by Amy Knupp
“Why thank you, princess,” Andie said, laughing. “How about if we—”
She was interrupted by Payton’s ear-shattering scream.
“Sweetie, what’s wrong?”
Payton’s eyes were squeezed shut and the scream turned to crying. Andie frantically scanned her, trying to figure out what the hell she was missing.
“Can you tell me so I can help you?” She turned the crying girl around, looking for blood, bruises — shit, she had no idea what she was looking for, but something was causing her anguish.
She picked the girl up and carried her to the steps but, looking up at all those stairs, changed her mind. She needed to understand what was wrong now. Andie sat on the second step and hugged her, tried to reassure her.
“Shh, it’s okay. Show me where it hurts, sweetie.”
Finally Payton pointed to the back of her leg, behind her knee.
Bee sting. Stings. There were two large red spots swelling up, one of them with a stinger in it.
“Aww, Payton, that hurts, doesn’t it? We’ll put some mud on them and that will help soothe the sting.” Payton quieted a couple of notches, her cries becoming muffled and mixed with hiccups as Andie sat her on the step and got up to take some dirt from the flower bed. She’d been stung lots when she was a kid. When she was really young, she remembered crying to her mom, who put the innards of an unlit cigarette on the area. Mud worked nearly as well.
She glanced over at Payton as she bent to scoop up some dirt.
Something wasn’t right.
Payton had lain down across the step and Andie couldn’t put her finger on why she looked off, but she did. Then she saw the girl’s skinny forearms — there were red marks popping up all over.
Forgetting the mud, Andie ran to her. “Are you okay?”
Payton looked at her but didn’t answer. She’d stopped crying and when she inhaled, Andie heard a rasp. Oh, shit. She knew that sound. She was having a reaction.
Andie pulled out her cell phone, shaking so badly she could barely dial 911. She’d watched a woman at a campground go through this, had been sitting right next to her when her symptoms started.
Minutes later, Andie heard a siren and she rushed, blinded by tears, with Payton in her arms to meet the paramedics.
Chapter Nine
The medical alarm sounded throughout the station, and Clay’s heart started thundering at the mention of a child in distress. When he heard his own address from the speaker, he lost his fucking mind.
“That’s my kid!” He sprinted to the truck, yelling the whole way, not sure what he was even saying.
The firefighters on San Amaro Island routinely went on medical calls with the ambulance and vice versa. This time the ambulance was coming from a different location than the station. Clay had no recollection from where and frankly didn’t give a fuck as long as they got to his house in about ten seconds flat and did whatever they needed to do for his daughter.
“Let’s go! Get your ass on the truck!” The others were moving like goddamn senior citizens.
He shut up once the four of them were ready to go, all his energy focused on getting to Payton. Hopefully the ambulance was closer than they were. If this thing didn’t start rolling in about five seconds, he was going to jump out and run for his little girl.
Derek was riding backward next to him, looking gravely at him. “We’ll get there. She’ll be all right, Clay.”
He should never have come to work today. All his trusted babysitters were unavailable, so he should’ve been the one to stay home with Payton. That was his responsibility now. She was his priority. What the fuck had he been thinking?
God, let her be okay, please. He’d never leave her with anyone again if she could just be okay right now. He twisted around and urged Evan to step on it.
The ninety seconds it took them to drive there seemed more like ten minutes, too much precious time ticking by. When the truck finally stopped, he jumped out, relieved that the ambulance was already there. Scott and Blake were on the grass bent over Payton — he was sure of it even though he couldn’t see her clearly. Andie knelt next to her, but he couldn’t waste a millisecond deciding if she was to blame. He had to be with his daughter.
“Payton.” He bent down next to Scott. “What’s happening? How is she?” He could see she was conscious but she didn’t say anything to him, just looked at him with scared eyes. She was dazed.
“Bee sting reaction. Just gave her epinephrine and she’s starting to respond. She called right away,” Scott said, indicating Andie with a nod. “Fast reaction. Makes all the difference.”
“Payton, Daddy’s here,” he said, afraid to take his eyes off her, as if, in looking away, something could go seriously wrong. He took her little hand in both of his and summoned up an everything’s-going-to-be-fine facade.
He moved around to his daughter’s head, next to where Andie crouched over her, robotically brushing Payton’s hair back from her face again and again.
Scott handed him the equipment to prep the oxygen, and Clay realized his hands were shaking so badly he could hardly function.
The guys, who normally stayed out of the way until they were needed during medical calls, had crowded around to see how Payton was and if they could do anything. Evan leaned over Clay from beside him. “You all right, man? Want me to do that?”
“I got it.”
Once the oxygen was hooked up and Scott was checking her blood pressure again, Clay bent over Payton and pressed his lips to her forehead. “It’s okay, girly. We’re going to make you all better.”
As he continued to talk to Payton, reassuring her, trying to keep her calm and relaxed, he noticed Andie had walked away and was sitting on the bottom step. She leaned over her knees and held her head with both hands, her hair draped over her face.
Somewhere in his mind, it registered that she was scared to death too, that she needed someone to comfort her. But Clay couldn’t be that person. His concern was his daughter. It wasn’t his place to worry about Andie.
