by Gwen Taylor
He wasn’t wanted. No one ever chose him.
But Nana and then Piper and Amy had mothered him, befriended him, and given him a place to belong. And the boy he had been had never forgotten their kindness in including him in their play or treating him like he mattered. The man he was wouldn’t ever forget either.
His jaw clenched. They needed him now, no matter recent history. He turned to Walsh. "They need protection. We'll need to cover both girls."
Walsh nodded, lowering his eyes and looking away. "Want me to get somebody to cover the hospital room?"
"Maybe tonight. I'm headed that way now. Got some questions for Amy and this,” he glanced at the registration and flicked the paper, “Jai Gilani."
"Right, boss."
Sean sent Walsh a pointed look. The man wouldn't stop calling him boss. Had started the day he'd made junior detective and hadn't stopped. If Piper hadn’t left, one of them would be in Walsh’s shoes… and one in his. How would that have worked? He shook his head, clearing it. What might-have-beens were no good to him.
“I’m gonna head out. You got this?”
Walsh grinned. "Yeah, boss. Send Piper my best. Tell her we miss her."
Sean gave a curt nod and walked the steep path back up to his cruiser. The hospital wasn’t too far. It felt like no time before he was standing at the automatic ER doors, his badge in his hand, his heart in his shoes. He wasn't sure what he'd find or whom. The Piper who had run into his arms. Or the Piper who had run from him. Either way, he wasn't prepared for the sight of her lying bruised and tethered to a monitor. His badge had gotten him in, and now he was contemplating how to get out. He didn't want to face her. He didn't want to know.
Coward.
Piper hadn't budged. Her hair had been washed, cleaned of the blood that had matted it to her head. Someone had loosely braided it over her left shoulder, making her look younger than her twenty-seven years, especially with her thinness, thinner than when she'd left Mirror Falls. And the purple shadows under eyes weren't just a recent look either.
Maybe her haggard eyes meant she knew something. Something that had to do with her getting pushed off the road. She was always doggedly determined to prove herself.
He let himself study her face.
She was still asleep, her eyelids quivering with quick darts. A whimper escaped her lips, and she moved her arm up over her face in defense. The motion pulled at the lines feeding her veins, and she woke with a moan, cradling her right arm. Her eyes adjusted, and she met his gaze with a smile that vanished as fast as it appeared. Warm to cold in seconds. A new record.
Unsure of his welcome, Sean moved to the foot of her bed. "How are you feeling?"
Her unbruised cheek grew red. She sat up, cringing and biting her lip. Signs she was about to lie to him. "I'm fine."
He sighed inwardly. Did he have to drag it out of her even now? "You don't look fine. I mean, not that you don't—"
"I know what you mean, Sean. Like I said, I'm fine." She gave him her best fake smile. He'd seen it often enough before she'd left to recognize its brokenness. The empty eyes, the aloofness, the slight edge of panic just at the corners like she'd been spooked and was going to bolt up and make for the exit any second. He was no expert on micro-expressions, but he could have sworn he'd seen fear cross her face when she woke. But she had composed herself, though she still looked ready to run.
As if to illustrate what he was thinking, she moved her feet in a restless motion and gripped the hospital blanket with a fierceness belied by her pasted-on smile. "You don't have to check on me. I...I'm sorry about...earlier. I didn't know."
"Know what?" His stomach knew what was coming. It was three years ago all over again. Only this time his heart had already heard it. And it had moved on.
"That wuh…” she struggled to move her lips slightly and shook her head, “we, that we weren't...weren't 'we' any… anymore."
She looked down, worrying her hands.
God, she looked helpless and still seemed unable to focus completely. He swallowed hard. It was difficult to remember the cold woman who had left him when he had the living memory of who she once was sitting so vulnerable and alone in front of him. The woman he'd pledged to marry, the woman who had once wanted him, their children, their life.
He swallowed again and looked at the empty chair beside her bed. She needed full-time attention. “You feeling okay? Where's Amy?"
