Blush

by Suzanne Forster

  There was pain now, deep, tearing pain that radiated mostly from his gut and chest area. He couldn't determine his own injuries because he couldn't make out the details. If there was blood it had been bleached as white as everything else. He did feel a terrible piercing force as he rocked to his knees and then to his feet, but getting to Bridget was the only thing on his mind. What mattered was that his body was moving. He could walk.

  His eyes were watering copiously from the glare. Light ricocheted dazzlingly off the road, and the background noise in his mind was like white noise coming through a headset. It was growing louder, harsher. Beyond the static, there were bells and pinging, melodious sounds, voices whispering.

  "Bridget?" he said as he knelt down next to the little girl. She sprang up and gaped at him. "Daddy! I thought you were dead!"

  Daddy! Daddy! Daddy! The word shrieked endlessly in Jack's head. The burning lights made him squeeze his eyes shut, and his heart pounded wildly. He dropped to his knees, to his elbows, and then he toppled over.

  "Daddy!" she shrieked.

  Jack felt someone jerking at his arms, opening his clothing. There were hands all over his body and people were talking excitedly.

  "His heart rate's going crazy!" someone said.

  "He's lucky to have a heart rate, " another countered. "Christ, he should have been dead. "

  "The wet grass saved him. It was soaked down from the sprinklers. "

  "The grass saved his ass!"

  Laughter erupted around him, and Jack tried to open his eyes, but could only manage it for an instant. The light was painful. Unbearable. He was surrounded by huge, grinning figures in white—dazzling blue-white—with halos as big and bright as the moon.

  Was he dead?

  Were there hospitals in heaven?

  Something jerked at his arm.

  "Blood pressure's dropping, " a voice announced.

  "Palpate his abdomen for internal injuries. He could have a gusher inside. "

  A door opened and slammed. A curtain zinged shut.

  "His wife's out there, raising hell, demanding to know his condition. "

  "Isn't she that model? Gus Featherstone?"

  "The beautiful brat? He's married to her?"

  "That should give him something to live for."

  Live for? Jack's heart surged again, wildly, as he remembered Gus's car coming straight at him, plowing into him head-on and flinging him thirty feet in the air. She was the one trying to kill him.

  "But I must see him," Gus demanded. "He's my husband. I have a right to know his condition, to talk to him. "

  "I'm sorry." The nursing supervisor glanced at her watch and sighed, a clear indication that she was wearying of the battle to fend off Gus. "My orders are no visitors. I don't know how I can make that any more clear. Your husband doesn't want to see anyone, Mrs. Culhane, and I'm afraid that includes you. Those are the instructions he left with the attending doctor. I am sorry. "

  It was nearly dawn and Gus had been at the hospital all night without food, sleep, or contact with anyone who was willing to give her information. She was frustrated enough to do bodily harm to the plumpish, graying woman, but she was determined not to cause a scene and risk having the place overrun with tabloid reporters. She'd been haunting the nurses' station since she found out about Jack's accident, hoping to talk to someone with the authority to override the supervisor's "instructions. "

  She'd been told it was a hit-and-run, that his condition had stabilized, that he was out of recovery and resting in his room. Beyond that they would tell her nothing, not even the extent of his injuries.

  "When can I talk to his doctor?" she asked, forcing a calmer tone, though she was anything but. She'd clasped her hands and nearly rubbed the skin under her thumb raw.

  She simply had to see him, for so many reasons. "I was told he hasn't been here since admitting Jack last night. Doesn't he do rounds? What kind of doctor is he?"

  "The doctors generally do rounds after their office hours. He'll be in this afternoon, I'm sure. Excuse me, " she said as a soft bing sounded, followed by a voice echoing through the hospital paging system. "They're calling me. "

  She was off down the hallway before Gus could say anything else, not that it would have helped. Since no one was willing to move the hurdles out of the way, Gus was going to have to find a way over them. She'd been eavesdropping on conversations all morning, hoping to pick up something, and at one point, she'd overheard the supervisor give a candy striper instructions to replenish the water pitcher in a patient's room. His last name had sounded like Jack's. Now all Gus had to do was find the room and enter unnoticed.

