"Feeling better?" she asked and widened her smile, until he almost believed it might be real.
"Yeah, thanks for the drugs, they helped," he said with a chuckle.
"My pleasure...I have good news for you. Your head is harder than it looks," she teased then stood beside his bed.
"Funny, that's what my mama always says too," he told her his handsome face splitting with a wide smile, or trying to. She imagined the drugs would explain the goofy wobble. Wobbly or not, his beautiful smile did things to her. Things she wasn't going to think about right at the moment.
"You have a concussion, but you didn't crack your skull. Now, all I have to do is sew you up, and you'll be as good as new."
"Well, little lady, I think we might want a doctor to be handling that job," a gruff voice said from behind her. Chase flinched and his lips pinched.
"She is a doctor, dad," he said with a groan and tried to apologize with his eyes. "Doctor Anderson, this is my father Jack Rhodes."
Jenny turned around and stiffened her shoulders. She stuck out her hand to the man whose head almost reached her shoulders. How this rough looking good ole boy could have fathered such a handsome man, Jenny would never know. The man was in a business suit, and a cowboy hat, and had enough bling on his fingers to blind someone, but it didn't hide his roughneck roots. Chase had evidently hit the gene pool lottery.
He shook her hand with a little clasp like men who had no idea how to interact with women in the workplace often did, then dropped it quickly and looked at Chase.
"How the hell did you get shot, son?" Jack Rhodes asked his son gruffly.
"It's a long story, and I'm too worn out to tell you now, dad...just let her sew me up, and we can get out of here before mom finds out."
"Your mama already knows, she's gonna meet Shauna here in a couple of hours. I was in Dallas when they called me, so I was closer."
Chase groaned again and closed his eyes. "Call them and tell them to turn around, I'm fine. I'll probably be out of here before they get here."
"No, you won't...I'm keeping you," Jenny told him. A small thrill shot through her when the double meaning of her words registered.
"Oh, please let me go home," Chase begged her in a low desperate tone.
He must really not want to see his sister and mother, she thought, but he needed to be here overnight for observation.
"You need to have IV antibiotics, and we need to watch you because of the concussion. I can't let you go," she told him with a shake of her head. "I'm sorry."
"You'll be sorry," he mumbled and huffed out a breath.
"You know there's no stopping your mama when she works up a head of steam...and let me tell you, she's plenty worked up," Jack Rhodes roughly said with a grimace.
"Why the heck did you call her?" Chase asked in a frustrated tone.
"Because her baby boy has a bullet in him, and I want to stay married to her. If I hadn't called, she'd have skinned me alive, and you know it," his dad told him with a chuckle.
"I guess you're right...but you didn't have to call Shauna, she's gonna miss class," Chase reprimanded.
"That was your mother's doings, not mine. I'm sure if she didn't call her, they'd have a blowout too."
"You're probably right there too," Chase admitted, although he didn't want to have to deal with the two women in his life right now. It was hard enough dealing with them when he was at a hundred percent. They both tried to smother him with love.
Chase loved his family, every single crazy one of them, his mother and sister especially, but sometimes their doting and nosing into his business sent him into family overload. Being at the mansion where he'd grown up got claustrophobic at times, even as large as it was, and even though he rented the guesthouse out behind the mansion, and didn't actually live in the main house. There wasn't enough space separating them.
At thirty-two years old, it was time for him to find his own space away from them, no matter how much his mother would wail. That was one reason he went to the lake so much, to have some time away from them.
He thought maybe that was why his brother Joel had gotten married and moved to Dallas. Chase would think about getting married, he didn't have anything against the institution, his brother's seemed to be working out well, but a guy had to have a long term relationship and a willing woman, before he could get married.
The best Chase could do with women these days was being a friend. Sex or friendship was all they wanted from him. While that was enough for most guys, Chase preferred more.
Yeah, he was a friendly guy, helped out where he could, but he couldn't figure out why none of the women he'd been interested in lately seemed to think he was a keeper. Maybe he needed to be like the men those women chose over him...an asshole.
