Western Man

by Janet Dailey

  “I never asked you to release me,” Ridge glanced at him with laughing scorn. “I’m checking myself out of here.”

  “If you do, I can’t be held responsible for anything that might happen,” the doctor warned him.

  “I never asked you to be,” Ridge pulled on the other boot, then remained partially hunched over, an arm folded across his stomach.

  “Are you positive you want to go through with this?” the doctor persisted in the face of the patient’s obvious debilitating pain.

  “Yes.” He made the short, one-word reply without looking up.

  Resigned to accepting the decision, the doctor sighed his disapproval and glanced at the orderly. “Bring him a wheelchair.”

  “I don’t need it.” Ridge struggled to his feet, using the chair and the wall for support, and reached inside the closet for his hat.

  “It’s hospital rules, Mr. Halliday,” the doctor informed him. “It’s required by our insurance.”

  There was no protest from Ridge as the orderly left the room to fetch the wheelchair. His departure was closely followed by the nurses, who obviously had other duties and patients. The doctor scribbled something on a paper attached to the clipboard chart he carried, tore it off, and walked over to give it to Sharon.

  “The hospital pharmacy will fill the prescription for you,” he said. “He should eat nothing but soft foods the next couple of days and there should be absolutely no strenuous activity at all. I would prefer that he doesn’t get out of bed, but failing that, he should be confined to the house.”

  Like Ridge, the doctor was taking it for granted that she was going to look after him and wasn’t wasting his time giving Ridge any advice. Sharon accepted the prescription without comment.

  “I know Mr. Halliday insists he doesn’t want anything for the pain,” the doctor continued. “But in this instance, it will be much less wearing on his system if he does take something. Rest is the best medicine for him, but it’s extremely difficult to rest when you’re in pain.”

  “I understand,” Sharon nodded, then glanced up to see Ridge staggering out of the room, minus the assistance of a wheelchair.

  “The man’s impossible,” the doctor muttered under his breath and went after him.

  Silently echoing the sentiment, Sharon hurriedly gathered his dirty clothes from the closet and stuffed them into the open satchel on the bed. As she left the room, the orderly went by with the wheelchair. Ridge was halfway down the corridor, hugging the wall as he moved with obvious care.

  When she caught up with the procession of patient, doctor, and orderly, the doctor’s insistence that Ridge sit in the wheelchair was falling on deaf ears. He kept putting one foot in front of the other as if he didn’t dare stop.

  “Look, Doc—” Ridge stopped and leaned against the corner of an intersecting corridor “—I’m going to walk out of this hospital. Let this guy follow me with the wheelchair and everybody pretend I’m sitting in it.”

  The doctor looked at him for a long second, then swung away in disgust. “Follow him,” he told the orderly and walked off muttering to himself.

  Half an hour had passed by the time Ridge signed for the hospital bill and collected his personal valuables. All the while Sharon stayed quietly in the background, slipping away once to have the prescription filled. Part of her admired the grit that was carrying him through the ordeal, while the rest of her was irritated by the sheer stupidity of his refusing all help.

  When they left the office to head for the hospital exit, they found the orderly had momentarily stepped away, leaving the wheelchair unattended. Ridge was free to leave the hospital on his own. Ten feet from the door, he stopped and leaned heavily against the wall. There was a grayness to his face, weakness visibly clawing at him. His gaze flicked to Sharon.

  “What are you hovering around for?” he muttered roughly.

  “It’s the first time I’ve seen a real macho cowboy up close.” The corners of her mouth twitched with a smile. “You’re so big and brave. I thought it would be interesting to see how long you can keep it up.”

  “Sharon.” Ridge spoke her name in a tone that tiredly appealed to her not to hassle him. He shut his eyes and let his shoulders slump. “Get the damned wheelchair.”

  She went back for the wheelchair and held it steady while he gingerly lowered himself into it. There was a barely stifled moan that was bitten off, then he cradled his forehead in his hand as if he lacked the strength to hold his head up. Her fingers almost touched his shoulders in a sympathetic caress, but she curled them up tightly and pulled her hand back. Her gaze lingered on the corded muscles in his neck, testimony of his pain-wracked tension.

