by Lori Wilde
Memories from another night threatened to take over but he pushed them away and scrambled to his feet again. He flung open the hall cupboard, snatching up a handful of clean towels. Then he was at her side again, pulling the soaked towel off her arm. His stomach lurched when he saw the extent of her injury. Quickly he wrapped the towel around her arm, pulling it brutally tight. He held it in place while he dragged his belt off one-handed and used the leather strap to cinch the towel in place. Then he lifted Elizabeth’s hand and held it upright while he dragged his cell phone from his back pocket.
He was starting to shake and his hands were so slick with her blood he fumbled the number for emergency services. He tried again, his gaze constantly flicking to Elizabeth’s face. She was so pale. So goddamned pale. And her hand in his was so cold….
“Emergency services. Please state the nature of the emergency.”
“I need an ambulance. She’s cut herself, I don’t know how. There’s a lot of blood. She’s unconscious.”
“Sir, you’re calling from a cell and I can’t pinpoint your location. Do you have an address for me?”
“It’s 14 Radcliffe Street, Cowes.”
“Cowes on Phillip Island?”
“That’s right. How soon can you get an ambulance here? She’s lost a lot of blood.”
“Is it a private residence, sir?”
“Yes. Tell me how long it’s going to take?” He was yelling, but he didn’t give a shit. Elizabeth needed help now.
“Sir, I’m checking the system and there has been a car accident near the bridge and all three ambulances on the island are in attendance. The wait time is thirty minutes.”
“What? No!”
“Sir. I need you to remain calm. Are you able to get the victim to hospital yourself? The nearest emergency facility is Wonthaggi Hospital. I can give you directions.”
Nate closed his eyes for a brief second.
“I know where it is.”
Wonthaggi Hospital was where they’d taken him after the accident.
“Tell them I’m coming in,” he said.
He ended the call and shoved the phone into his pocket. Then he slid his arms beneath Elizabeth and lifted her. He surged to his feet and headed for the door, not thinking about what he’d committed to doing.
She’d left the car keys on the kitchen counter and he leaned to one side to snatch them up. Then he was racing down the back steps and down the driveway to the car. Somehow he got the car door open, then he slid her into the front passenger seat, cranking it back as far as it would go before clicking her seat belt on. He slammed the door shut and ran around to the driver’s side.
His subconscious was way ahead of him as he slid into the driver’s seat. His whole body was already trembling, his breathing was shallow, his chest tight. Nausea burned the back of his throat as he pulled the driver’s door shut and shoved the key into the ignition.
Don’t think about it, just do it. Just do it.
His teeth started chattering as he slammed the car into reverse and planted his foot. The car swerved out into the street.
The feel of the wheel beneath his hand, the closeness of the roof, the dark pressing in from outside…
He pushed the car into Drive and took off, panting and shaking.
Don’t think about it, don’t think about it.
Olivia’s screams filled his ears, begging him to help her. He was clammy with sweat and his breathing was so loud he could hear himself gasping.
There was no traffic and he sped toward the intersection with Main Street. He signaled, checked the road and turned. Headlights flashed across the interior of the car and he swerved instinctively toward the curb. The other car drove past and he realized it was on the opposite side of the road and there had never been any danger of the two cars crossing paths.
I can’t do this. I can’t do this. I can’t do this.
The knowledge gripped him with dread certainty. He couldn’t make himself put his foot down. He was paralyzed, utterly powerless against the adrenaline and remembered trauma storming his mind. He closed his eyes and leaned forward, pressing his forehead into the hard plastic of the steering wheel.
She’s going to die, you bastard. Lizzy is going to die if you don’t get your freaking act together and drive.
He bared his teeth in an anguished grimace and banged his head once, twice, three times against the steering wheel. The small, sharp pain served to focus him, dragging him back from the edge.
Breathe. Breathe, you bastard. Put your foot down and save her.
He sucked in big belly breaths. Then he sat back in the driver’s seat and checked the road and pulled away from the curb.
The car surged into the night. He kept breathing into his solar plexus. Fighting the fear with every muscle in his body. His hands gripped the wheel so tightly his knuckles ached.
Slowly the initial panic receded, leaving him shaky and so freaking grateful he’d survived that tears pricked his eyes.
“It’s going to be okay, Lizzy. We’re going to get through this,” he said.
She didn’t respond and he glanced at her. She was very still.
He released his death grip on the wheel to press his fingers into her neck again. Her pulse fluttered against his fingers, faint but detectable.
She was alive. She had a chance. Renewed determination flooded through him. He flattened his foot to the floor and watched as the speedometer rose past a hundred.
Time seemed to ebb and flow in strange, unpredictable surges as he sped through the night. Trees flashed by outside, but it took forever to reach the San Remo bridge, and then suddenly the signs for Dalyston were flashing by and he knew he only had about eight kilometers to go until he hit the outskirts of Wonthaggi.
He pulled his phone from his pocket and called to the hospital, letting them know he was minutes away.
A low moan tore his attention from the road as he passed the first outlying houses of Wonthaggi township, and he glanced over to see Elizabeth’s eyes flickering open.
