Sam let the explanation pass. It might have been the truth, though he doubted it. She'd seemed too flustered by his questions. "Are you sure this schedule isn't too much for you?"
"It'll be better next session. I have independent study. I can work my reading in around work a little better."
"Why do you want this degree? From what I hear, English degrees aren't exactly in huge demand in the marketplace."
"I might want to teach someday. Or maybe write. I think I have a book locked away inside me. I intend to try to write it for my thesis."
"Then why on earth did you start out in microbiology?"
"It's fascinating stuff. Besides, maybe I can make a contribution to humanity, discover something really important."
"Doesn't it strike you that you'd probably accomplish more if you picked one or the other and really concentrated on it?"
Penny regarded Sam evenly, clearly not the least bit offended by the criticism. He guessed she'd had to undergo the same cross-examination by any number of family members already. She'd probably had to fight off Brandon's attempts to get her into the family business, just as he had. He knew the kind of will it took to withstand Brandon's persuasiveness.
"I do give them everything I've got," she informed him. "When I'm in the lab, I'm totally focused. When I read or write, I'm totally absorbed in that. Maybe it will take me a little longer to make great accomplishments in one or the other because I'm dividing my time, but what's the rush? If it takes both for me to feel fulfilled, then that's the way I have to go."
"Doesn't seem as if it would leave much time for a personal life."
She shrugged. "I don't have one."
"By choice?"
"Because there aren't a lot of men who fascinate me as much as my work does."
"Present company included?"
She evaded his eyes at that.
"Penny?"
She lifted her gaze finally. "My impression was that present company wasn't interested in my social life, except from a distant, analytical point of view."
He winced. "I can think of at least two recent occasions when I've demonstrated otherwise."
"A few kisses? Sneaking into my bed? I chalked those off as experiments which resulted in insufficient evidence from which to draw a conclusion."
He grinned. "Are you angling for more experiments?"
"I wouldn't want you to put yourself out."
"Oh, I think I can probably manage to survive a few hours in your company."
"Thank you so very much."
"Penny?"
"Hmm?"
"You realize this is a very dangerous gamble, don't you?"
She leveled a mischievous look at him. "For you or me?"
"I'd say we both have a lot to lose."
"And even more to gain," she retorted softly.
Sam was so busy replaying her taunting words in his mind as he walked back to his car later that night that he missed the approach of the five young men who came out of the shadows to surround him. Tank waved a knife in his face.
"I guess we'll find out who the tough guy is now," the teenager taunted.
"You don't want to do this," Sam said quietly. "Assaulting a police officer carries a very stiff penalty."
"If he lives to tell who did it," Tank retorted smugly. "I'd say the odds are in my favor at the moment."
"Is that how you intend to prove to your friends here how tough you are? It's an uneven fight. You've got a weapon. I don't. Drop the knife and we'll see who wins in a fair fight."
"I ain't interested in fair, man. I'm looking to get even for every time you've busted my chops, every time you've looked down your nose at me. I'm going to carve up that pretty face of yours and then you can see if your lady friend will take a second look at you."
Without further warning, he slashed the knife through the air. Sam ducked instinctively and saw the blur as it barely missed his cheek. He felt the sting as it nicked his shoulder instead. Tank's next slice was poorly aimed and gave Sam a chance to grab his arm and twist it. He kneed him in the groin and heard his grunt of pain.
"Get him," Tank ordered, sounding breathless and furious.
Sam could have taken on two of them, maybe even three, but not five. They closed in around him, pinning him in place for Tank's attack.
Sam tried to get to the gun he had tucked into his boot, the one he'd sworn he didn't have and didn't want to use, but one of the boys slammed a punch into his midsection and doubled him over. Gagging and trying to catch his breath, he again reached for the gun, only to have Tank stab him again...and again. The pain was unbearable and unrelenting and then it faded as the world turned hazy and distant. He was losing blood.
