All a Man Can Be

by Virginia Kantra

  Nicole glared at it. “Good dog,” she said.

  The dog barked and dripped on her upholstery.

  Her windshield was clouding. She turned on the air-conditioning, shivering as a blast of cold air hit her wet clothes.

  She backed the Lexus cautiously down the middle of the street, water whooshing away from her tires, until she reached the Blue Moon.

  And her heart sank.

  The parking lot now resembled a river delta, long fingers of gravel surrounded by brown, slow moving water.

  Okay. Not good. But how bad could it get? The anchorwoman this morning had reported that most flooding in the area occurred with the snow melts in the spring. The recent heavy rains had saturated the ground and flooded the narrow river channels. But the lake was not expected to rise.

  So she could ride out the storm. She could wait out the flood. She was going to be—she drew a deep breath—fine.

  On the seat beside her, the little dog whined.

  She looked at it, wet, cowering, miserable.

  “It’s okay,” she said reassuringly. “Things can only get better.”

  She hoped.

  She put her purse on her shoulder and pocketed her keys, opened her door in the driving rain.

  “Come on,” she chirped. “Let’s go.”

  She jumped from the car and waited for the dog to follow. It didn’t.

  She reached back in and tugged on the blank, black nylon collar. “Dog. Come on. Come.”

  The dog lowered its head, its knobby paws scrabbling on the edge of the seat.

  The hell with it. Nicole grabbed the dog and bolted across the flooded parking lot.

  Chapter 18

  “How come I always have to be the one on top?” Mark asked. His knuckles scraped the wall. Up front, the orderly’s flashlight beam jumped in the darkened stairwell. The cement steps were slippery with humidity.

  “I thought you liked being on top,” Lars said. He raised his end of the backboard over his head. “Easy. Step.” He started down the next flight of stairs. “At least you’re not going down backward.”

  “No, just doubled over.” Mark glanced at the monitor on the transport ventilator. This patient was lucky. On some floors, nurses were using hand pumps to aid in respiration as backup batteries failed. “Airway pressure is good,” he reported. “How’s pulse ox?”

  “Holding. We’ll make it down.”

  Downstairs in the E.R. staging area, a medical team, including a doctor, would take over the patient’s care until an ambulance or chopper became available to escort him to a new facility. And Mark and Lars, as they had for the past six hours, would hump it up the stairs and grab another backboard. The elevators were down. So were the lights. Four hours ago, to conserve the drain on the emergency generators, the hospital had shut down everything but the most essential life support. And then water had flowed into the subbasement, shorting the switches that directed power to the generators.

  McCormick Mercy Hospital was dying. Now the staff and rescue workers scrambled to make sure no patients died with her.

  Mark and Lars scuffled onto the landing.

  “Watch the rail,” Mark said.

  His pager went off.

  Lars froze. “Is that the disconnect alarm?”

  “Nope. Beeper.”

  Lars grunted. “You want me to get that while you carry this yourself?”

  “Very funny, Jensen. Lift.”

  “Why would anybody buzz you, anyway? You’re already here.”

  Good question. Sweat snaked down his spine. The downside of having somebody to wave goodbye was you had to worry about them the whole time you were gone. How was Danny? Where was Nicole?

  “It’s probably my sister calling me back.”

  “Everything okay at home?”

  “That’s what I called to find out.”

  And as soon as they stowed their patient, he called her again.

  She answered on the first ring. “Tess DeLucca.”

  She sounded distracted. That was okay. That didn’t mean there was anything wrong. She could be working on her story.

  “How’s Danny?”

  “Danny’s fine. Mom gave both the kids dinner. How are—”

  “You okay?”

  “I’m fine, too. Jarek—well, he’s up to his eyeballs rescuing motorists and diverting traffic, but he’s safe so far. Are you—”

  “What about Nicole?”

  Silence.

  Fear slid along Mark’s ribs like a knife. “Tess? Did you reach Nicole?”

  “The phone lines are down.”

  “That’s why I gave you her cell number.”

