t blame her.
He’d said things he shouldn’t have—things she definitely didn’t deserve because she’d tried to help him. Melanie said what she said because she cared about Brady, about him, not because she was trying to get even with anyone. Even if Lucy had been relatively calm the last week, she had been off-center around Melanie since she’d been back. Brock could see where Mel could jump to those conclusions about her—especially given her justifiable dislike from the past.
If anything, Lucy was the one who was jealous of her, not the other way around. She had every right to be, because Melanie Fox had grown up to be a pretty damned spectacular woman, and not only because she was beautiful. Her beauty was on the inside too, and that had to chap Lucy’s ass bad.
Maybe Melanie was cooled off now and he could apologize, explain that he’d talked to Lucy and things were fine, that it was not intentional. She probably wouldn’t forgive him, but at least he’d have it off his chest. There was so much on his chest these days, it was getting harder and harder to breathe.
As if on auto-pilot, his SUV hung a left onto Porter Street and his insides clenched. He slowly made his way past the well-tended bungalow style homes until he got to the end of the street. When Melanie’s car wasn’t in her mother’s driveway, and the house was dark, Brock’s stomach rolled as he glanced at his dash clock and saw it was almost one o’clock in the morning.
Where would she be at this time of night? Had she left early? Had she had enough of him and this town and just headed back to Texas already?
Emotion shot up to his throat and fear gripped him as he swung into the driveway to turn around. The only other place she could be would be Dr. Carter’s office on the other end of town.
But at one o’clock in the morning?
She’d been there at almost midnight last night, so it was possible. It looked like she was working damned hard to rid herself of this town again. He hoped he might be able to change her mind. This time he was going to find the right thing to say to her. I think I love you, and need you to stay so we can figure this out.
Please let her be there.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Brock drove past the station and saw Rowdy’s SUV parked on the side of the building, but he didn’t stop. God, he’d be so glad when the day came that he never had to put that badge on again and work there. Rowdy seemed to like it, but Brock fucking hated that job.
The only part of the job he liked was trying to make a difference. He just wished he felt like he accomplished that more often. The stoplight project still hadn’t been approved by the mayor even though he grudgingly acknowledged the need. Most of the time his job as sheriff only involved playing referee, adult babysitter and peacemaker, which was definitely not his cup of tea.
Brock had enough problems of his own.
When he neared the old Victorian and saw the lights shining through the window and Melanie’s car parked out front, extreme relief washed through him as he whipped into a parking space. He leaned over to nudge Brady, but stopped when he saw the nose of a gold van parked at the side of the building in the shadows.
Lucy’s van, he thought, and brows knotted. There were zero reasons he could think of as to why she’d be here at this time of night other than to cause Melanie trouble. She could even do that during the day, so she had to have another purpose in mind for picking one o’clock in the morning to confront her. That purpose couldn’t be anything good, he thought, and fear turned his blood to ice water in his veins.
Instead of waking Brady, he quietly opened the latch on the glovebox to pull out his pistol but his blood froze solid when it wasn’t there. He’d put it in there on Friday with his badge that was still inside, which made him even more afraid. Brock had driven Lucy to her parent’s house on Saturday morning to drop off Brady so they could go back to her apartment and talk. He’d stopped to get gas on the way, so she’d had the opportunity.
But would she do that? Why? Because you told her the reason you needed to talk to her on the phone before you picked them up and Melanie was right!
Blinding anger and more fear than he’d ever felt in his life mixed into a toxic stew to burn his stomach as Brock reached into the back seat for his shotgun, praying he wasn’t too late. He quietly left the truck so he didn’t wake Brady, then ran toward the front porch.
He flung open the front door and it hit the wall with a loud bang. As he raised the shotgun, as if in slow motion, Lucy spun toward him with his pistol in her hand and Melanie swung a large brown satchel at her head. When it connected, fire belched from the end of the pistol, then burned through his lower abdomen as the bullet dug into his body.
Brock put his hand over the wound and felt warmth ooze against his palm as he staggered back into the wall. It seeped between his fingers as he slid down to sit and the intense pain finally registered in his dazed mind.
Lucy screamed as she fell forward and the gun flew from her hand. Melanie dived on top of her, but it wasn’t necessary because she looked to be out cold. As out cold as Brock would be in a minute if he didn’t stop bleeding, he thought, as he pressed harder against the wound and groaned when pain sliced through him. Black dots danced before his eyes, but he fought them.
“Call 9-1-1, baby—get the gun,” Brock said weakly then moaned. “Brady’s in the tru—”
He tried to get it all out, but the searing pain in his gut took his breath. He gritted his teeth to fight through it, but that made him lightheaded as the black dots merged and he was sucked into a black hole where the pain finally subsided.
