Heart Trouble

by Jenny Lyn

  “What about Travis?”

  “He’s got court. Dad won’t let him postpone.”

  Sean aimed a pointed look his father’s way. “Imagine that.”

  “I don’t need full-time babysitters,” his dad said sharply, followed by a ripe curse when the nurse flushed his IV line with cold saline solution.

  “Then stop acting like such a baby. It’s not like you just had open-heart surgery or something,” Olivia teased before she kissed him on the forehead. “See you both tomorrow.”

  “Bye, sweetheart.”

  “We’re moving him to a private room,” one of the nurses explained, even though he’d sort of put that together for himself at that point. “So don’t get too comfortable.” She winked when he glanced at the baby-shit-yellow vinyl chair in the corner of his dad’s room.

  “Like that would ever happen,” he muttered. “Where’s Caleb?”

  “He left a few minutes ago. I’m surprised you didn’t pass him on your way in,” his dad said. He could’ve run smack into his brother, and he wouldn’t have known it. His mind had been somewhere else.

  Despite the nurse’s playful warning, Sean sat down and finished off his cold coffee while they readied Tom to be moved. He flipped open the paper, scanning the print for the latest article regarding the hunt for the Riverside Rapist.

  The Jacksonville Police Department has few clues, the headline read, and no suspects. Didn’t he know it.

  They’d run another small picture of Courtney Meldon with the article. She was smiling for the camera, a ray of blonde sunshine and hopeful dreams, all of it ripped away far too soon.

  Seeing the picture brought forth a fresh wave of worry over Erin.

  Luke was a damned good cop, and Sean trusted him and the other members of their team to look after her, protect her, just as competently as he would. Maybe more so since he’d been letting other parts of his body interfere with his duties as a cop. But then again, caring deeply about someone made the desire to keep them safe that much stronger.

  And fucking hell, he missed her. Except now, it was worse than he’d ever imagined, because there was finality to the way things had ended between them, thanks to him. No shot at a future. No chance of seeing her to end the ache. He was planning to use the excuse of picking up his duffel bag from her apartment, but it had been delivered to the fifth-floor nurses’ station yesterday by someone. Erin, he guessed. That sent a clear signal to stay away. She was over it. Moving on. Here’s your shit, I’m done with you.

  Because you’re a harsh, judgmental asshole.

  Sean tossed the newspaper aside.

  He could stalk her in the hospital. It wasn’t like he didn’t know where to find her. All he had to do was ride the elevator down to the first floor, poke around the emergency room. She typically worked nights. Those were her favorite shifts, she’d said. Busier, more crazies, better cases, and the time flew by. He stood up before he realized he was acting like one of those lunatics.

  Christ.

  Maybe there was some truth to what she said the first night they spent together.

  “Sometimes after intense emotional experiences people crave…sex.”

  He’d wanted her so badly he’d thought he might need to handcuff himself to a piece of furniture to keep from barging into her bedroom. And then there she was, standing at the foot of the couch, like he’d wished her there, watching him. Making his heart stop. She was so beautiful and sexy.

  She’d tried her best to explain away their deep attraction to one another, justify the strength of the pull between them. He’d been taken aback by what she’d said, and yes, a little ruffled by it too, but it was more a hit to his ego than anything else. Especially when he’d known the logic was bullshit. Desire had been an electrical current zinging from her body to his and back again, over and over. The attraction had started the instant they touched in Blue.

  He’d heard stories of people craving sex after funerals, but that was more of a life-affirming event. Because you needed to feel connected to a living, breathing human being, to feel alive and whole again after such a traumatic event. Their experience hadn’t been…

  Shit. The man who collapsed in the bar, Henry. Sean had forgotten he’d almost died. Would have died had it not been for Erin’s quick actions.

  “I was terrified,” she’d confessed afterward.

  So perhaps—

  “Son, what’s wrong with you?” his dad asked with a scowl. “You’re mumbling and pacing a hole in the floor.”