  “I know. Look, I just haven’t been able to get through yet. I’m sure she’s all right. Jarek says the lake is large enough to absorb most of the runoff. Most of the flooding is on the west side of town.”

  “I thought Harbor Street was closed.”

  “Because of sewer backups. Not the lake levels.”

  “What about Front Street?”

  “Evacuated. But—”

  Mark swore.

  “Mark, a lot of folks have chosen not to leave.”

  “Because they’re afraid of looters,” Mark said grimly.

  “Jarek’s entire department is out on patrol.”

  “Six men? One woman? Yeah, that’ll stop the bad guys. Keep trying, okay?”

  “You know I will.”

  “Tell Danny I said good-night.”

  “Absolutely.”

  “And ask Jarek if he can get an officer to check on the Blue Moon.”

  Lars touched his shoulder, signaling silently for him to get off the phone and hit the stairs. Teams continued to arrive in the E.R. One backboard went by carried by four men with two nurses in attendance, one to ventilate the patient and one keeping the IVs running.

  “Got to go,” Mark said.

  “Mark…are you all right?”

  “Fine,” he said.

  Oh, yeah. Filthy, exhausted, chafed and sore, but fine. His apartment was in an evacuation zone, his boat could have floated into a tree, his son was spending the night with his sister, and the only woman who could make him feel better about it all was lost in the flood and not answering her damn phone.

  “Just fine.”

  Nicole owned copies of The Dating Survival Guide, The Breakup Survival Guide, and The Single Woman’s Survival Guide for the New Millennium. She didn’t have a What To Do When You’re Trapped Alone by Floodwater in a Deserted Bar Survival Guide.

  But she was managing pretty well without it. She had raided the restaurant kitchen for food. There was a danger she could get tired of snack mix if the waters didn’t recede in a day or two, but she wouldn’t go hungry. And the dog was happy with raw meat.

  She had plenty to drink, cans of soda and bottled water from the bar and a tub of water for washing and flushing the toilet.

  Shelter? Well, her apartment was dry. But the lake had seeped into the downstairs, overrunning the makeshift dam of bar towels she’d stuffed under the door. Standing on the stairs, she could see the water shining in the beam of her flashlight, covering the floor. She couldn’t gauge its depth in the darkness, but it hadn’t cleared the tabletops yet.

  Something else slithered and gleamed in the darkness. The dog pressed closer to her leg and growled.

  The growl surprised Nicole. She didn’t think the dog had it in him. Her, she corrected herself. She’d rescued a girl dog. She tried to take power from the thought: all girls together, but at that moment she would have welcomed a strong, fearless male with a really big flashlight.

  I’ll be back, Mark had promised, but that was hours ago. Ten hours and twenty-eight minutes ago, to be precise. Not that she was counting.

  Nicole played the puny beam of her flashlight over the darkness again. And there was—oh, God, were those eyes, tiny eyes, close together, glowing at her from the tangle of tables?

  Rats? Snakes. Icky things in the dark. Her heart hammered. Her gorge rose.

&
nbsp; The dog shivered and growled again.

  “I agree,” Nicole said. Her voice shook. “What do you say we go back upstairs?”

  They retreated one step at a time, Nicole keeping careful watch on the floor in all directions.

  She closed and locked her apartment door. Shadows jumped away from her light. In the center of her living room, the stacked chairs and piled cartons created a lumpy landscape.

  “Well,” she said, making an effort to keep her voice bright, “this is cozy.”

  The dog sat and looked at her. Patient. Expectant.

  “Are you still hungry?” Nicole asked. The dog stared. “Food?”

  Its tail thumped once, but she suspected it was merely being polite. What she really needed was a book on dog care.

  The apartment was very quiet. The rain had stopped. Which was a good thing, she knew that, but the silence left in the wake of the storm was a lonely thing. No traffic. Only the wind, the groan of wood and the lap of water.