Melanie found her senses through the adrenaline overdose flowing through her veins and rolled off of Lucy Morris to scramble to pick up the pistol. That was a chore because her hands were shaking so badly, but she finally managed and turned to stagger back toward the far wall with it aimed at Lucy.
It took her a minute to realize the woman must be unconscious, but that didn’t give her comfort. If she didn’t find something to tie her up, she would probably wake up for round two while she helped Brock. And she needed to help him now, she thought, with sickness swirling through her as she ran toward the supply cabinet.
He was losing too much blood. It was an abdominal wound which could involve many organs. Brock could be dying right now, bleeding out internally and she couldn’t help him. Pressure built in her head until it felt like it would explode as she rifled through the cabinet for something to tie Lucy up with. She needed to get an air medical evac stat. But she had to tie Lucy up first. She needed to call 9-1-1 like Brock said.
Goddamn, where was the IV tubing that was supposed to be in here? When her hand finally closed around it, she got dizzy with relief. So dizzy, she almost fell when she stumbled back
from the cabinet with the tubing in one hand and the pistol in the other.
Get your shit together, Melanie. You’re a freaking trauma specialist. You do this everyday for a living!
But she didn’t do it every day on a man she loved.
Heart in her throat, Melanie ran over to straddle Lucy’s hips and jerk her hands up behind her back. She wound the tubing around and around her wrists in a figure eight as tightly as she could, then tied a double-loop knot to make damned sure it didn’t come loose. Melanie didn’t care if it cut off the circulation to her hands at this point, because those hands had caused enough death. She wasn’t about to let her cause more while she treated Brock.
Getting shot was an awful way for him to learn that this woman was the treacherous bitch Melanie told him she suspected. Some people had to learn the hard way, but like Doctor Carter, she guessed Brock’s heart was in the right place. He gave Lucy the benefit of the doubt, and Melanie hoped he didn’t pay the same price as her mentor for doing that.
She wasn’t letting him pay that price.
Melanie’s heart squeezed painfully as she pushed up against Lucy’s back to stand. She glanced at Brock but ran to pick up the phone and quickly dialed 9-1-1. The operator answered, but Melanie cut her off.
“I’m Dr. Melanie Fox. I have a critical GSW to the abdomen at this address and I’m treating. I need police and an air medical evac stat,” she said then dropped the phone.
Thank God she’d had the phone line turned on with the utilities. They could find her from the landline and she wouldn’t have to spend thirty minutes explaining.
Melanie ran back to the supply cabinet and was relieved when she found a fresh box of gauze bandages, a roll of tape and a pair of tape shears. Hurrying over to Brock she set the supplies down then eased him to the floor, quickly checked his vitals then grabbed the shears.
Positioning the shears at the hem of his shirt, she sliced up the middle. When she parted the sides a gag caught in her throat when she saw the charred, puckered edges around the wound right under his rib cage. It was bleeding a little, but not enough to account for all the blood on the floor where he’d been sitting.
That meant the exit wound was probably worse, she thought, positioning herself to roll him and take a look. She tried twice to lift him, but he weighed too much for her to move his dead weight alone.
Her insides quivered at the thought.
He was not dead weight—Brock Cooper was alive and dammit she was keeping him that way. With a grunt, and extra strength she didn’t know where she found, Melanie pulled up, wedged her shoulder under him then shoved him over onto his side and kept him there but sitting with her back to his. She pulled his shirt away from the wound, and the orange-sized hole put one just that same size in her heart. She grabbed the box of gauze, and pulled out several pads to rip them open. Pushing her shoulder into him like a linebacker, she rolled him, then pressed the gauze pads to the wound with the heel of her hand.
Melanie heard sirens for just a minute and relief flooded through her, right before the front door flew back on its hinges and Brock’s deputy Rowdy stood in the doorway wild-eyed with his pistol drawn.
“What the fuck happened?!?” he shouted, as his eyes fell on Brock then slid across the floor to Lucy who was moaning and squirming now.
“It’s a long story,” Melanie said. “Just arrest her, and take Brady with you. He’s in Brock’s SUV. I’ve got all the proof you need to keep her for a long time.”
Rowdy walked over to her and his face paled when looked down at the amount of blood on the gauze she was holding to Brock’s back.
“That’s, ah, a lot of blood. Is he…” Rowdy’s eyes filled and he swallowed hard.
“Not on my watch,” Melanie said arrogantly. She hadn’t been the best in her graduating class for nothing. She heard the faint whoosh of rotor blades and even more sirens and a tremor rocked her. “It sounds like the cavalry is almost here, so please just get her out of here. Whatever you do—do not let her parents bail her out. You’re arresting her for murder.”
