“I’m a doctor,” he said, alarmed at the insistence in his own voice.
“But not here,” she replied calmly. “Sit down, the doctors will be out to talk to you as soon as possible.” The door swung closed.
Strangely stung, Mark meandered back to the waiting room. He sank into a beige armchair, feeling oddly at loose ends. He was uncomfortable as hell just sitting around, twiddling his thumbs. He forced himself to sit still, jaw clenched.
“Sir?” The receptionist waved a clipboard at him. “Paperwork.”
Mark hesitated just a moment. He didn’t know anything about the patient, much less her insurance information. But he began to fill out the information anyway. Name: Lauren… She hadn’t given a last name. Her pained pleas were mostly about avoiding the hospital, so there hadn’t been a lot of background gathering. He scribbled “Spanner” for her last name. He wrote his ranch address for her address. Date of birth. He guessed she was twenty-five, and then gave her a birth date of January 1.
The rest of the document asked for information he couldn’t bluff. He didn’t know anything about her medical history, whether she had a history of heart problems or cancer in her family, whether she was allergic to any medications.
After filling it out as best he could, he returned the packet to the receptionist, but couldn’t sit still. He wandered casually around the hallways, noting the security was lax. Non-existent, in fact. A side door was propped open with a big rock. Mark kicked it out of place and pulled the door closed. Sauntering through the well-lit but deserted hallways and stairwells, nobody confronted him. Nurses and doctors chatted at the nurse’s station. The nurses and orderlies meandering from rooms seemed way too friendly for his liking. No one challenged him drifting by like a big, quiet ghost.
If someone were after Lauren, he would have no trouble walking in like he owned the place and being directed to her room by a friendly receptionist. Lauren had nearly killed herself trying to get away from him. Like a wolf chewing off its own leg to escape a trap.
Unbidden images of his sister danced before his eyes. Maggie Spanner was one of the strongest, most self-reliant women he’d ever known; she’d been treated like one of the boys on the ranch and was capable of handling physical and tasks that would cower men twice her size. But that didn’t add up to a hill of beans when her former boyfriend made the dire mistake of shoving her in full view of her brothers several Christmases ago. A football tackle ensued, and the guy was eventually sent to the hospital with a broken wrist. Since Mark had always been closer to her than the other siblings, she’d trusted him enough to reveal what was really going on in that relationship. What she thought of as charming protectiveness devolved into a level of control she was not comfortable with. Maggie swore he’d never laid hands on her before, and thank God for that because Mark would have killed the guy.
Mark felt that same murderous impulse toward the person menacing Lauren. He despised men who used their strength against women. Reminding himself that he wasn’t responsible for her didn’t stop the locomotive roaring in his chest. He was free to leave, though he wouldn’t. Not until he knew she was safe.
There was something sweetly compelling about Lauren. Her vulnerability appealed to his desire to heal people instead of hurt them, a desire he thought he’d buried long ago in Afghanistan. She made him feel compassionate and kind. Like a good person.
Who are you fooling, man? You can’t save her. You can’t even save yourself.
He had made a full circuit and ended up back at the waiting room. He noticed a coffee station. He poured himself a cup, mixed in some sugar, and tasted it. The coffee was bitter, no telling how long it had been sitting out. He added creamer and another teaspoon of sugar, then returned to his seat to settle in for a wait.
He had been in the waiting room for nearly three hours when a stubble-jawed surgeon walked out to meet with Mark. The surgery went off without a hitch; Lauren’s spleen was saved and would be completely fine when she healed from surgery. Her lung wasn’t collapsed; it was punctured though, which would be eased by holding a soft pillow against the chest wall; it would splint the fracture and lessen the pain of each breath.
“She’s in recovery room four if you want to see her.”
Mark thanked the surgeon and walked back through the labyrinth of corridors to find the recovery room.
