Chapter Eleven
Lila
Where was he?
Uneasiness warred with annoyance. Dan was seriously late. It wasn’t like him to not be where he said he would be when he said he would be there.
And it definitely wasn’t like him to not answer my texts or calls.
Something had to be wrong. He’d sent his last text of the day, right before his shift ended. Then . . . nothing.
Maybe he was busy. Maybe he’d had a call at the end of his shift that ran long.
Maybe . . . Nicole was involved.
I shrugged that off, since I had no reason to think she was involved.
Still.
He’d been like a little kid counting down to Christmas all week. I knew he’d made reservations for dinner, but not where. All he’d offered was a “dress nice“ edict.
And then he didn’t show up, didn’t respond.
Unease slid ice down my spine.
He wouldn’t just blow me off–
A firm knock sounded on my front door. Relief crashed through me. Probably, he’d been delayed and let his phone die. That would be a rare occurrence, but still a possibility.
Already laughing, happy to see him, I swung the door open. “Where have you–”
The words died on my tongue. I stared into Vic Ocampo’s light green eyes.
Her hair scraped back into a tight bun, she stood on my porch in full uniform.
The porch light glinted off her silver badge.
My stomach plummeted, leaving a heavy hollow behind.
Panic exploded in my throat, hot and sickening,.
I couldn’t breathe.
“He’s okay.” She didn’t reach for me, but stood with a steady, calm presence. “But he’s in the ER. We can’t find his phone, and he couldn’t remember your number.”
“What?” Why wouldn’t he remember? In the ER? She’d said he was okay, but that didn’t sound okay.
“He has a concussion, and he lost consciousness so they’re observing him. He was a little confused when he came to.”
“A concussion.” All I could do was repeat her words, while I frantically tried to wrap my brain around what was happening. “He lost consciousness.”
She nodded, a glimmer of sympathy flickering through her eyes. “A situation at the ER went sideways while he was on a medical transport. He took a hit to the face, fell and caught his head on a supply cart.”
“Oh, my God.” I covered my mouth, throat tight and aching. Someone had hit him. He was hurt.
“Do you want to see him?” She didn’t shift her stance, gaze fixed on my face. “He asked for you. I can take you.”
“Please.” I cast about, looking for my clutch, only to realize I already had it in hand. Tears pricked at my eyes. What was wrong with me?
“My unit is right here. I’ll lock the door.” Her voice gentled, a brief touch on my arm guiding me over the threshold. How was this real? He was picking me up for a dinner he was ridiculously excited about, not lying in an ER because someone hit him.
I walked beside her to the patrol car in my driveway, the hurried click of my heels a thin contrast to the steady scrape of her boots on the pavement.
“He really is okay.” She held the passenger door for me. I sank into the seat, my hands shaking so I twisted them together until my fingers hurt. “A little worse for wear, but he was fairly lucid when he came around. They sent him for a CT scan, but that’s pretty standard.”
A CT scan. He was hurt enough they were running tests, and I’d been annoyed he was late, wasn’t responding to me.
I couldn’t string coherent thoughts together, let alone spoken words. Vic let me sit in silence for the remainder of the trip to the hospital.
She parked behind his patrol car, which sat astride the sidewalk near the entrance. Something about that familiar car, sitting where he’d left it, sent a shudder through me.
He’d parked for something he did every day. Strode into the hospital. And didn’t walk back out.
I followed Vic up the steps. The small waiting room stood empty, and the heavy door to the left of the receptionist’s desk swung open as she entered. Two familiar blondes exited, Nicole stumbling to a halt as her gaze skittered over me. Already ghostly white, she paled further.
A voice I didn’t recognize drifted from the small room behind the glass window at the receptionist’s desk. “You know she needs to check out–”
“It’s okay.” Nicole’s cousin’s voice rang cold and hard. “I’ve got it.”
“You don’t have–”
“I’ve got it,” she ground out.
“It’s on you.” The receptionist laid down a sheaf of papers with a sharp smack, a sound dripping with disdain.
“That’s right.” The cousin lifted her chin. God, she was a nasty piece of work.
Eyes swollen and red, Nicole shrank into herself. “This is because of me–”
“Get it together.” Her cousin wrapped a hard hand around her arm and dragged a cold look over me. “I’ll drive you home.”
Nicole glanced at me, miserable, and her cousin pushed her toward the door.
