Uncovered: A Hearts of the South story

by Linda Winfree

  “I’ve been thinking.”

  She jerked at Ash’s quiet statement. He watched her with serious eyes and an ironic smile. Geez, how long had she spaced, anyway?

  “About?”

  “I know you’re only planning on being around a few weeks.” He rubbed his thumb over her knee in a hard caress.

  “Yeah.” Why did that single syllable hurt so much, pushing it out?

  His lashes hid his eyes for a moment before he met her gaze head-on. “Why don’t you move some of your things over here from your mama’s?”

  The guy really knew how to take a girl’s breath. Madeline swallowed. “Um, why?”

  He merely looked at her.

  Nerves fluttered in her belly. Coming over here, spending the night, borrowing his sister’s things…that was scary enough. Bring her stuff here?

  “Madeline.”

  “My mama would have a fit.”

  “Has that bothered you in the past?”

  Well, no, but…

  “Ash, you don’t—”

  “Babe, there’s a lot in life to be afraid of. Public speaking, Iraqi soldiers shooting at you, losing your ass in a business venture. But being afraid of living? No way. You’ve got to get beyond that.”

  “You’re afraid of public speaking?”

  His deep laugh hung between them. “Stop dodging the subject.”

  Bringing her things here smacked of a relationship, of something semipermanent. Besides, she was leaving in a few weeks, as soon as the review board finished the inquiry into Jack’s…into the shooting…and cleared her return to the PD.

  “Mad, I’m not asking you to marry me here.” Seriousness lurked beneath the sardonic humor. “We said we were going to take this one day at a time, but I like having you in my bed as much as you like being there. It’s just easier if you have some stuff here for the nights we’re together.”

  He made it sound so logical, so easy. Like the Devil and that slippery slope she’d been warned about so often in Sunday School while she was growing up.

  A distinctive truck rumbled outside. Ash swung to a seated position on the side of the bed.

  “That’s Tick. I have to go fix a roof.” He leaned over and kissed her, a quick featherweight brush of his lips that left her wanting more. “Think about it, will you, babe?”

  “I’ll think about it.” With an irritated huff, she gave him a tiny shove toward the door. “And quit calling me babe.”

  He sauntered out, damn him, on an amused laugh, leaving her still facing an empty day and his too-seductive suggestion.

  Shit. Now what was she supposed to do?

  “You asked her to move in?” Tick’s voice rose on a surprised note. “For real?”

  Ash hammered in another nail. “I didn’t ask her to move in. I suggested she bring some of her stuff over here.”

  “I think that constitutes moving in.” Tick grinned around the roofing nail clenched in his teeth. Ash shook his head at that bad habit. He was going to swallow one of those things some day.

  Ash gazed across the pasture. From his vantage point on the roof of chicken house number four, he could see the house. Madeline’s car was still gone. She’d left a few minutes after Tick’s arrival with no word on her plans. He was dying to know what she was up to, if she was over at her mama’s, packing up.

  “You are in sad shape.” Tick laughed and adjusted a shingle. His hammer made short work of two nails. “You’re whipped.”

  “Yeah? Go look in a mirror and say that.” Ash stretched out for another handful of shingles, almost out of reach. His foot slipped off the batting board and a jolt of unease slammed into his gut. He scrabbled for purchase, knee banging into the board and popping to the side as his other foot slid uselessly over rough shingles.

  He caught the one-by-four with the fingertips of one hand—damn it, his injured hand—and for a second relief hung before him, until his nails broke to the quick, stitches gave way, the injured muscles of his hand gave in and gravity pulled him over the edge. Hell, this was going to hurt.

  His chin jammed on the metal edging. A glimpse of Tick’s horrified surprise filled his vision before everything tunneled to the sick sensation of falling. Then hard earth slammed into his frame, and he couldn’t breathe.

  Pain, shock, a shout he wasn’t sure was his or Tick’s.

  Nausea flooded his throat, his chest frozen, blue sky blurring.

  Shit, this was bad.

  Metal clanged over and over. Tick’s white face appeared above him with a dismayed expression that would have been funny if he hadn’t been absolutely fucking sure he was dying.

