“You worry about our family because they’re your family,” James said.
“They are my family. I truly do love every one of them.”
“Will you make it official, then?” Adam set his cup down. Seeing Pamela’s was also empty, he relieved her of it and set it on the bedside table. He turned to face her and used his hands to slide her down farther so she was laying flat. Leaning over her, seeing James do the same, he knew she could see both their faces at the same time, and that was exactly what he wanted, what he knew James wanted, too.
“We want to have the commitment ceremony so that we can both give you our vows. Will you say those words with us, baby?”
“Of course, I will.” Pamela reached up, a hand to caress each of their faces. The beauty of her touch, knowing she was soon to be theirs according to the traditions of their family, filled Adam’s heart with more joy than he’d ever believe he could feel.
Pamela yawned, and he couldn’t blame her. They should all be asleep. Her sigh came out on a smile, and he knew she was not only relaxed, but happy. “We’ll have a wonderful commitment ceremony—the best one this family has ever seen.” She yawned again and then closed her eyes. “On Thanksgiving.”
Chapter Fifteen
As Pamela began to awaken, she knew the joy of being snuggled close between her men. She wiggled her bottom, sighing in pleasure as she felt the stiffness of Adam’s cock nestle against the cheeks of her ass. Beneath her head, James’s heartbeat, strong and steady, increased slightly. She thought both men might be awake, and then a few moments later, she knew it for fact.
“Thanksgiving?” The single-worded question, whispered in her right ear, made her smile.
“Mmhmm.” She wiggled her bottom again then nuzzled the chest under her face.
“Let me guess,” James said. “That was Mother’s idea.”
“Well, not really. It was Grandmother’s, but your mother immediately got on board with it. The reasoning, I believe, was that this way, each Thanksgiving, you’d both remember what it is you have to be thankful for.”
“Yes, that sounds like Grandmother, all right,” Adam said. He chuckled. Then he moved against her, and she felt her body readying itself for him.
“You’re not really going to make us wait that long, though, are you, baby?”
In concert with Adam’s seductively asked question, James began to caress her, shoulder to elbow. She was definitely getting aroused, but the urge to laugh was too strong.
“Maybe the commitment ceremony isn’t the only thing the two of you should wait for. Didn’t you tell me you had an early meeting this morning? I wouldn’t want to be the cause of your tardiness, so I’ll just go and get breakfast on.”
She turned her head, gave Adam a fast, smacking kiss, and then treated James to the same. Before either of them could reach for her, she bounded from the bed, giggling, as she scooped Adam’s tee shirt from the night before and quickly pulled it on. Pamela hadn’t planned the sexy move, but judging by their looks, it had sure been the right one. Their eyes were on her and filled with lust. She blew them a kiss and then headed for the stairs wearing nothing but a shirt that looked like a mini dress and a huge smile. The sound of appreciative, masculine laughter followed her down to the main floor.
In the kitchen, she set about putting together a breakfast for the three of them. They’d been good sports, eating fruit and yogurt as well as some good, whole grain cereals. Today, she decided to give them something they truly loved. The sound of first one and then a second shower coming on let her know how much time she had.
Pamela worked quickly, feeling as if she was truly in her element. She loved cooking, and she especially loved cooking for her men. She turned sausage links, flipped bacon, and scrambled the eggs. Adam and James had been game to try whatever she made, and so they’d discovered they liked cheese melted on top of their eggs. Pamela quickly grated about a half cup of cheddar and set it at the ready beside the stove.
By the time she heard the men coming downstairs, everything was ready.
“Good morning, again.” Adam drew her close and kissed her. Pamela wrapped her arms around him and snuggled closed. He ran a hand across her bare bottom, teasing her, much as she’d teased him, earlier.
Adam broke their kiss and grinned. She grinned right back. “Good morning, again.”
James gathered her in, and Pamela let herself sink into his kiss. She didn’t think she’d ever get enough of either of these men.
“Good morning, sweetheart. Breakfast smells good.”
“It does,” Adam said. “Sit down, baby. We’ll serve it up.”
Pamela was able to just manage to get her bottom covered by Adam’s shirt as she settled into the chair.
The platters were passed, and they began to eat. “Our meeting is with the management board of the hospital over in Hamilton,” James said. “It shouldn’t take all day, but if it looks as if it’s going to stretch, we’ll call.”
“That’s for the renewal of the cooperation agreement?” Pamela had heard that the doctors in Lusty had a history of helping out that and other facilities, in case of emergencies. She also knew they had an agreement with Benedict County to be on call for any rural emergencies.
“It is. The doctors from Lusty haven’t been called on a great deal in recent times,” Adam said. “Back before the Second World War, in Dr. Jerimiah Parker’s time, the practice was more common. There weren’t many rural doctors, and a lot of his patients came from different parts of the county.”
“His was one of the busiest practices,” James said, “because during the war, of course, he was the doctor of record for the Convalescent Home that Kate managed.”
“I’ve heard some very interesting stories of that time. Did you know that Kate keeps in touch with some of the men she cared for? Not only that, she communicates often with some of the Benedicts who left Lusty and settled in Montana and New York.”
