Holiday Op

by Lori Avocato

  A fuzzy voice filled her ears. Despite static that nearly made it unclear to understand a word, she heard the pilot say, “The mom … is … pain and water … post … ASAP. Sending … for you.”

  Sending for you?

  Sending … help. Yeah. She would be fine.

  It was then that she realized her arm was stuck to the cactus, legs dangling, body sore, blood draining down to her fingers and pain shooting throughout her mind.

  Maybe she wasn’t going to be fine.

  She was going to die on a giant Saguaro like an ornament on her mom’s blue spruce Christmas tree.

  Prue shut her eyes and thanked God for the life she’d led so far.

  So far. That really wasn’t very much.

  How sad.

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Chapter Four

  Pain radiated down her arm.

  Heat from something burned into her skin.

  And her eyes refused to open.

  That, she figured was some kind of self-defense mechanism as she had the sick feeling in her stomach that all wasn’t right in her world.

  With a groan, Prue opened her eyes—and then it hit her.

  She’d been yanked out of the helicopter last night. Or at least she hoped it was last night and not days earlier. Then again, she might be dead by now if too much time had passed. And, she told herself in her mother’s ‘strict’ voice, she had to get herself down onto the ground and … and … one thing at a time.

  Gusts of dusty wind smacked at her face as if being stuck up here wasn’t bad enough. Dust devils danced dangerously around, causing her to curse at the dirty winds.

  They’d picked up since last night.

  A scary thought, but she tried to convince herself that the pilot had told her they’d be back for her. Despite the sun and heat, the weather still sucked for flying.

  Hey, maybe they’d drive up. Some military vehicles would come bounding over the ridges and sand dunes to snatch her up—or down as it were. Then again, she looked around—it all looked the same. Surely the helicopter had some kind of system to mark where she was.

  Surely.

  With a force she never knew she had, Prue reached into her pocket to fiddle around and see what she could find to grab onto the dratted cactus, because she had to get down from here, yet there was nothing to grab onto. Kleenex tissues, natch. Lipstick, natch, since she couldn’t stand dry lips and her cell phone.

  Her cell phone!

  Somehow she’d managed to push her feet against one of the ‘arms’ of the Saguaro below to balance herself no matter how precariously and no matter the pain. Vomit worked its way up her throat, so she spit to the side several times, but wouldn’t allow herself to even think about it. With a deep breath, she turned her head to look down.

  Gulp.

  Had to be about fifteen feet below.

  Oh … my … God.

  Speaking of Him, she said a few silent prayers, then looked up to the sky. “If you get me out of this, I’ll … well, you know I’m a good person. But I’ll give it all I’ve got to be better.”

  Now, Prue, let’s think about the Saguaro itself. Shallow root system. Spikes that now held her captive. Wait a minute. How could this guy have yanked her out of the chopper?

  Shielding her arm against the dust and sun, she saw the real cause. Forty to fifty feet cacti surrounded the area amid all other sizes. The chopper might have bumped into one of the taller ones and she got caught by that varmint, but then had to have fallen down to the lower ones.

  Thank you very much. No wonder she hurt!

  Prue pushed her feet to stand, hoping she could un-attach herself and fall to the ground. Or, better yet, jump and land on her feet.

  Wishful thinking. Wasn’t she the eternal optimist?

  So, she started to push with her feet, kick as much as she could and, relying on the shallow root systems and the aged look of this captor, she continued until she caused a rocking motion.

  As the cacti started to give way or at least give her freedom, she heard it.

  A helo.

  A helo in the distance! She had to get down and send some kind of signal. But with what and how?

  Before the noise got any closer, her vision blurred into the brownish dirt of the Dust Devil himself. And she couldn’t even see her hands in front of her eyes as she shielded her face and kept up the rocking, not giving a darn where she landed as long as it wasn’t on another cactus.

  “Prue! Captain Hamlin!” The disembodied voice filled her ears amid the horrendous sound of a helicopter, the winds and her heart pounding.