It was the distant sound of sirens that probably saved him.
"Cops!" one of the teens warned, and then they were all gone, leaving him in an agony of pain, crumpled on the sidewalk in a pool of his own blood.
Just before he passed out, Sam thought he heard Penny's voice calling to him, demanding that he hold on. He could have sworn he felt her hand caressing his cheek, felt the brush of her lips across his, but that couldn't be. She was inside her apartment half a block away, safe. Dammit, she had to be safe.
Chapter 11
Penny stood by the pay phone in the emergency room shaking uncontrollably as she fumbled with her address book and tried to dial Dana's unfamiliar number. She got two wrong numbers, awakening some very cranky strangers, before she finally got it right by hitting the numbers with careful deliberation. As it rang, she tried to think of what she would say to Sam's sister.
Even though the paramedics in the ambulance had promised her that Sam was going to make it, she hadn't believed them. He'd been so terribly pale and his hand in hers had been like ice. She'd wanted to throw herself onto the stretcher to warm him. Only the awareness that the paramedics were providing him with essential treatments had kept her from shoving them aside to take over his care herself.
When Jason finally answered the phone, his voice groggy with sleep, it was all Penny could do to keep from sobbing. "Jason?"
"Yes. Who is this?"
"It's Penny. Penny Hayden."
"Are you okay?" he asked, instantly picking up on the alarm in her voice.
"It's not me. It's Sam," she said, choking back a note of hysteria. "He's in surgery."
"An accident?"
"No. He was attacked outside my apartment. I think it was one of those gangs."
"How bad is it?" he asked.
The calm note in his voice soothed her. She could hear Dana asking questions in the background. Penny wanted to reassure her, to reassure herself, but she couldn't find the words. "The paramedics said he would make it, but I'm scared," she admitted. "He lost so much blood."
"We'll be there as soon as we can find someone to look after the kids," he promised. "Hold on, okay?"
"I'm trying."
Penny retreated to the waiting room and huddled in a chair, trying to ward off the chill of stark terror. She couldn't lose him, not like this. Not now. The moment she had seen him on the street, lying there bleeding and unconscious, she had realized with absolute clarity that what she'd dismissed all these years as a silly infatuation really was love, a love that had been tested by time--for her, anyway.
She was hardly aware of the passing of time, but a nurse brought her a cup of coffee and promised to return when there was any news from the operating room. It seemed like forever, but it was probably no more than an hour before Jason and Dana arrived. Dana's eyes widened in horror at the sight of all the blood spattered on Penny's clothes.
"Oh, my God, were you hurt, too?" she asked, dropping into the chair beside Penny and enfolding Penny's hands in her own warmer, stronger grasp.
"No, I wasn't there. He'd just dropped me off," she said in a shaky voice. "It happened as he was going back to his car. Randy, this kid who's been keeping an eye on me for Sam, saw the guys come out of an alley. Thank goodness he was there. Sam had given him the night off, but Ra
ndy took his assignment seriously. He passed by just to check things out. Anyway, when he saw what was happening, he ran to my apartment and I called for help. By the time I got downstairs, the ambulance was on its way and the gang had taken off."
Dana looked puzzled. "Why was somebody watching you?"
"It's a long story, but a gang leader had threatened me. Sam's been trying to keep an eye on me. When he wasn't available, Randy took over."
Tears welled up in Dana's eyes before she turned away from Penny. She stood and began to pace.
"I knew it," she said, her gaze going to her husband. "I knew one of these days he was going to get hurt. I hate the fact that he's a cop. When this is over, I'm going to insist that he leave the force."
Jason pulled her into his arms. "No, you're not. You know this is something he has to do. Being a cop is who he is."
"Well, he can damned well be something else," Dana snapped angrily.