“Grandmother Chelsea says that Kate is a lot like her own mother, Sarah Carmichael Benedict,” Adam said.
“What do you have planned for today, sweetheart?” James asked.
“I was going to make a grocery run. I know what they have here in town, so I might head into Gatesville first then shop at our own store.”
“That’s what most of the families tend to do,” Adam said.
“I’ve always believed in supporting local businesses.”
“We’re going in Adam’s car, so take mine, sweetheart. But that reminds me.”
“It reminds us. You’ve put us off for a couple months, now. And I think now we both understand why. So let me, on behalf of us both, rephrase the suggestion we’ve been making since the day we brought you here and turn it, as it should always have been, into a question. How about on Saturday we all head into Waco and take you car shopping. You can choose whatever kind of automobile you want.”
Pamela grinned. They’d offered to just get her a car, and she’d demurred, as Adam apparently had guessed, because she’d wanted them to say exactly what he’d just said.
Pamela had wanted to choose her own vehicle. She needed to pick one that felt like it was made for her. She had enough money of her own saved up that she could buy it herself, but she had a feeling she was going to lose that battle.
That didn’t really bother her. She was very happy with the way her men had finally come around. “That sounds like a wonderful idea. We’ll make a day of it.”
Now that they understood she did love them and that they needed to make her a partner in every way, she was confident things would be better from now on.
* * * *
“I think the Town Trust will be happy with the proposal,” Adam said. He pointed the car toward home. “The committee asking to include our fire department in the mutual assistance agreement will nudge us all to get that new fire house built.”
“The Town Trust will likely focus on buying new equipment first,” James said. “Our being available to assist with fires in Hamilton County m
eans we’ll need double our equipment and roster of volunteers. It’s not inconceivable we could face grassfires in the two counties—Hamilton and Benedict—at the same time. We’d need to be able to fulfill that obligation, should the crisis arise, because it’s more than possible it will.”
“No kidding. Mother Nature can be a bitch when she wants to,” Adam said.
They drove in silence for a time. Adam let his mind go over the events of the day. He’d like to make notes tonight so that when he attended the next meeting of the Town Trust, he’d be sure of his presentation. He looked at his watch then smiled.
“We won’t be late getting home,” he said. “That’s a bonus.”
“We should pick up some flowers for our woman before we get there,” James said.
“You read my mind.” Adam gave a quick look toward his brother and then refocused on the road. “We can stop in Gatesville. That way they’ll still be fresh when we give them to her.”
“Good idea.” James sat back in the passenger seat, his gaze directed out the window.
They’d regularly traveled together and were more than comfortable in silence. But even if they weren’t speaking, their thoughts would often be on the same page. “Did you notice the look on Pammy’s face this morning when we invited her to go car shopping and gave her carte blanche?”
“Yeah,” James said. “That was a moment. My heart filled with love and gratitude, and at the same time, I wanted to kick my sorry ass for being such a damn fool and not seeing what we were doing sooner.”
“We’d never treat each other or anyone else that way, so why the hell did we treat the one person who means more to us than anyone in the world that way? As if her opinion didn’t even matter!”
“You know how Mother sometimes goes off on a tirade, in Spanish, about her idiot sons?”
Adam chuckled. “I’m thinking the same thing. Mother is a lot smarter than we ever acknowledged.”
James chuckled. “Maybe we should get her some flowers, too.”
They lapsed into silence again, and James turned his gaze to the window. His brother enjoyed looking at the farms and fields as they drove along the countryside.
They’d entered Benedict County and had another half hour-until they arrived home, slightly longer if they were going to stop and get those flowers.
“What the…Adam, slow down! What’s that guy doing?”
Adam slowed the car to a crawl, his gaze seeking and quickly finding what his brother was looking at. Just ahead and to the right, on a piece of farm land that appeared to have been recently plowed, a battle was taking place. Adam stopped the car because he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
The combatants were a man on his tractor, armed with either a rope or a chain, and a tree stump. Adam wasn’t a farmer or a rancher, but even he knew enough not to try to pull out an old stump that way.
Hell, if that tree was an oak, that stump could be bigger and ornerier than anyone could know.
“Oh, hell!” Adam watched as the rope or chain—probably a chain—grew taut, and the front end of the tractor began to rise up off the ground.
A few people who had been standing back raised their arms and, from their gesticulations, were likely telling the man on the tractor to stop.
It looked as if the man listened because the front wheels of the tractor came down again. Adam sighed in relief and then swore when the man looked behind him then apparently put his foot on the gas, this time with force. The chain went taut again, and then the tractor’s front wheels once more left the ground—and this time it didn’t look as if they were going to come down.
“Oh, fuck!” Adam headed for the driveway, one hand pressing down the horn, and his heart in his throat. That tractor was an old one, not equal to the task, and didn’t have a cage or a roll bar to protect its idiot operator. He was watching a disaster playing out before his very eyes and felt sick—heart sick—for what he feared would happen next.
The people on the ground watching the horror play out didn’t even notice their approach. Their attention was all on the tractor that was now falling…backward. Adam stomped on the brake and threw the car into park—but didn’t turn the engine off.
