ANNIE AND THE OUTLAW

by Sharon Sala

"Don't apologize to me. Save it for the man who's going to dig that glass out of your foot. If you give him half of what I got this morning, he'll be the one needing an apology."

  She groaned and made a face at the thought.

  "Let's get this over with," she muttered.

  And then, as he started toward the door, she spread her hand across his chest, found the spot where his heart beat loudest and closed her eyes in silent thanksgiving that he was back. For whatever reason … and for however long … she would take it as the gift that it was and appreciate it.

  At the sound of the emergency door opening, a nurse looked up. She raised an eyebrow at the sight of the big, leather-clad biker who'd just entered, carrying a woman whose injury was leaving persistent drops of fresh blood in their wake.

  The nurse read the look on his face and made an instant decision. This man was not the kind who would willingly wait to fill out the necessary papers.

  "This way," she said, and motioned them into a curtained-off area near the door. "You can put her down here. The doctor will be in shortly. There's a waiting area right down the hall, if you'd care to—"

  "No. I'll stay here," Gabe said, and gave the nurse a cool look, daring her to argue.

  She didn't. If someone wanted him moved, someone else could move him. She was a nurse, not a policewoman. She took down the patient's name, made note of the time and the type of injury, then left the chart at the foot of the bed.

  Minutes later, a doctor arrived.

  "What have we here?" he asked, and gave them a confident smile.

  "I stepped on some glass," Annie said.

  "She passed out," Gabe interrupted.

  The doctor looked from the big man to the smaller woman and masked a weary sigh. With one on the defensive and the other ready to argue, this looked like it was going to be a nuisance.

  "Let's start over," the doctor said. "I'm Dr. Pope." He picked up the chart that the nurse had started. "And you're Annie O'Brien?"

  She nodded. "This is my … um, my friend … Gabe Donner."

  Gabe hated it. They didn't even have a way of categorizing their relationship. He wasn't just her friend, damn it. But there was no getting past the fact that although they'd made love with sweet abandon, he'd never given Annie reason to think there was anything emotional in their relationship.

  "So, Mr. Donner. You're telling me she passed out," he said, as he bent down and began examining the cut on the bottom of Annie's foot. "How do you know? Did you witness it?"

  "No. But I saw her lying unconscious on the floor with blood everywhere and assumed she didn't choose that location in which to spend the night."

  Dr. Pope's eyebrows drew together at the sarcastic tone of Gabe's voice.

  "So you're telling me that you weren't there when this happened."

  Gabe swiped an angry hand across his face and cursed beneath his breath.

  "No … I wasn't there. I left yesterday morning." Gabe stuffed his hand in his pocket and pulled out the bottle containing Annie's pills. Her harsh gasp as she saw what he'd done told him more than he wanted to know. "She takes these for pain … headache pain. She says she has migraines. I didn't know people could pass out from headaches."

  Elevated eyebrows were the only sign of surprise that Dr. Pope allowed himself as he took the bottle from Gabe's hands and read the prescription, as well as the dosage.

  Gabe turned and fixed Annie with a hard, pointed stare.

  Her eyes were wide, the pupils transfixed. All color had drained from her face as she waited for the doctor's reaction.

  Dr. Pope looked up. Annie shook her head once in a negative motion. He assumed she didn't want anything further said about the matter, and because she was his patient, he recognized her right to privacy.

  Dr. Pope set the pills down on the table beside her bed and resumed his inspection of her foot. "Let's get some local anesthetic around this cut and then clean out the glass. I think it'll need a few stitches, too, but I can't be sure until I see how deep the glass is. Wait right here, Miss O'Brien. I'll get the nurse."

  Annie rolled her eyes and flopped back onto the bed. Where on earth would she go—and how?

  She looked up at the ceiling, then over at the door. Everywhere and anywhere except at Gabriel's face.

  "You're mad at me, aren't you?" he asked quietly.

  "No. Of course not," she said shortly. "Whatever for?"