Penny could sympathize. In the past hour she'd grown to despise the job that put Sam's life in danger every single day. Chances were when things calmed down, Dana wouldn't say a word to him, but Penny vowed that she would. She would not have him endangering his life just because he thought he didn't matter to anyone. With a sudden flash of insight, she realized that that conviction was behind all of his actions. Couldn't he see how many people cared about him? Hadn't he figured out yet how much his life was worth?
Just look at the gathering in the waiting room. In the time since word had gone out about the attack, Ryan and Jake had turned up, along with several other police officers. Dana and Jason had been joined by Kevin and Lacey. And Randy hovered nearby. Penny went to him.
"Would you like to go to the chapel with me?"
He lifted his distressed face and met her gaze. Finally he nodded. "I haven't said too many prayers in my life," he admitted.
She squeezed his hand. "Then this one will count even more," she promised.
They sat side by side in the dimly lit hospital chapel for what seemed an eternity. They were still there when Jason came in search of them.
"He's out of surgery."
Penny waited for more.
Jason smiled at her. "The doctors say he'll be fine."
An astonishing sense of relief washed through her. He would be fine, she repeated to herself. And then she vowed to strangle him herself if he ever took unnecessary chances again.
"You're very lucky," the doctor said to Sam a few hours after he finally regained consciousness.
They'd told him it had taken forty-eight hours for him to emerge from the haze of painkillers and anesthetic. He'd come to and started yelling. He'd raised such a ruckus that the nurses had fled, sending Dr. Kline to settle him down. Apparently the physician's favorite technique for taming a troublesome patient was to scare him to death.
"A hairbreadth to the right and he'd have cut a main artery," the surgeon added. "You would not be in here giving all my nurses a rough time. You'd be on a slab at the morgue. As it is, you should come away from this with nothing more than a nasty scar or two. Most of your wounds were superficial."
"How comforting."
"Don't knock it. It will impress the hell out of the ladies. One in particular has been fascinated with the damage ever since we brought you in."
He dragged his head off the pillow. "Penny? Where is she?" Awakening alone, he had been struck anew by the fear that she had been harmed in the attack.
"Not to worry," Dr. Kline soothed, his manner changing in response to Sam's obvious distress. "I sent her off for coffee. I would have preferred she go home and get some sleep, but she hasn't budged any farther than the hospital cafeteria."
So she had been there, Sam thought. "Was she hurt?"
"No. You can stop your worrying on that score. From what I hear she arrived at the same time as the ambulance, insisted on coming along for the ride. She has a stubborn streak a lot like yours."
"Who called for help?"
The doctor shook his head. "She'll have to tell you that. My expertise begins with your arrival on our doorstep."
"I want out."
The doctor grinned. "I'll just bet you do."
"Well?"
"Not if you threatened me with jail time." He waved on his way out.
For the next hour there was a steady parade of visitors beginning with Dana and Jason and Kevin and Lacey, all offering him a place to stay when he was eventually released. He responded testily to the offers. Then Ryan and Jake stopped by with a promise to have Tank and his pals locked up before the end of the day. They vowed to see that they were tried as adults and spent a long, long time in prison. Sam reacted crankily to them, as well, his eyes peeled on the door, waiting for Penny to return. He wanted to see for himself that Tank hadn't gotten to her. Fear warred with impatience.
When Penny eventually sashayed into his room, he took out his frustration on her before he noted the exhaustion on her face and the blood spatters all over her clothes. She hadn't even taken time to go home and change clothes. Alarm at her appearance made him even more irritable.
"What are you doing here?" he demanded. "You should be at home getting some rest."
"Rumor has it some creep tried to cut you down to size," she said, reacting to his testiness with amazing calm. "I thought I'd stick around to hear your version."
"It wouldn't have happened if there hadn't been five of them," he grumbled. "I couldn't keep my eyes on all of them at once."
"Tank, I assume. At least, that's what Randy thought. He saved your life, you know. He ran to my apartment and we called for help. Whoever attacked you had run off by the time we got back outside."
"It was Tank."
"How come you didn't spot him?"
