by Anne Fraser
Liz was pretty sure someone had mistaken her for an American football player. Because she’d been tackled by a three-hundred-pound lineman. Repeatedly.
Her head hurt, her chest hurt, and her leg hurt.
“Stay with me, Liz,” Dr Graviss ordered from somewhere to her right. His words didn’t make sense, which was strange as he was usually direct and to the point. She’d always admired that about the emergency medicine physician who was one of Adam’s closest friends.
She opened her eyes again, squinted at his fuzzy blond hair, and vaguely wondered what had happened to the bright light. “Where am I?”
“In Radiology. You regained consciousness while a CT scan was being performed on you.”
“A CT scan?” She tried to sit up and realized she couldn’t. That she couldn’t even move her arms. “Something’s wrong with my body.”
Dr Graviss took her hand and squeezed. “You’re strapped down to the table to cut down on motion noise on your scan.” He released a Velcro strap, but Liz still couldn’t lift her arms. They were too heavy.
“How much do you remember, Liz?” he asked gently.
“About what?”
“Tonight.”
“What happened tonight?”
“That’s what I’m hoping you can tell me.”
Liz tried to think, tried to remember why she’d be in Radiology with Dr Graviss. Neither of them belonged in the radiology department.
“Where is she?” A familiar voice broke into her thoughts. Adam.
Warmth filled her. Her gaze went in the direction from which she’d heard his voice.
He barged into the room with Mona in his wake tugging on his shirt, fussing at him. Why was her friend fussing at Adam? Mona knew Adam was wonderful, was her rock to keep her steady. That he was the father of her baby.
No, Mona didn’t know that. No one did.
That’s when everything hit her.
Adam’s avoidance, Adam’s treatment of her, using her for one-last-time sex, telling her he didn’t love her and wanted to date other women.
Her gaze met his and she saw concern that for a moment made her think his words had been lies. That she’d been right all along, and he did love her. Fool. She berated her naivety. When was she going to learn? Adam didn’t love her. Why would he lie about the way he felt? She’d told him she loved him so it couldn’t be fear of not knowing how she felt. No, she didn’t see love. What she saw reflected in his concerned eyes wasn’t real.
Very simply, he felt guilt.
Guilt because she’d been in a car accident.
A car accident.
Her baby. She wanted to touch her stomach but couldn’t. Had the crash hurt the precious life inside her?
“Oh, God, tell me I’m OK,” she demanded in a panicked voice.
“You’re OK, Liz,” Dr Graviss assured from her side, ignoring Adam’s intrusion. “You were in a car accident.”
“A deer ran in front of me.” Those few seconds before losing consciousness replayed in her mind. She’d been so afraid, thinking she was going to die, that she’d never hold her baby. She fought hyperventilating by taking controlled breaths. “I swerved to miss the deer and lost control of my car. Did I…” She paused, glanced toward Adam and hesitated before asking, “Hit the deer?”
Adam ignored Mona’s continued protests at his intrusion into the radiology department. He’d had to see Liz for himself.
His gaze ate her up, assessing each section of her body. She wore a thin cotton hospital gown that tied together at the back. Scrapes and bruises littered her arms and legs, but her face boasted the largest visible lesion. One that covered a large section of her right forehead. A gash that had been closed with a row of neat stitches.
He moved closer, straining to hear what she said, and the scent of blood made his head swim. The scent of Liz’s blood.
Her life could have been snuffed out just like that.
“I’m not sure, Liz.” Larry leaned close, looking Liz directly in the eyes while he spoke to her. “No one mentioned a deer. You were brought to the hospital by ambulance. Do you remember?”
Liz’s eyes closed. Her face pinched with pain, pinched with trying to recall the events that had occurred that night. “I remember crashing into the tree.”
What else did she remember? Did she recall that he’d been the biggest fool ever to walk the face of the earth? That all this was his fault?
“But nothing after that,” she continued. “Tell me I’m OK. Please.”