“Nasty witch,” Vic muttered.
“You said it.” The woman at the desk shook her head, mouth twisted in disgust. “I didn’t, even though we both know it’s true.”
“This is Gallagher’s girlfriend.” Vic gestured at me. “Can you buzz us back?”
A lock clicked, and Vic reached for the door. She peeked around the doorway to the receptionist’s room. “How’s Williams?”
“Sprained ankle.” She pursed her lips, although relief gleamed in her big brown eyes. ““He’s had worse.”
“Glad he’s okay.”
The small talk itched under my skin. All I wanted to do was get to Dan, even though at the same time I wasn’t ready for what waited on the other side of the small maze of hallways stretching before me.
Vic ushered me through the twisty halls between the waiting room and the ED, where rooms opened off of a central area with a nurse’s station.
An EMT sat on a chair next to the countertop, icing his ankle. Josh stood at the doorway to room three, forearm propped on the frame.
My stomach clenched.
A male voice from the room became more distinct as we drew closer. “ . . . good news is your scans are clear. We can take that collar off.”
Dan murmured, his words unclear, his voice raspy. My stomach dropped.
He was really hurt.
We reached the door, and Josh straightened.
“ . . . will numb you up so I can set your nose.”
I hovered in the door. Dan lay on the bed, white undershirt visible above the hospital blanket. Blood dotted his collar in rusty spots. His uniform shirt was draped over the back of a chair, his boots on the floor below it. Somehow, even with his broad shoulders, the bed made him look smaller.
“It’s non-displaced, which is good. Once you’re numb, I’ll realign the bones, set you up with a splint.” The young doctor rested his hands on the bedrail and flicked a glance at me. “It’s going to swell, and you’ll have a hell of a pair of black eyes.”
A grunt of amusement rumbled in Dan’s throat before he winced. “Lila?”
“She just got here.” Josh shifted so I could step across the threshold and into the room. A nurse laid out equipment on a tray near the bed.
The doctor flashed a quick smile. “He’s been waiting for you.”
With a slight nod, I made myself move toward the bed. My Dan was shy, a little awkward, with an underlying steadiness. Eager to please me, to learn about what worked for me, in bed and out.
This Dan, injured because of what he did every day, was pale except for that awful bruising at his nose, under his eyes.
I didn’t know what to do. A pit yawned in the bottom of my stomach, widening with the awareness of eyes all around me. I eased forward to stand at the edge of his bed. “Hey.”
Pain and confusion clouded his exhausted eyes. One corner of his mouth quirked up before the smile disappeared into a pained grimace.
“Hey.” He fumbled, rotated his wrist, looking for my hand. His fingers brushed the barest edges of mine. “Glad you’re here.”
My eyes stung. Again, the not-knowing what to say or do swamped me. Unable to pull enough oxygen into my lungs, I squeezed his hand. “I’m glad to see you.”
His chest moved with uneven breaths. My gaze skittered to the monitors, although the numbers there really didn’t mean much to me. Selling pharmaceuticals didn’t require medical knowledge beyond the facts and side effects listed in the brochures.
Behind me, a phone buzzed and fabric rustled before Josh murmured a hello.
“Gallagher, it’s your mom.” He joined me at the side of the bed, holding the phone near Dan’s chin, the device hissing with an open line on speaker. “She wants to talk to Mackey and hear from you.”
Dan blinked. “Mama.”
“Oh, my Lord, Dan.” Panic strangled Stephanie’s normally calm voice. “I can’t get a flight out–”
“Mama, ‘skay.” His fingers tightened on mine. “Lila’s here.”
Stephanie’s relief rushed out in an audible breath. “So you’re not alone.”
Again, I felt eyes lingering on me. I was such a fraud here. With a hard swallow, I wrapped my free hand around the bed rail. “No, ma’am. He’s not.”
“Oh, thank God. Jay? Are you there?”
“Yes, ma’am.” Dr. Mackey propped his forearms on the opposite bedrail. “His scans are clear. No brain bleed, but he has a concussion so we’re watching him. He’ll have a few days off to rest. His face will be a little bruised.”
My gaze jerked to him. A little?
“Remember when Lydia got hit with the soccer ball?” he continued. “About like that.”
“You’re sure?”
“Mrs. Stephanie, I would never not shoot you straight. He needs a little rest and time to heal. He’ll be right as rain.”