"My mind was on other things," he admitted reluctantly, recalling the conversation they'd had only moments before the attack. "It'll never happen again."
"Too bad he didn't aim for your hard head. The knife would probably have ricocheted off."
This wasn't going the way he'd meant it to at all. He'd expected a woman who'd spent two days at his bedside to display a little sympathy. She wasn't giving him an inch. "Did you stick around here to cheer me up?" he asked.
"Sure did."
"You're doing a lousy job of it."
"Ah, but I have news. Word is that you want out."
"I asked. The doctor said no."
"Obviously you didn't use your charm on him. He told me he would be willing to spring you day after tomorrow if you will go someplace where someone can watch out for you and where you will be guaranteed a week or so of bed rest."
"I can watch out for myself."
She glared at him with obvious impatience. "Do you want to get out of here or not? The entire medical complex has voted you worst patient of the year and you've only been awake for the past couple of hours. When Didi calls because she's heard the grumbling clear over in the labs, it has to be bad. Pretty soon, they're liable to start withholding food just to weaken your spirit."
"So what the hell am I supposed to do? Hire a babysitter?"
Wide blue eyes regarded him thoughtfully. "Let's see now. You could have gone to Jason and Dana's, but you turned them down. As I recall, you said something about not being cooped up with a squalling brat, one neurotic toddler and a budding delinquent, which I might add would probably earn you ten to twenty in prison if Grandfather heard you talking that way about his great-grandchildren."
He flinched. "Dana knew I didn't mean it. They're actually great kids."
"Perhaps you'll tell them how great they are, if Dana and Jason ever permit you near them again. Now let me think. Kevin and Lacey were willing to have you stay out at Cape Cod, but what were your exact words?"
She regarded him expectantly. He remained stubbornly, guiltily silent. It didn't matter. She filled them in for him. "I believe you told them if you wanted to retire to the damned beach, you'd go someplace that wasn't overrun with tourists. Was that it?"
"Something like that," he muttered. "So wh
at's your point?"
She studied him with a look that made him very, very wary.
"Looks like I'm elected," she announced.
"You?" he repeated weakly. This was beginning to sound like a very bad idea. Perhaps he should just stay put and deal with the whims of the nurses.
"That's right. Me. Grandfather's already called from California to check on you. He says we can stay over at his place."
"What's wrong with my own apartment? I'd rather be in my own place."
"Yeah, well, we don't always get what we want in life. Besides, do you honestly think the two of us could survive without killing each other in that cramped space you've described to me? Ditto my apartment. Besides, the housekeeper's at Grandfather's."
Sam sensed a new twist in Brandon's plot. Even though he might have wanted something exactly like this, he reacted with suspicion now that Brandon's fine hand was involved. "If Mrs. Farnsworth is around, why do I need you?" he inquired testily.
"To keep her from quitting," she said succinctly.
Chapter 12
It was just for a couple of days, a week at the outside, Penny told herself the next night as she packed a bag to take across town in the morning. She could put up with anything, even a foul-tempered beast like Sam Roberts, for that long. Who knew, maybe she'd even become totally disenchanted with the man. That would be a welcome change from the anguish she'd felt when a nearly incoherent Randy had come pounding into her apartment, tears streaming down his face while she frantically dialed 9-1-1.
She had relived the terror of the next few hours over and over again in her mind. In the time it had taken her to figure out what had happened to Sam and to reach him where he lay bleeding on the sidewalk, she had died a thousand deaths.
Ironically, her distress had calmed Randy and he'd knelt beside her, reassuring her over and over that Sam would be all right. He'd demonstrated a maturity far beyond his years and she'd been grateful for his presence in the emergency room while she and the rest of the family had awaited word on Sam's fate.
In the middle of the night when the trauma surgeon had eventually made the same promise for his recovery that she'd heard from the paramedics, she hadn't entirely believed it. Only when Sam had regained consciousness the previous afternoon had she finally been convinced.
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