"I hear your boat is shot up too?" his dad taunted. He knew Chase loved that boat, and babied it. When Chase had been carted off from the lake he was unconscious and woke up dazed and in pain, so he had no idea what condition the She Devil was in. He almost didn't want to know.
"I don't know dad, all I know is I got shot, slipped on the deck and hit my head. Who told you she was shot up?" Chase asked him curiously.
"I called a friend of mine with the Rangers and got the scoop." Of course he did, his dad had connections everywhere...knew everyone.
"They impounded it for evidence, so it'll be a while before you can get it back," he informed Chase with entirely too much glee.
"I know you don't like how much time I spend at the lake, dad, but I can't work twenty-four hours a day...I deserve some down time too," Chase said the words again that he'd said to his workaholic father too many times lately.
"Yadda, yadda...gotta keep your eye on the prize son, or someone else will snatch it from under your nose."
"Money isn't everything, dad..." Chase told him.
"Speaking of money...I was in Dallas for a reason, son. I'm hiring a private investigator, something is up with our wells."
Concern raced through Chase and he raised a brow. "What's going on?"
"Well fires...we've had a rash of them lately. You'd know that if you'd been inspecting them like you shoulda been doing, instead of causing a ruckus at the lake."
Chase closed his eyes and swallowed down the nausea that suddenly returned with a vengeance. He heard the angel doctor's voice, but this time it wasn't soft when she said, "Mr. Rhodes, I think you need to leave and let Chase get some rest. His condition is stable now, but he's been shot and rest is what he needs to get better. You may want to call your wife and daughter and ask them to wait until tomorrow to come. He probably will be out of here by tomorrow afternoon. Maybe they can come and pick him up?"
Chase opened his eyes to gauge his daddy's reaction, because nobody talked to Jack Rhodes the way the angel doctor had just done. His dad's only reaction was a lift of his gray brows and a twist of his lips.
"Well, aren't you a brazen little thing?" his dad said sarcastically, but Chase saw grudging respect in his gray eyes.
"When it's in my patient's best interest, you darned right I am. Now, I suggest you leave, so I can get him sewn up and moved to a regular room. If you insist on seeing him after that, you can do it there. Right now, you're in my way."
"Fine, I'll wait for your mother and sister in the waiting room," he told Chase then turned and left.
"I like your style, Doc...thank you," Chase told her with a wink, then managed to work his face into a grin. From the drugs his head kind of felt disconnected from his body, smiling took some concentration. When he saw her gorgeous smile in return, Chase figured the effort had been worth it.
She snorted, then told him, "This isn't my first rodeo with overbearing relatives."
"Well, you better get ready for round two when my mom and sister get here," he warned with what he hoped was another smile. He couldn't feel his cheeks now, his whole face felt kind of rubbery.
"You don't worry about that, you just relax and I'm going to stitch up your shoulder. Roll over on your right sid
e for me," she told him and he complied. He would do just about anything the beautiful doctor asked him to do right about now.
"I'm going to try to make it pretty, so it doesn't scar," she told him. "Let me know if I hurt you."
Chase was vaguely aware of a nurse coming into the room to help her, but his brain was so foggy now, he wasn't real sure. He felt the pinch of needles in his shoulder briefly, but he could tell she was being careful not to hurt him. He appreciated the effort, but it was wasted, he thought, right before he succumbed to the heavy pull of a drug-induced sleep.
***
When Chase came around he was in a different room, and Jazzie had stopped by to check on him, before she left the hospital. He was happy to see her no worse for wear after what happened to her. The only drawback was that Beau Bowman was with her. Chase took the opportunity to give the man some much deserved hell about leaving Jazzie on the boat alone, while he took off like Flipper to swim around the lake, when he was supposed to be guarding her.
Jazzie was pissed that they were arguing, but she only gave Bowman hell for it. She argued with him a few minutes, then whispered something in his ear that left the tough guy looking poleaxed. Chase would give anything to know what she'd said. Whatever it was left Bowman's feet stuck to the floor, before he followed her out the door without a word.