“Lizzy. It’s all right. We’re almost at the hospital. Stay still, sweetheart. We’re nearly there.”
He touched her shoulder reassuringly. Jesus, she was so cold and clammy.
“Nate.” Her voice was barely a whisper.
“I’m here, sweetheart. We’re all good.”
She frowned as her wavering gaze focused on him. “You’re driving.”
“Hang in there, Lizzy.”
She lifted her good hand and made a feeble attempt to touch him.
“So proud of you,” she said weakly.
Her eyes fluttered closed again.
Nate took the final turn at full speed. The hospital’s blue-and-white sign was a beacon at the end of the street. He slewed into the emergency drive and slammed his fist onto the horn as he braked sharply. Then he was out of the car and running around to the passenger door as the medical staff barreled outside with a stretcher.
“We’ll take her, sir,” a nurse said, pulling him out of the way.
“Do you know what blood type she is?” someone else demanded.
“No. But she’s lost a lot. I tried to keep her arm elevated…”
The team transferred Elizabeth to the stretcher with practiced efficiency. Then she was being rushed through the double doors, the attending doctor yelling instructions.
Nate was left behind, hands hanging slack by his sides.
He’d made it.
He’d been convinced that he would never drive again, but he’d conquered his fear and he’d made it. He’d gotten Lizzy the help she needed.
When push had come to shove, he’d battled his demons and won.
He didn’t feel a rush of triumph, however.
He didn’t feel anything.
ELIZABETH WOKE TO THE SMELL of antiseptic and the sound of voices. She frowned and tried to roll onto her side but something was holding her back. She protested groggily and forced her eyes open, only to blink in surprise when she registered the ove
rwhelming white of a hospital room.
What on earth…?
Then it all came rushing back—the trip to Melbourne, Jarvie and Nate’s confrontation, the shower door, trying to get to the phone.
Nate driving her to the hospital.
She frowned. Was she remembering correctly? But the picture in her head was indelible—Nate behind the wheel, telling her not to move, telling her everything was going to be all right.
She lifted her head, but the chair by her bed was empty.
Where was he? She was so proud of him. He’d driven her to safety. He’d saved her life. She wanted to see him and talk to him and thank him and tell him all the things she’d kept inside.
She reached for the buzzer pinned to her pillowcase, automatically using her right hand. Pain washed up her arm and she subsided with a groan.
She was so incredibly tired. Utterly washed out. She let her head drop on the pillow and realized there was an IV drip beside the bed, the tube attached to her other arm.
Weariness made her eyelids heavy. She let them fall closed. She’d rest for a minute, then she’d call someone and ask all the questions teeming in her mind….
When she woke again the hospital was quieter, the lights dimmer. Nighttime, then. But which nighttime? How many days had passed? She twisted her head to see if Nate was there but again the chair beside her bed was empty. She subsided onto her pillow. Where was he? She wanted to see him. She needed to see him.
She sniffed, aware that she was feeling very sorry for herself and not a little weepy. Then movement at the door caught her eye and she turned her head in time to catch a figure retreating away from the doorway.
“Nate?” she called.
No one answered.
“Nate? Is that you?”
Still no response. She shifted higher on her pillows, which was when it occurred to her that the figure had been too short to be Nate. He was much bigger and broader.
So where was he?
A young dark-haired nurse entered the room, a tray in hand. “You’re awake. Excellent. I’m Jodie, I’ll be looking after you tonight. How are you feeling? How’s your pain level?”
She slid the tray onto the table at the foot of Elizabeth’s bed.
“Um. I’m fine. A little uncomfortable but not overly so. Can you tell me, there was a man in the doorway just now…?”
Jodie shook her head. “Sorry. I didn’t see anyone. Might have been one of the other patients’ visitors. Although it’s well past visiting hours. Do you feel up to eating?”
“I don’t know.”
“Maybe some soup and some juice? You’ve lost a lot of blood and even though you’ve had a transfusion food will definitely help to get you back on track.”
“All right. I’ll try some soup,” Elizabeth said.
Jodie helped her sit up, propping an extra pillow behind her.
“Can I ask—has anyone been in to see me? A tall, dark man? Blue eyes?” Really sexy, utterly gorgeous? Love of my life?
“I’m sorry, no. Not that I know of. I can check at the nurses’ station to see if there are any messages for you, though?”
“Thanks.”
Jodie moved the table closer and removed the plastic cover from the bowl of soup on the tray.
“Chicken vegetable, and for a change it’s actually quite edible,” she said with a wry wink.
Elizabeth tried to smile but all she could manage was a weak twist of her lips. She didn’t understand. Nathan had driven her to the hospital. Why wasn’t he here?
She ate the soup and half a bowl of yogurt, then she had a visit from her doctor who explained that she’d cut her radial artery and that despite having received a blood transfusion she’d need to take it very easy while her body recovered.
“The stitches can come out in seven to ten days, and the nutritionist will be around to talk to you about your diet. You’ll need to take in a lot of protein for the next six to eight weeks.”
“When can I go home?” she asked.
“We need to do a few tests tomorrow, but there’s no reason why you can’t leave afterward as long as you’re prepared to take it very easy. Lots of bed rest, no standing quickly, no heavy lifting.”