“She’s stabilizing,” Scott said at last. “Blood pressure is improving. Let’s take her in.”
Clay felt as if he was breathing for the first time since the alarm had come in and he’d heard his address blasted out over the speaker at the station.
Blake had grabbed the stretcher from the ambulance, and he and Evan lifted Payton onto it. The sight of her little body on the large sterile equipment, such an everyday part of his job, twisted him up inside. The two weren’t supposed to be together. She wasn’t ever supposed to be the one lying there helplessly.
He held Payton’s hand and walked beside her to the ambulance. Andie was suddenly keeping pace with him.
“Can I ride with you?” she asked. “I know you don’t want me around, but I don’t have any other way to get there.”
At the back end of the ambulance, he stared down at her, at the anguish on her face, the tears in her eyes. It was more emotion than he’d seen from her in all the time he’d known her.
“I’m going, Clay. To the hospital. One way or another.”
He nodded. “I’m riding in back,” he told Scott. “She’s coming with me.”
oOo
Clay was never letting Payton outside again. He’d lock her in the house and let her out when she turned thirty. Maybe.
The terror of the day had receded — she’d just received the okay to go home, and now they were waiting on the formalities — but he’d aged a couple of decades in the past few hours.
Payton was asleep on the exam table, curled up on her side beneath a thin hospital blanket, still wearing her leotard and skirt. Her expression seemed peaceful now. Clay repeated the mantra of gratitude he’d been saying to himself all evening and slumped in the uncomfortable chair next to her bed.
“Here’s the prescription for the EpiPen she’ll need to have with her at all times,” Joanna, one of the nurses he’d refused to play with at Evan and Selena’s party, said softly when she came back in. “Still
waiting on Dr. Milton to sign off and finish the paperwork, but it shouldn’t be long. Isn’t the tall brunette in the lobby with you?”
Clay frowned. “Andie? Is she still here?”
“If she’s not with you, I’m not sure who she’s here for. Think she was with you at the Drakes’ party. Straight, dark hair past her shoulders, skinny. Wearing some god-awful boots?”
That was Andie. His pulse picked up speed. He’d assumed she’d left hours ago.
He watched Payton sleep, thankful for every rise and fall of her little body. He couldn’t leave her now.
“I can bring her back here,” Joanna said. “She doesn’t look like she’s doing too well herself.”
Clay nodded, telling himself the only thing he felt for Andie right now, the only thing he could allow himself to feel, was gratitude. “Thank you.”
After all, he’d fallen for Payton’s mother. That mistake, that lapse in judgment, was still hurting the people he loved today — Payton, his family. He knew his mom worried about her granddaughter all the time, wishing for more normal circumstances for her. Payton had paid with more than three years of God knew what from her mother.
Andie was a drifter. She was used to watching out for herself and would do what she had to for number one.
She carried everything she owned on the back of a motorcycle, and yet … she seemed to have more baggage than a loaded cruise liner.
oOo
They should put cots in the ER waiting area, Andie thought as she turned to her side on one of those uncomfortable double chairs with no armrest between them. Her legs were draped over the armrest that separated this double chair from the next one. Pain shot through her hip — damn things had virtually no cushioning.
She could’ve gotten up and walked home at any time. Called a taxi even. But she had to know that Payton was going to be all right. Had to see with her own eyes that she’d recovered.
She knew waiting to see Payton meant she’d have a run-in with Clay too. That could be ugly. She’d seen his animosity when he’d arrived on the scene to find his daughter laid out in the front yard. His fury had been directed at Andie — rightly so. She’d been responsible for Payton and the girl had almost died.
Nausea rose in her throat for the hundredth time today. What if she had died? Andie would never have been able to live with herself.
“Are you with Clay Marlow?” A nurse had come out from the back without Andie noticing.
Andie sat up. “Um, I guess so.”
“I can show you to where he is.”
She stood and followed the woman — a blonde wearing scrubs with pugs all over them.
“Is Payton okay?” Andie choked out, exhausted and starving. She hadn’t grabbed her purse or anything else when they’d left.
“She’s going to be fine, thank goodness,” the nurse said.
Andie let out a long breath and nodded.
“Here you go.” The nurse pushed the door of the exam room open a few more inches.
Andie noticed Clay in her peripheral vision, but she zoomed in on the bed, on Payton. She took a couple of steps forward, not feeling as if she had the right to get too close, and drank in the sight of the girl. Her coloring was much better, and the fear that had torn Andie up was gone from her angelic face. Her body rose and fell in even, non-raspy breaths. Payton was really okay.
Andie’s eyes filled with tears.
“She’s going to be fine,” Clay whispered. He stood a foot away, smiling.
Smiling?
“Clay…” Andie began in a low voice. “I’m so sorry. I should never have agreed to watch her for you. I don’t have a lot of experience with kids or emergencies or bees or anything. I was so focused on getting a temporary bike I didn’t really think about it and I almost—”
“Shh.” Clay took her by the elbow and directed her to the far corner of the room. He leaned against the counter and pulled Andie in front of him, facing him, their thighs touching. “Everything’s fine.” His voice was just above a whisper, still soothing and lacking any trace of the anger she’d expected. He brushed his fingers under her chin, forcing her to make eye contact with him.
