February 2018
Hello, all, and welcome to my column. This is Jory Harcourt, and normally I’m here offering help, a shoulder to cry on, and maybe even some advice, but I have another story to tell you from Valentine’s Day this year.
It wasn’t as scary as some of our other adventures, but I was not expecting to spend my evening in the emergency room…
So my husband was shot protecting me—I mean really, who needs flowers and candy when the love of your life puts himself between you and a bullet—and we were in the ER when our friends dropped off our kids at the hospital.
They, the kids, had just missed Special Agent in Charge Zane Calhoun, who had come to check on Sam and let us know that the man who shot at me, but got him instead, was in federal custody.
“Ohmygod, I was just with you, what happened?” Hannah, my daughter, moaned as she rushed into the room where we were.
She had been at an event with Aaron Sutter at the Field Museum that Sam and his team of marshals had provided security for, so of course she had seen her father.
That he now had a bullet in him was a scary surprise.
“It’s fine, I’m fine,” Sam soothed her, and I let go of his hand so she could take it as she slipped down onto the chair I got up out of.
He was lying on his stomach, head turned as the doctor was digging a bullet out of his right shoulder.
“Daddy!” she wailed, the tears coming fast as she saw the small gush of blood from the wound, leaning close to put her hand on his face.
He squeezed her hand. “Sweetheart, I promise you, this is so not life threatening. Tell her, Doc, tell her I’m fine.”
“He really is fine, honey,” Dr. Elias Cooper, the attending physician performing the bullet removal, told her.
“Dr. Cooper is a very good doctor,” the nurse who had been in charge of Sam since we walked through the door—this was the chief deputy after all—assured my daughter. “And his older brother works here too, so he keeps an eye on him.”
Dr. Cooper gave Hannah an eye roll, which she seemed to like, though she stayed where she was, hovering over her father.
Kola, my son, was standing by the door, hands in his pockets, looking miserable.
“He’s going to be fine,” I promised him.
Quick nod from him as his chin wobbled and his eyes filled.
He had talked to Sam earlier on the phone, but there was hearing about your father getting shot and there was seeing it, and I was betting that it was not what he imagined or had seen on TV.
“I told Uncle Aaron and Uncle Duncan that they shouldn’t come in, that Dad wouldn’t want them to see him like this. ”
“Good call, son,” Sam called over to him.
I, of course, had told Aaron the same thing in text, which was the real reason he hadn’t come in.
Kola’s dark violet eyes flicked to me before he darted over to Sam and crouched next to the bed, beside his sister’s chair so he could be eye to eye with his father.
“Are you okay?” he asked softly.
“I’m fine,” Sam assured him.
“Did you get a tetanus shot already?”
“I did.”
“What about an antibiotic?”
“Yep. Got a shot, and I have a prescription that the pharmacy is filling as we speak.”
Kola looked up at Dr. Cooper. “How many stitches will he have?”
“Two,” he explained. “I wasn’t going to put in any, but I know your father has to return to work on Monday.”
“So if he did something where he could sit all day, you’d just let it close by itself?”
“I would, yes.”
Kola nodded, listening intently. “Was the bullet not in there very deep?”
I moved closer, watching Kola lift to his feet to observe Dr. Cooper up close, one hand on the small of Sam’s back, the other holding on to the side of the bed. Hannah was still clutching Sam’s hand and stroking his hair.
“The bullet was slowed by your father’s jacket,” he explained to Kola, “as well as his shirt, and most importantly, by his gun holster. Once it broke the skin, it was further slowed by the muscles in his back.”
“Where?”
Dr. Cooper pointed.
“That’s the rhomboid major, isn’t it?”
“Yes. Very good.”
“And so it hit that, and then what?”
“It looks like it deflected and then became embedded in his skin,” he said, showing Kola where he’d pulled the bullet from. “So I didn’t have to dig deep for it, it was right here on the surface.”
Kola nodded. “So you’re just loading him up with antibiotics and some pain meds, putting in the stitches and covering it with gauze, and then you’ll have him come back to have them pulled out?”
“That’s the plan, but I suspect your father, like most law enforcement types I know, will simply remove the stitches himself at home.”
“Is that safe?”
“It’s not recommended, but since my nephew did it after a friend of his watched a YouTube video—I suspect you might be the one to pull them.”
