Sam went to the wall of windows on the other side of the bed and yanked the curtains open. Sunlight flooded into the gloomy, stinking room. Turning, she saw the woman blink several times and slowly sit up in bed. She was wearing all her clothes to keep warm, her face drawn and pinched.
“Lord be thanked,” Nanny whispered. She smiled unsurely up at Sam. “You a doctor, ma’am?”
Taken off guard by the woman’s soft, hesitant voice, Sam tried to put her fear and rage away. Looking at the diminutive woman and the very sick child she held protectively in her arms, compassion flowed through her.
“Yes…yes, I am. My name is Samantha Andrews. I’m a navy doctor.” She leaned over and placed her fingers against the child’s limp wrist to find a pulse.
“Please,” Nanny begged, her voice flooding with tears, “save our little one. She’s dying….” The woman sobbed once, then fought to stem her tears.
Sam gently eased the unconscious girl out of her mother’s arms. Laying her flat, she placed her stethoscope against the child’s thin chest, beneath the blankets she had been swathed in to keep her warm.
“Can you tell me her symptoms?” she asked the woman who knelt over her daughter, wringing her hands.
“Lordy, Dr. Andrews, it happened so fast. I think she drunk some bad water. We don’t have much…we’re all dying by bits and pieces around here….”
“Bad water? Did she vomit it back up?”
“Yes, she did.” Nanny searched Sam’s face. “Then she got this awful diarrhea…and, oh, she’s been vomiting and having diarrhea for the last day….” Sniffing, she wiped the tears from her wan cheeks with trembling fingers. “And then she just went to sleep like this….”
“Yes, unconscious,” Sam murmured. Turning, she looked over at Joey, who stood with his rifle in his arms, watching her intently. “Do you have any medical supplies? Any IVs on hand?” she demanded.
“Shore we do, Doc. Hold on and I’ll go get ’em. How many you need?”
Sam turned to Nanny. “Do you have the same symptoms?”
“Lordy, yes, but not as bad as my baby, here.”
“Get me two IVs, Joey,” she told him.
“You bet, Doc. I’ll be right back….”
In that moment, Sam realized that she could leap up, open that sliding glass door and escape to the backyard. Looking through the window, Sam saw an open door in the wooden fence that enclosed the space. She could escape through it and run. Where, she wasn’t sure—just away from here. Away from the Diablos.
Yet, as she sat there tensely, her gaze riveted on the glass door, Sam knew she wouldn’t run and leave this little girl’s life hanging in the balance. Her mission was to sustain life. And even at the cost of her own freedom, Sam couldn’t abandon her doctor’s vow.
She felt Nanny’s cool hand on her own.
“Thank you…thank you for bein’ here. I know my husband, Steve, has been lookin’ for a medical doctor for some time now….”
Sam met the woman’s pale gray eyes, which shimmered with tears. “Your husband kidnapped me. That’s not right. We have a medevac station near here. All you had to do was walk in. We’d have treated you there.”
The woman hung her head and sniffed. “We’re survivalists, Dr. Andrews. Ain’t no one gonna take care of us.”
Compressing her lips, Sam tried to rein in her anger. “Your husband has murdered a lot of people….”
“We have to eat,” Nanny whispered.
Sam realized it was useless trying to persuade the woman otherwise.
Joey returned promptly with the IVs in hand and gave them to Sam with a triumphant look.
“I need antibiotics, too. Do you have any?” Sam demanded as he stood nearby, the rifle pointed in her direction.
“Uh, yeah…we do….”
“Get me whatever you’ve got, then,” Sam growled as she began to hang an IV from the bedpost and prepare the needle to be inserted into the unconscious girl’s arm.
“Yeah, you bet. Hang on….” And Joey quickly left the room again. Sam’s fingers hesitated in their task. She could escape now. It was a second chance.
One glance down at the unconscious girl, her face looking like porcelain, her hair thin and uncombed, made Sam’s heart plummet. There was no way she was going to make this little girl pay with her life for what her father had done to get Sam here. No, she would try to save her….
