Chapter 4
“Come on in, the water’s fine,” Brock called as he threw Jules a boyish grin while treading water.
Jules inched over to the edge of the cliff and peered down at the shimmering water of the pond that looked impossibly far away. The idea of jumping had seemed easy enough. However, the reality was twisting her stomach and making her want to barf.
“What’re you waiting for?” Brock taunted with a grin. “Jump.”
With his dark hair plastered to his head, the rugged lines of his jawline were even more prominent, emphasizing his masculinity. Also, it didn’t hurt that his biceps were so cut. Everything in her wanted to get to Brock, but she just couldn’t make herself jump. Shivers ran through her as she rubbed her arms. Ouch! Why was her left shoulder so tender? No, not just tender. It was throbbing with pain. She tried to take in a breath, but her ribs hurt like she’d been beaten with a baseball bat.
“You can do it,” Brock encouraged.
“I can’t,” she gulped, ‘I’m injured.” Blackness swirled around her, threatening to pull her into a dark tunnel from which there was no escape. Couldn’t Brock see that she was struggling here? She expected him to say something sympathetic, but he just kept looking at her with that dazzling smile that normally drove her to distraction. Right now, however, it was dang annoying. Why was Brock so clueless about her pain? The pungent scent of chlorine invaded her senses. Was there chorine in the pond? Not chlorine, but some sort of sharp antiseptic. She’d smelled this odor countless times before in the OR. Wait a minute. The OR? She was swimming, not working.
Brock dove under the water.
She waited for him to reemerge. One second passed … two … three …
A white-hot panic pulsed through her veins. “Brock,” she shouted, “stop horsing around.” She got the terrible feeling that she’d never see him again. That he would forever be out of her reach. There was no way she could let that happen. She had to push past the pain. Past the fear. Closing her eyes tightly, she jumped.
She hit the water and went down, down, down like a brick hurled from a tall building. She tried to fight her way back to the top, but the water was too heavy. It sat on her like a suffocating weight.
A faint beeping sound drew her attention. Even as she tried to figure out where it was coming from, the beeping grew louder and more persistent until it crowded out all else. Where was Brock? She needed him like she needed air.
Air.
She was underwater and still breathing. How? Every breath hurt her ribs, but she was at least taking in air.
Exerting all of her effort, she tried to move her body, but it wouldn’t budge. Next, she tried to open her eyes, only to discover that her lashes were glued together. Alarm streaked through her. She couldn’t stay like this … in limbo. Unable to move. Unable to see. She had to fight.
She tried again. This time, she managed to get one eye open. Finally, she got the other one open and blinked several times, relieved that she could now open them.
The bright circles of lights beaming down were blinding. Where was she? A moan issued from her mouth.
“Jules,” a woman cried. “Thank heavens you’re coming to.”
Coming to? What was happening to her? It was like her brain was tangled in barbed wire, and her thoughts were too muddled to make sense of anything.
The woman touched Jules’s hand.
Her brain cleared enough to recognize the voice. “Mom?” she croaked, feeling like her throat was coated in sandpaper. She tried to lift her hand but realized it was connected to something. She looked down, surprised to see an IV line secured in the antecubital fossa—the crook of her elbow. Another was taped across the top of her hand. Her gaze followed the tubing to a nearby monitor beeping steadily beside her. Each note was oddly in time, with the pulse pounding against her temples. She felt the faint pinch of a pulse oximeter clipped to her finger.
A dull ache pushed at the base of her skull, radiating down her neck. The tightening of a blood pressure cuff around her arm drew her attention.
“Where am I? What happened?”
“You’re in the hospital,” Mom explained.
Confusion swirled through her.
“The hospital?”
Mom nodded.
Dad stepped up beside the bed, his expression tender. “Hey, honey,” he began hoarsely and then coughed to clear the emotion. “It’s nice to see you awake.”
Mom leaned over and brushed a cool hand across Jules’s forehead. “What do you remember, sweetheart?”
She searched her brain, which was starting to pound. “Nothing. I don’t remember anything.” A creeping sense of panic coiled in her chest. What … what happened to me?” She took in a quick breath and then winced at the sharp pain that stabbed through her. Her ribs were terribly sore, and her left arm was throbbing. She glanced at it, noting that she was wearing a sling.
The room began to spin, causing her stomach to roil.
“Jules, are you okay?” Concern trembled in Mom’s voice.
No, she wasn’t okay. Everything was wrong. Why was she in a hospital bed? And the pain was awful. She eased in a breath and let it out slowly, commanding herself not to panic. She had to think this thing through in a rational manner. She’d mostly likely suffered a concussion, and several of her ribs were probably cracked. Hence the agony when she breathed.
Loss of memory. Disorientation. She’d obviously been in some sort of accident, but how bad was it?