  “Nothing. Just wound a little tight tonight, that’s all.” Thinking too hard and too much.

  “Then lay off the coffee.”

  Sean grinned at his dad’s surliness. “You’re just pissed you can’t have any yet.”

  His dad eyed the nurses. “If my children loved me, they’d smuggle me some in.”

  One of the nurses snorted. “If your children love you, which I’m certain they do, they’ll help wean you off the caffeine.”

  “Bite your tongue, woman,” his dad said.

  Sean rolled his eyes. His dad was being cooperative, considering, but the longer he stayed in the hospital, the more ornery he was going to get.

  They transferred him to a wheelchair for the trip to his new room.

  “He’s moving to 525, and we’re going to bathe him once we get him to the room,” the little redheaded nurse told Sean. Beside her, his dad wiggled his eyebrows and Sean squelched a groan. “If you want to hang out in the visitors’ lounge at the end of the hall or run an errand, I can call you when we’re done.”

  “I’ll be around,” Sean muttered.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Instead of lounging, Sean paced some more, up and down the halls, until one of the nurses gave him a look that said he needed to plant it somewhere or leave. So he chose option number two.

  He rode the elevator down to the main floor of the hospital, navigating the maze of corridors until he found signs pointing him to the ER. When he got there, he sat down in a corner of the crowded lobby and just watched people come and go. Sick people. Really sick people, with cuts they’d temporarily bandaged themselves and swollen ankles they’d wrapped in bags of ice or frozen vegetables. Cranky, red-faced babies with high fevers and kids with bone-shaking coughs and snotty noses. Outside the windows, red lights flashed and sirens wailed, then died as ambulances pulled into an unseen bay around the corner to drop off more desperately ill or broken people.

  It was like waves crashing against a shoreline, one right after another, different sizes and strengths. Unrelenting and depressing as hell too. But the longer Sean sat and observed, the more he understood Erin. It had to be draining to work here. Physically and mentally exhausting, grating on her nerve endings until they were raw and exposed. Some days she might even be bled dry when it was over—the walking dead.

  No wonder she loved mindless television so much. “Reality shows,” she’d told him one night while they were tangled up on her couch, “are the furthest things from actual reality.”

  “Such a misnomer,” she’d said with a quiet laugh, and he’d agreed, not thinking much beyond the obvious and her soft, warm, distracting body curled around his.

  She knew what reality looked like, and it wasn’t pretty. It was right here in all of its bloody, feverish, contagious, pain-filled glory.

  But this was her life force too. Helping people, saving lives, was where she drew her strength. It fed her soul as much as it wore her down. He’d seen it that night in the bar with Henry, the way she’d shut out all the surrounding chaos, determined to see a stranger live to see another day.

  Just for the briefest of moments when the paramedics had shocked Henry’s heart back into a rhythm, there’d been a spark of triumph in Erin’s eyes. Sean had seen it and felt an overwhelming rush of awe, a strange sort of gratitude that he’d been there to witness what had happened, despite the dire circumstances.

  Then when the paramedics had rolled her temporary patient away, she’d seemed almost
lost, as if a part of her had followed them out the door, not exactly trusting they would take good enough care of Henry. And later that night she’d called to check on him, to make sure he was still doing okay.

  Her parents’ deaths haunted her dreams and pushed her when she was awake. She knew her purpose, and that was more than he could say for a lot of people. Hell, there were days Sean questioned his own drive. If she was 100 percent devoted to her calling, then she was to be admired for it, not questioned or hassled, which he was guilty of doing.

  The night they’d met she’d told him her job was hard for others to handle, namely the men she’d dated in the past. She’d cited the hours, the exhaustion, and the differences in salaries. What she hadn’t mentioned was her devout dedication to the job itself. Because it wasn’t just a career for her. It wasn’t about the money or the accolades. It was a major part of who she was, as if the desire to heal or help had been passed down through her father’s DNA.