  Great. She was hallucinating a hot, sexy, and familiar sounding voice. Yum crossed her mind despite the insanity. But it sure sounded as if the noisy machine was close. Then she looked up—and remembered it was Christmas day and her savior dangled from a rope several feet above her.

  Whoa boy. So this is what dying was like?

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Chapter Five

  Prue felt strong arms around her. She couldn’t open her eyes because pain had paralyzed her, along with fear.

  No white light. Only the wind and dust and someone yelling at her from a distance. Was it really the distance?

  Sounded closer.

  The arms pulled a bit and suddenly she felt freed from her captor, although no lessening of the pain. Then, a thud.

  “Oh,” she heard herself mumble along with several groans.

  “First the shelf of mistletoe takes a nosedive cause of you and now you’ve taken out one of the hundred-or-so-year-old Saguaro, Captain Hamlin. I can see I’m gonna have to watch my step with you.”

  She opened her eyes to see a foggy, dusty, dirty Slick above her. Slick? Slick? Wow. What a hallucination this was.

  Then it dawned on her. She wasn’t having her usual lusty reaction to him. Actually, she felt odd. Weird. That was when she realized silence filled the air.

  “Where’s the helicopter? Or did you just fall out of the sky?” She looked down and he’d torn her uniform sleeve and was doing all sorts of things to her arm, including pouring something cold and stinging onto it, and then stuck a needle into her thigh.

  “Ouch!”

  “Bad news is the chopper couldn’t land, and with these blasted winds I barely made it down without following you onto one of the Saguaros. Whole base is out looking for you, but by land would have taken too long.” He wrapped something tight around her shoulder and arm. “Good news is, I’ve just given you something for the pain, and the even better news, Captain, is that I’m here now.”

  She opened her eyes and glared at him.

  “What? Aren’t you glad to have a PJ fall out of the sky to rescue a damsel in distress?” He’d fiddled around in his bag and held something to her lips. “Drink.”

  “What it is? I don’t want anything. I’m …” Oops. Her words had sounded a bit “too many glasses of wine” slurred.

  “Look, Captain, I’m a trained medic. I’ve risked my life to come rescue you—”

  “It’s your … your job … duty.” In her head it sounded as if she said “dwuty.”

  He leaned near.

  She could see his face. His Newman eyes. A slight smile.

  “I volunteered.”

  Prue watched Slick remove his helmet, although her vision now matched the blurriness of her speech. “You … vowuntweered?”

  “Get some sleep. That morphine is kicking in now by the sound of your speaking and the size of your pupils.” He pushed her hair from her face.

  Gulp.

  Could morphine cause a rush inside her like this?

  Or, admittedly, it was his touch on her skin. Warm fingers, male fingers, strong male fingers doing something as simple as pushing damp, dusty hair from her eyes. Great. Even knocking on the door of death, she had sensual feelings for this cocky, gorgeous, out of her league, PJ.

  Sometimes life sucked.

  Prue felt something.

  Something that had made her fe
el good. Better. Cooler. Was the A/C on in her room? She opened one eyelid—to see she was nowhere near her room or any form of A/C.

  A makeshift tent, attached to the vicious cacti on both sides, shielded her from sun. The pain in her shoulder was tolerable, and she actually wasn’t as dusty and dirty feeling as she’d remembered. At least not on her face. She ran a finger across her cheek. Wow. Yep. Cleaner.

  Then she looked past the lean-to to see him.

  Slick knelt several feet away tending to a fire.

  She pushed up on her elbows, then quickly fell back in a bout of dizziness. “Drat.” She’d said it softly, but Slick swung around as if she’d yelled across the desert. And he was next to her before she could blink. Wow. PJs sure gave good service.

  “Hey.” He pushed her hair back again.