February 7: 1300
“Tie her ankles,” Steve ordered Joey with a smirk once he’d forced Sam to sit down in the small bedroom opposite the room where she’d taken care of his wife and child. “Now, yore gonna stay here.” Steve added. “Joey will tie up yore legs so you don’t get any ideas about runnin’ off and leavin’ us. I’ve put out the word that we got a doc on board, and plenty of my people are comin’ here for treatment. As soon as they arrive, yore gonna help them, too.”
Sam sat in an overstuffed chair littered with plaster that had fallen during the quake. There was a twin bed in one corner and a child’s dresser nearby. Joey bound her feet together with some nylon cord, pulling it so tightly Sam was worried about her circulation being cut off.
“Loosen that rope!” she demanded.
Steve scowled. “Doc, you don’t have a leg to stand on around here. You get that?” He looked her up and down, a smile playing on his full mouth. “Joey, go easy on the rope. We don’t want our doc to lose her legs and not be able to work on our folks.”
“Yes, sir,” Joey mumbled, kneeling at Sam’s feet and reworking the nylon cords around her ankles.
Sam didn’t like the look glimmering in Steve’s eyes. He was a tall, muscular man, probably in his mid-thirties. He held his M-16 across his barrel chest, with several bandoleers of ammunition crisscrossing beneath it. His hair was long and uncombed, and he had a scraggly beard that was nearly a foot long. There was dried food stuck in the strands near his thin mouth. Sam shuddered inwardly. The odor around the men was horrific. They hadn’t bathed in weeks, she was sure. It made her nauseous to breathe in his scent.
“You thirsty or hungry?” Steve demanded.
“I could use some water.”
“Joey, go fetch the doc some good water from our other supply out in the backyard,” he ordered. “And not the stuff that made my wife and child sick.”
Leaping to his feet, Joey grabbed his rifle. “Yes, sir!”
Alone with the Diablo leader, Sam tensed. He stood near the door, a lazy smile crossing his lined and weathered face. Sensing his interest in her as a woman, Sam avoided his appraising gaze. Mouth dry, she closed her eyes and tried to steady herself. Oh, God, what was she going to do? By now, Roc must know she was gone. He’d be so upset. And angry that she’d ordered Buck to leave her side. Oh, why hadn’t she listened to Roc? He’d felt the Diablos would strike back and he’d been right.
“You know,” Steve said, breaking the silence, “yore marines killed one of my best snipers yesterday, and they captured Jessie Lambord, one of my lieutenants. You wouldn’t happen to know about that, would you?”
Lips compressed, Sam stubbornly shook her head. She wasn’t about to give the bastard any information.
“Why’s your arm bleedin’ like it is?”
“I cut it the other day,” Sam retorted, lifting her chin defiantly and glaring at him.
“What do you know about my man bein’ captured?”
“Not a damn thing! I’m a doctor, not a marine!” she snapped angrily.
“Feisty…I like that,” Steve murmured. Shifting the rifle to his left hand, he smiled crookedly. “Doc, yore a good-lookin’ woman. Now, I ain’t had any from my wife for a long time, since she fell sick.”
Sam’s heart froze. She stared in disbelief at him.
“And, hey,” he chortled as the door opened and Joey returned, “you play yore cards right, little lady, and I’ll let you stay alive longer than I wuz planning to….”
Gulping, Sam watched as Steve left. Joey, panting, held out a bottle of clear, clean water toward h
er. Taking it, Sam recognized it as being from a shipment that had been brought in by marine helicopter. The Diablos had obviously stolen the boxes. Twisting off the cap, she drank deeply, with Joey watching her intently.
Her heart thumped wildly in her chest as she finished it off. She handed the empty bottle back to Joey, who took it and left. Silence settled in the cold room and a chill went through her. Wrapping her arms around herself, Sam sat in the chair, her legs bound, feeling scared as never before. Oh, why hadn’t she told Roc she loved him? She knew that Steve was a murderer. He would have no problem shooting her if she resisted him. Escape was her only option. Looking around, she saw a small window, but it wasn’t big enough to crawl through.
Disheartened, she pressed her hands against her face and tried to think. How could this have happened? It was her own fault. She’d disregarded orders. If Buck had been with her, the likelihood of the Diablos kidnapping her would have been much less. They’d jumped her because she was alone and unguarded. How stupid she’d been! And now the happiness she’d had with Roc was in serious jeopardy, because of her independent streak.
