Unbridled (Unlikely Lovers)

by Brooks, Cheryl

  “Enough to know you need one.”

  She laughed at the absurdity of Kira’s nine-month-old colt giving her medical advice, but stopped abruptly as a sharp pain knifed through her side. “Dammit, Damar, you kicked me!”

  “No, I didn’t. You fell by the gate and hit your head. I’ll bet you broke a couple of ribs, too. Come here for a second.”

  Turning her around, he kissed her—a slow, sweet, penetrating kiss that reminded her of something she thought she should remember…

  Travis arched an eyebrow. “Now, do you still think I’m a horse?”

  Chapter 13

  Miranda knew she was in for a tongue lashing as soon as she saw the tall, dark-haired nurse behind the glass partition to the ER.

  “You didn’t drive yourself to the hospital with a concussion again, did you?” Denise demanded. “You’ve obviously hit your head. What happened this time? Did a horse throw you or kick you?”

  Miranda gave her an evil look. “Neither. I slipped on the ice and hit my head on the gate when I went to feed the horses this morning.”

  “I knew there had to be a horse involved somehow.” With a smug smile on her baby-doll face, Denise didn’t look like the sort of woman to have any intelligence at all, but sometimes she had way too much. “What else did you hurt?”

  “Maybe some broken ribs, and my knee hurts, but I don’t think it’s serious.” She knew from past experience what a serious knee injury felt like.

  “Any memory loss or loss of consciousness?”

  “I’m not sure.” She touched the bump on her head. “I feel like I’ve missed something, but I have no idea what it was. Plus, my horses were talking to me.”

  “Uh-huh.” Denise was clearly debating whether she needed to call in the orthopedic doc or notify the Behavioral Health Unit. “Hearing voices?”

  Miranda gave her a cheerful nod. “Just lock me up in the psych ward. I’m sure I’ll feel right at home with all the other nut cases.”

  “I think we need to take a few x-rays before we make any rash decisions. Come on back.” She stopped and leaned over the desk, checking up and down the hall. “Dammit, Miranda. You did drive yourself here, didn’t you?”

  “No, this time I had a ride and a witness to the accident.”

  The last time Jadzia had thrown her, she’d been alone. She’d come away with a strained knee ligament, a concussion, and no memory of falling off or hitting the ground. Denise had been on duty that day as well, and she’d given Miranda hell for driving herself to the hospital. She thought she’d done pretty well to drive a truck with a clutch when her left knee didn’t work right, but Denise had yelled at her.

  There’s no justice in this world…

  “He’s parking the truck,” Miranda said. “He’ll be here in a minute.”

  Her eyes lit up. “He’s parking the truck? You’ve got a boyfriend?”

  “Not exactly. Travis got stuck at my house last night when he came out with his brother’s backhoe to dig a ditch around my barn. All this rain we’ve been having kept flooding it, and I guess he got tired of hearing me complain.”

  “Uh-huh,” she said again, arching her brow. “The freezing rain didn’t start until late, Miranda. Are you telling me he was out digging ditches in the dark?”

  “Well, no,” she admitted. “I sort of paid him for the work by fixing dinner for him, and then we watched a movie. He went to leave at about eleven and it was too slick by then, so he spent the night.”

  Denise was giving her that yeah, right smirk again.

  “He slept in Levi’s room! Don’t look at me like that. Really, we didn’t—”

  She paused as a brief flash of Travis’s face popped into her head—as if she was staring up at him from the middle of the kitchen table. She could even see the light fixture above his head. Then it was gone.

  Weird.

  “Poor Travis. Now everyone will think I’ve been sleeping with him, and all he did was dig a ditch around my barn. He probably won’t ever offer to help me again, and I wouldn’t blame him a bit.”

  Travis came up behind her. “Blame who for what?”

  “Blame you for not ever wanting to dig a ditch for me again. I’m sure you never bargained on having to stay the night and then take a crazy woman to the emergency room.”

  “Beats watching Saturday morning cartoons with my brother.” He glanced at Miranda with a conspiratorial smile. “Much more exciting.”