  “Ash?” Tick’s hoarse voice bordered on a squeak. “Don’t move. I’m going to call for help.”

  Don’t move? He couldn’t fucking breathe and Tick was worried about him moving?

  With excruciating slowness, his lungs decided to begin working. The problem was each inhale and exhale brought piercing, cringe-inducing pain. Hell, where didn’t he hurt?

  Metallic taste flooded his mouth, like he’d licked a flagpole. He concentrated on getting oxygen in and out, on not screaming, on the fact this was the dumbest-ass thing he’d ever done.

  “Ash? Called for an ambulance. Don’t move.” Tick was back, breathing hard, hands roving over him, making darts of pain worse in places, sending shards of torture through his knee. “Can you feel that?”

  Feel it? Shit, he was living it, wrapped up in nothing but friggin’ agony. Tick looked down at him, eyes darker than usual with appalled concern.

  “Holy hell, your face is a mess.” Tick mopped around his chin and mouth with a handkerchief, and the flash of crimson staining the white fabric as Tick pulled it away turned his stomach further. What had he done?

  Tick’s face relaxed a little. “I think you just busted your mouth. Your lip is bleeding.”

  Strong, sure hands eased along his body once more, testing, assessing, sending rockets of pain over his nerves every so often. A touch at his torso took his breath all over again.

  “Can you talk?”

  “Never…getting…” his jaw felt like smashed glass, his tongue swollen and thick, and that metallic taste filled his nose, “…on a…fucking roof with you…again.”

  “Mama, I am thirty-six years old.” Madeline pulled a stack of T-shirts from her dresser and dumped them on the bed. “I don’t need your permission to do anything.”

  “I simply do not understand you,” her mother said from the doorway. “What are you thinking, moving in with this man so fast?”

  “I’m not moving in with him. I’m taking some stuff to his place for… Oh, forget it.” Madeline opened her rolling case and tossed clothing into it in a haphazard jumble. She’d sort it out later. “I thought you liked him.”

  “I do. But, Madeline, spending nights at his house? What will people think?”

  “Who cares? It’s a small town, Mama. Everyone gets talked about, and if people don’t know the gossip, they make it up. Lord knows you should be used to people talking about me by now.”

  “What would your father say?”

  She froze in the act of transferring toiletries and straightened, a cold knot at the base of her throat. “Nothing. He’s dead, and when he was alive, nothing I did was ever good enough, remember?”

  “Your father loved you, Maddie.”

  “I think you’re confusing me with Autry. She was Daddy’s perfect little girl, the one who did everything right. I was…” Her throat closed, and she swallowed hard, blinking against a stinging rush of tears. “I was his biggest disappointment.”

  “I just think—”

  “That’s fine, think whatever you want, Mama. You’re not going to change my mind.”

  “You know, that is the same stubbornness that broke your daddy’s heart.”

  What about his stubbornness and her broken heart? The wave of pain and guilt shut her lungs down, the same old huge knot of remorse and separation settling in her chest, and she was right back where she’d bee
n at eighteen. “Fine, whatever. I’m out of here, Mama.”

  “There you go, with that attitude.”

  Without a word, she lifted her bag and brushed by her mother. She refused to cry. Shedding tears never solved anything, never made a situation better. Her mama trailed her through the house to the front porch. “Madeline, please, would you stop and think about what people will say?”

  God, that’s all her father had ever been concerned with too. Didn’t it ever stop? She tossed her bag on the backseat. “What are you going to do, Mama? Tell me if I go I can’t come back?”

  Those words echoed in her head, her father’s anger bouncing around like it had for years. All she’d ever wanted was…

  To get the hell away from here. To find acceptance, somewhere she could be herself without unreachable expectations hanging over her every single second. The Jacksonville PD couldn’t call her back to work soon enough. She hoped Ash didn’t mind having her around a few days. She was going to need that in order to calm down before facing her mother again.

  Behind the wheel, she flexed fingers aching from being clenched too tight and backed around, finally pulling out to the highway and turning in the direction of Ash’s. She fumed all the way to Long Lonesome Road.

  An unmarked patrol car topped the hill behind her, blue lights and headlamps flashing. He flew around her, engine roaring. What was that all about? She frowned, trying to remember what all was on this road now.