"S’fine. The nurse made Amy leave. Ha." A brief glimmer shone in her eyes. "She was being too much like me."
He felt the need to protect her come over him like a visceral tug of his chest, propelling him toward her. He took a tentative step and saw another shiver draw in her shoulders. Trauma and exhaustion had taken their toll on her. She looked beaten.
As if she knew she appeared vulnerable, she sat straighter and gave a shrug of her thin shoulders. "The me I know, I mean. Guess I’m still sst...stubborn as ever." She shivered slightly, but the room was comfortably warm. Was she in shock?
“I’d wager it.” He met her eyes. Gone was the emptiness, replaced by that returned fear. What had her spooked if she couldn't remember? "Nothing coming back to you?"
"No, nothing." Her voice broke and he felt drawn to her side, his feet moving without his mind.
He handed her the bag he’d gotten from her SUV. "These things are usually temporary. I know you might not feel up to it, but do you remember anything about the accident?"
"Not really." She eyed the bag like she didn't recognize it. "I don't remember much of anything."
"Another car? A person?"
"I remember climb-climb-climbing” she tripped over her words and looked frustrated. “I remember climbing,” she stressed it this time, a hard puff of air enunciating the ‘g’ as she rolled the blanket in her lap, “out of a vehicle kinda and definitely wuh-walking through the woods... to that… the um… the party those kids were having. You know the rest." She put a hand to her temple and rubbed but dropped it as if too weak to hold up her arm. “S’headache rough.”
He looked at her pupils. Dilated. How much pain medication was she on?
She caught him staring at her. A blush spread up her neck, and her hands fisted in the blankets again. "My head hurts. Can we do this later?"
He scratched at his chin as hers quivered. "I'll get Amy." He needed to ask about the pain meds. She needed to scale back, maybe.
She reached out as if to stop him. "No. I'd rather be alone."
"Do you need anything?"
"No." She leaned forward. "Wait," she rifled through the bag and frowned, "where's my gun?"
"I've got it—”
The door opened, and Amy stepped in. She nodded at him, indicating he could leave. He tilted his head toward the entrance and finished answering Piper. “I'll leave it with Amy’s fiancé back at the hotel. Anything I can get you now?”
”I want to go home.”
Amy chimed in, “Home?"
"To the house."
Amy shook her head. "Oh, Piper, we sold the house when—”
"When what?" Another little shiver seemed to sweep over her.
He cringed, remembering how she’d struggled with giving up her parents’ house. All of this was going to break her over and over. He glanced at his watch, aware he was avoiding her eyes, avoiding looking at her as she realized what that meant.
"We put it on the market when you were going to get married." Amy's voice was monotone, robotic. "It sold right after you left."
The memory was painful to him, and he expected to see more hurt in her eyes, but her eyes were drooping. She was struggling to stay upright.
Something was wrong.
He tried to keep his voice level. “Amy, I think her pain meds need to be adjusted. She’s not doing well. Grab the nurses.”
Panic threatened to unleash emotions he’d tamped back down after she’d shown up.
As Amy rushed out, yelling for a nurse, Piper leaned back, not looking at him, drifting off and then sitting s
traight up like the effort took all her strength. “I’m fine, I think. Maybe...I’m going home.”
She looked down at her arm and pulled the IVs out.
“Piper! No!” He reached out to stop her, but she made a growling sound and held her hand out. She cried out at the pain but kept pulling, unhooking everything else attached to her and standing back up. Blood trickled out, traveling down her skin in slow scarlet lines.
“You ssstop! Ssstay away… away from me.” Her slurred words were slower than her hands. She pulled off the blood pressure cuff, and the monitor beeped over whatever she was saying about home.
Two nurses rushed in with Amy leading the way and stopped short at Piper’s warning hand. One skirted around her and Amy and turned off the monitor’s sound. Piper backed away.