Kola nodded sagely.
“Are you thinking of becoming a doctor?”
“Yes, I am,” he told Dr. Cooper, and as this was not the first I was hearing of his interest in pursuing medicine, I stayed quiet. It was nice of the man to talk to Kola and explain things. A lot of people wouldn’t have taken the time.
“Well, make sure you take good care of your father, all right?”
“I will.”
“Do you want to watch me put in the stitches?”
Instead of answering, Kola stepped in closer.
“Pa,” Hannah called me.
Moving around her chair, I knelt down beside her. “What’s wrong, B?”
She tipped her head at Sam, and I saw that his eyes were closed.
“It’s the painkillers, sweetie, he’s fine.”
Sam’s eyes fluttered open, and he smiled at Hannah. “The doc numbed the area before he dug the bullet out. I only felt the pressure.”
“Okay,” she said softly, her voice shaking as she lifted her eyes not to the doctor, but the nurse. “He’s going to be fine, right?”
“Yes, honey, he’ll be fine,” Nurse Brenner told her.
“I’m Hannah.”
“Arlene,” Nurse Brenner replied, smiling at my daughter.
Hannah then turned to Dr. Cooper. “You’re sure you got the whole bullet out?”
“Yeah, look,” Kola said, moving the metal pan that the bullet was in so she could see it.
“Oh, that’s tiny,” she said, brightening, seeing the size of it making her feel better. Her father was a big man, after all. The little piece of metal couldn’t possibly kill him.
“Yeah, but you can die from being shot with a twenty-two,” Kola informed her.
And instantly her face fell, then scrunched up and there were fresh tears.
“Nice,” I said sarcastically.
“But Dad was super lucky,” Kola continued, not missing a beat, making his voice soothing at the same time he darted over to the counter by the sink, grabbed the small box of tissues there, and returned.
He pulled two and held them over her nose like he’d done when he was six and she was four. All his life he’d taken care of her.
She blew, noisily, not a demure bone in her whole body, and then he repeated the process with a fresh set, before passing her the box to return to overseeing his father’s procedure.
“Dad was lucky?” she asked, sniffling.
“Yeah—I mean yes, because it didn’t go in very deep. With small-caliber bullets you worry about them bouncing around inside, but this one barely went in.”
She nodded quickly, as always, taking her brother’s words as gospel.
“I was the lucky one,” I said hoarsely, carding my fingers through Sam’s thick hair, tracing his right eyebrow with my thumb. “I would have been shot if your father hadn’t put himself between me and the gun.”
“Thank goodness,” Hannah breathed. “If you got shot with that bullet, you might have been killed. You’re way smaller than Dad.”
Kola grunted his agreement.
“Can we keep the bullet?” Hannah wanted to know.
“No, it’s evidence,” Kola told her. “They need it for a ballistics match so the guy who shot Dad will go to jail.”
“Oh yeah, that’s good. Give the bullet to the police.”
“It actually goes to the FBI,” Sam corrected her, yawning tiredly.
“That’s even better,” Kola agreed, pinning Dr. Cooper with his dark blue gaze. “You’ll make sure that happens?”
“Actually, someone will be by to collect it. I just have to bag it up for them.”
“Okay, good,” Kola said, giving his seal of approval, watching the man tie off the two stiches. Sam’s back was covered in betadine, which must have triggered the next question. “When can he shower and get the blood and the brown stuff off?”
“In forty-eight hours.”
Sam scoffed, and I knew there was no way he wasn’t showering in the morning. “I’ll put a waterproof bandage over it, but there’s no way I’m waiting that long.”
Sam had been a Marine, and he’d been wounded in the line of duty, and I knew, from seeing the scars up close, that he’d taken bigger bullets, had a medic dig them out, been bandaged up and then gone back to the line.
The whole shot with a .22 was simply tedious to him.
He was hungry and grouchy and ready to go home.
We only had a few minutes left before he started snapping.
“So this made for an exciting Valentine’s Day, huh, guys?” I said cheerfully.
“I’m hungry,” Hannah sighed, “are you hungry, Daddy?”
“Starving,” he told her. “Your father took me to a restaurant with duck liver.”
Hannah pretended to vomit; Kola just looked at me in horror.