  She forced herself to relax, breathing through the hurt anger. She would not take this home to Ash. He didn’t deserve the aftereffects of her crazy family dynamics.

  The road straightened out from the double S-curve, blue lights still visible ahead of her. He was moving, though, almost at pursuit speed. Brake lights flared as the cop swung a turn.

  Into Ash’s driveway.

  Fear surged into her bloodstream. She pressed harder on the accelerator, seconds stretched into dreamlike forever even as she closed the distance. Her pulse pounded in her ears, laid over by the cool calm instilled by years on the job.

  Her little car jounced over a couple of ruts in the drive. The patrol car continued across the pasture before the chicken houses.

  That was not good.

  No way would her low-slung car handle that rutted field. Leaving it before the house, she took off at a run, fear pounding with every step. She reached the clearing around the chicken houses just after the unit came to a stop and a sturdy dark-haired man stepped out.

  Beyond the unit, what she saw stopped everything.

  Ash, lying on the ground, not moving. Tick crouched beside him. The cop grabbed a portable medical kit from his trunk and jogged toward them. Swallowing against a wave of fear, she ran the final few yards.

  “What happened?” the cop asked, kneeling next to them and slanting a look at Tick as she finally skidded to a stop just behind him, transfixed by Ash’s face, bloody, eyes closed, twisted in pain. “You push him?”

  “Shut up, Cookie. That’s not funny.” Tick had Ash’s wrist in hand, fingers pressed to his pulse point. “Where’s the damn ambulance?”

  “They’re both out on other calls—heart attack in Rayford and a wreck at the Greenough crossroads. Roger’s dispatching us one from Albany.”

  “That’s twenty minutes away.” With tentative movements, Madeline went down beside them. The amount of blood on his face, the ragged way he breathed, the absolute stillness frightened her. The naked anxiety on Tick’s pale face made it worse.

  “I’m a certified First Responder.” The cop shot a curious look in her direction, running assessing hands over Ash.

  “Not…you, Cookie. God…help me.” Trying to grin, Ash opened one eye on a pained grunt. “Don’t…touch my…fuck!”

  The agonized cry shattered through Madeline, bringing a wash of tears to her eyes. Ash’s chest heaved, his eyes scrunched closed. She laid a firm hand on the cop’s wrist. “Don’t touch him again.”

  Thick brows dipped in a glower over sharp gray eyes. “Lady, I—”

  “Cookie.” Tick’s firm voice stopped him. “I’ve already checked him out. I think he’s good until the ambulance gets here.” His dark eyes caught Madeline’s gaze, and the smile he attempted tried to be reassuring. “I don’t think anything’s broken. Ribs are tender, and he’s messed up his knee. No numbness, he can move fingers and toes, but the way he fell…I want him on a backboard before he’s moved anywhere.”

  Madeline’s eyes jerked to the chicken house behind them—and the nearly twenty-foot drop to the ground. “You fell off the roof?” She turned on Tick, glaring. “You let him fall off the fucking roof? Don’t y’all know what a safety harness is?”

  “Sure they do,” Cookie offered. “They just don’t use ’em. Tick-boy won’t wear a bulletproof vest either.”

  Did she ask him anything? Madeline narrowed her eyes. “Shut up.”

  “I know you from somewhere.” Unperturbed, he shook a finger between them and looked sideways at Tick. “Where do I know her from?”

  “She’s Autry’s sister.” Fingers still on Ash’s wrist, Tick checked his watch. “And our interim investigator. Madeline, this is Mark Cook. Cookie, Madeline Holton.”

  Ash grimaced. “Y’all…have to hush. Head hurts…like a mother.”

  At a distance, a high-pitched siren wailed. Cookie’s handheld radio crackled, and he lifted it to his mouth, offering specific directions to the ambulance, which turned out to be from Chandler County EMS after all. The bus bounced over ruts in the field, coming to a stop beside Cookie’s unit. The driver, a lanky rusty-haired man, hauled equipment out of the back while the second medic, a woman with big dark eyes and short black hair, hurried to the small group huddled on the ground.