"You're not well, Piper. Please…” He addressed the nurses. “I think she’s reacting to her pain meds. Symptoms of slurred speech and slowed reflexes, dilated pupils, look!”
Piper looked at him and then the nurses, ready to fight. “None of you can stop me. Now get my clothes. I’m going...” She seemed to forget where she was going and instead slipped the hospital band from her wrist and threw it on the floor. “I’m going wherever I please.”
“Piper, you can’t!” Amy grabbed at the back of Piper’s hospital gown. “I mean, not yet. Let me get you some clothes.”
One of the nurses moved towards Piper. "You can't leave, ma'am."
"Oh, yesssss I ccan." She swayed and the nurses looked at each other in alarm. They scurried around, checking bags and leads and the trash.
He heard one nurse questioning another. “Check her morphine?”
Oh God. Sean started toward Piper, something to help, but the nurses had her in the bed and readjusting her ports, checking her vitals. Piper’s eyes rolled back in her head, and it was all he could do not to let his legs give way.
Amy clutched his arm, talking a mile a minute in words he wasn’t processing as they were forced from Piper’s room and pushed into the hallway. More people came flying by them, and the curtain was pulled, effectively closing them off from what was happening. A code sounded overhead, and he suddenly knew. Overdose.
As if on cue, a nurse rushed by with a kit he recognized. It was just like the one he carried in his cruiser. Naloxone.
Amy leaned into him like she wanted to borrow strength. But he didn’t have any left. He felt weak. And helpless.
Minutes passed that seemed like stretched-out loops of him reliving the moment he knew something was wrong. Then a nurse came to him, gently shaking his shoulder.
“We found this in the trash.” She held up a syringe in a gloved hand. “Not one of ours. Everything goes in the sharps container, that’s standard protocol. This looks like street heroin if you ask me. See that?” She tilted the syringe, and a brown residue oozed down the plastic interior.
He nodded, taking the syringe with his sleeve. “Brownstone. We’ll take it from here. But if you could grab me a bag, that would be great.”
It was another attempt. There was no denying someone was out for Piper.
The nurse smiled at Amy. “She’s gonna be okay.”
Amy started weeping all over again and nodding, sucking back air through her nose like she was about to lose it. Sean absently rubbed her arm and pulled her to him. She sobbed quietly on his shoulder while he got himself together. Two times now. Twice he’d almost lost her. His heart berated him for not speaking up, for not saying sorry.
Everything between them seemed to be a hurry-up-and-wait stasis of unresolved issues. And once more, it had to wait.
He radioed in for a unit and texted Walsh what needed to be done.
How long it took for them to arrive and start sorting through things, he didn’t know. The whole night was a blur. He was on autopilot even now as they were interviewing the staff on the floor and sweeping the area.
Walsh came up behind him. “Hey, boss, bad news. We dusted the syringe. No fingerprints. And no one saw anyone other than the cleaning service come in here.”
Walsh sounded apologetic. He tried hard to please.
Sean wasn’t pleased though. His voice was sharp without meaning to be, but Walsh took it in stride. Sean tried to change his tone. “Did you check with the entire crew?”
Walsh gave him a sympathetic half-smile before looking down at his notes. “We’ve checked everyone. None of them have been on this floor. The best description we got was from someone visiting across the hall.”
“What’d you get?”
“Female, mid-thirties, blonde, about one-eighty, five-four, Caucasian.”
Which was about as nothing to go on as it got. He nodded to Walsh and continued pacing the waiting room, his gaze landing on the far corner of the room where Amy sat in a beige chair, shaking her foot and holding the hand of a well-dressed man, obviously the Jai she was going to marry. He was older than Amy, at least by a decade judging from the lines at his eyes.
Jai looked up and stared back, a defiant expression that wasn’t lost on Sean. It reminded him of the indignant look of a man feeling the eyes of the world on him. Sean gave him a curt nod and went to look through the small window in the door.
“Hey, Sean?” Amy's strained voice was trying too hard to be jovial.
Just like her sister. Always hiding what was really going on inside.