“It was very good,” I told them both. “You all need to expand your horizons.”
“Why didn’t you guys just have Italian or go to, like, Chicago Cut and have a steak?” Kola wanted to know, so very much his father’s son.
“This is an excellent question, my boy.”
I threw up my hands in disgust.
Aaron had graciously left his car there for us, so when we were finally ready to leave the hospital, we were driven to a deli in Oak Park close to where we lived.
I didn’t even say anything when Sam ordered a loaded roast beef sandwich, content to let him have whatever he wanted.
The kids had their usual, Hannah her sky-high egg salad and chocolate shake, and Kola his pastrami on rye with extra spicy mustard and a vanilla shake.
They also had ice water, and the waitress was surprised that neither wanted a soda.
“I didn’t raise them with it,” I told her when she looked at me.
“That’s smart. I’m trying to get rid of it at my house at the moment, and I’m having a helluva time.”
I smiled at her as she left.
“So how come you had to eat duck liver?” Hannah asked her father.
“Because I was being punished,” Sam informed her, which made her giggle.
“We’re going back to that restaurant,” I told Sam, my hand on his thigh under the table.
He grunted as he ate, and I picked at my grilled cheese.
“We are.”
“What makes you think they’ll let us back in there?”
“It’s not our fault that your ex-boss tried to kill you.”
“Yeah, but maybe they won’t see it that way.”
He had a point.
Hannah got up then to go to the bathroom, and Kola went to check out what he wanted for dessert. As soon as they were both a few feet from the table, Sam grabbed my hand and pressed it over his groin.
“What are you doing?”
He turned, and I got a look of concern. “If you can’t tell, we’ve got real problems.”
“You just got shot,” I reminded him, even as I felt his cock thicken under my fingers.
“Tiny bullet and it’s Valentine’s Day. I want the good stuff.”
I snorted. “The good stuff?”
“I wanna get laid.”
“Oh really.”
“Hey, I saved your life, you owe me, so you gotta put out.”
“Is that right.”
“Hell yeah that’s right. I expect you to be all over me as soon as we get home.”
Leaning sideways, I kissed along his gorgeous square jaw that I’d been a fan of for years. “That’s not going to be a problem.”
He sighed deeply, and I saw the smile I loved curl the corner of his mouth and make his eyes shine with heat and promise.
“Could have lost you tonight.”
“With a twenty-two?” he said like I was ridiculous. “Baby, come on.”
“Just—I need to show you how much you mean to me.”
His eyebrows lifted. “Oh yeah, that’s good. Do that. Show me. Show me all over.”
I groaned as the kids came back to the table.
“It’s due tomorrow,” Hannah was telling her brother. “That’s the best you can do?”
“Fine. How ’bout a story about a blood specialist who falls in love with a sex-addicted vampire who's a model, and you can call it Vein by Vain.”
“I don’t—oh, I see. So vein like blood and then vain like conceited.”
“Yeah.”
“Okay, okay.”
“What are we talking about?” Sam asked her. “And sex-addicted what?”
“It’ll be off-page, Dad, geez.”
“Of course, how stupid of me.”
“What is this, B?” I questioned her.
“It’s just a creative writing assignment due tomorrow. Don’t worry your pretty little head about it, just focus on eating and then getting home and putting Dad in bed.”
“Oh, that’s good advice,” Sam assured his daughter with a waggle of his eyebrows for me.
“Hey, if you have to write another one, you could do a sequel,” Kola told his sister.
She started giggling. “And?”
“And they can go undercover at a vampire fashion shoot at the Mayo Clinic.”
“Ohmygod.”
“You can call that one, Hold the Mayo.”
She was punchy as she started to laugh harder.
“And the next one could be Love in Vein, and then Open a Vein, and finally the bodybuilding gym drama, Veiny Arms.”
Face down on the table, she was howling and Kola was laughing too.
I knew it was the relief of their father being fine, because both of them had been very scared, Hannah visibly in tears, Kola, quietly, as he was far more reserved.
It was good to see them both happy at the same time, because with the ups and downs of parenthood, I, like most parents, like Sam, was only ever as happy as my saddest child.
It was nice that in that moment we were all safe and happy.
And I got to go home and make love to my husband.
As Valentine’s Day went, I really couldn’t complain.