  He seemed to be attempting to convey something significant, but whatever it was, she wasn’t getting it. Truth be told, she wasn’t getting a lot of things that morning. She hoped to figure it out eventually, but she also knew that memory loss was sometimes permanent. The fall she’d had with Jadzia still haunted her, mainly because she couldn’t recall what had actually happened. All she remembered was Jadzia tossing her head and backing up. The next thing she knew, she was in the barn with a twisted knee and a splitting headache.

  Miranda followed Denise into Room 6 and climbed up on the stretcher. Travis sat down on a chair in the corner.

  Denise nodded at him. “Do you want him to wait outside?”

  “He can stay if he wants to.” She held out her arm while Denise applied the blood pressure cuff. “He might as well get his money’s worth.”

  “The heat isn’t working in the waiting room, anyway. It’s freezing out there.” After checking vital signs and making a few notes on the chart, she took Miranda’s insurance card and went to get the doctor.

  A few minutes later, Dr. Schwartz wandered in wearing rumpled scrubs and moccasins. “Well, let’s see now…a bump on the head and a knee and rib injury.” After studying the chart, he peered at her over his thick lenses, waggling his bushy eyebrows. “Looks like we need another CAT scan, don’t we?”

  “Very funny.” The fact that Miranda had been scanned more than anyone else on the staff was a standing joke. One of the techs suggested she schedule them on a monthly basis, which was silly, since this was only her fourth in the past eight or nine years.

  After checking her pupils, he poked around on her ribs. Then he wiggled her knee cap and tested the range of motion in the leg. “I guess we need some chest x-rays and one of the knee, too.” He glanced briefly at Travis and then turned back to Miranda. “You’re not pregnant, are you?”

  Miranda sighed. She was tired of having to answer that question and wondered how old she would have to be before they finally stopped asking it. “Not a snowball’s chance in hell.”

  Travis opened his mouth as though about to say something, but seemed to think better of it.

  Dr. Schwartz simply nodded. “Okay, then, let’s get those films and we’ll go from there.” He shuffled out of the room, leaving her alone with Travis.

  “Why did they ask if you were pregnant?”

  “X-rays can affect the baby during the first trimester,” she explained. “They ask any woman of child-bearing age that question before taking any pictures. It’s one of those cover-your-ass things.”

  He nodded. “I see. And you’re sure you wouldn’t be?”

  “Oh, yeah. I haven’t needed birth control since Levi was born.” Aside from the fact that a woman actually had to have sex to get pregnant…

  Rodney came breezing in wearing the same smug expression as Denise. He’d been the one to run her previous scan and often teased her about having seen her brains. Other men may have seen various intimate parts of her body, but he had looked into her mind.

  Miranda groaned. “Oh, no. It had to be you, didn’t it?”

  “Ooh, baby.” He smacked his lips. “I get to look at your brains again—and your knee and your chest. I’m getting hot just thinking about it.” Rodney didn’t seem like the type to ever get hot about anything. Tall and skinny with a beak of a nose, he didn’t have enough hair on his head to hold in any warmth whatsoever.

  “If your wife knew how excited you get from looking at x-rays, she might make you quit and do something else.”

  He shook his head. “
Nah. She doesn’t mind. We all have to get our jollies somehow. Besides, isn’t it thrilling to see a man enjoying his work?”

  Travis frowned. “He’s kidding, right?”

  Miranda shrugged. “No clue. For all I know he might actually be telling the truth.” Rodney was rarely serious about anything, though he did take a nice x-ray. She’d never had to go back for repeats whenever he took the films.

  “Maybe I’d better go with you, just the same.” Travis stood up and gave her a wink. “You might need protection.”

  Rodney clutched a hand to his heart. “We won’t be alone? He doesn’t trust me with you?”

  “It’s okay, Rodney.” She laughed, then clutched her own chest. “Dammit, Rodney. Will you hush up? It hurts to laugh.”

  “Oh, please forgive me, dearest.” Rodney’s voice dripped with solicitude as he wheeled the stretcher through the door. “I wouldn’t hurt you for the world. I promise to be on my best professional behavior from now on.”