The deputy’s face went whiter, and then green. “I thought you said he wasn’t—”
“He’s not, but she killed Dr. Carter, and tried to kill her son too, so don’t let her near Brady either.” Melanie bit her lip as worry consumed her. If they were transported together, there was no way he could keep them apart. “Drop him off at my mother’s house. She’ll take care of him until I get free. Don’t tell anyone where he’s at.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Rowdy said, with an eyeroll she didn’t miss, and a salute. “Brock is gonna have his damned hands full for sure,” she thought she heard him mumble as he walked over to pull Lucy to her feet.
An hour and a half later, Melanie felt a lot better about Brock’s prognosis when she exited the helicopter. The door across the roof burst open and medical personnel from the level one trauma center she insisted they fly him to, even though it was twenty minutes outside of Atlanta and a lot further away, rushed toward the helicopter.
The flight nurse and medic, who probably hated her guts now, got out and swung the narrow stretcher out through the doorway, then helped the hospital staff transfer Brock to the gurney along with IV bags and monitors. She watched them hang blood, and was damned happy to see it since he’d lost so much. During the flight, Melanie had been on the horn with the head ER doctor here, so she knew as soon as that blood was on board, a trauma surgeon waited to take Brock into surgery.
It was all she could do not to insist on being in charge as they surrounded him and pushed him toward the door across the roof, leaving her standing there feeling like a piece of useless driftwood in a raging storm. Being on the other side of a trauma this time gave her new insight on how those relatives who depended on her to save their loved ones felt.
Melanie looked up and frowned when the crew surrounding Brock stopped just short of the door and buzzed around him. Two nurses separated from them to run inside, and fear overwhelmed her as she ran toward them.
When she got closer, she realized what the problem was. Brock was awake now and struggling with them. Melanie shouldered her way between two nurses and grabbed his arm just as he opened his mouth and roared her name.
“Brock, settle down—you’re at the hospital and they’re trying to help you,” she said, forcing calm into her voice that she definitely didn’t feel. Melanie wanted to bawl like a baby at that moment because he was finally awake and obviously alert.
His pain-filled eyes shot to hers, and he growled, “I fucking love you, Hooty—so don’t you dare think about leaving until we talk!”
Melanie’s insides turned liquid, her face heated and she felt six sets of eyes burning into her, but she didn’t care. She leaned down and pressed a kiss to the corner of his mouth then whispered, “If you want me to stick around, you just said the magic words. Now that you have, though, you better not fucking die or I’ll find you in hell.” She raised up, and glared at him, but her lips trembled. “Now stop being a difficult patient and let them fix you.”
They pushed the gurney a foot, but he stopped them again. “What about Brady?” he demanded, gripping one of the nurse’s arms.
“Brady is safe, Lucy is in jail, and I’m in love with you,” she grated, as she walked over to glare at him again. “You have nothing to worry about other than getting through surgery. Now, let them take you there so I don’t have to knock you out!”
The corner of his mouth ticked up and that dimple appeared. Her heart slid down in her chest then melted and flowed to her toes.
“You sure are bossy, aren’t you?” he asked, then relaxed back on the gurney still wearing a smile. “I think I need someone like you in my life to keep me in line.” The hospital crew pushed him through the door and Melanie sighed.
What in the hell had she gotten herself into? Whatever it was, she looked forward to a lifetime of it, and it appeared that that lifetime would be spent in Sunny Glen, Georgia, a place where five hundred of the oddest hillbillies
on earth lived.
Make that five-hundred and one.
EPILOGUE
Melanie’s body tensed as she watched Brady step behind the center and put his hands down for the ball. This always made her nervous, especially when there was a kid two times the size of her stepson on the other side of the line waiting to cream him if he had a chance.
Brock didn’t seem to be nervous at all, though, his expression was one of calm intensity as he focused on the game. Pee Wee Football, according to him, was serious business. The league that Brock started this fall as his first official act as the new mayor was proof of that. Well, his first was really the only stoplight in town, but he’d seen that done before he resigned as sheriff when the Morris’ left town to be near Lucy in Atlanta.
She liked when Brock was focused like this because it gave her time to watch her sexy new husband in his element and fantasize about him like she did in high school. The only difference now was she could live out those fantasies when she got him home and out of those tight football shorts to have a shower with him.
That was her favorite part of Saturday afternoon, and happened right after they dropped Brady off at his new grandmother’s house for some tea time, leaf reading lessons and lots of love. Unless he insisted on helping Brock with chores before he went.
Please just go over there after the game today, buddy.
Her mother adored Brady, and Aunt June doted on him, and he begged to go over there every chance he got, so maybe he’d just let them drop him off. Unless he insisted Brock give him another lesson on Lorrie today. Brady was getting to be a very good rider, and Brock was talking about upgrading him to one of the mares soon.
That would have to wait until she foaled next year though. He’d had both of the mares inseminated. With the heifers he bought, and the new bull she gave him as a wedding present, next spring the ranch was going to have a lot of new babies. She wondered if the following spring they’d have another. She and Brock had been talking about giving Brady a sibling.