  Loving Erin meant accepting the fact that he would not always come first in her life. That there would be days and nights she would be an empty shell when she came home, incapable of conversation or comprehension, perhaps even sensation. None of that knowledge tempered his desire for her one iota.

  “Sean?”

  He snapped out of his reverie when he heard his name. Tess was approaching from across the crowded room, her pretty features etched with concern. “Is something wrong? Are you hurt?”

  He held up a hand. “No, no, I’m fine.”

  “Oh.” The worry vanished from her expression. A coolness took its place, and rightly so. He’d hurt her friend. Her loyalties lay with Erin’s emotional welfare, not his. “Then what are you doing here?”

  It was hard to miss the sharpness lacing her voice. And he didn’t know how to answer her question without sounding like a fool. “I, uh…was just killing time while my dad was moved to a private room.”

  “By hanging out in the emergency room?” Yeah, she wasn’t buying it at all.

  “I like to people watch sometimes.”

  “Huh.” Tess’s dark eyes nailed Sean to the wall behind him. “Well, the people you want to watch isn’t here. She doesn’t come on for another hour.”

  “Tess, I swear I didn’t come here…” He shook his head tiredly. Fuck it. “How’s she doing?”

  She crossed her arms over her chest, getting ready to give him an earful of what he had coming to him. “If you want to know that, you’ll have to ask her yourself.”

  “Fair enough. I’ll let you get back to work then.”

  When Sean turned to leave, Tess’s words stopped him. “She took an oath, you know.” He faced her again. “She would never violate that oath, no matter what the circumstances.” She sighed, some of the stone in her expression dissolving. “Erin’s a tough nut to crack, Sean, but somehow you got in. For the first time since I’ve known her, she was thinking about something other than work. That in itself is a miracle.”

  She walked away, leaving Sean feeling as if he’d been sliced from his navel to his throat. At least he was in the right place for it.

  * * * *

  The move to a new room exhausted Tom, so he slept somewhat comfortably for a good part of the night. Sean, on the other hand, tossed and turned on the thing the hospital provided that they called a cot. His comfort didn’t matter, though. As long as his dad was receiving top-notch care, which he was, Sean could sleep on the floor if he had to, or propped in a corner. Instead, he lay there staring up at the ceiling through bleary eyes, listening as the heart monitor beeped in steady, reassuring intervals.

  “Isn’t this Erin’s hospital?” his father asked, startling Sean fully awake.

  He glanced at his watch. It was just after five a.m.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Wonder why she hasn’t been by to visit?”

  Sighing, Sean sat up and dry-washed his face with his hands. “That’s my fault, Dad. I…saw you two talking that afternoon at your birthday party. When Livvie called to tell me you’d had the heart attack, I figured you’d been discussing your health issues with Erin because she acted strangely after we left. She became quiet and a bit distant, sad almost, now that I think about it. I lost my temper and said some nasty things I shouldn’t have.”

  His dad shifted around in the bed, grimacing as he tried to get comfortable.

  “Son, I made her promise she wouldn’t say anything to you.”

  “Why would you do that?”

  “I didn’t want you to worry. Your job is dangerous enough without the added distraction of your old man’s rotten ticker.”

  “God, Dad.” Sean reached over and smoothed his father’s graying hair back from his forehead. “I appreciate your concern, but if there’s something wrong with you or Mom, I want to know about it right away. Don’t ever pull that shit again, okay?”

  Tom chuckled. “I hope I won’t have a need to.” After a deep breath, his dad continued. “Erin guessed that something was wrong before I told her. She has this directness about her that I find very refreshing, and she’s just that sharp a doctor at such a young age. Imagine how good she’ll be when she’s in her fifties.”

  I hope I’m still around to see that version of her.

  “I screwed things up,” Sean said. “And now I miss her something awful.”

  “Then stop feeling sorry for yourself and do something about it.”

  “What do you suggest?” He knew what he needed to do, but he asked anyway because he liked that he was having this conversation with his father. They rarely talked about serious stuff anymore. It had been years since his dad had offered him any sort of advice, other than “be careful” or “I wish you’d change your mind about becoming a police officer.”