“Tell her she’s OK,” Adam demanded, needing to hear the confirmation himself. Liz would be OK. She had to be.
Larry glanced up from Liz, met his gaze, and frowned. “Adam,” he acknowledged. “You’re not on duty and should have waited out front. Not to mention that you should be home in bed. Resting.”
“The hell you say.” He wasn’t going anywhere. Not until he was sure Liz was going to be OK.
He could have lost her for ever.
Just like that, and all his worrying about the future, about burdening Liz, would have been for naught.
“Oh, Liz.” He took her hand in his and gave a gentle squeeze, but she didn’t respond to his action, didn’t even look at him.
Instead, she kept beseeching eyes on Larry. “Make him leave.”
Stunned by her soft plea, Adam let go of Liz’s hand. Her limp arm fell to the table she lay on. She wanted him to leave?
“Please,” she said. Her heart monitor beeped rapidly as her pulse rate increased. “Make him go. I can’t deal with him right now. I just want him gone.”
She didn’t want him here? Just hours ago she had been in his condo, telling him she loved him. Now she didn’t want him in the same room?
Larry gave him a sympathetic look. “It would be better if you waited outside, Adam. I need to finish examining Liz so the radiology tech can finish her tests.”
He was being asked to leave. By Liz. By Larry.
She didn’t understand and he had to make her. Had to tell her that he loved her, always had, and that everything he’d done had been because he’d believed it was the right thing for her.
“Liz,” he began, but she refused to look at him, just kept her gaze trained on Larry’s face.
“Please,” she said a third time, tears in her eyes. “I don’t want him here.”
“You’re upsetting her, Adam,” Larry needlessly informed Adam. “Wait outside.”
Adam wanted to argue, but logically Liz needed medical care. His interference was only slowing down her examination and tests. Unfortunately logic was in short supply when Liz was lying injured on the table.
But he stepped out. After dropping a kiss on Liz’s good cheek and whispering something to her, Mona followed.
“You shouldn’t have barged in there,” she scolded, but gave him a reassuring pat on his arm.
“I had to see her.”
“And now that you’ve seen? Now what?” Kelly demanded from a few feet away, gripping a cup of coffee tightly in her hand, like she really wanted to throw it at him. “You had no right to interrupt Liz’s care, not after the past few weeks. You’ve hurt her so much.”
Apparently, Kelly had been waiting outside the room for Liz’s tests to finish and resented it that he’d interrupted. He shouldn’t have, but he’d had to see her. Not that he was sure he could make her, make anyone, understand the conflicting emotions running through him.
Mona watched them curiously.
He raked his fingers through his hair. “I’d never intentionally hurt Liz.”
But that wasn’t true. He had intentionally hurt her because he was saving her from a greater pain at a later time. Or so he’d thought.
The memory of how fragile she’d appeared on the radiology table flashed through his mind, and he winced. Damn it. He never wanted Liz to hurt.
“Yet you’d do this to her? Knowing…” Her hand covered her mouth but her eyes shone with grave disappointment. “I’d thought better of you.”
K
elly gave him a dirty look, downed her coffee, crumpled the cup the way she probably wanted to crumple him. She walked away, but not without tossing a dirty name over her shoulder.
He didn’t contest her assessment of his character.
He had hurt the woman he loved. Hurt her deeply.
He deserved every negative thing her friend said.
Several hours later Adam rolled his throbbing forehead against the cold concrete of the hospital wall. What was taking Kelly and Mona so long? They’d been in the ICU room Liz had been admitted to for over an hour. Wasn’t Mona on duty in the emergency room?
All he wanted was a few minutes with Liz, but her self-appointed watchdogs didn’t want him “upsetting her”. Although he’d gotten a look while she’d been in Radiology, until he checked her himself from head to toe he wasn’t going to be satisfied.
If she would agree to see him.
What if she didn’t? What if she refused to give him the chance to say how sorry he was?
To tell her that when the officer had shown up on his doorstep, all he’d been able to think of had been getting to Liz? Of telling her how much he loved her and needed her in his life?