He’d seen surgery patients before, of course. He’d seen much worse –
catastrophic car accidents, bullet wounds, industrial accidents—but he’d never been so relieved as when he saw her in that unconscious state that mimicked sleep, her body hooked up to monitors. He was thankful for the oblivion on her face. She wasn’t in pain. Certainly not with that IV pumping painkillers and antibiotics through her veins.
“Are you her husband?” The voice behind him startled him. It belonged to one of those round, friendly looking nurses.
“Yes,” he answered for purely bureaucratic reasons: he wanted to be able to stay past visiting hours. It might also provide some protection from the mystery stalker.
He moved aside to allow her to record Lauren’s vitals into her chart.
Lauren’s eyes began to flicker open. The nurse chirped, “Hi Lauren, you’re in recovery.”
She shut her eyes again.
“We’ll give you an hour or so before we take you up to your room.”
The nurse left and Mark sat down in the chair beside the bed. Knowing she would be in and out like a bad light, he picked up a magazine on the table and began to flip through it. The magazines were better in here than the waiting room. Esquire and Vanity Fair, compared to the celebrity gossip tabs in the waiting room. He was halfway through one of Christopher Hitchens’ didactic essays when he felt eyes on him. Her eyes were glassy and she looked disoriented from the powerful sedatives.
“Remember me?” Mark asked, putting the magazine down.
She nodded.
“How are you feeling?”
“Don’t know,” she whispered softly. Her voice was low and scratchy, the result of the intubation.
Mark took her hand in his. It was swollen and bruised. Dirt crusted her fingernails, and a trickle of blood had dried on her wrist from a cut on her palm. Whatever she had been through, she’d put up a fight. “Is there anyone you want me to call for you?”
Her face remained expressionless for a moment, then she shut her eyes.
“Lauren?”
She shook her head. Tears began to spill from under her lashes again.
“Hey, I didn’t mean to upset you,” Mark said gently. He grabbed a tissue from the bedside table and delicately pat her bruised cheeks.
“I have to get out of here,” she whispered.
“You need a few days of rest at least,” he said, incredulous. “You’ve just had serious surgery.” It was unbelievable how concerned she was that danger was lurking. She couldn’t turn it off.
“He’s going to kill me,” she slurred softly. “If he finds me, he will kill me. He is a police officer. He knows how to find me. I have to get out of here.”
“Just relax,” Mark said. “I’ll stay here with you.”
“You don’t have to do that,” she said. But her eyelids were fluttering and the sedatives were pulling her back under.
Mark let her sleep. He flipped through another magazine, pausing at a photograph accompanying a story about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The graham cracker earth and blue sky were too familiar, the screaming background of his nightmares. He turned the page.
Lauren briefly awoke again when the nurse returned to roll her to her room. She groggily reached out and touched her fingertips to his forearm. Her eyes again were beseeching.
Mark asked the nurse if they could have a private moment. As soon as the door was closed, Lauren licked her lips. “Can you get me out of here? I’ll go to a hotel.”
The thought of her recovering in some anonymous hotel room was unacceptable. He wasn’t going to allow that to happen. “Do you want me to call someone
? Do you have some place to go?”
Tears began to pool in her eyes again. “No, but I can’t stay here. Please just take me to a hotel. Or the airport.”
She couldn’t even stay awake longer than five minutes, yet she thought she was able to travel? To care for herself alone in a hotel room? He supposed desperation could drive anyone to extremes, but this was ridiculous.
“How about my house? Not the barn, but an actual bed? I’ll give you all the privacy, security and medication you could ask for.”
Her eyes were already closing.
Mark waited a beat to make sure she was asleep and wouldn’t wake up alone, then stepped out of the room. He spotted a collection of people wearing lab coats and scrubs and ID badges at the end of the hallway, gossiping and chatting at the nurse’s station. One glanced up and saw him waving her over.
“I’m taking her home,” Mark said. “Can you call the surgeon please?”
“I’ll have him come down to talk to you,” she replied.
He nervously paced the corridor, arguing with himself about what he was going to do. Before he came to any real conclusion, the stubble-faced surgeon that he recognized entered the room. Mark explained the situation then asked for prescriptions for morphine, antibiotics, and a lighter sedative like demoral.
