by Marie Force
“Are her keys here?”
“I saw the tennis ball on her desk.”
They shared a smile. Georgie was forever losing her keys, so Cat had affixed a tennis ball to the ring to help her keep track of them.
“You’re really going out with Ian?” Tess asked with another nervous glance at Ben.
“It’s just ice cream. He’s got the kid with him, so that’s all he can do.”
“Rosie,” Tess said. “Her name is Rosie.”
Cat screwed up her face with distaste.
“What’ve you got against kids?”
“It would be easier to tell you what I don’t have against them.”
“That’s terrible!” Tess said. “I’ve never known anyone who doesn’t like kids.”
“Now you do.”
“If that’s how you feel, you shouldn’t go out with him at all.”
“Why not? We’ll get her ice cream and then hopefully she’ll leave us alone so I can get to know him better. He’s gorgeous, isn’t he?” Without waiting for Tess’s reply, Cat added, “Seems to be a Caldwell family trait.”
“Except for dark and stormy over there.” Tess nodded toward Ben, who used his good leg to kick the last of the chairs into place.
“He’s not exactly tough on the eyes, either. Don’t let his crankiness put you off.”
“Too late.”
“Hey, Cat,” Ian called. “Are you coming?”
Cat glanced at Rosie and then at Ian. “Sure. Count me in.”
“Be nice to her,” Tess whispered.
“Yeah, yeah.”
“I’m leaving, too,” Tess said loud enough for Ben to hear.
“Do you mind if I hitch a ride with you?” Ben asked. “Ian’s going the other way, and I can’t walk home yet.”
Tess watched as Cat disappeared out the door with Ian and Rosie. “Um, sure, I guess. Let me get the keys.” She went into Georgie’s office, grabbed the keys, and turned off the lights. At the end of the long hallway, she locked the back door and flipped the dead bolt. Her heart began to beat faster as she contemplated the long, dark corridor that led to a room where a man she didn’t know waited to get into a car with her.
“Walk, Tess,” she whispered. “One foot in front of the other. He’s Nathan’s brother. Nathan’s brother. We like Nathan. He’s cute and funny. Nathan likes Georgie. Keep walking. Almost there.”
She found Ben bent against the wall massaging his thigh.
“Ready?” Tess asked in a bright tone.
He startled, and when he stood upright, the expression of sheer agony on his face stopped her cold.
“Are you all right?”
His lips were white with pain. “Yeah,” he said through gritted teeth. “Just a muscle spasm.”
She rushed over to him. “I’m a nurse. I might be able to help.”
“Don’t,” he said sharply.
Startled, Tess pulled back her hand and straightened to find his dark blue eyes fixed on her, his complexion waxy with pain and irritation.
“It’ll pass.”
She gestured for the door. “After you, then.”
Grimacing, he hobbled out ahead of her.
Tess shut off the last of the lights, locked the door and pulled it closed behind her. “Do you suppose that’s all there is to it?”
“There’s a dead bolt above the knob.”
Using the overhead nightlight, she scrolled through the fat wad of keys on Georgie’s ring until she found one labeled DB.
“What’s with the tennis ball?” Ben asked.
“Georgie has issues with keeping track of her keys.”
“That’s some wad of keys.”
Tess turned the dead bolt. “Which is why she can’t lose them every day like she did her first few weeks here.”
When they got into the car, she tried to ignore his hulking presence while figuring out where everything was in the newfangled car. She had never driven a car this nice or this new. “Where do you suppose the headlights are?” she asked.
He leaned across her to flip them on.
“Oh,” she said, shocked by the feel of his body brushing against hers. She cleared her throat. “I was going to run by the hospital before I go home. Do you mind?”
“Are you one of those do-gooder types?”
“If going to check on an old man who was viciously assaulted makes me a do-gooder, then yeah, I guess I am.”
“Do you even know him?”
“No, but he’s a friend of Georgie’s, and I want to check on her, too.”
Ben snorted. “You’d make a good pair with Nate, the original do-gooder.”
“Nathan seems like a lovely person.”
“So why don’t you ask him out?”
“Because he likes Georgie.”
“So you would ask him out if there was no Georgie. I see how it is.”
“If there was no Georgie, I wouldn’t even know him. Besides, I have no interest in dating anyone.”
“Why?”
“Are you always this annoying and nosy?” she asked as she drove down Spring Street to Broadway.
“Pretty much. So why don’t you date?”
“No desire.”
He raised an eyebrow. “None at all? You don’t strike me as the frigid type. The exact opposite, in fact.”
“I refuse to have this conversation with you. I don’t even know you.”
“Sheesh, you are one uptight chick, you know that?”
Tess glared at him. “You have some nerve saying that. You don’t know me, either.”
“I know your type.”
“And what type is that?”
“Uptight and prissy.”
“Don’t talk. Do you hear me? Just sit there and be quiet. For someone who needed a ride, you’re awfully opinionated.”
“Just calling it like I see it.”
“You were going to be quiet, remember?”
He chuckled, which annoyed her even more.
“What are you laughing at?”
