The place was thriving. Old Man Michaels had bragged that they’d make a go of it without any help from the likes of Travis. Had he been the reason Katie had broken up with him? Ben had never been particularly fond of Travis, that was for sure.
And from the looks of things, the cantankerous old man had been right. Katie didn’t need Travis at all. The notion of coming all this way to aid of someone who didn’t need him irked Travis.
Why was he here in Midway again when, from the look of things, Katie was doing fine?
Oh yeah. Danny had sent him on this mission.
“Stop messing with my head, Danny boy.” The loss of his friend had consumed him day and night for months. If only Danny had reached out to him that night…
Don’t think about that now. Figure out why you’re here, fix whatever it is, and head home to Tennessee where you belong.
Stepping onto the back porch, Travis thought he heard someone inside. Good. He wanted answers only Katie could provide. He hoped Ben wasn’t home. That ornery old coot had interfered in his and Katie’s business more than enough during their fourteen months together. What Travis had come here for had nothing to do with him.
But was there a husband in Katie’s picture now? He hoped that wasn’t who opened the door when he knocked.
He rapped sharply, only to be answered by the sound of breaking glass inside the kitchen. Peeking through a slit in the door’s curtains, he saw a woman—Katie!?!—lying face down in a spreading pool of amber liquid and shattered glass. Passed out? What the…?
He tried the handle. Locked.
“Katie, it’s Travis! Can you hear me?”
Silence.
Looking around the porch, he grabbed a baseball bat, of all things, and broke out one of the window panes. Reaching inside, he unlocked the ancient double-cylinder deadbolt. Why would she leave a bat on the porch and the key in the lock? He’d worry about her lapse in security later, because if he hadn’t been able to break in this way, he’d have busted down the door somehow.
Once inside, he knelt beside her. “Katie!”
Nothing.
He felt for a pulse in her neck, letting out a breath when he found it. She wasn’t dead at least. Pulling his phone from his back pocket, he dialed 9-1-1 and relayed what limited information he could to the dispatcher. He didn’t have an address, having come here by memory, so he said the Michaels Farm. The woman said she knew where the farm was.
“Is Chelsea okay?”
The woman must be confused. “I’m calling about Katie Michaels. She’s lying in her kitchen in a pool of apple juice of some kind.” Or was it apple-pie moonshine? He and Katie had had a little too much of a friend’s home brew one Thursday night, which had been the last time he’d touched the potent liquor. He’d thought they’d both learned their lessons then, though.
“Is Kate breathing?” So the dispatcher not only knew the location of the farm, but Katie, too. That was one thing he liked about living in a small town; everybody knew everyone else.
“Yes.”
“Is she having a problem with her sugar?”
“What?”
“Did Kate faint because of her sugar?”
Hell, he didn’t know Katie had health problems. Is that why Danny told him to come here? “She has diabetes?” His mother had been diagnosed with Type II diabetes five or six years ago, and before she’d found the right balance of diet, exercise, and medication. Mom had had a couple of close calls where her sugar had dropped too low. Was that what was wrong with Katie?
There was a pause on the phone before the dispatcher said, “Who am I speaking with?”
“Travis Cooper.”
“Are you one of her students?”
Would the woman ever send the damned ambulance and quit asking all these questions? He was afraid to move Katie, but if they didn’t get help here soon, he’d take her to the hospital himself.
“No. Just an old friend.” An old boyfriend to be exact. He’d noticed the riding lessons sign out front before pulling into her driveway, so that must be one of the ways they kept the place afloat all these years.
A distant wail of a siren came through the broken pane of glass. Finally. Apparently, the dispatcher had sent an ambulance while keeping him on the phone asking questions.
“Make sure she stays breathing and don’t put anything in her mouth.” What would he possibly put in her mouth? “We’ll have someone there in a few minutes. They’ll take very good care of her.”
“Thanks. I hear the siren now.”
Katie moaned, and Travis disconnected the phone without thinking. He stroked her hair. “It’s okay, Katie. Help’s on the way.”
Her brow wrinkled, but her eyes remained closed. She faded out again, and her forehead relaxed once more. He continued to touch her there and along her cheek, hoping he was soothing her and that she knew he was with her.
“I’m sorry, Katie.” Sorry he hadn’t come back sooner. Or that he hadn’t sought the answers he wanted back when they’d first broken up. He’d let his bruised ego rule him then, refusing to come groveling on his hands and knees to a woman who’d made it clear she didn’t want him.
And yet he’d never wanted to make any other woman his wife.
Why the hell had she broken up with him in the first place? He still had no clue.
The siren cut off nearby, and he ran to the door so he could show them where she was. They drove up the lane at a good clip and stopped near the path to the kitchen door.
“She’s in here. Passed out. Possible complication of diabetes.”
When the hell had she gotten the disease? She wasn’t overweight, but then neither was his mother. But Katie was only thirty-three—thirty-four in September. Did she have a family history? Her father didn’t have it, as far as Travis knew. He only knew what she’d told him about her mother—that’s the woman had died when Katie was five.
