Legacy of Danger

by Jillian David

  ABCDE ABCDE. For the love of little puppies. AB freaking C. Airway, breathing, circulation, disability, exposure. Concentrate.

  The trauma resuscitation mantra was for amateurs, and Mariah West was many months out of residency. But she would do whatever was needed to stay laser focused on the two patients in front of her. Sure, she could handle multiple patients at once, but it got dicey when they were in such critical condition. In the rural Bondurant Valley Hospital, the family doctor on call also covered the ER since the patient volumes and acuity were typically low.

  Typically low. Except when she went on call. Then all flipping hell broke loose. Or so it always seemed, thanks to her doctor's superstitions about having a karmic black cloud.

  Tonight, Bondurant Valley Hospital's small emergency department vibrated as nurses, doctors, and EMS personnel scrambled to stabilize these two seriously injured patients.

  Staff threaded additional large bore IVs into the patients' arms. Both subjects were breathing on their own. No airway compromise at this time, although both had head injuries, so their status could change rapidly.

  Mariah glanced over at the stone-faced man who had planted himself on the far edge of the room. According to a nurse's whisper, he was Vaughn Taggart, the oldest brother of the unconscious woman in front of her and son of Mr. Austin Taggart, head of a local ranching family and one of Mariah's regular clinic patients.

  Vaughn had insisted on coming into the ER with the patients. But instead of getting in the way, he hadn't moved from his vigilant position against the wall. The intensity of his scowl made Mariah want to rub the back of her neck.

  Or hide.

  He observed the care team with a quiet grimness, but the tight lines bracketing his hard mouth made him look concerned, not terrifying. His Adam's apple bobbed, shifting cords of muscles around in his neck. He reminded Mariah of the guys at her brother's MMA gym in Salt Lake City. Always tense, clenched, and primed for a fight.

  Shaking her head, she tried to ignore the man and concentrate on the secondary evaluation of her patients.

  Right as she leaned over to reassess her male patient, the trauma bay door slammed open and she jumped, losing her grip on the stethoscope bell. Garrison Taggart stormed into the room. The second oldest Taggart sibling. Mariah had met him a few weeks ago; she'd cared for his girlfriend, Sara, and his only son, Zach, when they had been injured.

  Wow. This family could not buy a break.

  Garrison stalked straight over to the unhappy man plastered to the wall. Vaughn stood there like a bronze cowboy sculpture. In fact, with both men next to each other, it was clear that Vaughn was a harder, bigger version of Garrison, like the rough draft before the final product. Vaughn's face wasn't so much handsome as compelling. Dark brown, almost black eyes narrowed beneath thick brows. A crooked nose suggested this wasn't his first confrontation, and the tilt of his thick chin told her it wouldn't be the last. His dark brown hair had red glints, like embers in a banked fire.

  Not breaking stride or momentum, Garrison lifted a thick, shearling jacket-clad forearm and slammed his brother in his chest, the boom reverberating through the trauma bay, making everyone freeze. How did Vaughn remain standing after such a hard impact? The two men glared at each other. Nurses' jaws dropped open.

  What the hell? Sweat prickled Mariah's chest.

  "You've got some nerve, coming back here now, after all this time. What I'd give to punch your lights out." Garrison's voice filled the room.

  "So do it," his brother gritted out. His body was tense, but his arms remained down. Although, given his massive frame, he could likely fend off any attacker and then some.

  Damn it. Were those two bulls going to go at it in her ER? Because she only had experience as a ringside doctor, not as an actual MMA fight referee. No way did she want to get between the two glowering men.

  He reset his grip on Vaughn's leather jacket lapels, making the glass cabinet doors rattle. Then Garrison growled.

  Yep. Definitely going to brawl.

  Not happening. Not here and not if she had anything to say about it.

  Rule one of trauma management? Make sure the environment is safe to care for patients. Control the situation.

  Control? Safety? Funny, since the first half of her life had been all about a lack of safety and zero control of her situation. Well, then. Nothing like making up for lost time in a public forum.