  It was going to be a long night. In the burst for the bar, she had stupidly left her cell phone on the passenger seat of the car. However hungry she was for the sound of a human voice—ten hours and forty-seven minutes since Mark had left her—she certainly wasn’t braving whatever lurked or plopped or floated downstairs to retrieve it. But she still had her computer, at least until the battery died.

  She unearthed her laptop from the pyramid of boxes. The screen glowed reassuringly in the darkened living room, crisp white cards against a still, green backdrop. Nicole clicked on an ace of spades and flicked it to the upper right-hand corner.

  The dog sighed and laid its head at her feet.

  Seventeen games later, the grumble of a motor broke the hush. The dog stiffened. Nicole strained to listen. A car? No, she decided. A boat. A single engine tooling quietly along the water-filled streets. She heard something scrape and someone swear, a man’s voice, low.

  And a new fear leaped in her like a candle flame, sudden and bright.

  Some snakes driven by the flood were human.

  She sat paralyzed as a powerful light pierced the window and bounced across her ceiling. Stay or move? Scream or be silent?

  The engine clattered and choked.

  And then the voice called, “Nicole! Babe, are you there?”

  Joy flashed through her. “Mark!”

  She scrambled to her feet and lunged for the window. The dog scuttled after her, yapping.

  Boat. Searchlight. Men. Mark. There, riding the waters of what had been her parking lot, were two rain-slickered figures in a boat, one dark and tall and one dim yellow with reflective stripes.

  Nicole struggled with the swollen sash.

  The yellow slicker called, “Miss Reed? Nicole Reed?”

  “Yes!” Nicole banged the window open. “Up here!”

  The light swung crazily, blinding her. The dog barked and yipped.

  “Why the hell don’t you answer your phone?” the dark figure exploded.

  “I—” Now didn’t seem a very good time to explain she’d left it in her car. Thankfully, her companion was providing a distraction. Nicole bent to pat and shush her. “It’s okay. Good dog.”

  The good dog announced that it was not okay, there were strange men out there in a boat, with lights and nasty engine sounds, and it was her duty to scare them off.

  “What is that?” Mark demanded.

  Nicole smiled in the direction of the light. “It’s a dog,” she said. “For Danny.”

  “Oh, God.” The boat rocked as the dark figure sat down abruptly. The shoulders of the yellow slicker appeared to be shaking, but it could have been a trick of the light or the bobbing of the water.

  “I found her,” Nicole explained. Her heart raced. Did he remember? Would he understand? And then I could stay, and we’d be a real family with a dog and everything.

  But Mark seemed perfectly willing to drop the subject of the dog. “How is the downstairs? Can you reach the door?”

  Nicole sighed. But she didn’t really want to discuss their possible future in front of the yellow slicker. And she was still awfully glad to see him.

  “Nicole.” Mark’s voice was tight with control. “We’re attempting a rescue here. Can you get downstairs to the door?”

  Downstairs. Little eyes close together, glowing in the darkness. Nicole shivered. “I’m not sure. I don’t think so.”

  “How deep is it? Because—”

  “It’s not the water,” Nicole interrupted him. “There are…things…in it.”

  There was a brief silence. “Okay,” Mark said calmly. “Then I’ll carry you.”

  “And the dog,” Nicole said.

  Mark swore.

  “No dog,” the yellow slicker said regretfully.

  “Excuse me?” said Nicole.

  “Sorry, ma’am. No pets. We’re a small department. And this is a small boat. We have to set priorities.”

  “It’s a very little dog.”

  “Ma’am, we still have all of Front Street to cover. There may be people stuck in these buildings who need help to leave their homes. I cannot make room in the boat for a dog. Even a little one.”

  The boat pitched as Mark dropped over the side. Nicole squeaked, but the water only came up to his thighs. He waded forward, his slicker dragging on the black surface.

  The dog barked once.

  Nicole looked down. “I can’t just leave her.”

  “I’m sure it will be fine alone overnight,” the young patrol officer assured her.

  “Is the water still rising?”

  “We still have some runoff. But there’s no more rain in the forecast. As long as you leave it closed up upstairs with plenty of food and water, it will be perfectly safe for your pet to stay.”