The EMTs grabbed their equipment and followed him inside. Katie still lay pale and motionless in the same spot. Damn, he could have at least cleaned up the juice around her. He wasn’t thinking clearly.
As they worked on Katie, he found the waste can under the sink and a pile of old newspapers on the floor near the door and began picking up the glass from the window he’d broken. He glanced at Katie and the EMTs every few moments to see what was going on. They worked in near silence, only asking each other for what they needed and what they found. One did a finger stick, and Travis thought he read the number as twenty-six on the monitor. Damn. No wonder she’d passed out.
If the dispatcher was aware of her condition, then Katie wasn’t new to diabetes. So why wasn’t she taking better care of herself?
Too many questions he didn’t have answers to.
When one of the EMTs went outside again, Travis moved closer. “How is she?”
“We’re administering glucose but will need to transport her to Georgetown for observation.”
Georgetown. After confirming where they intended to take her, Travis pulled out his phone and programmed the map app to the regional hospital. It was about half as far there as to the hospital in Frankfort, given that her farm was east of Midway. “I’m going to check on her horses and will follow you.”
They quickly loaded Katie into the ambulance and left. Knowing the hospital wouldn’t let him in to see her until she came to, Travis mopped the stickiness off the kitchen floor before going out to the barn to check on her horses, which appeared to be fine.
Katie had been the one to spark his interest in horses. Even though he’d never owned any of his own, he’d gone to a number of Saddlebred shows and had helped out on the horse farm of his foreman in Franklin, Kentucky. He’d check on Katie’s horses more carefully later tonight after bringing her home. If she was released. Where the hell was her dad?
Five minutes later, with her purse in the passenger seat to give to the hospital staff, he drove the hilly, winding roads as fast as he safely could, relying on the GPS to get him to Georgetown Community Hospital
.
Once there, he quickly learned only family could go back without her consent. He provided them with her driver’s license and insurance card, feeling strange to be rifling through her wallet this way. He exhaled in relief when he found no photos of a husband or boyfriend. Only a few of a blonde-haired girl who looked to be a preteen, but too old to be Katie’s daughter. A friend’s kid, maybe? Or a godchild?
Every few minutes, he tried again to find out her condition, but they said they couldn’t tell him anything. Would they at least inform him when she was being discharged so he could take her home? He had no clue who else to call for her.
“Mr. Cooper?” He looked up at the woman in the receptionist’s window. “Ms. Michaels is asking to see you.”
Seriously? He carried Katie’s purse to the door where the woman buzzed him inside. A staff member met him and guided him to Katie’s bedside. She was still far too pale, her hair plastered to her forehead, and she was avoiding eye contact with him, perhaps from embarrassment about how he’d found her—and yet she was the most beautiful sight he’d ever seen in too damned long.
When she finally looked up at him, his stomach did a funny little flip, and he grinned at her like a fool.
“Glad to see you’re awake, Katie.”
Chapter Two
Kate couldn’t believe she’d woken up in the hospital after having a rare diabetic episode. But hearing the deep, soothing voice from her past made the experience even more surreal. It had to be him. No one had ever called her Katie but Travis.
Why was he grinning at her like that? Was he amused by her predicament? She looked away. “You found me?”
“I did. How are you feeling?”
“I’m fine.” She avoided his gaze for as long as she could without coming across as an ungrateful bitch. When she looked his way again, his hazel eyes stared back at her with the intensity that had haunted her dreams for more than a decade. When Travis Cooper looked at her, she felt like she was his whole world.
Not that she wanted to feel that way anymore.
“Thanks for being there.” Much as she hated to admit it, if he hadn’t been there, Chelsea could be left motherless. “Um, I don’t have my phone to call anyone for a ride home when they discharge me.”
“No worries. My truck’s parked outside, unless your dad will be back in time to take you home.”
Travis must not have kept up with her from afar. Thank heaven. He probably doesn’t know about Chelsea, either. She released the sheet she’d been holding onto for dear life and smoothed her hand over the wrinkles she’d made. “Daddy died ten years ago.”
Travis came a little closer and squeezed her hand. “I’m so sorry, Katie. I didn’t know. That had to have been hard on you.”
“He was very weak from heart disease those last couple years, so it was a blessing.”
“If I’d known, I’d have been in touch sooner.”
She shook her head. “It’s not necessary. I’ve been doing fine.”
“I’ll say. The farm looks great.” He almost sounded as though that made him happy. “What happened this morning?” he asked as he pulled a chair closer to the bed and sat down. “You scared the hell out of me.”
His eyes were more mature than she remembered. No, sadder. The newfound crow’s feet added more character and made him even more distinguished looking. Where’d he gotten that tan? Travis loved being outdoors, but she’d pictured him primarily working behind a desk as a civil engineering, given his field of study.
Those carefree college days seemed like a lifetime ago.
Chelsea’s lifetime, to be exact.
With sudden clarity, Kate remembered the chain of events that had landed her in the hospital. He’d asked her a question. “The day got away from me…” after you called. “I forgot to eat breakfast.”
“Were you recently diagnosed with diabetes then?”