  Gulp. “Hey,” she managed while he pulled a canteen out of his bag and held it to her lips. This time she drank the water without question. Even from a canteen, it tasted delicious. She swallowed, then pulled back and wiped her hand across her lips. “Yum.”

  It dawned on her that she must look like crap. But, his eyes still held something interesting when he looked at her. Something that made her insides quiver. And why was it that she even cared how she looked? Normally not a vain person, she found herself pushing back her hair at the same time Slick did—and their fingers touched.

  Oh … my.

  “You cleaned my face off,” came out before she could think of how stupid that actually sounded. “Thanks.”

  He smiled.

  “I … when is the helicopter coming back?” She almost didn’t care. She almost didn’t want it to come back too soon. She almost forgot it was Christmas day and now she was stranded in the New Mexico desert with one hunk of a hunky PJ—and she wanted these few minutes to last.

  Snowy, white New England Christmases seemed a thing of the past.

  She looked up at him, pushed up on her elbows, and with his help, managed to sit. “Thank you.” It came out softer than she’d planned. Quieter than she’d expected, and sounding almost sensual without her planning it.

  Slick moved closer and supported her back. “It’s my job.”

  When he’d said it, her heart had sunk and her face must have shown the disappointment.

  He chuckled. “A job I love and risk my life for nearly every day. I’ve done tours in the Middle East and survived—thank goodness. But, Prue, when the call came in last night that a nurse was in a helo accident and stranded in the desert—I instinctively knew it was you.” He touched her forehead this time and ran his finger down her cheek. Wow.

  She wanted to ask, “How?” but then remembered she’d told him she was on-call. Deep inside she really wanted to know that he volunteered because he felt something too. Something like the shivers she felt right about now despite the desert sun.

  “Thank you again,” came out instead. And her hand touched his as his finger lingered on her face.

  What pleased her most was that he didn’t pull away. Maybe this Christmas wasn’t going to be so bad after all.

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Chapter Six

  “Okay, Captain. We need to get you out of this place. The chopper will come back as soon as it can.”

  Please at least give us today, she thought not sure if she was more shocked at herself for not wanting to get to the ER and a long, hot shower, or if the shock came from thinking things … those kinds of things … about Slick.

  Slick. “What’s your name?” she whispered.

  He turned with a look of surprise. “Oh, yeah, Captain. Believe it or not, ‘Slick’ isn’t on my birth certificate.”

  “Is that so?” She chuckled. “And what is?”

  “Kodyn. Kodyn Lang. My friends, and by friends I mean you, too, call me Kody.”

  “Kody,” she said. “Nice.” Her mouth dried. “Could I … water—”

  Before she could finish, he was up in a flash and held the canteen out to her. “Go slow. Don’t want you puking up anything after the morphine.” Then he smiled at her. “Okay. Okay. I know you’re a nurse and know all that stuff, but it’s ingrained in my medic mind, too. And sorry for the term ‘puking.’”

  She laughed and winced at the same time.

  “Need another shot?”

  She did. But instead she said, “No,” because there was no way she wanted to lose her faculties and miss out on this very different Christmas—pain or not. From the day she’d met Slick, or rather Kody, there was that cliched chemistry, yet she’d always tried to ignore it and tell herself he annoyed her.

  After all, he was jock material, and she’d had her fill of jocks in high school and college—and the relationships never worked out. Never worked out for her, thus her career goal of the military.

  Then there was Daddy. The jock of all jocks and he treated their mother like some prized possession until she decided she needed a life of her own. It was then Prue and her brother started calling themselves “orphans” when their family, as it was, crumbled. And she’d vowed then, she’d never date anyone like her father. Ever.

  She looked up at Kody. Darn, he even had the same dark hair, although Daddy’s eyes were a pale green while Kody’s were that fab blue. Oh so very blue. The kind of eyes one lost themselves in—as she was doing right now.

  Great.

  Kody lifted some medical stuff out of his bag. “Let me do a once over on you again.”