  The room was on the seventh floor, and to her great relief, there was no one in the corridor when she found the number. Conflict flooded her as she let herself in and saw him lying in the hospital bed, unconscious. She simply couldn't sort out her feelings for the man. She was torn between a crazy desire to run away and an even crazier need to rush to him. She wanted to pour out her heart to his silent, sleeping form and tell him everything that was welling up inside her, hoping that he could hear her, and that he would understand her plight. She had things to tell him that she knew would astound and confound him, things she didn't know how to say. Worse, she was riddled with guilt and fear, and she loathed both emotions.

  She'd had no idea how badly he was hurt, but the only injuries she could see now were a bandage on his forehead and a Styrofoam-like cast on his shoulder. Other than that, he seemed to be sleeping peacefully. At least he wasn't clinging to life inside an oxygen tent. Bridget had been so hysterical, the poor kid had made it sound as if he'd been torn limb from limb.

  She walked to his bedside and stood there for a moment, watching him breathe and trying to decide what to do. There were multiple cuts on his face, and the large gauze bandage on his forehead looked as if it were covering a nasty bump. She was almost glad she couldn't see the disturbing blue glints of light in his black irises. They always threw her for a loop, his eyes. For now it was enough dealing with the way he looked as he slept.

  She hadn't realized his lashes were quite so long or that the width of his mouth was as sensual as it was sensitive. But it was the lacerations on his face that pulled at her, stirring an entirely new contest within her. The cuts and bruises decorating his rugged features made him look surprisingly vulnerable and tender to the touch. It was all she could do to resist the temptation.

  Her hand quickened a little with the urge.

  Restraint, she decided, was a greatly overrated virtue.

  As she bent closer, poised to glide her fingers over the proud flesh beneath his cheekbone, she saw his lashes quiver.

  "Oh!" she cried, jerking back as his eyes flicked open.

  She might have run if she hadn't been so startled. He didn't move, didn't speak. He simply stared at her with the eerie calm of a man who'd been waiting for her to come that close. Lying in wait. There was no confusion in his gaze, no drowsy remnants of sleep, just cold, deadly questions.

  "What are you doing in here?" he asked, his voice as glacial as his eyes. Black ice, those eyes. That's how cold they were.

  She moved back, seized again with the urge to run. "They wouldn't let me in.... I-I had to see how you were. "

  He looked her up and down, taking in her Chanel suit and stiletto heels with undisguised contempt. "Who are we today? Dress-up Barbie?"

  "I had meetings, " she started apologetically. "I came the moment I heard. "

  "Really? Did you? Shame I'm not on life support, isn't it. You could have pulled the plug. "

  She kept backing away from the bed. "What is it?" she asked him, unable to force her voice much above the whisper-level of his own. "What's wrong with you?"

  With some effort he pushed himself up to a sitting position. "Someone ran their Mercedes into me and left me for dead. Excuse me if I'm not as chipper as usual. "

  "They told me it was a hit-and-run, but you're all right, aren't you? Your injuries don't look that serious,
I mean—"

  "The doctor tells me it's a miracle I'm alive. The police report said I was thrown thirty feet into a ditch alongside the road. Fortunately it was overgrown with grass and soaked down with runoff water from the estate's sprinklers. "

  "Thank God for that."

  "I'm not done, Gus. The report also said I was hit by a red Mercedes convertible with a personalized license plate. "

  "A red Mercedes... like mine?"

  He stared at her long and hard. "Just like yours, Gus." His mouth twisted into an ugly shape as he added, "Exactly like yours. R-E-D-H-O-T-T-T? Ring a bell?"

  "But that's not possible."

  "It's not only possible, I saw it with my own eyes. I was conscious the whole time. It was your car that hit me. "

  "But I was at a meeting, and I drove my car there."