“You’ll have to sign an AMA,” the doctor said. Mark already figured this was way, way against medical advice. He waved away the surgeon’s concerns, then signed the paperwork, assuming responsibility for Lauren Spanner.
What the hell had happened to him? Such a total personality change could signal a neurological disorder. It couldn’t hurt to have himself checked out by a psychiatrist.
He had come to Montana in part to escape the expectations and obligations of women. Yet he had just signed up to be the round-the-clock caregiver to one. What the hell was he doing?
Either he really was going crazy or the iceman was melting. Melting into mud.
Taking responsibility for the care of a gravely injured woman didn’t strike him as very intelligent under any circumstances. Yet as he drove back toward the ranch, careful to avoid potholes and rough patches of asphalt that might jostle her, he felt better than he had in months. Lighter, freer. He had a purpose – at least for the short term.
Lauren was unconscious, laid out across the bench seat in the back, and covered with a blanket. He had wedged a hospital pillow between her and the seatback to help brace her cracked rib.
Arriving at home, he parked in the garage and remotely shut the door behind him. He stepped out of the truck and opened the back door. She looked out of it, still doped up. He checked her pulse with his fingertips. When she didn’t stir, he gently shut the door and walked inside the house.
May trotted behind as he walked upstairs to a guest room, where he pulled down the down comforter and soft, overlaundered sheets from the headboard of the log-post bed. Back in the garage, Lauren was asleep when he picked her up, but stirred briefly in his arms.
“We’re at my place,” he whispered. It was impossible to tell how much she understood, but he felt that it was important to talk to her, to let her know what was going on.
She sighed and shut her eyes again.
She stayed unconscious and limp as he carried her up the stairs. He gently placed her on the bed. She still wore the gown and blue fuzzy socks the hospital had issued to her. Her vulnerability struck him straight in the heart. Having removed her from surgery in such a weakened state, she really was his responsibility.
But what could they do for her convalescence that he couldn’t? While he wasn’t set up for any emergencies, he was still a good enough doctor to monitor her meds.
As he hauled the blankets over her, she opened her eyes to slits.
“Hi there,” he said. “I’m going to run back to town to the pharmacy. Just sleep. I’ll be back soon.”
She mumbled something then drifted off. Mark shut the curtains to the bright sunlight, cloaking the room in soothing darkness. May looked up at him as he passed, but she didn’t move from Lauren’s bedside.
Mark drove back into Spanner, parking directly in front of Carrie’s Apothecary. As he walked inside, he glanced back to the pharmacy, and was relieved that Carrie herself was not on duty. If she saw him with prescriptions for one Lauren Spanner, she would be unable to keep that bit of intelligence to herself. Gossip would wildfire through the town. He didn’t particularly care, but if Lauren was hiding out from some crazy cop, he thought it best to show some discretion.
Thankfully, the pharmacist on duty was a youngish guy Mark didn’t recognize. He didn’t blink when Mark slid the scripts across the counter.
While the pharmacist was in the back, Mark glanced out the window and saw the new sign for Glacier Outfitters across the street. His friend John Jenkins had recently bought the storefront and launched the new retail store after six years in Whitefish. At his grand opening party earlier in the summer, John had declared that he was back in Spanner for good.
Spanner attracted world-class fly-fishing, hiking and mountain sports, and the town had was starting to respond to the lure of tourist dollars. It was too remote to ever be a major hub of activity, but folks passing through were happy to splurge on new waders or carabineers to wile away an afternoon in a cold mountain stream or on some sheer mountain face. Definitely a smart move to open up shop here. And fortuitous for Mark because the store undoubtedly sold clothing, which Lauren needed.
After Mark paid for the medications, he crossed the street. Bells jingled over his head as he opened the door. A familiar face looked up from the front register. “Well I’ll be,” John Jenkins drawled.
A smile broke across Mark’s face as he recognized his old friend. He could not remember a time when he didn’t know John. He felt bad he hadn’t been out to see him since the grand opening.
