It was a relief to relinquish my role as caretaker. I had felt over my head every time I reached for one of the injections and helpless in the face of his craziness. I concentrated on giving him the comfort he so badly needed. I wasn't sure he could even hear me, but I whispered encouragement to him throughout the flight and the painful transfer to his hospital bed. It was all that was left for me to do.
After the doctors had hooked Dylan up to an IV, it took a full day for the powerful antibiotics to kick in. As the fever finally, blessedly began to break, the restlessness and the bizarre mumblings stopped. But he didn't wake up. The doctors told us that he was still comatose from the septic shock, but he was out of real danger. His youth and strength had saved him.
I was praying that 'my' Dylan would return when he was finally drifted back into reality. When I heard him say my name I wept with relief. Searching his ocean eyes, I wondered what I'd find there.
By the time the bossy bull of a nurse hustled me out of the room I wasn’t any less confused. He really didn’t remember much at all. What he apparently did recall were feelings I certainly hadn’t seen the night or the morning after we’d shared his bed. Anything but.
He held my hand, he called me beautiful and he begged me to stay.
It was a devil’s bargain. He was needy. He was scared. Dylan’s strength and even his arrogance was part of his attraction. What happened to that part of him? Was he more damaged than was thought? Who was this man-boy? I had no answers.
Chapter 22—Dylan
Everything was so fuzzy. I couldn't find the strength to part the curtain of fog in my brain. The nurse shooed Rene out of the room to poke and wipe and check and fuss with the plastic ghosts that hung from the poles around my bed. I was in hell again. Light and air left the room with my pretty brown-haired girl.
The nurse's cold hands adjusted the vice around my arm and I watched her count the racing beats of my heart. She frowned at the frenzy under her fingertips and noted my galloping pulse on her chart.
I tried to pull away from her nasty claws. Her face was a montage of all the many monsters who had crawled in and out of my life trying to ‘help’ me. I thrashed around, looking for Dawn, but everything just past the edge of my bed seemed out of focus.
“Where’s my sister?” I demanded.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Cruz. You’re confused. You’ve got no sister here.”
“Nurse Kelly! I want to talk to her now.”
“Mr. Cruz, we haven’t a Nurse Kelly that I know of. Please try to stay still. I have to try again to get your temperature.”
“Where am I?”
“You’re in hospital. We’re taking the very best care of you.”
“Let me up. There’s nothing wrong with me. Tell them I want to leave.”
“Who shall I tell? Your friends?”
“The doctors. Tell the stinkin' doctors I’m not sick and I want to leave.”
"We'll just have to get you a bit calmed down, won't we?" She answered her own clipped non-question by pumping a little more of something in one of the dripping specters above my head. The room, the smells, the equipment—it was all nightmare fuel. Waging a futile war for control of my mind, I slipped back into a bizarre and confusing dreamscape of drugged consciousness.
It was a Looney Tunes landscape where Dali-esque clocks dripped over jagged cliffs and Spanish moss hung from IV poles in dull green corridors. The doors were numbered in no order. I didn’t want to open any of them. Cold drops of fear coated my skin as I reached for the first one.
Dawn rocked in a corner clutching her beloved ‘Boo’, cooing an incoherent lullaby to the well-worn stuffed rabbit. Her hair covered the side of her face and I reached to push it out of the way. She turned to me with bloody sockets where her eyes should have been and I shot out of the room in panic.
There was music coming from the end of the hall. I followed the sweet notes of a cello toward a half open door where rosy light diffused the sharp shadows of the ugly hallway and made it seem less frightening.
Through the door I saw Rene propped against a mountain of pillows on a gauzy canopy bed. She was swathed in more white veiling that cast a misty curtain over her face. The pale light behind her made her hair glow like a halo around her head. I was drawn to her. When I moved to step out of the shadows toward the circle of light around her, I couldn’t move my feet. I tried to say her name—to tell her I was there—but my voice made no sound. She couldn’t see or hear me, but she was looking right at me into the blackness.