  He nodded, his laughter cynical. "Someone stole it, right? Is that the story? Someone stole your car and ran me down with it to make it look like you did it?"

  "No one stole my car!" She walked to the window and looked out. The parking lot seven stories below was nearly full now, but it hadn't been when she'd arrived late last night. The Mercedes was parked up front without a scratch on it, or at least nothing that could be seen from this distance.

  "Come and look," she told him. "My car's where I parked it last night when I got here, and that was after you'd been hit. The car would be dented if I'd been in the kind of hit-and-run you're describing, wouldn't it? Badly dented. You'd be able to see the damage even from here. Look. "

  He struggled out of the bed, determination apparently overcoming any weakness he might have felt. He was wearing one of those embarrassing hospital gowns that fasten in the back, and this one was definitely too small for his large frame, but he didn't seem self-conscious in the slightest, even with Gus staring as she was at the considerable exposure of his strong, sinewy legs.

  His grimace told her he probably had a few taped ribs in addition to his other injuries. Painful, but not serious. A sigh released inside her, all the stronger for its having been held back so long. God, how he'd frightened her.

  She stepped back, giving him plenty of room as he approached the window. She didn't want to crowd him in any way. Even with his injuries, she was sure he could be dangerous given his present state of mind. She could hardly forget that he himself had once warned her that she shouldn't have made the mistake of leaving him alive in the snakepit.

  He looked out the window, silent and pensive as he stared at the car. She could almost see his mind whirring, trying to make sense of what had happened. How could her car be parked outside, undamaged, if it was the same car that had run him down? He'd believed it was her and apparently steeled himself to that horrible reality, despite everything that had happened between them the last few days. She could hardly blame him, given her other attempts on his life—and what he swore he'd seen... her red Mercedes.

  "I didn't do it, " she said, barely getting the words out. "J-Jack, I didn't. How can I make you believe me?"

  He turned to her, distrust still smoldering in his features. The icy contempt she'd seen was banked now, overridden by the questions in his dark eyes, but it was there. He was torn, she could tell. He didn't want to believe her. It was probably easier not to, then he could justify whatever revenge he meant to take. He could go after the Featherstones and take them all down, her included. If he wanted to brutalize her alone, he could turn her over to the law with equanimity—

  She met his questioning gaze with one of her own. "If the police believe it was me, why haven't they questioned me? No one's spoken to me or looked at the car. I've been here since last night—"

  "The police don't know," he said brusquely. "I told them it happened too fast, that I couldn't I. D. the car. I just wanted to see what your reaction would be. "

  So he'd had doubts that it was her; otherwise he would have reported her. "Did I pass the test?" she asked him.

  "What the hell is going on, Gus?" He flared angrily and moved toward her, but stopped short of touching her. "Who's trying to kill me? If it isn't you, then who?"

  Gus could think of any number of people who might want him dead, including her ex-fiancé and almost everyone else in the immediate Featherstone circle, with the single exception of Bridget. She also knew of someone outside the circle who might pose a threat to him. She'd come here to warn him about that, but she couldn't do it just yet, because he wasn't going to like her news. Of that she was certain.

  "I can't imagine that you're without enemies," she said, softening her voice. "You've told me what you do for a living, and I don't mean security systems. " She meant killing people. He had told her that.

  He slumped back against the windowsill as if exhausted. He probably shouldn't be out of bed, she realized, and she would have offered to help him back if she thought there was any chance he'd accept. Gazing at the rather endearing spectacle he made—a big, ruggedly handsome guy in a little bitty hospital gown—she felt a sigh of despair building. Her whole body trembled inwardly as she realized what she had yet to do. This was the lousiest possible timing, but she had no choice. There was something she had to tell him, something earth-shaking that had nothing to do with his car accident, and it couldn't wait any longer.

  "Shouldn't you be resting?" She pointed out the chair alongside his bed. "Can I get that for you?"

  "I'm fine," he insisted.

  But he quite obviously wasn't. His jaw muscles were taut with pain as he studied her, searching her nervousness and noting the way she was mangling her white leather clutch.