“What are you still doing here? Didn’t I tell you to go home and rest?”
Adam straightened, turned to meet Larry’s eyes. He hadn’t heard the doctor come up the hallway, had been too lost in his own thoughts. “Would you leave without seeing Liz if you were me?”
“Probably not, but she doesn’t need to be upset,” Larry repeated Mona and Kelly’s warnings.
Did everyone think he planned to go in and cause a fight? Surely they knew him better than that?
“She’s been through a great deal and has lost consciousness again. She has a concussion and her ankle is broken. Whatever’s going on between the two of you, and I have a horrible suspicion I know exactly what it is, tonight isn’t the time to go into it.”
“You should mind your own business,” Adam started, then rubbed his jaw at Larry’s pointed look. “The truth is,” he admitted, “I told her we were finished.”
Larry’s brows rose and he gave a disappointed shake of his head. “Shouldn’t you have told her the truth?”
“I made a mistake. A big mistake. You just can’t imagine the hell it is not knowing what the future holds, whether or not I’ll just put Liz right back to where she was with Gramps. Liz shouldn’t have to go through that a second time.” Adam stated his fears out loud for the first time. “I need to know she’s OK. I care about her. You know that.”
“I know.” Larry slapped his arm. “Like I said, you should have told her everything and let her decide for herself what she wanted for her future.”
“But what if…?” What if she’d chosen to walk away?
Adam gulped. Was that why he’d put Liz through all this? Because he’d been afraid when push came to shove she’d leave him? Or had he been more afraid she wouldn’t leave and he’d be forced to see the pain in her eyes when and if she was forced to take care of him?
“What if…?” Larry prompted.
“Nothing.” Adam shook his head. “I believed I was doing the right thing. Stupid, I know, but being told you have MS does funny things to a person’s ability to think clearly.”
“Apparently.” Larry sighed, glanced down the hallway at two nurses heading their way. “Look, we’ve been friends for a long time, and you know I have your best interests at heart. But Liz is my patient and I owe her certain courtesies—like respecting her wishes regarding visitors.” Larry ran his fingers across his forehead. “We’ve all had a long day. Go home, get some rest. If Liz wakes up, she’s not going to be up to a confrontation with you. She needs rest. You need rest. I’m going to run the dynamic duo out of her room so she can get that rest.” His gaze met Adam’s. “I don’t want you upsetting my patient. Or getting upset yourself. You can bend over backwards to make up with Liz when you’re both more up to it.”
“You want me to just leave her?”
“I promise I’ll take good care of her for you, Adam.”
“But what if she needs…?” He started to say “me”, but hesitated. What if she needed him? If she did, would she even ask for him after everything that he’d said and done?
“You could sleep in the doctors’ lounge,” Larry suggested. “I’ll wake you if there’s any change or if she asks for you.”
The doctors’ lounge. Would there be any point? How could he possibly sleep after tonight’s events?
“Or if I think she needs you,” Larry added perceptively. “Rest, Adam. I can give you a mild sedative if you need something to take the edge off.”
Adam shook his head. “Thanks for the offer, but I don’t want to be drugged. Neither am I leaving the hospital. If Liz needs me, I want to be close.”
Adam waited until he saw Liz’s watch dragons leave her room, courtesy of Larry. He suspected Larry knew he was there, but his friend avoided looking in his direction and Adam appreciated that.
Knowing the glass walls that allowed the intensive care nurses to see Liz would also allow them to see him, he slipped into her room anyway.
He’d be quick, but if someone noticed they wouldn’t think too much about him being in the room with her, wouldn’t ask him to leave. Although people knew there were problems, they didn’t know specifics of his and Liz’s relationship. Not unless Liz had told them, and he doubted that.
He stood next to her hospital bed, soaking in the sight of the wires and attachments to her body. Her hair was pulled back from her face and he reached out to run his finger along the discolored skin beneath the sutured cut on her forehead.