Like chapters unfolding in a book, the next scene found me in a warm bed. I lay in sweet-scented sheets with the sound of gentle waves slapping against a nearby shore. I could smell the salty freshness of the ocean—my heart’s home—and there was peace all around me.
A faceless woman slipped into the bed beside me and I was neither surprised nor disturbed to feel her silky nakedness wrap around me. I couldn’t see her, but that didn’t bother me, either. There was light in the room, but no form. There was feeling but no thought.
Velvet lips hovered above my mouth and I could smell sweet breath as she grazed my mouth with hers. She didn’t linger there but trailed butterfly soft kisses down my jaw and through the contours of my neck. I groaned a little when she nibbled at my collar bone and traced down my chest with the tip of her tongue.
My body melted against her warm, welcoming flesh. She engulfed me in a blanket of pleasure that asked for nothing but simply to be. I was no longer lost. Her arms, her legs, the secrets of her body all told me I had found my place. Her touch soothed away all terror and fear and called me home.
Chapter 23—Rene
Nurse Collins bustled out of Dylan’s room with a purpose. The woman had the warmth of a corpse. Before I could snap my laptop shut and get up to talk to her, a tall man brushed past me and cornered the nurse at the door to Dylan’s room. It took all of ten seconds for me to realize it was the great and powerful Jackson Cruz. I already disliked the man based on what little Dylan and Stephen had told me. It seemed cruel to me that a man with the wealth of the senior Cruz would withhold the benefits of his vast fortune from his only son. I could understand not wanting to hand everything over on a silver platter, but to deny Dylan the opportunity for a job seemed very unfair.
Jackson was just as handsome as his son. He wore middle age like a movie star—graying temples, ever so slight crinkles around his eyes and a slim frame most men half his age would envy. I hated the fact that I instantly found him attractive. I wanted to find him as ugly on the outside as I thought he must be on the inside.
I watched him question the nurse who visibly cowered under his interrogation. That was a surprise. She didn’t seem the type to bend easily. She had certainly treated me as a very unwelcome intruder.
I didn’t have to hear the words to know that the big man was irate that he couldn’t go barging in on his semi-conscious son. But Stephen had explained to me that he and Dylan had signed some legal agreement that gave them each the power to handle the kind of bizarre incident we’d just experienced.
“When we started cruising the world on El Loco, we both knew that trouble was not only possible but likely. We signed over power to each other to make the . . . necessary . . . decisions.” Stephen had shifted uncomfortably and wouldn’t look me in the eye when he revealed their agreement.
“You mean like ‘pull the plug’ decisions?” The notion scared me. Just thinking about it gave me a chill. Dylan was thrashing on his bed two days from any meaningful help when Stephen shared that disturbing bit of information with me.
“Well, yeah. But other smaller things too.” He had seen the horror cross my face when I considered the possibility that Dylan might actually never wake up for good. “Don’t worry. I’m just telling you this so you know there’s someone in control. Because I have to warn you, Rene, Daddy-O is going to come knocking at the door as soon as he learns about the accident.”
“Have you told him?”
“I don’t need to te
ll him. He’s got jungle drums that reach into the deepest caves. I couldn’t keep our whereabouts from him if I tried.” He had given me a smug, bittersweet grimace. “But I can keep him from Dylan until my man is good and ready to see Dear Pops.”
Now “Dear Pops” was looming over me, glaring down at me from his considerable height and looking very much like a raptor ready to swoop.
“Ms. Waters?” I felt small, awkward and clumsy just sitting there under his gaze. “Let’s have a little chat, shall we?” Before I could answer him, he took the seat beside me and angled his long legs toward me. I couldn’t help but notice the precise crease of his trousers and the impeccable sheen of his perfect shoes. Every detail about the man was utterly tailored to convey wealth and class. “The nurse seems reluctant to let me in to see my son and yet I understand that you have been with him almost constantly since he was admitted.”