“I’m not allowed to talk.”
“Ugh! How can you be related to Nathan? You’re nothing like him.”
“Thank God for that.”
“You could learn a thing or two from him.”
“Spare me.”
Tess pulled into the parking lot at the emergency room. “Since you’re not able to be civil, why don’t you wait here?”
“Because my leg gets stiff if I sit too long.”
“What happened to your leg, anyway?” she asked, unable to resist.
“Why do you care? I thought you didn’t like me.”
“I don’t, but that doesn’t mean I’m not interested as a health care professional.”
“As a health care professional,” he mimicked.
Tess got out of the car and slammed the door behind her. She took off for the emergency room without so much as a glance over her shoulder to see if he was following her. Inside she found a group of seniors from the center converged in a corner and went over to them. Neither Georgie nor Nathan was anywhere in sight.
“Hi, I’m Tess, Georgie’s roommate. I was wondering how Gus is doing.”
“They just took him up to the ICU,” Walter replied. “We don’t know much more than that. They won’t tell us because we’re not his family.”
“I work here, so let me see what I can find out for you.”
“That’d be real nice of you, honey,” Walter said. “Thank you.”
“Is Georgie still around?”
“She got a look at Gus, and I guess it shook her up real good. That Caldwell boy went off after her.”
Tess smiled. “Then I’m sure she’s in good hands.” She patted Walter’s arm. “Stay here. I’ll be right back.”
At the nurse’s station, she found Pam and Debby, two of the more senior nurses on the ER staff.
“What are you doing here on your night off?” Pam asked.
“Checking on a friend of a friend. The older man they brought in, assaulted at
home? What do you know about him?”
They exchanged glances.
“It’s not good,” Pam said. “The CT scan showed some bleeding in the brain, but they decided it was too risky to operate.”
“He’s in a coma,” Debby added. “They just took him up to ICU a few minutes ago. The people with him said they weren’t leaving until we told them something, but you know how it is with HIPPA and everything.” She referred to the federal law that protects patient privacy. “We called his daughter, and she promised to be here late tonight. She can decide what to tell them.”
Tess nodded. “I’ll tell them he’s stable, and they can visit him upstairs tomorrow.”
“We’d appreciate that,” Debby said. “They’re taking up a lot of room out there.”
“Who’s the tall, dark, and handsome drink of water who came in with you?” Pam asked.
Tess glanced over her shoulder and frowned when she found Ben watching her from the doorway. “Don’t be fooled by how he looks. He’s a jerk.”
“Then what are you doing with him?”
“Giving him a ride. That’s it.”
“Uh-huh,” Debby said with a wink for Pam. “Sure.”
“Thanks for the info, you guys.”
“No problem.”
Tess returned to the waiting room to tell Bill and the others as much as she could, which wasn’t enough for them.
“Patient privacy, my ass,” one of them growled.
Tess decided he had to be Bad Gus. “I know you’re upset about your friend, and I’m sorry to be quoting hospital policy. When his daughter gets here, she’ll be able to fill you in more on his condition. In the meantime, why don’t you go home and get some sleep? Visiting hours begin at eleven, but you’ll only be able to go in one or two at a time in the ICU, so try to stagger your visits.”
“Thanks, Tess,” Walter said. “We’ll do that.”
She waited until they had filed out of the emergency room door before she went over to where Ben waited for her. Once again she wished Ian had asked her out for ice cream with him and his gorgeous daughter. Why did I have to get stuck with this one?
“Ready?” she asked without looking at him.
“That was smooth,” he said as he pushed himself off the wall he had been propped against.
“What was?”
“The way you handled those old people. You didn’t tell them a damned thing, but somehow you sent them away satisfied.”
She shrugged. “It doesn’t take much to be human. You might want to try it sometime.”
He hooted with laughter. “Ouch.”
“If the shoe fits.”
At the car, he stopped her with a hand to her shoulder.
Tess did her best not to flinch, reminding herself yet again that not all men are monsters.
“We seem to have gotten off on the wrong foot,” he said. “How about we start over?”
Tess eyed him warily.
He extended his hand. “I’m Bennett Caldwell.”
With great reluctance, Tess took his hand and looked up at him. “Tess Daniels.”
He rendered her speechless when he raised her hand to his lips and kissed the back of it. “Pleased to meet you, Tess Daniels.”
They drove to Extension Street in silence. He had unnerved her with the unexpected, romantic gesture. She was so far removed from anything romantic, she had no idea what it meant. Was he just trying to make up for being a jerk earlier? Was he genuinely interested in her? If so, how did she feel about that? It was all so confusing, and it was one of many reasons she had sworn off men forever. Still, she had to wonder if she had witnessed a hint of the man he might be underneath all the obnoxiousness.
“It happened in Iraq,” he said.
“Excuse me?”
“You asked about my leg.”
“Oh, right. I did.”
“I was driving a Jeep when we hit a roadside bomb outside of Fallujah fifteen months ago. The friend who was with me was killed instantly.”
Tess had no idea what to say. After a long, awkward pause, she said, “You’re lucky to be alive.” And then she winced, knowing how stupid she sounded.