Josh snorted. “You’re like an eighty-year-old man.”
Dr. Mackey grinned at him, then returned his attention to the phone. “You heard that, right, Mrs. Stephanie?”
“Thank you, Jay. Daniel, I can fly out–”
“Mama.” He coughed, hoarse and choked. “I’m fine.”
“Lydia can–”
“Mama. She doesn’t need to take time off.” He scowled, hissed in a breath, and exhaled. “I’m good.”
“Okay. Okay.” Stephanie repeated the word like a mantra, like she was calming herself as much as she was agreeing with him. “Joshua? Jay? You will call me if anything–”
“Yes, ma’am.” Dr. Mackey’s voice dropped to a soothing promise. “I sure will.”
“Okay. Lila?”
“Yes?”
“I’m here if you need anything. You call me.”
“I will.” I didn’t have her number, but I could get that. And that seemed like a small enough promise to make. I didn’t know what I was doing in any of this, but I could make a phone call.
With an I love you to Dan and assurances she’d be home as soon as she could get out of Boston, where she’d been all week for training, she ended the call.
Dr. Mackey probed Dan’s nose with gentle fingers, nodding when he got no reaction. “Let’s take care of that nose.”
Dan flexed his fingers on mine. “Can she stay?”
“If you like.” Dr. Mackey quirked a brow in inquiry, his blue eyes steady on my face. “You want to?”
No. I’d never seen anyone like this, never seen anyone bloodied and bruised because of another person’s violence. I’d visited my mother in the hospital after a minor surgery, but that had been nothing like this.
But he was holding on to my fingers and walking out was wrong.
I swallowed against the lump holding my throat hostage. “Of course.”
Josh left, boots a quiet thud on the tile.
Dan closed his eyes while the nurse removed the packing in his nostrils.
Dr. Mackey lowered the rails on his side of the bed and leaned over, a metal object like an old-school shoehorn in his hand.
My stomach clenched when he placed the thin end inside Dan’s nose, testing the bridge of his nose with a gloved hand.
A crunch snapped through the air. I flinched, bile pushing up my throat.
Dr. Mackey palpated his nose again. “I’m going to try that one more time.”
Squeezing my eyes shut, I cringed, anticipating that awful sound.
Did that hurt him at all? My stomach pitched.
What if I threw up? I did not need to be a distraction here.
He hadn’t even moved during the procedure, so maybe he didn’t feel any of this.
I folded my fingers more closely about his, finding his fingertips chilled but his palm warm.
This time, the snap wasn’t as loud or extreme. Dr. Mackey stepped back with a satisfied hum. “Izzy will get that packed and splinted, but it looks good.”
Minutes later, the nurse withdrew, and the room lay quiet, the lights dimmed.
Dan slipped into a doze, and I perched on the edge of the chair nearest the bed.
The sharp tang of disinfectant mingled with the rubbery essence of gloves.
Beyond the closed door, voices murmured, wheels squeaking on the floor.
I watched his face while he slept, the rushed feeling so heavy with adrenaline and fear ebbing away, leaving me shaky and ashamed.
Here there was only me and him, the soft hush of his breathing, the click of his IV, and the occasional buzz of his blood pressure cuff.
A trembling breath worked up from my lungs and bled out in a low sob. I didn’t know how to do this.
I’d do it, though, so his mom was at peace. So he was at peace.
I was pretty sure Josh and Vic and the medical staff saw right through me, though.
He was my boyfriend. We were dating, but I hadn’t looked at this relationship as anything with a serious endgame. I’d thought only that we’d be together, enjoy one another – laugh and have good sex and spend good time together.
And eventually go our separate ways.
Except he wanted me when he was hurt.
Held on to me like I was everything.
This was nothing at all like what I’d expected.
And in our months together, I’d never slowed down to think about his job. Oh, I saw the stress sometimes, in the tense set of his shoulders or the small lines about his eyes. I appreciated how he looked in uniform, that air of authority he exuded.
He put himself in danger every time he clocked in. This had happened.
Worse could happen.
That left me breathless in a different way, the idea of a world without him in it.
I clenched my hands on my knees, fingers digging down hard. I didn’t want that idea living in my brain.
He could put on that uniform, kiss me goodbye, and be gone.
How did I even begin to conceive of that?
My heart squeezed into a tight ball, wanting to pound right through my chest and escape.
This was real – and I wasn’t ready at all.