I wasn’t sure how to answer that. Stephen had taken it upon himself to tell the staff to admit only the two of us. He had specifically asked that the senior Cruz be turned away until his son was well out of the woods just as he had alluded to on the boat. I was glad Stephen wasn’t there at that moment. Mr. Cruz was quite obviously a man to whom the word ‘no’ was rarely ever spoken.
“I . . . well I don’t know what to say about that, Mr. Cruz. I’m . . . that is I’m not . . . what I mean to say is I haven’t got . . .”
He waved an elegantly manicured hand in dismissal. “I know you aren’t the one who’s responsible for this. But you might let Captain Stephen know that he’ll be pounding Pier 77 for another job by the end of the week.”
“Isn’t that Dylan’s decision to make?” I instantly regretted my words. I knew it wasn’t Dylan’s boat or Dylan’s employees on the boat. Something just made me want to say something—anything—to check the man’s arrogance. It was obvious he had no respect for Stephen or his son and the decisions they had made together.
“Actually, no it isn’t. But that’s neither here nor there. What I want to know is why you have been allowed such easy access to my gravely wounded son while I, his father, have been turned away.” He looked at me in a way that made me feel slightly less important than pond scum. “Exactly who are you to Dylan?”
Wow. Good question. Who was I to Dylan? Less than two weeks ago I could have said ‘nothing’ or maybe ‘I’m his cook’. But now? Was I his lover? Or was I his mistake? At that moment I felt as if I was playing some fantasy role. The injury and the infection had catapulted us into an entirely unfamiliar, unexpected and uncomfortable place. I was confused and literally taking my life minute by minute waiting for . . . for what I wasn’t sure.
I had to answer Mr. Cruz. I settled for “I’m the new chef on El Loco.”
“That answers nothing. I asked you who you are to my son. I’d like a better answer than your job description.”
Deep breath. “Dylan and I became close during the crossing. And when he was injured, I more or less became his nurse.” I hoped that would satisfy the man. He was intimidating me and besides making me uneasy, I was starting a slow burn. Anger wasn’t going to help the situation but I couldn’t stop it. “He became . . . reliant on me during his illness.”
“Yes, well Dylan has a weak streak in him. He becomes dependent easily.”
That was enough. The man was insufferably arrogant and I had already had plenty of his looking down his perfect patrician nose at me. “Mr. Cruz, your son suffered a grave injury followed by a life-threatening infection. I would think you’d be more concerned about that than dissecting his character flaws.”
“Dylan will pull through. He always does. And I would guess that you’re in no position to even recognize his character flaws, let alone dissect them.” He rearranged his legs and slid toward the edge of his seat. “Now, suppose you tell me why you are allowed to stay by Dylan’s bedside night and day and I am not allowed to enter the room.” He practically hissed at me. I leaned away from him clutching my laptop against my body like a shield.
“You’ll have to take that up with Stephen. They have some sort of legal agreement . . . I don’t know the details.”
“But you know full well that Stephen specifically barred me from the room.” It was a statement of fact that I couldn’t deny. My eyes answered yes. “I will ruin that son-of-a-bitch. He’ll be lucky to get a job on a shrimp boat when I get through with him.”
“Mr. Cruz, I’m sure Stephen meant only to protect Dylan.”
“From his own father?”
“Maybe he thought you’d upset him.”
“You’re goddamn right I’d upset him.” Jackson Cruz stood abruptly and smoothed the creases from his thighs. “It’s plain that my feeble brat is still being protected by as many forces as he can muster around him. Welcome to Dylan’s little support group. I’m sure you and Stephen are doing a splendid job sheltering him.”
“That is so not fair!” I said, louder than I meant to. “He came to London to try to convince you to let him join your business. He wants to work. He wants to prove himself.”
“He told you this?”
“More or less.”
“I’m not sure the kid can handle my world.”
“Have you ever given him a chance? You seem to think he’s some weak child.”
“But you know better, I suppose?”