  “I certainly hope so,” Travis muttered.

  “You’ve got to excuse these guys,” she told him. “I not only work here, but I’m what they call a frequent flier.”

  “Meaning?”

  “I get hurt a lot. My old chart must be into its second volume by now.”

  Rodney nodded. “Oh, at least. Your file here in x-ray is huge. Brains, knees, fingers, feet, ankles, and now, ribs.”

  “And my right hip,” she reminded him. “Don’t forget that one.”

  “How could I possibly forget that?” He heaved a sigh. “My only regret is that I wasn’t here to do it.”

  “Me, too. Becky tried three times before she got it right.”

  Rodney sniffed. “She doesn’t enjoy her work the way I do.” Turning the corner, he bumped the stretcher into the door jamb.

  Miranda let out a yelp.

  “So sorry, dear. Allow me to apologize for my atrocious driving.” He rolled the stretcher close to the table and she scooted over as best she could while holding on to her side.

  Donning his lead apron, he nodded at Travis. “You should probably wait outside. You might want to father children someday.”

  “I don’t think it matters.” Travis gave her another wink, but stepped out of the room anyway.

  After shooting the films, Rodney wheeled her over to the next room and parked the stretcher next to the scanning table. Miranda hitched over onto it, biting her lip as her broken ribs grated together. Settling herself on the hard, flat table, she heard Rodney in the control room doing his standard lounge lizard routine, putting a radiological spin on the theme from Star Wars.

  “CAT scan...beautiful CAT scan. Wonderful CAT scan. Get one today.”

  The man truly did enjoy his work.

  Having finished the scan, he danced out of the control room. “I didn’t see any big, honking hematomas, but I did see I love you, what’s his name scribbled all over your brains. What did you say his name was?”

  She scooted back onto the stretcher. “Whose name? You mean Travis?”

  “Yeah, that’s it.” He leaned over the end of the stretcher to adjust the pillow under her head. “That’s the name I saw on your scan, dear. All over your pretty little brains.”

  “Nonsense. You didn’t see anything of the kind.”

  “Did too.”

  “Did not.”

  “Did too.”

  “Dammit, Rodney. You’re going to make me laugh again.”

  “Oops! Sorry dear—force of habit. I positively adore making you laugh.”

  She arched a skeptical brow. “Me and everyone else, so you can stop trying to make me feel special. I’m just another collection of bones and brains to you.”

  “Ah, but they’re such nice bones. Some beauty is only skin deep, but yours goes all the way through.”

  She rolled her eyes. “For heaven’s sake, don’t start that again.”

  “But it’s true,” he insisted. “Don’t you think so?”

  This question was directed at Travis who had returned from the waiting area. “Think what?”

  “That she’s beautiful all the way to the bone.”

  Travis smiled. “Yes, I do. Even the broken ones are pretty.”

  Miranda scowled at him. “Has he been showing you my old x-rays? That’s a breach of confidentiality, Rodney. HIPPA will get you for that.”

  “I didn’t have to see the x-rays,” Travis said. “I’ve got eyes.”

  Rodney gazed at him with newfound reverence. “Ohhh…x-ray vision! You are one lucky man.”

  “Shut up and drive, Rodney.” Miranda growled. “I’d like to get home before I have to feed the horses again.”

  Travis patted her hand. “Let’s wait and see what the doctor says about that.”

  She glared at him. “Oh, really?”

  “Really. I’ve always heard that doctors and nurses make the worst patients, but I never believed it until now.”

  Miranda snorted a laugh. “Not true. Beyond a shadow of a doubt, the worst patients are the overdoses. The only kind that might be worse is a drunk with an upper GI bleed.”

  “She’s got you there, pal,” Rodney said with a nod. “You should try taking pictures of a drunk sometime. It’s a real bitch.”

  Travis was undeterred. “If the doctor says you can’t lift or he wants you to stay in bed for a few days, I’ll feed the ponies for you. Just tell me what to do and I’ll do it.”

  Rodney leaned down to whisper in her ear. “You’ll never get a better offer. I’ve never said that to a woman in my life.”