  He almost bought it. Almost … but not quite. Because no matter how sweet her smile or how innocent her look, he still saw a deep and abiding fear in the depths of Annie's eyes. Before be could press her for more of an explanation, the nurse arrived with an ominous-looking tray bearing an assortment of bottles and needles.

  "You'll have to wait outside," she announced.

  Gabe glared. Annie intervened.

  "Please, Gabe," she said. "I'll be fine. You did your job by getting me here. Now let them do theirs."

  He nodded—reluctantly. Then, before he changed his mind, he leaned over and kissed her gently on the lips.

  It was unexpected, and because of that, Annie reacted before she had time to hide her own feelings.

  When their mouths merged, sighs traded places. Gabe reluctantly tore away from the seductive pull of her lips and walked, away without looking back.

  The nurse raised her eyebrows and winked at Annie. "He's a tough one, isn't he?" she asked, eyeing the stiff, unyielding back of the man in black.

  Annie didn't answer at first, and then when she might have, she was too busy trying to get past the sharp little needle jabs around the cut on her foot, as the nurse went about her business of deadening the area for the stitches that were to come.

  The waiting room chair was small and uncomfortable as hell. But Gabe was unaware of anything or anyone except the muted sounds of conversation going on between Annie and the doctor. He could hear their voices, but not clearly enough to discern what was being said. It was making him crazy. If he could only get a little bit closer, he knew that he would have the answers to his own questions regarding one Annie O'Brien.

  He sighed and shifted restlessly in his seat. It wasn't going to happen. Not here. He'd been relegated to being on the outside looking in, and for now, that was the way it would have to be.

  A small, determined smile slid across his mouth. But, he told himself, there was always later, after he got Annie home. After she'd rested. When she wasn't in so much pain. Then she had some explaining to do, and he wasn't going to be happy until she did.

  "All done," Dr. Pope said a little while later, coming to stand in front of Gabe.

  Gabe stood.

  "You can take her home," the doctor continued. "I want to see her again in seven days. Earlier if she has unusual soreness or swelling around the area. I gave her an antibiotic. She should be fine."

  "What about the headaches? What about the pills? Is that normal?"

  A weary, time-worn expression of sympathy moved across the doctor's face. He could see that the man was sincerely worried. His concern for Annie O'Brien was obvious.

  But a long time ago the doctor had taken an oath to be faithful to a patient's right to privacy. And this patient had certainly been adamant about hers. He simply shoved his stethoscope into the pocket of his lab coat and answered Gabe's question without actually revealing any confidential information.

  "The pills are Miss O'Brien's regular medication."

  He'd told the truth … as far as it went. It was up to Miss O'Brien to reveal the rest … if she chose.

  "Exactly what is her condition?" Gabe persisted.

  The doctor shrugged. "You should know better than to ask me that. If you want to know more than what I've told you, it will have to come from Miss O'Brien, not me."

  He walked away, leaving Gabe to read between the lines of his vague remarks. And what he read there didn't make him feel any better. In fact, it made everything worse. It seemed to confirm his own worst fears.

  "Annie … are you ready?" he asked as he stepped inside
the curtained cubicle.

  She nodded.

  "I'll get a wheelchair," the nurse said.

  "It won't be necessary," Gabe answered, and scooped Annie gently from the bed.

  Moments later, they were gone.

  * * *

  He watched her sleep.

  With her still groggy from the painkillers and the shock of the accident, it had been all he could do to get her inside and in bed before she succumbed to exhaustion. The moment her head hit the pillow, she rolled over on her side, curling up like a child in prayer, with her hands clasped beneath her chin. She never knew when he left the room.

  He hadn't gone far, and he wasn't gone long. As soon as he was satisfied that all was as it should be within Annie's domain, he went back to her room. And there he remained, slumped down in another chair too small for his large frame, staring at each separate feature on her face, trying to understand what made her so special to him.

