by Nora Roberts
As he was alive. As he was whole. He would have to carry that weight for the rest of his life.
For a moment, he rested his brow on his knees, fought to clear his head again. He knew the Beaumonts were just down the hall in the waiting room. They’d offered him comfort, support, unity. And he’d had to escape. Their quiet compassion had all but destroyed him.
He already knew that if Buck had even a slim chance of survival, it wasn’t due to him, but to Marla’s quick, calm and unflinching handling of a crisis. It was she who had taken control, even down to remembering to grab clothes from the boat.
He hadn’t even been able to fill out the hospital forms, but had only stared at them until she’d taken the clipboard from him, gently asked the questions and filled in the blanks herself.
It was frightening to discover that he was, essentially, useless.
“Matthew.” Tate crouched in front of him, took his hands and wrapped them around a cup of coffee. “Come in and sit down.”
He shook his head. Because the coffee was in his hands he lifted it and sipped. He could see that her face was still pale and glossy with shock, her eyes red. But the hand she rested on his updrawn knee was steady.
In one terrifying mental blip, he saw her hurtling through the water toward the jaws of the shark.
“Go away, Tate.”
Instead, she sat beside him, draped an arm around his shoulders. “He’s going to make it, Matthew. I know it.”
“What, are you a fortune-teller now, on top of everything else?”
His voice was cold and sharp. Though it wounded, she leaned her head on his shoulder. “It’s important to believe it. It helps to believe it.”
She was wrong. It hurt to believe it. Because it did, he jerked away from her, got to his feet. “I’m going for a walk.”
“I’ll go with you.”
“I don’t want you.” He whirled on her, letting all the fear, the guilt, the grief explode into fury. “I don’t want you anywhere near me.”
Her stomach quaked, her eyes stung, but she held her ground. “I’m not leaving you alone, Matthew. You’d better get used to it.”
“I don’t want you,” he repeated, and stunned her by putting a hand just under her throat and pushing her against the wall. “I don’t need you. Now, why don’t you go get your nice, pretty family and take off?”
“Because Buck matters to us.” Though she managed to swallow the tears, they roughened her voice. “So do you.”
“You don’t even know us.” Something was screaming inside him to get out. To keep it hidden even from himself, he pushed her. His face, inches from hers, was hard, cold, merciless. “You’re just out for a lark, taking a few months in the sun to play at treasure-hunting. You got lucky. You don’t know what it’s like to go month after month, year after year and have nothing to show for it. To die and have nothing.”
Her breath was hitching now no matter how she fought to control it. “He’s not going to die.”
“He’s already dead.” The fury died from his eyes like a light switched off and left them blank and flat. “He was dead the minute he pushed me out of the way. The goddamn idiot pushed me out of the way.”
There it was, the worst of it, out, ringing on the sterilized hospital air. He turned from it, covered his face, but couldn’t escape it.
“He pushed me out of the way, got in front of me. What the hell was he thinking of? What were you thinking of?” Matthew demanded, spinning back to her with all the helpless anger rolling back into him like a riptide. “Coming at us that way. Don’t you know anything? When a shark’s got blood it’ll attack anything. You should have headed for the boat. With that much blood in the water, we were lucky it didn’t draw a dozen sharks in to feed. What the hell were you thinking of?”
“You.” She said it quietly and stayed where she was, backed against the wall. “I guess both Buck and I were thinking about you. I couldn’t have handled it if anything had happened to you, Matthew. I couldn’t have lived with it. I love you.”
Undone, he stared at her. There had been no one, in his whole life, who had said those three words to him. “Then you’re stupid,” he managed, and pulled unsteady fingers through his hair.
“Maybe.” Her lips were trembling. Even when she pressed them hard together, they vibrated with the power of her roiling emotions. “I guess you were pretty stupid, too. You didn’t leave Buck. You thought he was dead and you could have gotten away while the shark had him. You didn’t. Why didn’t you head for the boat, Matthew?”
He only shook his head. When she stepped forward to put her arms around him, he buried his face in her hair. “Tate.”