“I love you, Roc…” she whispered between taut lips. “Please forgive me…forgive me….”
Chapter 15
February 7: 1450
Near 1500, Sam was untied and hustled out of her prison room by Joey. Pushing her hard, he growled, “Git in there and take care of Steve’s kin. I’ll be awaitin’ out here for you. After yore done with them, we’re taking you to another house to help our kin.”
Glaring at him, Sam opened the door. She’d been sitting alone for hours. During that time, she’d often heard men’s voices, along with the heavy thunking of boots along the carpeted hall. This was a busy place, no doubt about it.
Worried about Jolie’s deteriorated condition, Sam hurried into the room. She saw Nannette sitting on the bed, joy on her face as she cradled her daughter in her lap. Jolie was awake, her big, blue eyes watching Sam’s progress into the room after she shut the door behind her. Going to the bathroom, she washed her hands in a small basin of water that was waiting for her.
“Look, Doctor! Look. My baby is gonna make it! She just opened her eyes a few minutes ago and called out for me. Ain’t that wonderful?” The woman smiled gratefully as Sam moved to the bed after drying her hands on a nearby towel. She checked the girl’s IV drip into her slender arm.
“She looks much better,” Sam murmured sympathetically. The tears running silently down Nannette’s face as she stroked her daughter’s hair touched her deeply. Quickly checking the girl’s pulse and listening to her heart, Sam eased off the bed.
“She’s going to be fine, Nannette. Her pulse is strong now. She’s getting the fluids she needs.”
“And the antibiotics are workin’, Doctor?”
“Yes. She doesn’t seem feverish anymore.” Sam smiled tenderly down at the thin little girl beneath the mound of blankets.
Sniffing, Nannette said, “I feel much better, too.”
Sam nodded and came around to her side of the bed to check the IV hung on the bedpost above her. “That’s great.” The IV bag was empty, so Sam removed the needle from the woman’s arm and quickly put a Band-Aid over the area to prevent bleeding. She had no protective gloves to wear, and that bothered her, but she said nothing.
“Y-you saved our lives, Doctor. I’m so grateful….” She gave Sam a wobbly smile.
Removing the little girl’s IV bag, Sam took a second one and put it in place. “You’re welcome. I’m going to put Jolie on a second drip.” She studied the label. “This one has antibiotics in it, Nannette. Just let her sleep while this flows into her arm. Once it’s done, I’ll remove it and she should be feeling much better.”
“Bless you, Doctor.”
As Sam stood at the girl’s side and gently adjusted the IV drip, she saw that there was now a tall, rough-looking man with black hair outside the sliding glass door, keeping watch. Heart sinking, Sam realized that her hopes of escaping that way were now squashed.
“Is my husband treatin’ you right, Doctor?” Nannette frowned and sniffed.
“No, but that’s not your concern,” Sam said, smiling down at the little girl, who sucked her thumb, her huge blue eyes fixed on her.
“I’m so sorry…. I—I tried to tell him that no one would know me or Jolie, that we could walk to your new medical tent, which is only about four miles from here. But he wouldn’t listen….” Nannette reached out toward Sam’s left arm, gazing worriedly at the bloodstained sleeve on her shirt. “He hurt you….”
“I fought back,” Sam said, giving her a game smile. “I don’t take kindly to kidnapping.”
Closing her eyes, Nannette whispered, “I’m so sorry, Doctor. I truly am…. Steve…well, he gets in a rage awful easy.”
Looking at the woman, Sam saw evidence of Steve’s anger. Nannette had the remnants of a black eye, a yellow-green bruise on her left cheekbone. Reaching over, she gently touched the woman’s injured cheek. “He hits you, too, doesn’t he?”
Shrugging, Nannette bit her lower lip, unable to look at Sam. “Ohh, you know, Doctor…my Steve means well. It’s just that so many people rely on him for food and water and all. He’s jumpy, and he’s angry at the government. He’s got god-awful responsibilities—you know, everyone lookin’ to him for everything….”
Straightening, Sam saw the guard move toward the left and disappear from view. He seemed to have heard something. Resting her hand on the bedpost, she looked down at the woman, who was quite obviously an abuse victim. “No one has any excuse to hurt someone with their fists, Nannette. Not ever.”
Just at that moment a huge crash sounded outside the bedroom door.