  Dissecting her face with his eyes, feature by feature, was revealing experience for Gabe. He saw past the externals. To the woman beyond, and he finally realized that what he loved most about Annie was what was invisible to the human eye. It was a combination of her spirit and her unswerving trust in the face of what should have been insurmountable odds.

  He groaned quietly and buried his face in his hands. She was so loving, and too giving, and he couldn't help but wish their lives had been different. He wanted to stay here forever. To go to sleep each night holding her in his arms and wake up each morning by putting a smile on Annie's face. But it wasn't going to happen, and the sooner he faced it, the better—for himself as well as Annie. Giving her false hope was the crudest thing he could have done, and despite whatever reasons he'd given himself for coming back, it had already happened.

  Without thinking of the consequences, he crawled into the bed beside her, then slid one arm beneath her head and the other around her waist. It didn't take much. Just a scoot and a shift before he had her right where he wanted her. Right where he needed her. He closed his eyes, unaware of the painful smile that cut across his features as she relaxed against him.

  My Annie.

  It was his last conscious thought before weariness claimed him, too, and they slept. But only Annie dreamed.

  Fateful dreams and flights of fancy had no place in Gabriel Conner's life. He was here on sufferance only, his days marked by a ticking clock and the number of times that he tried to right a wrong. It was what he did, who he was, but this time it wasn't going to be enough.

  * * *

  Chapter 9

  «^»

  "Juh … Juh-ack and Juh-aisle…"

  "That's a short I Davie. Try again."

  "Juh-ill…"

  "Right! Good job! Now continue."

  "Juh-ack and Juh-iil wuh … wuh." Davie grimaced in frustration, as he continued. "…Wuh-int up the huh-ill to … Jack and Jill went up the hill!"

  The expression on Davie's face was priceless. The sudden understanding of what he'd been trying to read colored his expression with joy. She smiled. That look was the single reason she'd chosen teaching as a profession.

  "Oh God, Annie. I read that whole sentence, didn't I?"

  Annie nodded. She patted his arm, then pointed to the next line. "You sure did, Davie. But now's no time to stop. What comes next?"

  Eagerly he leaned forward, his forefinger still positioned below the last word he'd read so as not to lose his place, and began sounding out the syllables.

  Annie's thoughts wandered as she absently listened. It had been a week since their lessons had begun. And in that week, so much had occurred in her life.

  Gabe was back and, except for the time she spent with Davie, never far from her side. The stitches had come out of her foot. And Davie Henry was making progress, actual visible progress in learning to read. She should have been the happiest woman on the face of the earth. But she wasn't. Day by day, she became more anxious, more certain that, for her, time was running out.

  Each night she was loved to sleep so deeply and so thoroughly that she often found herself pretending that this way of life was going to go on forever. But when morning came and she had to face herself in the mirror, she couldn't lie … not even to herself. It wasn't forever. And it was all because of the secret she was keeping from Gabe. The secret that was eating her alive.

  The ragged grumble of the Harley's engine broke her wayward concentration. Annie blinked, looked at the clock on the wall and then over at Davie, who was quickly closing the book he'd been reading from.

  "I'd better be going," he muttered, still embarrassed for anyone other than Annie to know about his problem.

  "Take this with you," she said, shoving the book toward him. "Practice reading aloud. Sound out the letters the way I showed you, and we'll do the next page tomorrow."

  Davie nodded, glancing nervously toward the back door as Gabe's footsteps sounded on the porch.

  "He won't interfere," Annie said, and she squeezed Davie's arm reassuringly, remembering the understanding with which Gabe had received the news of Davie's handicap.

  "So what," he'd remarked. "I was older than him before I learned. It's the learning that counts … not when it happens."

  Annie sighed, wishing she could share that bit of Gabe's conversation with Davie. She suspected it would go a long way toward making him feel better about himself.

  The two men passed each other with nods and furtive smiles. Gabe imagined Davie didn't approve of him and his relationship with Annie, and Davie imagined that Gabe could see into his soul and read his shortcomings in a single glance.

  Gabe stopped just inside the doorway, his gaze sweeping across Annie's face as the screen door banged behind Davie Henry's exit.