  She took a big breath and snapped, "Take it outside, guys. That crap has no business in here."

  Everyone in the room pivoted and stared at Mariah. Even the machine beeps seemed to stop.

  Attention. Damn it. Heat flowed over her chest and neck. She pushed her discomfort aside; patients' lives depended on her ability to maintain order and focus on their care.

  Over Garrison's shoulder, Vaughn's gaze locked onto her until she shivered. It wasn't so much that the action was inappropriate. It was his blank, detached exterior that stole the air from her lungs. The coldness. Like he didn't care if Garrison beat the hell out of him. Didn't care if he made a scene. Didn't care what anyone thought.

  If she had felt inadequate before, his cold assessment triggered too many memories and took her insecurities to a whole other level. Exactly what she could not afford today. And frankly, his opinion meant nothing. She had one job to do, and it didn't involve this hulk of a man.

  With a flex to his massive shoulders, Vaughn pushed against the wall and lifted his hands, dislodging his brother's grip. He stormed out, followed by Garrison. In their wake, clods of sandy mud and snow dropped from their thick boots onto the trauma bay floor.

  The air whooshed out of the room, and everyone continued to stand still for a few seconds.

  Then with a ripple, like shaking themselves awake, Mariah and the staff all turned back to caring for the patients. The low voices and sounds of medical devices resumed.

  An invisible band she hadn't realized had been cinched around her chest released. She could breathe again. A fleeting headache came and went across her temples.

  Exhaling deeply, she turned back to her patients.

  ABCDE. Airway, breathing, circulation, disability, expos

  Chapter 3

  Vaughn slumped against yet another wall while Garrison came unglued in the hospital waiting room. Not that he cared what anyone else thought about his brother's behavior, but the fact that no other person wanted to approach within thirty feet of them came as a relief. Hell, Vaughn didn't want to be within thirty feet of this damned hospital. He wanted to leave so badly that his muscles twitched and skin crawled.

  Back in that emergency room, the sharp scent of rubbing alcohol and snap of gloves combined with the sounds of whooshing and beeping, blasting him with a memory of Mom's last days as she fought cancer. How many years ago had that been? Four? Five? For his part, Vaughn had been too involved in self-destructing via alcohol-fueled brawls to be fully present for his own mother. Couldn't fix the past, but no way would he make the same mistake again. No more hiding.

  Which meant, at some point, he'd have to fess up and tell Garrison his real reason for leaving the ranch last year. Not now, but soon. If he thought Garrison wanted to kill him now for deserting the family, wait until he heard about how thoroughly Vaughn had screwed up his brother's life. Now that was a conversation to look forward to. Start the popcorn, kick back, and enjoy the shit-show.

  "Son of a bitch, what are you doing here?" A vein. A real goddamned vein stood out on Garrison's wind-roughened forehead, visible even beneath the brim of his hat. His younger brother's hands curled into hunks of anger at his sides. It would come as no surprise if Garrison punched him into oblivion.

  Vaughn tapped his own forehead. "Shelby left a weird message with me earlier today and thought I needed to be here. You know how she gets feelings."

  "Of course I know about her feelings. And your feelings. And all of our goddamned feelings. We're all a bunch of fucking mutants with our brains wired crossways."

  Garrison hadn't been left o
ut of the strange power lottery. No, he could reach into someone's mind and detect if they were lying. Seemed like a great gift, until paranoia and distrust made him avoid everyone.

  In the immediate family, the four Taggart siblings had these special "gifts." But go a little further out on the family tree and there was a mess of... odd... cousins in Montana, where Mom grew up. Nosing around a little more, Vaughn had found stories about his maternal grandmother from back east and the interesting things she could do.

  For the most part, the Taggart kids kept their powers hidden. It was hard enough growing up in the fishbowl of a small town without being freaks of nature.

  Garrison took a breath. "Why return now? Why not a month ago or two?"

  "No one called me before today."

  "Lame excuse. Try again."