  “Now where?” She made her voice sound falsely bright and watched him stiffen.

  “Home,” he answered curtly.

  “How do you plan to get there?” Sharon inquired innocently and tilted her head downward in smiling inquiry.

  “Sharon, for God’s sake, will you take me home?” Ridge demanded impatiently.

  “Oh? You want me to give you a ride home,” she said as if she had just discovered his intention.

  “You know damned well I do,” he snapped.

  At that point, Sharon had had her fill of his high-handed tactics. The full skirt of her dress swirled about her legs as she moved to the front of the wheelchair. Determination ruled her expression, making her gaze just as hard and unyielding as his.

  “I’m not going to take you anywhere until we settle a few things,” she informed him. “First of all, you’re going to do exactly as the doctor ordered.”

  “I’m not staying in this hospital.” An instant after the firm declaration was issued, an expression flickered across his features that invisibly reached out to her with an irresistible poignancy. “I want to go home, Sharon,” he murmured, a touching ache in his voice that was nearly her undoing.

  “And you’ll stay in bed for three days,” she added the second condition.

  “Two days for sure,” Ridge grudgingly conceded.

  “Three days,” Sharon insisted. “And I’ll be there to make sure you do. Do I have your word on it?” She saw his hesitation. “I’m warning you, Ridge. I’ll walk away right now and leave you sitting here in this wheelchair.”

  An angry frown darkened his brow. “I’ll call somebody else to come pick me up.”

  “And I’ll convince them that you should stay in the hospital for your own good,” she retorted, continuing to challenge him with the steadiness of her gaze. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the orderly approaching.

  A brief spark of admiration glimmered in his eyes, although his mouth remained grimly drawn. “I’m in no shape to argue with you,” Ridge replied.

  “I have your word?”

  “Yes,” he grudgingly gave in.

  Her expression softened with inner relief. “Wait here while I drive the car up to the door.” She smiled at the orderly who was very careful to say nothing about finding Ridge in the wheelchair. “I’ll just be a minute.”

  Chapter Five

  The ranch appeared to be deserted when Sharon stopped the car in front of the sprawling, single-story ranch house. A golden twilight was throwing long shadows over the land and casting a yellow tinge over the buildings.

  Climbing out of the car, she walked around to the passenger side to help Ridge. After he’d taken one step, she could tell he was too exhausted and weak to walk all the way to the house under his own power. She took his arm and put it around her shoulders, trying to help him without adding to his pain.

  “You’d better lean on me,” she advised him.

  Her quick glance at his face was caught and held by his half-veiled look, so lazy and warm. There was even the suggestion of a smile around his mouth. She became conscious of the heat of his body running the length of hers, the closeness of his leanly handsome features, and the caressing warmth of his breath. A disturbance started in the pit of her stomach.

  “It seems that’s all I’ve been doing is le
aning on you,” Ridge murmured while his eyes made a slow, roaming study of her upturned face. “I leaned on you all the way to the hospital—and here I am, leaning on you again.”

  “I know it’s hard on the male ego, but you’ll survive.” She was having trouble breathing evenly, so she tried to make light of his comments.

  “It would be easier if you were softer.” Ridge shifted his position slightly to keep her shoulder bone from poking him in the side.

  It was the break Sharon needed to regain control of the situation. “Come on. Let’s get you inside.”

  With slow, measured steps, she helped him into the house, entering into it through the living room. His bedroom was the first door off the hallway. Like the rest of the house, it was Spartarnly furnished. His mother had died some years ago and the house was beginning to lose the traces of a woman’s touch. Except for an odd vase or two, most of the flat surfaces were bare of adornment—an indication of a man’s impatience to pick up things when he dusted. Ashtrays, lamps, radios, and clocks were practically all the movable items.