“You were in a car accident,” Dad said gently.
The words knocked the breath from Jules’s lungs, causing her to gasp in pain.
“Maybe we should call a nurse.” Mom’s tone was frantic.
Jules’s heart began to pound. “I’m okay,” she muttered and then bit down on her lower lip. “I just need a minute to process this.” A car accident? She tried to piece things together, but her mind was a blank. “How?” she uttered.
She caught the worried glance that passed between her parents.
Whatever happened, she should remember. This was bad. She became aware of the slight tickle from the nasal cannula beneath her nose, delivering oxygen. What was the flow rate? Two liters? Maybe four?
“You don’t remember leaving the reception?” Mom asked.
“The reception?” Jules looked at her parents and realized they were dressed in formal wear. “I went to a reception,” she said mechanically, hoping the act of speaking the words would trigger some shred of recollection.
Zoe’s reception,” Mom supplied.
Dad spoke up. “You left right after Zoe and Junior’s sendoff. You said you had a headache and needed to go home.”
Just like that, a shard of memory pierced the dense fog. “I remember,” she interjected and talked faster. “Zoe and Tippin got married. The reception was at the ranch … in the backyard.”
Relief sounded in Mom’s voice. “It’s coming back to you.”
Jules spoke to herself as she tried to piece together the events. “Brock and I had an argument. I was upset. That’s why I wanted to leave.”
“We figured as much,” Mom said quietly and glanced at Dad.
“I was sitting at a red light and talking to Nikki on the phone.” Her breath came faster, causing her to wince. “I saw headlights coming at me. I screamed.” Horror streaked through her, causing her body to quake.
Dad filled in the rest. “Nikki heard you scream and called 911. It was thanks to her that the paramedics got to you so quickly.”
“Who hit me? Is the other person okay?”
A silent exchange passed between Mom and Dad.
“What?” Jules demanded.
“It was a hit-and-run accident.”
Shock rattled through her. “Hit and run?” She looked at Dad, who nodded.
“The police are searching for the driver. They’ll want to ask you some questions and get a statement. Do you remember anything else about the accident?”
She tried to think. “No. Nothing. Only that I was upset about Brock. My phone kept ringing, so I finally answered it and was talking to Nikki. She was planning on coming over and ordering a pizza.” She stopped. “Where’s Nikki?”
“In the waiting room.”
“Does Zoe know about my accident?”
“Not yet. She and Junior are in flight. We haven’t been able to get in touch with them.”
She let this information settle. Where were they going on their honeymoon? She sifted through her brain. Where was it? Oh, yeah. To Ireland. She welcomed the sensation of a lock being turned and a door opening to give her the knowledge she needed. At least she could remember something. “How long have I been in the hospital?”
“A couple of hours,” Dad answered.
Jules looked at the monitor, relieved to note that her blood pressure was good. “Has a doctor been in to give you a report?” She didn’t like this helpless feeling of being a patient confined to a hospital bed and having to wait for the news. She much preferred to be on the other side of the equation.
Dad began listing her injuries. “You have a concussion and a couple of fractured ribs on your left side.”
A TBI, or Traumatic Brain Injury, would explain the confusion she’d experienced and the memory loss. Had she gone unconscious after the initial impact of the collision? Was that why she couldn’t remember anything past the phone call and seeing the headlights coming at her?
“Your shoulder is injured.”
That explained the sling. And the intense discomfort in her shoulder.
“You have a pelvis fracture on your left side and minor lacerations on your face from the shards of glass.”
A tremble of alarm went through her as she gingerly touched her face with the fingertip of her free hand. “How bad is it? Will it leave scars?”
“I don’t think so,” Mom said with a reassuring smile. Tears gathered in her eyes. “You’re lucky to be alive.”
“Why would someone hit me and then flee the scene?”
Dad’s eyes narrowed. “That’s what we’re trying to figure out.”
“Maybe someone got scared and panicked,” Jules surmised.
“That could be the case, but it’s still unacceptable.” Dad’s tone held the hard edge of one ready to hunt down the driver and put the man or woman in jail.
More memories of the wedding and reception came trickling back, filling Jules with a heavy gloom. Brock was going back to his ex-wife. He loved her, not Adrian. And yet he was going back to Adrian because of Trevor. The knowledge was as painful as her broken body. Tears filled her eyes.
“It’ll be okay,” Mom soothed, stroking her forehead. “Are you in pain?”
“Yes,” Jules rasped.
“I’ll call the nurse and ask her to get you something.”
Jules nodded, even though no amount of pain meds could temper the hollow ache spreading through the center of her heart. Hot tears spilled down her cheeks.
In a matter of a few short hours, her life had completely fallen apart.
And she had no idea how she was supposed to put herself back together again.