  “How safe?” Nicole asked.

  “Oh, no,” said Mark. His voice was directly below her now. “You’re leaving with us.”

  “Why? If there’s not enough room in the boat—”

  “For animals. There’s no room for animals.” He grunted. “What did you do to this door?”

  “Did you forget your key?”

  “No, I did not forget my key. It’s stuck on something.”

  “Oh. When the water first started coming in, I stuffed bar towels under the door.”

  “Right. I’ll have to break a window.”

  “No!”

  “Nicole, it’s the only way I’m going to get in.”

  “But you don’t have to get in. I’m fine. The officer said so.”

  “You can’t stay here.”

  His order rankled. Not that she was crazy about the idea of spending the night alone above her water-logged and rat-infested bar. But now that Mark had come back for her, the way he’d promised, she no longer felt so scared and alone.

  Anyway, it was important she meet him as an equal, not a victim. Maybe she wasn’t out saving the town. But she had rescued a dog. She could keep an eye on her own property. And she could give up her place in the boat to someone who was actually suffering.

  “I have food and water and a flashlight and a dog,” she said. “Go rescue somebody who needs it.”

  Mark drew a sharp breath.

  “We do have other calls to answer,” the young cop said hastily. “And the chief wants us to check out Liberty Sporting Goods, make sure the grill is down over the window.”

  Mark sloshed back toward the boat until he was in her line of sight. He looked up at her window, his face harsh in the glare of the search light, his voice grim. “We’ll be in the area all night,” he told her. “You have a problem, you yell.”

  “I will,” she said.

  “And I’m coming back.”

  She smiled. “That’s a promise,” she told him.

  The vibration woke her before the noise. Nicole blinked bleary eyes in the dark room. It was…okay, it was the dog. She was growling, her small, furry body shaking with warning, her head raised from the bed she had shared with Nicole.

  “It’s all right,” Nicole whis
pered, although she wasn’t sure it was yet, not really. She threw back the covers and slid out of bed, still wearing her T-shirt and slacks.

  A knock sounded from the front of the apartment. That was good, Nicole thought as she armed herself with the flashlight and hurried down the hall. The dog’s toenails clicked beside her. Burglars wouldn’t knock. Would they?

  “Nicole?” It was a man’s voice. Mark’s.

  The dog yipped once. Nicole sighed in relief and pleasure and moved to let him in.

  “It’s about time you showed up,” she said, opening the door. “What is it, two o’clock? Three?”

  He slouched through the doorway. “Four-thirty. Call off your beast.”

  Nicole bent to shush the dog. “You must be exhausted,” she said, straightening. Her heart pattered in her chest. “Come to bed.”

  He stopped in the middle of her living room floor among the cartons and the stacked chairs. “I’m not coming to bed with you. I’m wet and I smell.”

  She wrinkled her nose. Now that he mentioned it… “Yes, you do. Why don’t you take your clothes off?”

  He didn’t move. “Too tired.”

  She might have felt rejected, except he had been up all night with the rescue effort.

  “Then I guess I’ll have to do it for you,” she said, and reached to take hold of his slicker.

  He made a halfhearted effort to fend her off. “You’ll get all dirty.”

  She ignored the jerky motion of his hands to tug the slicker down his arms.

  “Then you’ll get to undress me,” she said. “I don’t see this as a problem.”

  He stood there then, as she concentrated on snaps and buttons, as she wrestled with wet and wrinkled fabric. Under the stink of the floodwaters, he smelled of male and exhaustion. She uncovered him, his leanness and his manliness and his strength, the black hair that grew on his chest and his thighs, his olive skin still cold from the water, and an enormous tenderness flowed in her and filled her.

  It was such a small, intimate service, undressing him. So personal, so practical, so…subservient, almost. She could have felt used. Maybe with another man, at another time, she would have felt used. But now she was only happy to be able to do this one thing for him.

  She let his clothes fall in a heap to the floor, where the dog nosed at them. Taking his hand, she started to lead him down the hall to her room.