Sam gasped and whirled around. Men’s voices called out. Shouts tunneled down the hall. Shots were fired.
“Oh, no!” Nannette screamed. “The feds!” She threw her body over her daughter to protect her.
Caught off guard, Sam hesitated, unsure what to do as more explosions occurred. The room shook, she fell to the floor, covering her head. Seconds later, bullets smashed through the walls of the room. The glass door shattered and blew outward into the yard. Screams and yells joined the staccato noise of M-16s firing, assaulting Sam’s sensitive ears. Her mind whirled with questions, confusion. Who was attacking? Marines? Police? A rival gang? She wasn’t sure.
The house shook again, this time from a grenade that had gone off. The door to the room blew inward, smashing into what was left of the windows on the other side. Glass spewed everywhere, hundreds of fragments raining down on them. Sam kept her arms over her head, lying flat on her belly, next to the bed. Dust billowed in from the hall. Only it wasn’t dust. It was a white, curling, cloudy substance that made Sam choke as soon as she breathed it in. Tear gas! Immediately her throat burned and tears streamed from her eyes.
“Get out!” Sam screamed as she scrambled to her hands and knees. “Get out! It’s tear gas!”
Launching herself to her feet, Sam grabbed the IV and hauled Jolie into her arms. Gasping and choking, blinded by tears streaming from her eyes, she stumbled toward the backyard. The ground was slippery with shattered glass. Nannette was choking, too, but managed to grab on to Sam’s lab coat and follow her outside.
Once in the yard, Sam hurried to the fence, where they could breathe clean, fresh air. Laying Jolie down, she held the IV bag high enough so it continued to drip. Nannette fell to her knees beside them, coughing violently and holding her throat with both hands.
Looking up, Sam gasped. That was Sergeant Buck Simmons jerking open the gate to the backyard!
“Buck!” she cried. “Over here!” Sam waved at the Recon marine.
Instantly, Buck changed course.
Sam saw the relief immediately etched on the marine’s sweaty face. His green eyes were slits, his M-16 ready to be fired at any enemy he saw.
“Get down, Doc!” he yelled at her. “There’s a full assault under way!”
Immediately, Sam flattened, her body as a barr
ier between the house and the little girl. Nannette screamed and dived down alongside her daughter, her hands over her head.
In minutes, it was all over. Buck hunkered near them, on one knee, his full attention trained on the house at all times. He was providing a barrier between them and the Diablos, Sam realized belatedly.
Sam saw a dark figure move through the bedroom they’d just occupied. It was a marine. As soon as he stepped outside, rifle in hand, Sam gasped. She handed Nanette the IV bag to hold for her daughter.
“Roc!” she cried, scrambling to her feet. “Roc!”
Sam didn’t care who saw her at that moment. After the terror of nearly being killed, having Roc appear so miraculously shattered her military restraint.
Roc heard Sam’s voice calling his name. When she got up from behind Sergeant Simmons and ran straight toward him, her arms wide, his heart mushroomed with relief. He didn’t give a damn about military protocol at that moment, as she flew into his arms.
Taking her full weight, while she wrapped her arms tightly around his neck, Roc took two steps back and clamped his left arm around her body.
“Sam…” he rasped.
Sobbing, Sam whispered, “Oh, Roc…I’m sorry…so sorry. This is all my fault! I was so scared…. I love you so much! I love you!” And she pressed a series of fierce kisses on the hard line of his mouth.
Those precious seconds spun out of time for Roc. Her mouth was soft and hungry against his. Holding her hard against him, he leaned down and savagely returned her kisses. Had he heard right? Had Sam said she loved him? He could barely take it all in. There was too much going on. The Diablos had been routed. Roc and his men had prisoners to take care of.
Tearing his mouth from hers, he looked down into her eyes, which were swimming with tears of relief and joy. “Stay with Buck, sweetheart. I’ve got to get the prisoners rounded up. A bird is on its way here to take us back to HQ. You okay?”
Sam realized Roc was in charge of this assault. She quickly eased out of his embrace. “Y-yes, I’m fine. Fine. Go ahead…I know you’re needed elsewhere….” And she touched her lips, which still sang from the cherishing strength of his mouth upon hers.
Protecting His Own Page 18