The gentle action from this bulk of a man was such a contradiction that all she could do was stare at him. Take in his features, the warmth in his eyes, the insistent set of his chin, the alluring stubble.
“You were mad at me,” she said.
“I owe you an apology. I can’t tell you how terrifying it was to hear my own address on the speaker at the station. I was out of my mind when we got there. My anger wasn’t directed at you … or it shouldn’t have been.”
Andie hadn’t known Clay would respond to the alarm, hadn’t given it any thought. Hadn’t realized firefighters would show up along with the paramedics.
“I admit I hesitated to call you this morning. If I hadn’t, though, she might not be alive right now.” His voice was rough, ragged. “I don’t know how to thank you for reacting so fast.”
She started to shake her head, but he grasped her wrist and gave her a stern look.
“It made all the difference in the world. She could’ve been so much worse off if you hadn’t called immediately.”
The terror from earlier bubbled up and nearly suffocated her. Her tears finally overflowed and ran down her cheeks.
“It’s not adequate,” he said, “but thank you.”
She saw such sincerity in his eyes, through her damn tears, that she could’ve collapsed in relief. “I’m…” Her voice wasn’t working right. She cleared her throat. “So glad she’s okay.”
Saying the words out loud released the last of her pent-up fear, and she did the worst thing she could do at that moment. She started crying in earnest. Not just little sniffs and sharp inhales. Oh, no. Her shoulders shook and all the emotions came out in ugly sobs.
Clay pulled her to him, wrapping those mammoth arms around her. She buried her head in his shoulder and fought for control to avoid waking up Payton. He was the last person she wanted to break down in front of.
He pressed his lips to her hair. Andie kept her face down, taking long, unsteady breaths, trying to fight through the emotions that had blindsided her. As she gradually calmed down, she became more aware of the man who held her. He caressed her back with long, slow strokes, up and down. His chin rested on the top of her head. The chest beneath her face was solid, reassuring. Hard. Alluring.
She stirred, suddenly overly conscious of the heat where her body aligned with his — her abdomen and thighs were pressed into him. Even though he wore long pants and a fire department T-shirt, she could feel the muscle, the ins and outs of his body, as if he were unclothed.
Bad line of thinking, she realized as her body reacted.
Andie reached between them to wipe her eyes. When she looked at him, his gaze bored down on her. Before she could school herself and do the smart thing, he glanced at her lips and she was screwed. She wanted his mouth on hers again. Couldn’t have walked away from it if the building had been in flames.
Except … apparently he could, because he raised his chin, then looked beyond her to his daughter. Andie backed away, feeling like an idiot for wanting so badly what he’d just passed up with no problem. Again.
The nurse who’d shown Andie to the room breezed in. Clay turned to her while Andie tried to shake off his effect on her.
“All set to go,” the nurse said. “Dr. Milton signed everything. We just need to review Payton’s care instructions with you.” She set down a stack of papers next to Clay.
Andie half listened as the nurse gave him directions.
Payton stirred while the nurse was still talking, and Andie was surprised when the girl reached out for her and asked her to pick her up. When Andie lifted her, Payton threw her skinny arms around her neck and hugged her tight.
“When we get home,” Andie said quietly, “I have something for you to borrow.”
“What’s borrow?”
“It means you can use it for a few days and then
give it back to me when you don’t need it.”
“What is it?” Payton asked, lighting up despite exhaustion.
“His name is Lyle. He’s a teddy bear who loves to get hugs.” She rested her forehead on Payton’s. “Interested?”
“Lyle?” Payton giggled. “Okay!”
“Okay then.” Andie closed her eyes and breathed in the baby shampoo scent of the girl’s hair, never once before having guessed that hugging a child could be so … comforting.
When she opened her eyes, she caught Clay’s gaze on her but couldn’t read his thoughts. His arms were crossed, and he rubbed his chin with one hand — a capable, strong hand that captured Andie’s attention like it hadn’t before.
The nurse left and Andie carried Payton over to Clay. His daughter tried to spring toward him, making her difficult to hold on to until Clay stepped in. Andie’s body brushed his as she handed Payton over, and she was overwhelmed by the idea of the three of them.
Andie quickly relinquished the little girl, weak and nauseous at the direction of her thoughts. Once Clay had Payton, Andie flipped her arm over so she could see the long white scar there. The scar — one of them — caused by Trevor. It was a reminder, whenever she needed it, of what could happen when you trusted someone.
She was leaving in three weeks. Because she wanted to. Leaving these two people, both Payton and Clay, wouldn’t be easy, but it would be necessary.
She rubbed the raised scar, over and over.
Chapter Ten
“Daddy, we have to get Lyle.”
“Who is Lyle?” Clay asked as they approached Andie’s landing.
“He’s the bear I promised to loan Payton,” Andie explained. She opened the door to her place.
“You didn’t lock your door?” He followed her inside, shifting Payton to his left arm.
“Uh, no. I left in a hurry?”
Of course. In the ambulance. “I’ll check all the rooms.”