  Ridge sat on the edge of his bed while Sharon plumped the pillows, one atop the other, so he could rest against them. Holding himself very carefully, he shifted to lie on top of the chenille bedspread fully clothed.

  “I’ll go out to the car and get your things,” she said and started to leave the room.

  “When you come back—” his eyes remained closed as he spoke “—would you bring me a pack of cigarettes from the kitchen? They took mine away from me at the hospital. I sure could use a smoke.” The last was murmured in a tired sigh.

  “Sure.”

  Without saying more, Sharon quietly withdrew from the room and retraced her steps to the car. Returning to the house with the satchel, she paused in the spacious kitchen long enough to take a pack of cigarettes from the carton on top of the refrigerator.

  When she returned to his bedroom, it didn’t appear that Ridge had moved an inch from his previous position. The lines in his face seemed more deeply etched, giving the impression of pain being suppressed. There was a tinge of grayness around his compressed mouth and the pinched-in tightness of his nose. His eyelids were closed, long lashes casting shadows on the faint hollows under his eyes.

  Sharon hesitated. There was no sign that he’d heard her come in. She didn’t want to disturb him if he had managed to fall asleep or drifted into that in-between state that is neither sleep nor wakefulness. Rest was more vital to him than the cigarettes in her hand.

  “If you’re through staring, you can bring me my cigarettes.” The roughness of impatience was in his voice.

  Startled, it was a second before she noticed the narrow slits of his eyes, observing her while they appeared to be closed. Recovering, she walked calmly to the side of the bed.

  “I thought you might be asleep,” she said.

  “If I was, I suppose you were going to wake me like those damned nurses, so you could take my pulse and check my temperature,” Ridge grumbled.

  “I’ll bet they enjoyed sticking a thermometer in your mouth just for the pleasure of shutting you up,” Sharon countered, and observed the slight widening of his eyes to more than slits.

  “It’s wonderful that you’re so understanding,” he murmured with dry sarcasm.

  “I understand, all right,” she assured him. “You feel rotten, so you behave rottenly to everyone around you. Misery loves company.”

  He shut his eyes and made no comment to her remark. “Light me a cigarette.” As an obvious afterthought, he added an explanation to the demand. “Right now, the pain’s bearable and I don’t want to move.”

  Sharon shook a cigarette from the pack, then picked up the book of matches from the bedside table to light it. “Shall I smoke it for you, too?” she asked and blew out the match flame along with a stream of smoke from her mouth.

  “Very funny,” Ridge murmured. “Why don’t you pretend it’s a thermometer.”

  With his eyes shut, Ridge didn’t see her amused smile as Sharon reached over and placed the lit cigarette between his lips. Her fingers briefly touched his mouth before she drew them away. They tingled slightly from the intimate contact with his smooth, hard lips.

  As she straightened, she noticed the cautious way he lifted his hand to take the cigarette from his mouth after he’d taken a short drag. Even then, he winced as if jarred by the careful motion.

  “Where would you like me to set the ashtray?” Sharon realized that it would be too painful for Ridge to twist himself around to use it if she left it on the bedside table.

  “Just somewhere within reach,” he said, then added hastily, “but not on my stomach. It hurts to have anything touch it—even these clothes.”

  “Do you want me to help you take them off?” she offered, as she placed the ashtray on the bed next to him and half-turned from the bed in the direction of the chest of drawers and the clothes closet. “Last night, Mom and I looked for a pair of pajamas and a robe to take to the hospital, but we couldn’t find any. Where do you keep them?’

  Ridge started to laugh, but the bruised muscles in his stomach must have screamed a protest because it ended in a groan. When he finally answered, his tight voice was heavily threaded with suppressed pain.

  “I haven’t owned a pair of pajamas since I was ten,” he told her. “And as for a robe . . . when you live in an all-male household, you don’t need one.” A smile deepened the corners of his mouth at the stunned look on her face. “Do you still want to play nurse?” Ridge mocked.