  “Groveling,” his dad said.

  Sean smiled. “Does that work with Mom?”

  “Usually, but it doesn’t hurt to have a nice piece of jewelry handy as a backup.”

  “Erin’s not the jewelry type.”

  No, she’d be happy with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, no crust.

  “She’s a great girl. She has the Rembert Family Seal of Approval, not that you need it.” But he was glad to have it.

  “I’m afraid it might be too late.”

  “It’s never too late,” his dad said. “Unless she’s moved on to someone else that fast, which I somehow doubt.”

  “She hasn’t.”

  Of that, Sean was certain.

  He grabbed his shaving kit and stepped into the room’s attached bathroom to splash cold water on his face, shave, and brush his teeth.

  Erin wasn’t the type to have a revolving door in her bedroom. It might be months before she would even consider dating again. Hell, they hadn’t dated. They’d…collided.

  The more he thought about it, the more he was sure if things hadn’t gone down the way they had that night at Blue, he would’ve never seen her again. Their connection had scared her as much as it surprised her, so in a twisted sort of way, luck had been on his side in getting that assignment and in the subsequent series of events.

  He dropped his shaving kit back into his duffel bag, then stomped his feet into his boots and laced them up.

  “I forgot to bring my phone charger up with me last night, Dad. I’m going to run down to my car and get it.” And grab one of those monstrous cups of coffee. “Can I bring you anything from downstairs? Magazines, crossword puzzles, a balloon to cheer you up?”

  “Steak and eggs, preferably rare and runny.”

  Sean grinned, happy his dad’s appetite was returning, along with his sense of humor. “Nice try.”

  * * * *

  Erin was going to make one more concerted effort to see Tom, then give up. She felt like a coward, avoiding Sean like he was a pharmaceutical sales rep, but she couldn’t handle the animosity in his eyes, the hurt. It might’ve tapered off by now, since his dad was doing better, but perhaps not. He might never forgive her. And maybe she was trying to avoid more pain for herself as well. Th
e ache was still deep and acute, too tender to even try and ignore yet.

  As soon as her shift ended, she called first, asking the nurse who answered on the fifth floor if Tom had any visitors at present. She put Erin on hold for a few minutes, then came back to tell her no, he was alone. Erin hung up and took a risk by jumping in the elevator.

  The door of Room 525 stood ajar by a few inches. She hesitated there for a second, listening for voices on the other side. When she heard none, she knocked. His clipped “enter” made her second-guess her decision to visit for a moment, before she brushed it off, figuring he was just being a typical restless hospital patient.

  Tom sat propped up in bed, wires and tubes attached to his body in their necessary places. His color was good though, and he smiled when he saw it was her.

  “Erin! It’s good to see you. Come in, come in.”

  She perched her bottom on the edge of the windowsill. Behind her, the sun was rising, pushing daylight through the tiny cracks in the blinds. There was a rumpled, unmade cot in one corner of the room, and Erin could swear she caught a whiff of Sean’s aftershave in the air. Then she spotted his blue duffel bag shoved underneath the cot. He’d been there, spent the night with his father, and could return at any minute. Her heart raced at the possibility, even though her mouth went a little chalky with trepidation.

  “You just missed him,” Tom said.

  Erin’s face flushed with embarrassment. Good grief, was she that transparent? When she spoke, she stuttered a bit. “Oh, no…I didn’t. I came to see you. How are you feeling?”

  “Sore, grouchy, and claustrophobic.” Yeah, she bet it felt like being squeezed inside a shoebox, coming from a house the size of his. He chuckled, though. “Think you can pull some strings and get me out of here faster?”

  “If I had any sway whatsoever with Dr. Stanhope, I would use it for you, but I’m afraid I don’t. Sorry.”

  “Well, it was worth a shot.”

  “If you keep improving at the rate you are now, getting up and walking on your own, it won’t be long before you’re released.”