John laughed and walked around the register to shake his hand. “What the heck are you doing here? I thought you’d probably sneak out of town before the snow comes. How long are you in town for this time?”
“I’m not sure,” Mark replied. “Probably through Christmas.”
“I heard you were over at the cabins a couple weeks ago. You fixing them up finally?”
Mark wasn’t surprised that John knew he’d been working on the cabins at Starlight Lake. In a small town like Spanner it was impossible to keep a secret. “Yep, I had half a mind to try and revive the property. You interested in some heavy lifting?”
“Sure, absolutely. Let me know when you’d like a hand.”
“I’ll do that,” he promised.
“You need anything specific or are you just here to say hello?”
“A bit of both, actually.”
“Well, find whatever you need and we’ll catch up when you’re done.”
Mark took a long look around the new store. John had really made this place pretty fancy. New top-of-the-range North Face jackets were in stock, as well as luxurious fleece pullovers and pants for mountaineering, and trail running shoes. The sports equipment selection was as robust as any he’d find at REI in Falls Church, particularly the fly-fishing and skiing selections. “Look what you’ve done to this place,” Mark said.
“I hope Spanner is big enough to support it,” John said, looking thoughtfully around the store as if seeing it for the first time.
That was a question Mark had too, but the town was definitely growing. Earlier this spring, some Hollywood movie sensation bought a mega-ranch in the foothills. Mark assumed celebrities were like cockroaches: where there was one, plenty more would follow. If that was true, then Spanner was about to get a population boost.
Spanner was in an excellent position to take advantage of Glacial National Park tourism. The community was more charming and more picturesque than many of the smaller fishing towns nearby. A population boom over the last three years and economic expansion of the small town had been a topic of conversation all summer.
John’s face transformed when a very attractive blonde woman ca
me out of the back room, snacking on fruit leather. John’s wife Larissa had not aged a day since high school. She cried out, “Oh my gosh!” when she saw Mark, and ran into his arms. “How are you? It has been too damn long.”
Larissa kissed his cheek and looked up at him with friendly affection. “Come over tonight. I’ll make up some chili and we can catch up.”
“I can’t,” Mark said with genuine regret. “In fact, I need to get going. I just stopped in to see if I could find some clothes… For a friend.”
A slow, knowing smile appeared on Larissa’s and John’s face.
“Has some woman finally got her hooks into you?” Larissa purred, her eyes glinting with mischief.
Mark winced. “No, just a friend.” For the first time all day, he thought of Shelby Sloan at home in D.C., waiting for him to return to her. Neither Larissa nor John asked about Shelby because they didn’t know about her. Mark had never introduced her to his family or friends, despite the fact that he’d been dating her off and on for nearly three years. He had never even mentioned her in casual conversation.
Shelby had reluctantly given him this time in Montana to “sort his shit out” as she put it, but she did expect him to return to her with a ring in hand.
He didn’t know what he wanted with her. There was nothing “wrong” with Shelby. She was beautiful, funny, smart, successful in her job as a federal prosecutor. And great in bed. That last point lingered. Sex with her had always been a whoop-de-doo thrill ride, but he’d begun to feel empty afterward. A little sick. Despite all the sex with Shelby, there was no real “sexiness”. No sweetness. No connection.
Exactly when his needs in a woman transformed from the gross physical, he couldn’t say, but lately a part of himself that he didn’t understand seemed to need more than just a roll in the hay.
Just one look at Larissa and John together and any fool could see they were as crazy in love as they had been when they started dating in high school. When Mark had dropped into Spanner for a couple of days to be with his family for Christmas last year, he had invited them over for dinner and drinks. Larissa had curled up on the sofa beside John, and they’d barely been able to keep their hands off each other. Larissa was touching his hair, or his hand was squeezing her leg. It was like their hands were magnets; they couldn’t resist touching each other. After eighteen years of marriage, you’d think all that stuff had played itself out, but not with these two.
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