  She recovered instantly. “For heaven’s sake, I’m not a schoolgirl anymore,” she flashed in annoyance, irritated with herself—and with him for drawing attention to her brief moment of self-consciousness. “I’m not likely to be shocked by the sight of a man’s body. I do have a brother.”

  “In that case, I would like these clothes off,” he acknowledged, still watching her with a challenging gleam in his eyes.

  Sharon didn’t falter for a second. “Then TU take these.” She picked up the ashtray she’d just set on the bed and removed the partially smoked cigarette from his hand. “Can you sit up by yourself, or do you need some help?”

  “I can manage.”

  His stiff and stilted movements were such a marked contrast to his usual effortless and fluid motion that Sharon couldn’t help noticing it. But she stood back and let Ridge take as much time as he needed to sit up and swing his legs over the side of the bed.

  “The boots first,” she said and knelt down to tug them off.

  Without socks to ease the friction, it wasn’t easy. She closed her ears to the half-smothered, grunting sounds of pain that came from him. When both boots had been removed, she set them next to the dresser. Ridge already had his shirt half unbuttoned, so she unfastened the last few and eased one arm out of the shirt sleeve. After that, it was a simple matter of slipping it off the other.

  As he edged off the bed to stand up so his pants could be taken off, Sharon avoided meeting his gaze. She was very careful when she unfastened his pants so her hands wouldn’t touch the badly discolored flesh of his stomach. Her hands were steady and sure as they inched the pants over his hips and slid them quickly down his legs. The white material of his jockey shorts filled her peripheral vision, but she concentrated on her task.

  Ridge lowered himself onto the edge of the bed and the pants slid onto the floor. His bare legs were in front of her. For an instant, she let her gaze linger on the silken-fine hair covering them. She had never found hairy men very attractive, but Ridge wasn’t covered with a furry, dark mat.

  As she straightened to hang up his clothes, she caught his eye. Amusement danced openly in the blue irises. It instantly made her conscious of the warmth in her cheeks. She had been so positive she had been a model of indifference at the sight of his lean and muscled body that she hadn’t been aware of the building heat in her cheeks.

  “Don’t look now, nurse, but you’re blushing,” Ridge informed her in a deeply resonant voice as he tried very ha
rd not to laugh because it would hurt too much.

  Denying it would be foolish. She picked up the burning cigarette from the ashtray and passed it to him. “Smoke your cigarette.”

  “—and shut up?” An arching brow queried whether that was the rest of her suggestion.

  “And shut up,” Sharon agreed with a sweetly angry look and walked to the closet to put away his clothes.

  “Sorry,” Ridge said. “I guess it wasn’t fair to tease you.”

  No suitable reply occurred to her, but she swallowed her anger. It served no purpose except to give him more fuel. Her expression was calm when she turned back to the bed.

  “I’ll be in the kitchen if you need me,” she said and exited the room.

  In the sunny yellow kitchen with its shiny white cabinets and windows facing to the east to catch the light from a rising sun, Sharon halted her hasty retreat from Ridge’s bedroom and paused to calm her shaky nerves. There were bound to be more intimate moments like this last one during the next few days. She was going to be in constant contact with him—figuratively and literally—so she might as well come to grips with it and stop turning it into a sexual encounter every time. She was here to take care of him—as a family friend and neighbor—and that was all!

  Her breathing returned to a more normal rate. A corner of her mouth lifted in a wry semblance of a smile turned inward. With considerable more aplomb, Sharon was remembering Ridge’s testy behavior. It was amazing how one man could be so infuriatingly difficult—and so damned sexy at the same time!

  A telephone extension was mounted on the kitchen wall. Sharon crossed the room and lifted the receiver to dial her parents’ number so she could advise them of the changed situation. Her mother answered on the fourth ring.

  After Sharon had informed her about Ridge’s condition and explained her subsequent decision to take care of him at the ranch when he stubbornly refused to stay in the hospital, there was a few seconds of silence on the other end of the line.

  “Under the circumstances, I don’t see what other decision you could have made,” her mother finally concluded with a trace of a sigh.