“It’s all right,” she murmured, running soothing strokes up his rigid back. “It’s going to be all right. Just hold on to me.”
“I’m bad luck.”
“That’s foolish. You’re just tired now, and worried. Come in and sit down. We’ll all wait together.”
She stayed beside him. The hours passed in that dream state so common to hospitals. People came and went. There was the soft flap of crepe-soled shoes on tile as nurses passed the doorway, the smell of overbrewed coffee, the sharp tang of antiseptic that never quite masked the underlying odor of sickness. Occasionally there was the faint swish as the elevator doors opened and closed.
Then softly, gently, rain began to patter on the windows.
Tate dozed with her head pillowed on Matthew’s shoulder. She was awake and aware the instant his body tensed. Instinctively, she reached for his hand as she looked toward the doctor.
He came in quietly, a surprisingly young man with lines of fatigue around his eyes and mouth. His skin, the color of polished ebony, looked like folded black silk.
“Mr. Lassiter.” Despite the obvious weariness, his voice was as musical as the evening rain.
“Yes.” Braced for condolences, Matthew pushed himself to his feet.
“I am Doctor Farrge. Your uncle has come through the surgery. Please sit.”
“What do you mean, come through?”
“He has survived the operation.” Farrge sat on the edge of the coffee table, waited for Matthew to settle. “His condition is critical. You know he lost a great deal of blood. More than three liters. If he had lost even a fraction more, if it had taken you even ten minutes longer to get him here, there would have been no chance. However, his heart is very strong. We’re optimistic.”
Hope was too painful. Matthew simply nodded. “Are you telling me he’s going to live?”
“Every hour his chances improve.”
“And those chances are?”
Farrge took a moment to measure his man. With some, kindness didn’t comfort. “He has perhaps a forty percent chance of surviving the night. If he does, I would upgrade that. Further treatment will be necessary, of course, when he is stabilized and stronger. When this time comes I can recommend to you several specialists who have good reputations in treating patients with amputated limbs.”
“Is he conscious?” Marla asked quietly.
“No. He will be in recovery for some time, then in our Critical Care Unit. I would not expect him to be alert for several hours. I would suggest that you leave a number where you can be reached at the nurses’ station. We’ll contact you if there is any change.”
“I’m staying,” Matthew said simply. “I want to see him.”
“Once he is in CCU, you’ll be able to see him. But only for a short period.”
“We’ll get a hotel.” Ray rose, laid a hand on Matthew’s shoulder. “We’ll take shifts here.”
“I’m not leaving.”
“Matthew.” Ray squeezed gently. “We need to work as a team.” He glanced at his daughter, read what was in her eyes. “Marla and I will find us some rooms, make the arrangements. We’ll come back and relieve you and Tate in a few hours.”
There were so many tubes snaking out from the still figure in the bed. Machines beeped and hummed. Outside the thin curtain Matthew could hear the quiet murmur
ings of the nurses, their brisk steps as they went about the business of tending lives.
But in this room, narrow and dim, he was alone with Buck. He forced himself to look down at the sheet, at the odd way it lay. He would have to get used to it, he thought. They would both have to get used to it.
If Buck lived.
He barely looked alive now, his face slack, his body so strangely tidy in the bed. Buck was a tosser, Matthew remembered, a man who tugged and kicked at sheets, one who snored violently enough to scrape the paint from the walls.
But he was as still and silent now as a man in a coffin.
Matthew took the broad, scarred hand in his, a gesture he knew would have embarrassed both of them had Buck been conscious. He held it, studying the face he’d thought he knew as well as his own.
Had he ever noticed how thick Buck’s eyebrows were, or how the gray peppered them? And when had the lines around his eyes begun to crisscross that way? Wasn’t it strange that his forehead, which rose into that egg-shaped skull, was so smooth? Like a girl’s.
Jesus, Matthew thought, and squeezed his eyes tight. His leg was gone.
Fighting off panic, Matthew leaned down. He was nearly comforted by the sound of Buck’s breathing.