In the dim light, she looked tiny, fragile, helpless. The beeping of her monitors pulsed around him like a living thing.
Her cheek felt silky smooth beneath his fingertip. As with any time he touched her, electricity sparked low in his gut.
Just as protectiveness also washed through him.
“Oh, Liz.” If he could take on her pain, ease her suffering by taking it on himself, he would without batting an eyelash.
“What have I done to you?” He leaned over, breathed in her scent. Although mingled with the smell of cleansing antiseptic, the unique fragrance that was Liz filled him.
No matter how long he lived he’d never grow so old that he wouldn’t recognize her scent. He imagined he’d close his eyes and dream of breathing her in, of touching her, kissing her, holding her, all the days of his life.
Selfish fool that he was, he wanted to be there for Liz. He always wanted to be there for her, a permanent part of her life.
So far his MS hadn’t improved with the injections, but even that evening Dr Winters had said it was too early to tell.
What if Dr Winters was right? What if the exacerbation went away and he never had another flare-up of his MS? Or only a few throughout his lifetime without any long-term ill-effects?
He loved Liz. Loved her more than any other man possibly could.
Even if he had an acute flare-up, wouldn’t them being together be better than her being with someone who could never love her as deeply as he did?
Or was that wishful thinking on his part?
Because Liz was easy to love and no doubt any number of men could fall madly in love with her. What wasn’t to love about a kind, gentle-spirited beauty who gave so much of herself to those around her?
But what they had was strong, special. The kind of bond that spanned eternity and bound their souls together.
Which was why he’d done such a dismal job of setting Liz free. They belonged together.
If he did have acute flare-ups, he’d spend his good days making up to her for all the bad ones.
Liz. He laced his fingers with hers and lifted her hand to his mouth. He placed a gentle kiss on each finger.
“You deserve better, Liz. So much better than I am at my best, but if you’ll have me I’ll spend the rest of my life loving you and making up for these past few weeks.”
CHAPTER NINE
&n
bsp; “HELLO, May,” Adam said to the woman he’d operated on the previous day. He’d spent the night at the hospital, waiting for news on Liz, hoping she’d send for him. She hadn’t. To pass the long hours, he’d checked on May a couple of times. He’d ordered her another unit of packed RBCs, but otherwise she’d had a good night.
Adam couldn’t say the same about his own night.
After sneaking into Liz’s room a second time, just to make sure she was still OK, he’d lain down in an empty patient room for a couple of hours.
“Dr Cline.” Although she was weak, May’s lips turned up with pleasure when she spotted him. Her husband stood, rushed over to Adam.
“Dr Cline.” He didn’t say more, just shook Adam’s hand over and over with great gusto, his eyes brimming with emotion.
Adam nodded in understanding, waited until May’s husband stepped back, looking a little embarrassed.
“It’s good to see you smiling,” Adam told his patient, pleased with her skin color and the verve in her eyes. Although still pale and a long way from being recovered, May was going to be OK.
“Just knowing that rock is out of me makes me want to smile.”
“More like the root system of a tree than a rock.” May’s surgery was definitely the most complicated he’d ever undertaken. No doubt he’d be called before the board about his “collapse”, but given the same set of circumstances he’d opt to do the surgery again. “A mighty oak’s roots.”
“Whatever.” She shuddered. “I’m glad it’s gone.”
“We all are.” Her husband sat back down next to her, placed his hand over his wife’s.
“The nurse told me that you refused to take any pain medicine this morning.”
“Why would I? My pain now is nothing compared to before you operated.”
On cue the nurse walked into the room, handed Adam a printout of the most recent results on May’s labs. “Thought you might want to see these, Dr Cline. I know you were asking about them earlier. They just got entered into the computer a few moments ago, so I printed out a copy.”
Adam glanced over May’s hemoglobin and hematocrit levels. Still low, but holding steady to what they had been after the infusion of her last blood transfusion. A good sign that she wasn’t bleeding internally.