  "You look about as innocent as a hooker in a police lineup. You're begging me to believe you didn't do it, but I'm having a real hard time with that. "

  He focused in on her again, his gaze hardening. "Convince me, Gus. Make me believe you. "

  An odd sensuality had crept into his voice, and it abraded her nerves like a wire brush. Her bright red fingernails dug creases in the satin-soft contours of her bag. She was ruining the thing, but she felt as if she would fly apart if she let go of it.

  "This isn't about guilt, Jack. There are things I need to tell you, and well... I think it might be a good idea if you sat down. "

  He rose instead. "What is it?"

  Gus tucked the bag under her arm and began to walk the floor. This was going to be bad, she could feel it. It was going to be worse than bad. There was no way he could possibly be receptive to her news given the situation. She could feel his eyes on her awkward gait and wished she'd had time to change. Her sky-high heels made pacing a challenge, but she was too uneasy to stand still.

  "I've seen a... doctor, too, " she said, aware of the hesitation that had snuck into her voice. This time she almost wished it would stop her, that she wouldn't be able to get the rest of it out. But no such luck. "It seems I had a little accident, too, but I didn't know anything for sure until today. "

  "Accident? What do you mean?"

  For some reason tears welled up as she turned to him. Thank goodness he was across the room. She hoped he couldn't see the way her eyes must be glittering. There was nothing to do but say it, and yet her throat muscles grabbed frantically, and the words burned like acid as she tried to force them out.

  "I'm pregnant, " she told him hoarsely.

  He stared at her as if she'd spoken in another language and he hadn't understood a word of it. Pain struck Gus's heart as she took in his bewildered expression. She had imagined so many different reactions. This was not one of them.

  "I'm going to have a baby, Jack. I—we—"

  "P-pregnant?" The word came out cold and incredulous. She nodded. "A... bah... a baby?"

  Now she could talk and he couldn't? Someone upstairs had a cruel sense of humor, she decided. His gaze was running up and down her body as if he were searching for evidence, and all the time he was shaking his head. Clearly this was not good news to him, she realized, and stupidly, she must have wanted to think it would be. But why? Because he'd carved her name in a heart on a tree? Apparent
ly that one decidedly childish form of endearment had made her think that he cared, that he might want her enough to want her baby, too, especially if it were his child.

  How perfectly absurd of her.

  She drew in a deep breath, trying to calm herself. But her heart hurt so fiercely it might as well have been her flesh he'd carved instead of the tree. Too many TV commercials, Gus! Too many pregnancy test ads where the husband beams like a demented idiot and takes the little wife and mother-to-be into his arms. Too many Pampers ads, too many ridiculously romantic, happily-ever-after fairy tales!

  "I don't see how—"

  "There's no mistake. " She cut him off indignantly. "I'm pregnant, and it's your child. I haven't been with anyone else. "

  "When did that happen? We only made love two nights ago. "

  "We made love in the desert, too, in the shower. Or have you forgotten?"

  "Not likely, but I didn't—"

  She looked at him accusingly, then added one pithy word. "Leakage."

  He raised his hand, then dropped it helplessly. "Jesus, I do need to sit down. " He walked stiffly to the chair that sat alongside his bed and collapsed into its creaky vinyl contours. "How long have you known?" he asked.

  Gus had expected surprise, even shock, but nothing like this. All the blood had drained from his face, and he seemed totally thunderstruck, almost unable to conceive of the idea. Conceive. Unfortunate choice of words, she thought.

  "I didn't know," she said, "not for sure. I thought there might be a chance, and it was time for a check-up anyway, so I went in—"

  "A baby?" he muttered under his breath. "Christ, what a sick joke this is."

  Gus stared at him in horror, unable to comprehend how he could have said such a brutal thing. She was gripped with the urge to fly at him, to slap him! But he didn't even seem to be aware of her presence. He was shaking his head as if he didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

  "You bastard," she breathed. She couldn't stop herself. It spewed out of her like venom. "You're the sick joke. "