  “Ash Hardison, what have you done?” Bent on one knee, she ran gentle hands over him, her eyes concerned. “Hey, Tick, Cookie. Jim, get the neck brace and the backboard. Ash, darlin’, can you talk to me?”

  “Layla.” His lashes fluttered up. She grasped his lid and held one open, checking his pupil with a penlight, then the other.

  “That’s me, sweetheart, filling in for Clark.” She smiled, gaze flicking over his face while she continued prodding. “Seeing me for stitches wasn’t enough this week? Did you miss me that much?”

  His reply was a mmphf of amusement soon swallowed by a hiss of pain as she palpated his upper abdomen. Madeline cringed, wanting to wrap him close and absorb that pain. Her eyes burned, and she blinked to clear suddenly blurry vision.

  “Oh yeah, that’s probably a bruised kidney. You’re going to be horribly sore. Tick, honey, get out of my way, would you? I need to get his pulse while Jim checks his blood pressure, and I can’t do that while you’re holding his hand.” She leaned forward, one eye on her watch, and lowered her voice to a conspirator’s whisper. “Feels guilty for pushing you off the roof, doesn’t he?”

  Tick huffed, an exasperated sound. Ash mumbled and caught his breath. “Shit…can’t laugh, Lay. Hurts.”

  “I know, darlin’. But it’s a good thing that you’re alert enough to want to.” She gave him a saucy wink. “Next time you want to see me, though, an invite to dinner would suffice. I’m flattered, but this is too much.”

  “No dinner.” He flicked the fingers on one hand. “Mad.”

  “Mad?” She did that head-tilt thing once more, watching his face while she moved down to assess his legs. “Are you angry with me?”

  “Watch his knee, Layla,” Tick whispered. “He almost came out of his skin when we touched it earlier.”

  “Not angry.” He moved those fingers again. “Mad?”

  Madeline leaned forward, afraid to touch him. “I’m right here.”

  “Oh, I see. That’s why I’m not getting any more dinner invites.” Layla grinned, carefully cutting away his jeans so she could see his knee. Madeline hissed in a breath as the bruised, swollen mess came into view. Layla gave her an encouraging nod. “You can hold his hand, hon. Probably make both of you feel better. Ash? We’re almo
st done here, and then Jim and I are going to take you to the ER and let them torture you for a while.”

  “Can’t…wait.” His fingers moved in Madeline’s easy hold, and she stroked her thumb over his knuckles. God, she hated this, seeing him hurt, not being able to do anything. She’d worked a ton of medical calls in her career, but this was horrible. This was Ash.

  “Yeah, there’s that sense of humor we know and love. Listen, Jim’s going to put the brace on your neck and I need you to be really, really still while he does that. Tick’s going to help by holding and lifting your head, all right? Let him do it, and you just lie there.”

  The two men made short work of getting the plastic support in place.

  “All right, almost there, honey. Backboard next, then on a stretcher and you’re out of here.” With professional ease, Layla guided the men through transferring Ash to the board and strapping him with a minimum of jostling. Madeline held his hand as long as she could, not even bothering to tell herself it was ridiculous to be this wound up over a guy she’d known four days.

  Because it was Ash and that changed everything. He had changed everything.

  “Here’s the deal,” Layla said as they loaded the stretcher into the back of the ambulance. “He’s going to the ER. Stitches, CAT scan, ultrasound, the whole shebang. Tick, do you want to ride along—”

  “No.” Ash’s hoarse voice cut her off. “Want Mad.”

  Madeline looked around at Tick, expecting to see resentment and censure on his face and finding neither. He jerked his chin toward the bus. “Go on. I’ll follow.”

  She clambered aboard, snatches of Tick and Cookie’s conversation floating to her.

  “Hey, Tick, who’s Allison Barnett anyway?”

  Tick’s groan was laden with disgust. “Why?”

  “She’s called looking for you three times today.” A patrol car door swished open. “Didn’t like hearing you were off all three times, either.”

  Layla slammed the ambulance doors and settled into the jump seat at the end of the stretcher. Madeline rubbed stinging eyes. God, what was Allison up to now? Couldn’t she simply leave well enough alone?