Chase just couldn't see what Jasmine saw in the guy. The man sure didn't appreciate her, or treat her right from what Chase could see. He hadn't even had the consideration to tell her the FBI had found her brother and had him in protective custody. In Chase's opinion that was pretty unforgivable, because they all knew she was worried sick about her brother.
If the argument he'd just witnessed was any indication, Chase figured those two wouldn't be together for long. People in love just didn't argue like that.
But that was Jazzie's call to make, not his.
At the lake, Jazzie had made it perfectly clear to Chase that she wanted them to be friends, and only friends. That's what he was going to be to her...unless she changed her mind. Chase didn't like it, but what choice did he have? The heart was a fickle organ, and hers seemed to be attached to the man she'd just left with.
Hoping to fade off to sleep again, Chase huffed out a breath and closed his eyes. His shoulder was starting to throb, and his head was too. Sleep wasn't going to happen though, because the door to his room seemed to be a revolving one. It swished open and he looked up to see his sister poke her head around the door. Her tortured green eyes were circled by big black mascara rings. Next to his mama, the biggest drama queen in Texas, who also happened to have the biggest heart, had just arrived.
"Oh, god, Chase..." Shauna wailed and her face pinched up, then she ran across the room and threw herself across his chest like a widow on a funeral pyre. Tears plopped on his chest and Chase groaned, then he moved his hand to caress her hair.
If there was one thing Chase couldn't take it was a crying female. He felt like the most useless tool in the shed when the waterworks started.
"I'm okay, sugar...stop crying," he said softly rubbing her hair. This week, her rich brown tresses were shot through with vibrant blue streaks. His little sister was an artist, and she was damned determined to let everyone know it with how she dressed and wore her wild hair styles. It drove his mother nuts.
"Is mom with you?" he asked dreading her answer.
"Yeah, she's downstairs talking to daddy. She'll be up here in a minute, so prepare yourself. She's a wreck."
Chase sighed and closed his eyes. "Ya'll didn't have to come, I'm getting out tomorrow. They only kept me for observation."
She snorted then squeezed him, "You're my brother, and you were shot, where else would I be?"
"School? You're almost done, sugar, you can't mess this up," Chase reprimanded. Shauna had been in school forever, she was twenty-seven and almost a professional student since she'd changed majors so many times. She was a hairsbreadth from her fine arts degree, and he just wanted to see her finish something for once.
"Yeah, there's that," she said and pushed up off of his chest. "I'm thinking I might go a few more semesters and switch my major to graphic arts."
"What!?!" Chase launched up in the bed and wished he hadn't when his brain swam around inside his skull a few times and nausea danced in his chest. He flopped back on the pillow and threw his good arm over his eyes. "You can't switch again, you're graduating next semester. Just get your damned degree, Shauna."
"I'm going to get it...in graphic arts in two more semesters," she said belligerently.
"Why graphic arts?" he asked and peered at her from under his arm.
"Money...I've decided I don't want to be a starving artist. I can make money in graphic arts. I'll take web design classes too."
Chase couldn't argue with that. He'd told her when she'd picked fine arts with a concentration in painting that she'd be hard pressed to make money when she graduated, but had she listened to him? Hell, no. Shauna danced to her own fiddle, and nobody could tell her anything.
"Have you told dad yet?" he asked knowing his dad was gonna have a stroke.
"I told mama and she's going to tell him," Shauna said with a chuckle. His sister definitely knew the path of least resistance, and had taken it. "I'm not here to talk about me...how the hell did you get yourself shot?"
"Long story, I'll tell you later...it was minor. I'm fine," he assured her.
"You could have been killed and you're calling it minor?!?" she screeched and he flinched because it sawed through his head. Someone knocked on the door and he was thankful...unless it was his mother.
"Come in," he said.
The door opened and the beautiful angel doctor walked in with a big smile on her face. She didn't have on her white coat, and his eyes feasted on the curves that had been hidden earlier. Dr. Anderson was one tall, fine drink of water, that was for sure.