They didn’t need to use words between them. Adam had more experience with trauma situations. He headed to the scene confident James would use his own key to open the trunk while Adam raced to the scene of screaming people with a man pinned under his now overturned tractor.
“Stop! We’re doctors!” Several of the witnesses turned and made way so that, when Adam slid to a stop himself, he was right there.
There was blood, and the patient was unconscious. Adam had looked at his watch the moment he saw the tractor go over and began counting.
It was called the golden hour—the period of time following a traumatic injury where the chances were best that prompt medical or surgical attention could save a life. He now had less than fifty-eight minutes. They were about twenty minutes away from the hospital in Hamilton—the one they’d just left.
That didn’t give them much time to stabilize this man and prepare him for transport.
James dropped Adam’s black bag, open, and then raced around to the other side of the tractor. Adam was aware of his brother squatting on the other side of the machine and knew he was trying to figure out the best way to extricate this man.
Adam left that to his brother and focused on his patient. “What’s his name?”
“Tommy—Thomas.” An older man knelt down, close but not too close. “My grandson. Damn fool, I told him not do it that way.”
“Does he have any medical conditions? Heart? Diabetes?”
“No. Nothing like that.”
“How old is he?”
“Nineteen.”
Lord have mercy. Adam saw the gash above Tommy’s knee, watched the bleeding, and reached into his bag for a tourniquet. He was able to tie the leg off above the cut, and the bleeding slowed to a mere trickle.
“Okay, people, listen up. We’re going to start to try and lift this bitch, but slowly. You, here, you there, and you, there.”
James’s voice, his presence, reassured Adam. Fifty-four minutes.
“I can help.”
Feminine, neither young or old, the voice held conviction.
“Good. You stand here, get a good hold. Now, this is vital. If either my brother or I tell you to stop, you must hold where you’ve lifted this thing to. If you don’t stop, or if you drop it, that could result in harming Tommy even more. Ready?”
They must have nodded because Adam sensed that his brother dropped to the ground so he could observe the other side of the patient.
Adam focused on his patient—or rather, that part of the patient under the tractor that he could see.
“Ready? Lift on three. One, two, three! Slowly…slowly…”
Adam saw there was no part of Tommy’s body on this side hung up in the machinery. “Clear.”
“Here, too. Okay, let’s get this away from him!” James must have joined the group. The tractor lifted and thank God it wasn’t a full-sized one! Adam moved and slid his hands under Tommy’s shoulders and, as gently as he could, eased the man away from the machine.
“Watch yourselves! Set it down, he’s clear!”
Then James was there, checking Tommy’s left side for injuries then quickly slipping on the blood pressure cuff. Adam grabbed his stethoscope and listened, his eye on the second hand of his watch. Forty-eight minutes.
“BP’s one hundred over seventy.”
“Heart rate at sixty and thready.”
“I’ll go call an ambulance,” a young woman said.
“There’s no time. We’ll drive there ourselves. We can take one more person with us,” Adam said.
“I’ll come.” It was the woman who’d helped lift the tractor. “He’s my boy.”
Adam nodded then carefully lifted his patient. It wasn’t ideal, but there was no time. The golden hour had now become the golden forty-five minutes. He looked up
. “Call Hamilton General. Tell them Dr. Jessop is bringing in a patient who may need immediate surgery and describe the accident. Visible heavy gash to the right thigh, close to the artery. Tell them we should be there in twenty minutes.”
“On it.” The man who said that looked young, but competent. Adam walked to the car, grateful when someone ran ahead and opened the back door. One thing about a Cadillac, it had a roomy back seat. He laid his patient down. His bag appeared, open, on the floor next to him. He felt the motion of two more people getting into the front seat. And then James was backing out and headed right back the way they’d just come.
Adam didn’t have to ask. James stepped on it, possibly setting a Jessop land-speed record as he raced them to all back Hamilton General Hospital.
Chapter Sixteen
Pamela waited until five thirty, and then she called her mother-in-law. She trusted Maria to have sound advice, and it pleased her very much that the advice she received was the same thing her heart was urging her to do. In fact, Maria offered to drive her there.
Pamela filled a thermos of fresh coffee to take with her. It didn’t take all that long to reach her destination. Maria pointed out Adam’s car in the doctor’s lot, so they knew the men were still there. At six forty-five p.m., she entered the emergency department of Hamilton General Hospital.
The woman at the desk had a pleasant smile. Pamela was used to working in a hospital environment. This emergency room, at this point in time, was blessedly quiet.
“Hello. I’m Mrs. Jessop. My husband, Dr. Adam Jessop, brought an accident victim in this afternoon. I was wondering if you could tell me if they’re still in surgery?” She’d been grateful that James had taken a moment to call her earlier. He’d explained what had happened and then mentioned that, since the matter had been critical, Adam and he were going to operate on the young man and that it might take a while. She’d known they had privileges at the hospital. It didn’t surprise her one bit that they’d want to see this situation through.
One Thanksgiving in Lusty, Texas Page 14