  "Gar, it's late—" He checked his watch. "Or rather, early. We don't need to work through all of our issues right now. Let's put our energy toward Shelby and Eric in there." And as a bonus, Vaughn wouldn't mind figuring out why his power had just flared around that ER doctor, right when her moss-green eyes had pinned him in place. Maybe whatever had changed in his head when he flipped gears and protected Shelby and Eric had fried his ability to detect danger.

  Or maybe interacting with that nasty, stinking glob out there had changed Vaughn's power. What the hell was that thing anyway?

  Later. He'd figure it out later and then get rid of the thing.

  His brother rubbed his neck. "Look, Vaughn. Can you just go back to the ranch and stay there? I want to be here with Shelby and Eric. And now that Kerr has sorted out his guide service guests, he needs to be here with her."

  Ah yes, Shelby and Kerr's extra "twin sense." Feeling his sister's injuries must have rattled the hell out of Kerr. Almost as bad as what Shelby had suffered when Kerr had almost died in that IED explosion in Afghanistan.

  Vaughn glanced around the empty waiting room as a prickle of his power came and went. "Why can't I stay at the hospital, too? We can all three wait."

  "Because there is some bad juju going on. Long story, but the Taggart family is having issues."

  "Issues? Is Zach still... normal?" Garrison's young son. His brother's pride and joy. And his biggest fear, due to the uncertainty of whether Zach would also manifest a supersensory ability.

  "Yeah, no powers yet, thank God. Maybe it'll skip a generation. But we've got much bigger problems. Not sure how much help to ask for"—worry lines crinkled around his eyes—"since I don't know how long you're sticking around this time."

  That comment hurt. And was also well deserved.

  He continued, "But right now, the rule is that one of us has to be at the ranch all the time, in case—"

  "In case what?"

  "In case something happens," he lowered his voice to a hoarse growl, "like that thing you saw out there. Not sure what the hell it was, but it has our number. Son of a bitch. Too much going on." He paused. "You going back to the ranch will also give you time to see Dad."

  "How's he doing?"

  Maybe he didn't want the answer, based on the downturn of Garrison's mouth.

  "Poorly."

  It was like an uppercut to the jaw.

  "What do you mean?" Vaughn asked.

  "He isn't doing well, okay? That's all you deserve to know right about now."

  He opened his mouth again, but Garrison cut him off with a slice of his hand through the air. "Later. We'll catch up once I make sure that Shelby and Eric are okay."

  Because someone had to take care of them went unsaid. Because my oldest brother fell down on his job.

  Vaughn clamped his mouth shut. "Got it." He strode through the hospital doors. It was a still night, cold and harsh.

  Colder, now that he was away from his sister and brother.

  The separation shouldn't have been palpable, but their connection as Taggarts, as family, as individuals who shared a strange secret, all pulled at Vaughn like a tightening rubber band, painful and stretched to its limit.

  When would it break?

  * * *

  The dirt road to the main buildings of the family ranch took far too long to travel, and the distance was more than he could measure in miles.

  Early dawn glowed on the cloudless, cold horizon. The weather had cleared out, leaving a biting chill. Sparse snow failed to soften the wild rangeland Vaughn had called home for his entire life.

  Until last year.

  Until the biggest mistake he'd made in his life.

  Unless you counted returning home, which might turn out to be an even bigger mistake.

  His heart thundered in his chest. What had Garrison meant about Dad not doing well? Shelby hadn't mentioned anything in her tense, whispered message.

  His gut churned. That might have been the last time anyone heard his sister's voice.

  Christ.

  As Vaughn guided the loaner car over a rise in the bumpy road, the wan light gave the ranch buildings a grim, flat appearance, like quiet ghosts rising out of the wild Wyoming land.

  He blinked and rubbed his eyes.

  The big barn was missing. In its place stood a skeleton of new lumber.

  Off to the other side of the big ranch house and out buildings, cattle lowed in a small field. Wasn't it too early to bring them close to the house? There was still forage available on the grazing land. Too early for calving. What was going on?

  Where were the three yapping dogs that usually ran amok–their family pets and working ranch dogs?