"Hey, Doc," he said and grinned.
She looked at Shauna then back at him, and hesitated in the middle of the room. "I was just coming by to check on you. I was headed out for the night," she told him.
"Doc, this is my sister, Shauna..." he told her with a wave of his good hand toward his sister.
"Hi, Shauna, it's nice to meet you," Jenny said and pulled her hand from behind her back and extended it.
Shauna's pierced eyebrow shot up and she gave Jenny a quirky smile. "You're a doctor, huh? Mine is about seventy years old and wrinkled like a prune. How'd you get so lucky big brother?" she asked looking back over her shoulder at her him.
"Luck of the draw, sis..." he said with a chuckle.
"Yeah, contrary to popular belief, I am a doctor...your dad seemed to have a hard time believing it too," Jenny said with a little edge to her tone.
Chase thought maybe the members of his family were missing the little filter between brain and mouth that everyone else had, and inwardly cringed. "She's a damned good doctor, she patched my ugly butt up," Chase said fervently and watched her blush.
Shauna elbowed him gently and said, "Well someone had to do it, I guess she just made it a little easier to take," Shauna said with a sly grin.
"You're headed out?" Chase asked the gorgeous doctor and thought she probably had a date, and his heart twisted a little in his chest.
"Yeah, I'm meeting a friend for drinks after work," she told him hesitantly. "I'd better be going..." She walked over to the bed, then stuck her hand out to him, and said with a finality he didn't like, "It was a pleasure meeting you Mr. Rhodes. I hope you get to feeling better soon."
It was a goodbye, and he wasn't ready to let her go.
"Chase," he corrected her. "Call me Chase...and please don't leave yet."
"I have to go, but I'll be here tomorrow morning. I might stop by tomorrow and check on you before you get discharged."
"I'm going to find mama," Shauna said, but he didn't look at her, his eyes were trapped by the beautiful aqua blue ones of Dr. Anderson.
"Okay, I'll see you in a few then," he said offhanded
ly as Shauna walked across the room and out the door.
"Your sister is um...colorful," she said.
"That's definitely putting it mildly..." he agreed with a chuckle, then sobered and asked her in a low intimate tone he hadn't intended, "What's your first name, Doc?"
"Jenny," she said unsteadily.
"Jenny, before the wrecking crew comes back, I want to ask you something..." he said then ventured with a grin, "Will you have dinner with me?"
Chase knew he was about to get shot down, because her smile faded. "I'm sorry, Mr. Rhodes...Chase...I don't date patients."
"As of tomorrow afternoon, I won't be your patient," he argued mildly.
"I don't date former patients either," she told him with a shake of her head.
"Consider it a thank you for saving my life, not a date," he suggested. There had to be something he could say to get her to agree. He definitely didn't need any more women friends, he had plenty of those lately, but if that's what it took to get to know Dr. Jenny Anderson better, that's what he'd be...for now.
"You don't have to thank me, you'll get a bill from the hospital," she told him with a wry twist of her full lips. "That's thanks enough."
"Please...." Chase wasn't above begging. Something about Jenny Anderson drew him, and it was more than her being gorgeous. She was obviously a caring person, seemed to have a sense of humor, but there was an air of vulnerability about her.
Someone had hurt this woman, and badly. It was right there in her eyes, and her tense shoulders. She was afraid.
He'd like to hear that story, because whoever it was must be a moron for letting her go. And the way she was avoiding agreeing to dinner with him, he knew he had his work cut out for him getting close enough to her to hear it.
Chase wasn't afraid of a little work though, if one thing could be said about him, he was determined, which meant he usually got what he wanted....except lately his luck had been running south. That was going to change.
"Sorry, no..." she said and patted his shoulder then stepped back from the bed. "I'll drop by tomorrow. Try not to give the nurses too much of that charm. They'll go into a sugar coma." Jenny Anderson winked at him then turned and walked out the door.
Chasing Trouble (Texas Trouble) Page 2