  Again? Obviously he must have done a complete assessment of her medical condition last night. “I’m fine. Really.” For a second, she thought, how sweet. He must care. Then she told herself how nutty a thought that was. He was a PJ. A medic for crying out loud. He’d treat any victim the same. “Really. Fine.”

  He merely had to look at her for her to say, “Okay. You’re the boss—at the moment.”

  He laughed and aimed a penlight into her eyes to check her pupils. “Active and reactive to light, Captain.”

  “So, am I going to make it?” She smiled.

  He leaned near. “If I have anything to do with it.”

  Without a thought, at least without a realistic, conscious thought, she lifted her good arm and ran her finger across his face and down to his lips where she gently, slowly let her finger remain. But only for a second because before she could speak or pull back, Kody kissed the tip—and Prue nearly melted into a dusty puddle.

  “Oh. Sorry.” She pulled back. “I don’t know what I was—”

  Now his finger was on her lips, silencing her stammering.

  Thank you, God.

  “Don’t think, Captain. Just go for it.”

  Oh … my … God!

  Did he mean go for a kiss? Could she really? Was this the right place and right time? Was she nuts? Was she crazy? Was she suffering some mental condition brought on by her accident? Could post-traumatic syndrome start when you just got into a situation like this?

  She should be thinking about the five basic needs of survival now. Personal protection like shelter and fire. Medical condition. Sustenance. Travel. And signal and recovery.

  But she was having lusty thoughts about her rescuer. That had to be some syndrome like the Stockholm syndrome even though Slick, as she called him in her head still, hadn’t abducted her.

  Only her heart.

  Yet she felt so safe, so secure, with him here. With a mental slap to herself, Prue pushed up all the way and stood, albeit on shaky legs.

  Slick grabbed her. “Whoa girl. What are you doing?”

  “I … I.” Good question. She had no good answer let alone any answer. I need to get away from you was her reason, but she said, “I need to walk. Cramps.”

  Oh crap. First thing she thought of was “female” cramps and felt her skin burn hotter than the desert sun. “Um. Muscle cramps. My legs.”

  “Walk where? You can’t go traipsing around the desert in this kind of weather. Dust devils are exceedingly dangerous and for some reason, prolific these last few days. Some kind of weather phenomenon.”


  Yeah, weather phenomenon that had them trapped here together, yet her in no condition to do much about it. What rotten luck.

  Christmas.

  Bah humbug again.

  “I know, but, when will the helicopter come back?”

  “They’ll be here ASAP with the first weather clearance. You can always count on the paratroopers, Captain. You know our motto—”

  “That others may live,” she interrupted, because now she knew it was true. She’d been turned off by so many cocky jocks in her past that she suddenly realized she’d built up some kind of falsehood about them in her mind.

  They were all not like her father. These were brave guys who thought of others first. Daddy never thought of anyone else first other than himself.

  “Right, Captain. But to survive, one never can become complacent. That’d be contrary thinking to survival.” Didn’t he realize he was talking to a ‘worse case scenario thinker’? If something could go wrong, Prue always thought it would. Complacency wasn’t in her vocabulary—as it must not be in his.

  Nice.

  “Now, if you need to stretch, go ahead. But we need to stay put so we can be found. No traveling except for sustenance, which, I’m glad to say, I thought to bring. I’ve signaled with the fire going and my guys know where we are anyway. I’m sure you learned the basic five needs of a survivor in flight school.” He busied himself trying to communicate with the base in his assumption about her.

  She merely nodded, almost ashamed to say she never applied to be a flight nurse because she wasn’t all that crazy about flying.

  After all, look where the helo trip had gotten her!

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Chapter Seven

  Sustenance he’d called it.

  Prue called it cat food. That was her take on the Air Force’s version of gourmet brown pouch food. Ick. Okay. Okay. It wasn’t too bad. Well, it was when she thought about a Christmas ham, turkey, and her mom’s gravy. The taste took a nosedive.