  “Yeah, well, you wouldn’t,” Miranda drawled. “You’d dearly love for a woman to get hurt worse so you could take more x-rays of her.”

  He rubbed his chin, pursing his lips. “Hmm…hadn’t thought of that.”

  She heaved a weary sigh. “Just drive, Rodney. I really want to go home.”

  Chapter 14

  Travis held his breath as Dr. Schwartz flipped through the radiology reports. “The knee is only bruised, you do have a mild concussion, and there are three broken ribs—”

  Miranda grimaced. “I knew that.”

  “I’m going to let you go home,” he said with an inflection that suggested he would’ve preferred to keep her overnight. “But you have to take it easy for a few days. I’ve written an excuse from work for two weeks, and in the meantime, don’t lift anything heavier than a bottle of water. In light of the concussion, I’d rather not give you anything stronger than Tylenol or Motrin for the pain. We’ll give you an incentive spirometer to use every two hours to prevent pneumonia.”

  “Pneumonia?” Travis echoed. This was a complication he hadn’t considered.

  “The spirometer encourages her to take deep breaths,” Dr Schwartz explained. “People with broken ribs tend to breathe more shallowly than normal, which can cause secretions to pool in the lungs and possibly result in pneumonia. You’ll need to make sure she uses the spirometer as directed. Plus, you need to assess her neurological status every two hours for the first twenty-four and every four hours for at least another day after that. If you notice any significant changes in her level of consciousness, bring her back here immediately. We’ll print out a list of instructions for you.”

  Travis nodded, not only relieved that the news wasn’t nearly as bad as it could have been, but also pleased that he now had the perfect excuse to stay with Miranda for a few days. “No problem.”

  “So much for the trip to the ER,” she muttered after the doctor left. “Guess I’d better take my note up to the unit.”

  “Want me to take you in a wheelchair?”

  She scowled at him, but she didn’t refuse, which seemed a little out of character. She must be in more pain than I thought.

  As he wheeled her into the ICU, although Travis felt completely out of his element, Miranda seemed right at home. “Holy cow, Lola! What on earth did they have to pay you to get you to work the day shift?”

  The tall blonde grinned as they approached the desk. “Night shift dif
ferential, time and a half, plus the call-in bonus. You better believe I did some wheeling and dealing before I said yes.” Her smile disappeared as she leveled a disapproving glare at Miranda. “What happened to you this time?”

  “I fell on the ice when I went to feed the horses this morning.” Miranda held up the note from the doctor. “Is Jeni here? I need to give her this.”

  “She’s on break.” Lola blew out an exasperated breath. “Those horses are going to kill you someday—either that, or you’ll wind up permanently crippled. Then what will you do?”

  Miranda shrugged. “Retire on disability, I guess. Just remember, I can out-walk you even with a brace on my leg.”

  “True,” Lola admitted. She glanced at Travis. “I’ve already had one knee worked on, and it took so long to heal I didn’t have enough sick time left to fix the other one.”

  “Unlike me, who’s one of the walking wounded whenever I get hurt,” Miranda said. “I’ve had to wear leg braces and use crutches, but I’ve always been mobile.”

  “You still need to be more careful.”

  “I am careful. I can’t help it if Mother Nature is always slamming me with mud and freezing rain.”

  “And evil horses,” Lola added.

  “They aren’t evil,” Travis said. “One of them helped her up after she fell.”

  Miranda twisted her head around to look up at him. “Really? You mean I didn’t imagine that?”

  “No. Kira nudged you a couple of times and then after you got up, you held onto her tail while she walked to the barn. I’d have thought she would’ve kicked you, but she didn’t seem to mind at all.”

  Lola’s eyes narrowed with suspicion. “And where were you when this happened?”

  “Watching from the kitchen window. After she fell, I got dressed and went up to the barn to check on her.”

  She arched an eyebrow. “Got dressed?”

  Travis didn’t blush very often, but his face suddenly felt very hot. “Well…I did have to put on my coat and boots.”

  “It’s a long story.” Miranda handed over the doctor’s statement. “Give this to Jeni when she comes back, and I’ll tell you about it later.”