“That was a damn stupid thing to do. You made a mistake getting in front of me that way. Maybe you figured on wrestling with that shark, but I guess you’re not as quick as you used to be. Now you probably figure I owe you. Well, you’ve got to live to collect.”
He tightened his grip. “You hear that, Buck. You’ve got to live to collect. Think about that. You kick off on me, you lose, and me and the Beaumonts will just split your share of the Marguerite on top of it. Your first big strike, Buck, and if you don’t pull out of this, you won’t get to spend the first coin.”
A nurse parted the curtain, a gentle reminder that the time was up.
“It’d be a real shame if you didn’t get to enjoy some of that fame and fortune you’ve always wanted, Buck. You keep that in mind. They’re tossing me out of here, but I’ll be back.”
In the corridor, Tate paced, as much from nerves as the need to keep herself awake. The moment she saw Matthew come through the doors, she hurried over.
“Did he wake up at all?”
“No.”
Taking his hand, Tate struggled with her own fears. “The doctor said he wouldn’t. I suppose we were all hoping otherwise. Mom and Dad are going to take a shift now.” When he started to shake his head, she squeezed his fingers impatiently. “Matthew, listen to me. We’re all a part of this. And I think he’s going to need all of us, so we may as well start now. You and I are going to the hotel. We’re going to get a meal, and we’re going to sleep for a few hours.”
As she spoke, she drew him down the corridor. After sending her parents a bolstering smile, she steered Matthew toward the elevators.
“We’re all going to lean on each other, Matthew. That’s the way it works.”
“There has to be something I can do.”
“You’re doing it,” she said gently. “We’ll be back soon. You just need to rest a little. So do I.”
He looked at her then. Her skin was so pale it seemed he could pass his hand through it. Smudges of exhaustion bruised her eyes. He hadn’t been thinking of her, he realized. Nor had he considered that she might have needed to lean on him.
“You need sleep.”
“I could use a couple of hours.” Keeping her hand on his, she stepped into the elevator car, pushed the button for the lobby. “Then we’ll come back. You can sit with Buck again until he wakes up.”
“Yeah.” Matthew stared blankly at the descending numbers. “Until he wakes up.”
Outside, the wind kicked at the rain, swept through palm fronds. The cab bumped along the narrow, deserted streets, its tires sluicing at puddles. It was like driving through someone else’s dream—the dark, the huddle of unfamiliar buildings shifting in the glare of headlights, the monotonous squeak of the wipers across the windshield.
Matthew fished Caribbean bills from his wallet as Tate climbed out. In seconds, the rain plastered her hair to her head.
“Dad gave me the room keys,” she began. “It’s not the Ritz.” She tried another smile as they entered the tiny lobby crowded with wicker chairs and leafy plants. “But it’s close to the hospital. We’re on the second floor.”
They took the steps with Tate jingling the keys nervously in her hand. “This is your room. Dad said we were right next door.” She looked down at the keys, studied the number. “Matthew, can I come in with you? I don’t want to be by myself.” She shifted her gaze to his. “I know it’s stupid, but—”
“It’s okay. Come on.” He took the key from her, unlocked the door.
There was a bed with a spread of brightly colored orange and red flowers, a small dresser. The lamp’s shade was askew. Marla had brought him a kit from the boat, and had left it neatly at the foot of the bed. Matthew switched on the lamp. Its glow was yellowed by the crooked shade. Rain beat against the window in angry fists.
“It’s not much,” Tate murmured. Compelled, she reached out to straighten the lampshade, as if the little homemaker’s gesture would make the room less sad.
“Not what you’re used to, I guess.” Matthew strode into the adjoining bath and came out with a thin towel the size of a place mat. “Dry your hair.”
“Thanks. I know you need to sleep. I should probably leave you alone.”
He sat on the side of the bed, concentrated on removing his shoes. “You can sleep in here if you want. You don’t have to worry about anything.”
“I wouldn’t be worried.”