He glanced back. "Yeah?"
Amy patted the seat on her left. “Come sit.”
“I’ll stand, thanks.” He had to keep moving. It was the only way to feel he was doing something when he wasn't, when he should be out working her case. But he couldn't be in two places, and right now, whether it made sense or not, his place was here. Waiting.
Amy rose. She came and stood beside him. “Then I’ll join you. Waiting makes me so nervous.”
A code sounded overhead, and Amy clutched his arm.
He guided Amy back to her chair. “She’s going to be fine. The nurse told me Piper won’t have any lasting damage.”
A tremor ran through him at the images that wouldn’t stop battering his mind. Piper’s eyes blank to the world, her limp body on the bed, the nurses scrambling to save her life. He winced and noticed that Amy saw it. She squeezed his hand.
“God was taking care of her. That’s all there is to it.” She gave him another squeeze. “And so were you. I know you love her. I mean, I know you care for her and would protect her. I blame myself for not staying by her side. I just can't believe some...some...criminal tried to kill my sister in broad daylight in a hospital room of all places, and no one saw anything.”
Sean swallowed. Amy might not blame him, but he blamed himself. If something happened to Piper...
"Someone wants my sister dead," Amy said it and looked down at her hands and then away. "Who would hurt her?"
"Can’t say. We have everyone on it, though." He shook his head. "Maybe we're dealing with—"
The room's phone rang. Amy turned and rushed over to the desk where the patient advocate took the call and wrote something on her memo pad. All the people waiting stopped what they were doing and sat unmoving like they were on pause. When the advocate hung up the phone, no one seemed to breathe until she called out.
“Piper Adams’ family?”
A long exhale had Amy's words running together. “That’s us. I’m her sister.”
“She’s alert, blood pressure’s back to normal. She’s got some mild edema, a little swelling in her face, but you can see her one at a time if you’d like. She’s in room four, corner room on the right behind the curtain.”
“Thank you so much.” Amy rushed back to her seat and hugged her stoic fiancé. "She's out. Thank God. She's okay."
An uncomfortable third-wheel feeling had Sean shifting his feet. “I’ll get going, then.”
“No, stay. Sit with Jai. I’ll come back and tell you how she is." Amy started forward and then came back. "Who's watching her tonight? I have to go sign some papers with Jai and his lawyer. I’ll probably get back late, but I
’ll come straight here and spend the night.”
Jai stood behind Amy and put his hands on her shoulders. “I will stay with you, love.”
“No, you need your rest. You'll have to pick up the bridesmaid dresses first thing in the morning and go to the DMV and touch base with the caterer and get our license." Her shoulders slumped. "It's too much. Can we even do this now?"
“I’m not sure your sister will be able to be your maid of honor at this point. Maybe we need to postpone. The wedding can wait. We can put it off a few days if we must. Family comes first.”
Amy’s eyes filled with tears again. “Have I told you how much I love you?”
“Only every day.”
The corny reply would normally irritate him, but he caught the tender look that passed between the two, and a tightness gripped Sean's chest, despite how cliche his brain thought their little exchange was.
"I'll stay." The words surprised him. He had intended to go, join the investigation, let someone else stand guard, but now he found himself reluctant to leave. Reluctant to let a stranger see to Piper's safety, even if she didn't want him there.
Amy gave him a strange look, like she was trying to gauge his motives, his feelings. She and Piper were both naturals at reading people and situations. That gift had helped him many times as Piper's partner. But having Amy turn that skill on him made him wary of his movements, carefully avoiding what Piper had called his tells.
Amy frowned. "You think that's a good idea?"
Jai gently pushed her shoulders, turning her toward the doors. He gave Sean a sideways glance that may have been sympathy and planted a kiss on Amy's temple. Her jaw relaxed, and Jai pushed her closer to the entrance. "Go, love, see for yourself that she's okay, then get some rest. You've been here all day. You look exhausted, and I can't have my bride unwell."