“Yeah,” he said with an ironic chuckle. “Lucky.”
She swallowed and forced herself to continue the conversation. “Were you injured, other than your leg?”
“Shrapnel wounds all up and down my right side. That’s how I got the scars on my face. But my leg took the brunt. Totally shattered. Somehow—I have no idea how—I managed to get a tourniquet on it, which is the only reason I didn’t bleed to death.”
“You don’t remember?”
He shook his head. “Not a damned thing. We were just riding along, and then my memory goes dark for about three days.”
As Tess drove down Extension Street, Ben pointed to a white house at the bottom of the hill.
“There it is—home sweet home, or at least until Nate sells it and moves on to his next project.”
Tess parked in front of the house but left the car running. Her head spun with questions she burned to ask if only she could have found the words.
“Well, thanks for the ride.”
“So you live with Nathan?”
He smiled, which softened his gruff features and took him from reasonably good-looking straight to dashing. “I had an apartment in town, but I gave it up when I got called up to active duty with the National Guard. After I came home in pieces, my brothers decided I couldn’t live alone until I was getting around better. Nate drew the short straw, but he probably rigged it so he could keep an eye on me.”
The bitter edge to his voice led her to ask, “Don’t you two get along?”
“We used to before we lived together. Now we mostly get on each other’s nerves.”
“I’m sure your cranky disposition is a real joy to live with.”
“You don’t pull any punches, do you, Nurse Tess?”
“What’s the point of pulling punches?”
Ben studied her for a long moment. “If that’s how you like to play it, what do you say we walk down the hill and have a drink?”
“Oh, um, well, I don’t think so. I have to work tomorrow, so I should get home.”
“Just one? I promise to behave like a perfect gentleman.”
“So you’d be pretending, then?”
He laughed.
“Maybe another time.”
“If you decide you don’t like me, you can run away. What am I going to do? Chase you? So you see, you’re safe with me.”
Tess resisted the urge to laugh. When he put forth the effort, he almost achieved human status. In light of the things he had shared with her, the do-gooder in her couldn’t help but recognize the wounded soul that rested just beneath his hard exterior. And despite herself, she was intrigued.
“All right.” She turned off the car—and her racing mind. “One drink.”
Chapter Twelve
While Nathan went to get his pain medication, Georgie didn’t allow herself to think about all the reasons it was a bad idea to be in a bed with him. Rather, she thought about how happy she had been to find him waiting for her when she got home, how sweet it had been—with a badly injured arm, no less—for him to carry her to bed and how he had offered just the right amount of support more than once during that long, difficult evening.
He came back with a prescription bottle and a glass of water, which he offered to share with her.
Georgie took a drink and passed the glass back to him.
After he took a pill, he put the bottle and the glass on the bedside table and reached for her. He held her as if she was the most precious thing in his world, his fingers spooling through her hair, his lips pressed to her forehead. “Tell me,” he said softly.
“What?”
“Everything.”
So she did. From the minute she received the phone call about her mother’s grim diagnosis right up to getting fired earlier and the shock of seeing Gus so bruised and battered. The only thing she left
out was how her mother’s diagnosis had affected her and her sister. When she finished, she was surprised to realize she felt better.
“All that in three months?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Well, no wonder.”
“No wonder what?”
“No wonder why there was no room in your life for another complication. You weren’t kidding.”
And he didn’t even know the biggest reason she had held him at arm’s length. “I’m sorry I hurt you. I didn’t mean to.”
“We aren’t talking about me. We’re talking about you, Georgie. You amaze me.”
“I do?”
“Yeah, you do. You were beating yourself up for not doing enough for Gus today. What about what you’ve been doing for all of them for months—while taking care of your mother, too?”
“I don’t want to be there, though. I hate every bloody minute I have to spend in that smelly, hot place with old men who don’t even try to hide that they’re lusting after me. Doesn’t that make me a bad person?”
“No,” he said, laughing softly. “It does not make you a bad person. All your choices were taken away. It’s only natural you’d resent that. Anyone would. And I can’t blame them for lusting after you. They are only human after all.”
His words hung heavily in the air for several long, quiet minutes. “Your boyfriend really dumped you over the phone?”
“Yep. In fact, it was the same day I met you. That was one reason why the whole thing with the Dumpster took me right over the edge.”
The hand that had been caressing her hair suddenly went still.
“What?” When he didn’t answer, she turned so she could see him. “Nathan? What’s wrong?”
“So I was like, what, a rebound?”
“No! Not at all.”
He tried to sit up, but she wouldn’t let him.
“My relationship with Doug was over a long time ago. Months ago. I just hadn’t gotten around to officially ending it with him. He beat me to it, and that made me mad more than anything. You were not a rebound, Nathan. I swear.” She slid her hand up over his chest to caress his face. “What happened between us had nothing to do with anyone but me and you. Do you believe me?”
“I want to.”
Against her better judgment, Georgie leaned in and touched her lips to his. “I need you to believe me.” She ran her tongue along his bottom lip.