She shook her head. “No, I’ve had it for more than a decade.” He raised an eyebrow, as if questioning her sudden inability to take care of herself. This had been her first major lapse since she’d been diagnosed as Type I when Chelsea was about fourteen months old. While she’d developed gestational diabetes in her seventh month, it had been easily controlled and went away, or so she thought, after giving birth. Then, about a year later, it was back with a vengeance that scared her and Daddy both. Most women who contracted diabetes post pregnancy ended up as Type II—able to treat it with exercise, diet, and perhaps oral medications. But Kate hadn’t been among the luckier ones and required daily insulin injections. “Oh, I usually am much more in control of it. When I stick to my routine, everything’s fine. Today…well, things didn’t go as planned.”
“My mom’s been Type II now for almost six years. She had a hard time of it at first. Have you thought about getting an insulin pump?”
“After weighing the pros and cons of the pump, I decided monitoring and doing my own injections was the way to go. I don’t want to freak out my students or their parents if they see one strapped around my waist.” Not to mention that her insurance company wouldn’t cover the cost.
“Still, if it can help…”
She waved away his concern, not wanting to talk with him about her body’s moment of weakness. Travis obviously still liked to fix things, and the last thing she needed was to have him hovering over her. “My endocrinologist said I was doing a great job of controlling my A1C. She agreed that the pump was more a convenience than a necessity for me, and I couldn’t afford it. Trust me, today was just a glitch and won’t be repeated.”
“I couldn’t convince Mom to get one, either, although it probably was overkill in her situation. She doesn’t require injections any longer.” Travis grinned.
Her heart fluttered the way it always had around him. The hint of a five o’clock shadow burnished his jaws and chin, and she couldn’t help but remember the feel of his whiskers on her…
Kate blinked back to the present. What had they been talking about? Whatever it was, it was lost now.
Even though Travis had been the cause of this hypoglycemic tailspin, she needed to show a little gratitude. Be fair. All right, while she’d like to blame this episode on Travis, she alone bore the responsibility for her lapse in care and judgment today. No one else. “Thanks for calling for help. I might be facing a much longer stay in here if you hadn’t found me when you did.” She refused to think about what might have happened to Chelsea if he hadn’t found her in time.
She shuddered, and Travis glanced around the room. “Want me to ask a nurse for a warm blanket?”
“No, thanks. I’m fine.” Thank heavens her daughter hadn’t found her. Chelsea already fussed over her too much. A twelve-year-old shouldn’t be obsessed about her mother’s health the way Chelsea was. Just getting her to go to camp this year had taken a promise she would take care of herself this week. Now look at her.
“Any idea when you’ll be discharged?”
Kate shook her head. “Soon. I think they want to test my glucose again in half an hour or so just to be sure.” She glanced away. How was she going to get rid of him when they got back to the farm without appearing ungrateful?
“Good idea. I’m sure you’ll be happy to get back home.”
She nodded, finally ready to ask the question that had plagued her after his call. “What brings you back here, Travis? Where are you living now? Louisville? Or did you stay in New York?” He’d been so excited about his internship she wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d stayed there.
He ran his fingers through his short brown hair, much shorter than he’d worn it when he was younger. “Not a chance. There’s such a thing as a city that’s too big. That place is on steroids twenty-four seven. And the noise with all those horns honking and sirens blaring—well, one summer was enough. But I’m glad I went. It changed my life, for sure.” Without explaining what he meant, he grinned. “I live in a small town south of Nashville called Nolensville. Mostly residential and very quiet.”
“I woul
d have expected you to stay in the city.” Definitely not some small community like mine.
He shrugged and looked away, a sudden solemnity settling over him. “I’ve changed. I avoid crowds and seek solitude more now.”
Had something happened? Something more than a noisy summer in Manhattan? This Travis wasn’t like the easy-going one she’d met and dated while going to school at UK. He’d always been driven, but pretty much went with the flow.
“I see you’ve done a great job with your farm, Katie. How’d you manage all that in such a short time?”
She’d had no choice. “It’s been long time since you’ve been there.” He still hadn’t answered her question about what had brought him back here. “I’m sure you didn’t come all this way to check on how my farm was doing.”
He stared at his hands a moment then met her gaze again. “I needed to see you again, Katie.”
“Why now, after all these years?” Her voice grew husky and ended on a whisper. For a time—years, if she was honest—she’d longed to hear him say he cared about her even though she’d sent him away. Then she’d become too busy taking care of Chelsea, the farm, her father, and her students to give Travis another thought.
That so?
Not even close.
Who was she trying to fool?
“I wanted to make sure you were okay. I had a feeling you needed me. Call it a premonition. Or whatever.”
“I never knew you were tuned into that kind of stuff.”
After several moments, he grinned. “You’d think I was nuts if I told you where it stemmed from.”
Judging by his cryptic statement, it definitely wasn’t because he’d heard about Chelsea. She sank against the narrow bed, finally letting herself fully relax. “Try me.”
“It’s not important.”
“If you leave it to my imagination, I’ll probably come up with something a lot crazier than what really happened.”
Kate's Secret (Bluegrass Spirits Book 2) Page 3