  As the sky lightened right before the sun broke over the horizon, he caught a shadow of movement off in the trees beyond the field a few hundred yards from the house. A wince against the inevitable headache, a prickle on the back of his head, and his ability activated, senses on high alert. He didn't need to clench his fists to open his mind this time.

  His power yanked his head around toward the tree line. He peered into the gray forest.

  Nothing there. The ache in his temples receded.

  Had he imagined it? Was he tired and hallucinating?

  Since when had any of the Taggarts' abilities been wrong? Even when he and his siblings didn't want their powers to be right, no such luck.

  He parked the sedan next to Kerr's old truck near the kitchen, where a window glowed with warm, yellow light. Waves of memories crashed over him: his mother and father fixing meals as they stood at the counter together, the cheery red-and-white tile floor, the loud chatter across the table while he ate with his three younger siblings. One time, there had been a food fight, followed by a terrifying walk to the barn that all the kids took with their father. The anticipation of doom was enough to set Vaughn and his sister and brothers back on the right path.

  What about the hours of games, hiding in all the nooks and crannies of the ranch buildings? Or laughing their heads off at the worst tackle football games ever. Vaughn always won.

  Despite the memories, nothing felt right. This wasn't a homecoming.

  He had screwed up. He had taken the better of two rotten options and left all of this life behind more than a year ago. Done and done.

  His own life had changed for the better in New York. Well, mostly. By using that power to detect danger, Vaughn's MMA star was rising quickly, although he'd declined to enter the UFC as a contracted fighter, because he had one or two ethics left. Extra ability equaled unfair advantage. But along the way, he had gained some wealthy friends.

  And wealthy friends attracted women who wanted Vaughn solely for his connections. Damn it. Hadn't seen that betrayal coming. His danger detector hadn't made a peep when that particular Delilah walked into Vaughn's gym, embedded herself into his life, and then ripped it all apart when she spun around and sunk her talons into one of his wealthy friends.

  Given why he'd fled the ranch, a woman betraying Vaughn was the most perfect karma the universe could dish out. After that disaster, he had stuck with what he did best: fighting and picking stocks.

  Pair his ability to avoid danger with financial decision-making,
and he'd developed a reputation as quite the financial advisor with a hell of a track record, even over the brief period of time he'd been in New York City. He cultivated many of the MMA managers and organizers as his personal clients. Succeeding in those two worlds guaranteed that he had money and well-placed friends.

  So, hell yeah, when Shelby had called him for help, he had pulled a well-connected favor and hopped a private jet.

  But aside from saving her life, it had otherwise been a mistake, coming back to Copper River and opening all these wounds.

  He paused. Well, maybe returning hadn't been a complete mistake. In his mind's eye, an image formed of the pretty doctor with those quick movements as she worked on his family.

  At least he'd met someone new in town. Well, not met, actually. Got yelled at.

  So, not meeting someone new at all.

  Slamming the car door closed, he strode into the kitchen.

  Kerr sat at the worn wooden table. His head and shoulders drooped as he gripped a coffee mug. Car keys rested on the table.

  A tall, sturdy woman Vaughn didn't recognize had three skillets on the stove, all emitting mouthwatering aromas. When she turned, he rocked back on his heels. Her hazel eyes glinted with the same kind of gold flecks he and his siblings had. The woman's auburn hair was pulled back into a no-nonsense bun. One corner of her mouth lifted.

  Kerr cleared his throat as he waved a hand. "Vaughn? Ruth. Ruth? My brother Vaughn."

  She closed the space between them with purpose and gave a firm handshake. "Ruth Turcot. I'm a nurse caring for your father until he... improves."

  Vaughn reared back. Improves?

  She continued, "You might see my husband, Odie, wandering around. If you do run into him, please tell him to stay out of trouble."

  "Could someone tell me what the hell is going on here?" Vaughn's grip on his temper slipped.

  The woman coolly raised an eyebrow and moved back a few feet.

  "Better to show you," Kerr said, pushing to his feet with a grimace. He led Vaughn out of the kitchen and down the hall.

  Gut churning, Vaughn whispered, "Who the hell is that woman? And what's the story with Dad?"