  Her familiar smile was in place. Everything about her seemed so open and aboveboard. But instinct told him that she was hiding something. Something she was afraid to tell him about.

  "I'll be right back," Annie said, and gently touched Gabe's shoulder before following Davie to his truck.

  Just as she left the kitchen, the phone rang in the front part of the house. She paused in the doorway, indecision catching her in mid-stride.

  "I'll get it," Gabe offered. "Go tell Davie whatever it is he needs to know."

  She nodded, waved her thanks and hurried out the door, anxious to give Davie some more last-minute instructions regarding his lessons.

  Gabe picked up the receiver on the third ring.

  "Hello … O'Brien residence." Then he frowned. The man's voice on the other end was unfamiliar, the tone of his question far too serious for Gabe's peace of mind as he answered, "Yes, she's here, but she's outside. Could she call you right back?"

  A slow sigh slid through the line and into his ear. For some unknown reason Gabe shivered. And then the man spoke again.

  "So … she's actually there … as, in residence?"

  Gabe frowned. "Yes, of course," he answered. "If you'll wait—"

  "I can't right now," the man answered. "I'm due in surgery." And then, as if he felt compelled to continue, he said, "My name is Dr. Peter Barnes. Miss O'Brien is … was … my patient. She's missed her last two scheduled appointments, and I was extremely concerned about her welfare. In fact, I was actually relieved to know that she missed them because she moved, not because … well…"

  Gabe inhaled slowly. His belly muscles clenched as he closed his eyes and said a small, silent prayer. Something told him that if he handled this right, he would get the answers he'd been wanting, and no one would be the wiser.

  "That's too bad," Gabe said. "I wish I'd known about her appointments. I would have made sure she'd called and let you know about the move. We made it together, in fact." He let the doctor digest the information he'd planted before he continued. "So—how did you find out where she was?"

  He thought he could hear Dr. Barnes shuffling papers. "I had a request for the transfer of her medical records come across my desk today. I took a chance and called Walnut Shade for a number. After I realized that
a doctor there … a Dr. Pope … had already treated her, it only made sense that she had to live nearby."

  "Right, that was late last week," Gabe said. "When she had one of her fainting spells and cut her foot I took he to the emergency room myself."

  Gabe imagined that he could actually hear Dr. Barnes absorbing this news. "So … you know something of her condition, then?" he asked.

  Gabe bit his lip. What he was about to say wasn't a lie. He did know something. He just didn't know why or how it mattered.

  "Yes, I do," Gabe said. "And it's a constant worry to me. I care very deeply for Annie. I could be wrong … but seems to me that her episodes are more frequent and more intense than when we first met."

  Dr. Barnes sighed heavily into the phone. And as he did, Gabe absorbed the sound with a sick shudder.

  "That's to be expected. Does she still have plenty of medication?" Dr. Barnes asked.

  My God … to be expected? What the hell did the man mean?

  "Yes," Gabe assured him. "We make sure she's never out of those. I don't think she could survive without them."

  "Unfortunately, as you know, the time will come when that point is moot. I'm really sorry about that. I liked Miss O'Brien immensely."

  Liked? Why the hell did he say it in the past tense?

  Gabe blinked in shock and turned his attention back to the doctor's comments as soon as he realized that the other man was still talking.

  "It's a damned shame that something like this had to happen to someone like her … someone in the prime of her life, with so much to offer," Dr. Barnes continued.

  Gabe grunted. But it wasn't in agreement, it was from pain. Had Dr. Barnes been able lo see the look on Gabe's face, he would have realized that what he'd unwittingly revealed had provided the worst kind of shock.

  "Please tell her that I wish her well, and if she has any questions regarding her condition, she should feel free to call me and talk anytime. Even though she's asked for Dr. Pope to be her doctor of record in the last phases of her illness, I can't help wishing she hadn't moved. There's going to come a time when even the strongest medications won't help. After that, as I'm sure you know … it's only a matter of time."