She nodded dutifully and waited patiently while the doctor conferred with her nurse at the foot of her bed. Then they left and she was alone again. She sighed and rolled onto her left side, facing the window. She felt incredibly alone and the sudden, childish urge to call her grandparents overtook her. Just to hear the sound of their voices. She couldn’t, of course. Not from hospital. No way would her grandmother’s health cope with learning Elizabeth had had an accident on the other side of the world. And her grandfather would insist on flying out to see her, and he’d want her to come straight home the moment she was good to fly….
She could call Violet, however. She was reaching for the phone when she glanced up and saw a reflection in the window—a man hovering in her doorway, a pair of crutches propped beneath his armpits.
She shuffled around in bed but by the time she’d gotten herself turned around Sam Blackwell was gone.
“I know you’re there, Sam,” she called.
There was a brief silence, then Sam returned to the doorway. There was no mistaking the chagrin on his face—he looked like a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar.
Despite everything—his dismissive attitude, his abrupt departure—her heart squeezed at the sight of him.
Stupid heart. She reminded herself that this man had already disappointed her more than once.
“Why are you here?” she asked coolly.
“Nate called me.” He remained in the doorway, unprepared to make even the small commitment of entering her room.
“I see. And you rushed straight to my bedside, I take it?”
She was being sarcastic, but the fiery blush that swept up his neck and into his cheeks gave her pause.
Had he really come rushing to her side, then? Was that what that fierce blush was about?
“Why? Why bother when you didn’t even want to give me the time of day back on the island?”
His gaze slid over her shoulder to focus on the water jug on her bedside table. “Wanted to make sure you were all right.”
She pushed herself higher in the bed and eyed him across several feet of scuffed linoleum.
“If we’re going to have this conversation, could you at least come into the room so I don’t have to shout? I assume there might be some patients next door who’d like to get some sleep.”
He entered the room with visible reluctance. If it wasn’t so heartbreaking, it might almost be funny.
“I thought you weren’t interested in me?” she asked.
“I never said that. Don’t put words in my mouth.”
“Well, someone has to, since you never say anything for yourself.”
Bugger being polite. She’d tiptoed around him enough.
“I was doing what I thought was best. That’s all you need to know.”
Elizabeth slapped her good hand palm-down onto the bed. “No, damn you, that’s not all I need to know! I’m your daughter, Sam. The very least you can do is look me in the eye and tell me why you don’t want anything to do with me. I’ve had a bloody gutful of people deciding what’s best for me—my grandparents, my fiancé. I’m the one who gets to decide what’s best for me, not you.”
Sam frowned. “Fiancé? I thought you and Nate were on with each other? Don’t tell me he’s proposed?”
Elizabeth shook her head. “No. I’m not telling you a thing until you explain why you left and why you’re here now and why it’s for the best that you ignore me.”
She eyed him belligerently. She wasn’t going to give an inch until he offered her something. Some sign that he cared.
He stared at the ground, his hands opening and closing on the hand rests of his crutches. The fierce frown on his forehead told her he was debating something internally. She held her breath, waiting. If he turned away now, she knew in her hear
t that she would never see him again. It would be over, for good.
His chin came up and at last he met her eyes.
“All right. You want to know, I’ll tell you. Then you can tell me to go to hell and we’ll be right back where we started from.”
She didn’t say anything, simply waited.
“I met your mother in Greece. She’d just finished school and was traveling with friends. She was good fun, beautiful, loved a party. We, um, hit it off right away. Then her friends went home and Elle decided to stay on, and even though I had a charter I was supposed to crew on, I stayed on, too, and we got a little place on one of the islands, down near the water.”
Elizabeth frowned. It was strange to hear her mother’s name shortened and to hear that the cool, slightly sad woman she’d known as her mother had once been a party girl, someone a young man could “hit it off” with.
“Did you love her?”
Her father shrugged, not meeting her eyes. “We were both nineteen years old. What did we know?”
Elizabeth decided to count that as a yes.
“She told me she was pregnant after the first month. I—” Sam brushed a hand over his face, momentarily hiding his expression from her. After a minute he started talking again. “I didn’t take it well. I was angry. She was supposed to be on the pill. I thought she was trying to trap me. I took off. Took a charter to Turkey. Left her all on her own, with nothing.”
Elizabeth frowned. “What does that mean, with nothing?”
“What does it sound like?” Sam said, his tone sharp. “No money, no food, no way of getting home or getting help. She was in trouble with her parents for staying on, so she couldn’t turn to them. Her friends had gone. But I didn’t think about any of that. I wanted to take off, so I did.”
Elizabeth could hear the self-condemnation in his tone. She spared a thought for her nineteen-year-old mother, pregnant and abandoned by her lover in a foreign country.
“What happened then? I take it she went home to England?”
“I don’t know. I wasn’t around, was I? I always assumed she called your grandparents.”
Elizabeth looked at her hands. It wasn’t exactly a beautiful romance, but there was nothing particularly surprising in it, either. Her father had behaved like a selfish, immature young man, and her mother had paid the price for her youthful impulsiveness. It was a story as old as time.