“You should.” On a sigh, he rose and, taking the towel, rubbed it briskly over her hair himself. “But you don’t have to. Take off your shoes, and stretch out.”
“You’ll lie down with me?”
He glanced over as she sat and fumbled tiredly with the laces of her sneakers. He knew he could have her—one touch, one word. He could lose himself and all of this misery in her. She would be soft, and willing, and sweet.
And he would hate himself.
Saying nothing, he turned down the spread. He stretched out on the sheet, held out a hand to her. Without hesitation, she lay down beside him, curled her body to his, pillowed her head on his shoulder.
There was one keen slice of need low in his gut. It mellowed to a dull ache as she settled her palm on his chest. He turned his face into her rain-scented hair and found a baffling mix of comfort and pain.
Safe, lulled by trust, she let her eyes close. “It’s going to be all right. I know it’s going to be all right. I love you, Matthew.”
She slipped into sleep as easily as a child. Matthew listened to the rain and waited for dawn.
The shark shot through the water, a sleek gray bullet armed with ready teeth and a lust for blood. The water was red and roiling, choking her as she struggled to escape. She was screaming, gasping for air she couldn’t find. Those jaws opened, hideously wide. Then closed over her with a pain too excruciating to name.
She came awake with a scream locked in her throat. Curling into a ball, she fought her way out of the nightmare. She was in Matthew’s room, she reminded herself. She was safe. He was safe.
And she was alone.
Lifting her head, she saw the murky sunlight just easing in the window. Panic came first that he had somehow gotten word that Buck had died, and had gone back to the hospital without her. Then she realized what she thought was rain was the shower.
The storm was over, and Matthew was here.
She let out a long breath, pushed at her disheveled hair. She could be grateful he hadn’t been with her when she’d had the nightmare. He was already carrying so much weight, she thought. She wouldn’t add to it. She would be brave and strong, and give him whatever support he needed.
When the bathroom door opened, Tate had a smile ready. Despite her worries, her heart did a quick tumble at the sight of him, damp from his shower, bare cheste
d, his jeans carelessly unfastened.
“You’re awake.” Matthew hooked his thumbs into his front pockets and tried not to think about how she looked sitting with her arms wrapped around her knees in the middle of the bed. “I thought you might sleep awhile longer.”
“No, I’m fine.” Suddenly awkward, she moistened her lips. “The rain stopped.”
“I noticed.” Just as he noticed how big and soft and aware her eyes had become. “I’m going to head back to the hospital.”
“We’re going back to the hospital,” she corrected. “I’ll go shower and change.” She was already climbing off the bed, picking up her key. “Mom said there was a coffee shop next door. I’ll meet you there in ten minutes.”
“Tate.” He hesitated when she stopped at the door, turned back. What could he say? How could he say it? “Nothing. Ten minutes.”
They were back at the hospital in thirty. Both Ray and Marla rose from the bench outside of CCU, where they had taken up the watch.
They looked, Matthew thought, rumpled. It had always impressed him that no matter what the circumstances, the Beaumonts were so neatly groomed. Now, their clothes were wrinkled and limp. Ray’s face was shadowed by a night’s growth of beard. In all the weeks they’d worked together, he’d never seen Ray unshaven. For reasons Matthew couldn’t pinpoint, he focused on that one small fact. Ray hadn’t shaved.
“They won’t tell us much,” Ray began. “Only that he had a restful night.”
“They let us go in for a few minutes every hour.” Marla took Matthew’s hand, gave it a squeeze. “Did you get some rest, honey?”
“Yeah.” Matthew cleared his throat. She hadn’t brushed her hair, he thought foolishly. Ray hadn’t shaved, and Marla hadn’t brushed her hair. “I want to tell both of you how much I appreciate—”
“Don’t insult us.” Marla deliberately laced a scold into her voice. “Matthew Lassiter, you use that polite tone with that polite phrase on strangers when you feel obligated. Not with friends who love you.”
He’d never known anyone else who could shame and touch him at the same time. “What I meant was I’m glad you’re here.”