I blushed inside remembering just how much of a man Dylan was. He had found something in me that no man had ever found and taken me to a place I thought I’d never go. His body tore into what I thought I was and recreated me.
And When I watched his epic struggle with that murderous behemoth, I witnessed the kind of masculine power books are written about. That was the Dylan that Jackson Cruz needed to know. “Mr. Cruz, I watched your son battle a thousand-pound fish for hours. I’ve never seen anything like it in my life. The physical power Dylan brought to that fight was astounding. But it was the mental part that impressed me the most. His will reeled the marlin in as much as his strong arms. Your son is no weakling—not physically and certainly not when it comes to strength of character.”
Jackson smirked at me in a way that made me want to stand up and slap him right into the next week. “I find it interesting that you draw such dramatic conclusions about his character from his great fishing ability.” The despicable man’s voice dripped with condescension.
“Apparently the concept of ‘man against nature’ eludes you.” I fired back. “Hemingway would be appalled.”
“Aren’t you the clever girl? Am I supposed to be impressed by your erudition?”
“Am I supposed to not know what that word means? Sorry. My parents wrote the book on ‘word of the day’. You know exactly what I’m saying to you about Dylan. You’ve underestimated him.”
“We’ll see.”
“I hope we will. But you aren’t going to see anything if you don’t take the blinders off.”
I saw Stephen come around the hallway corner toward us. Jackson’s back was to him. The brave captain did a one-eighty and disappeared, the coward. Not that I really blamed him. The big man glowering at me was gunning for somebody to take his frustration out on and I wasn’t giving him much satisfaction. I mentally patted myself on the back for standing up to the sucker. With a father like him, it was miraculous that Dylan wasn’t more screwed up in the head than he was.
Mr. Cruz was about to sling another zinger my way when I spied the nurse who’d been in Dylan’s room earlier. I bounced out of my seat and darted away from him before he could get a word in. I was finished with him anyway. There wasn’t anything he could do to redeem himself at that point. Heartless bastard.
“Nurse Collins?” She did me a big favor and actually looked up from the chart in her hands. “How’s Dylan?”
“Mr. Cruz is resting. I gave him something to calm him down. He became agitated when I took his blood pressure.”
“He seems to be getting sedated a lot.”
“I assure you, it’s all well within the treatment protocol,” she
sniffed haughtily.
“It’s just that he never seems to get the chance to completely come to.”
“You’ll have to get Captain Stephen to take that up with his doctor. As Mr. Cruz’s health care proxy, he’s the only appropriate person to discuss Mr. Cruz’s treatment.” The emphasis she put on the words ‘Captain’ and ‘Mr.’ made it very clear that she didn’t approve of the arrangement in the least. The stodgy old hag had a kind of pinched, constipated air about her. I had mistaken her attitude toward Jackson as one of intimidation, now it was clear she had been being apologetic and was squarely on the older man’s side.
“Well, is it okay if I go sit with him, then?” There was no point in arguing with stone-face. I’d just have to get Stephen to take it up with the doctors. I’d read about patients actually getting addicted to pain killers during treatment. Hell, I’d given Dylan enough morphine on the boat to knock out an elephant. It worried me.
“He’s not likely to waken any time soon, but you can suit yourself. Captain Stephen has given express instructions that you are to have complete access.” Again with the Captain. Like she didn’t believe he was a real captain of anything.
I peeked in and found Dylan in a dead sleep. It seemed worse than the semi-comatose thrashing and mumbling to me. I put my hand on his chest just to reassure myself that he was still breathing. My touch didn’t even make him stir. His unnatural stillness freaked me out.
My hand rested on his muscled chest and I pushed the loose hospital gown down to uncover the single fish hook tattooed over his heart. I traced the dark barb with my finger tip and thought again how perfect the body under my fingertips was. Dylan was a man in full. His thoughts and actions moved with the force of an ancient imperative. He conquered and possessed the space between us and drew me to him with primal magnetism.
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