by Cate Ashwood
“I have surgery in an hour.”
“Not anymore, you don’t. I’ll do the lap chole.”
“Gage, I’m fine.”
“Yeah, you’ve been saying that for two weeks. Which is how many days in a row you’ve worked, by the way. And I’m not buying it.”
“I’m fi—”
“Don’t you dare say it again. You’re done for the day. You can take tomorrow off too. In fact, I don’t want to see you back in here until next week.” He looked around the room. “Where the fuck is your coat?”
“I forgot it.”
“Get the fuck out of here. Go to J’s. Get a drink. Go home. Take a nap. Knit a goddamn sweater. Whatever you want to do, but you’re not setting foot back in that OR until next week.”
“I have procedures booked back-to-back,” I protested, and I felt like we were talking in circles.
“We will cover them.”
I exhaled, knowing there was absolutely no arguing with Gage, especially when he got like this. It was a waste of breath and a waste of time.
“Fine.”
I shut down my computer and walked out, Gage standing in the corner of my office to make sure I’d actually go. I’d seen Gage in a snit, and it wasn’t pretty. If they wanted me out of the hospital, I was going to go.
But I didn’t want to go home.
J’s was as good a place as any. Jane was always there—I’d been surprised she’d taken the night off for Thanksgiving—but even more than that, Jane poured a mean drink, and I’d never gotten around to taking Jackson there. It was one of the few places in Sawyer’s Ferry that wasn’t tainted by the memory of him.
Thankfully it was a short walk from the hospital. By the time I got there, my teeth were chattering.
“Logan Baker, I’m surprised your mother had enough sanity left after raising you to enjoy her empty nest,” Jane scolded, as I took a seat at the bar. “Where is your coat?”
“Why does everyone think I need a keeper?” I mumbled.
“Because clearly, you do. You of all people—”
“You know being cold doesn’t give you a cold.”
“How about hypothermia? Frostbite? Does being cold give you either of those?” She stared at me, one hand on her hip, and I couldn’t help but laugh.
“Fine, you got me there. When I start showing symptoms of either, I’ll seek treatment immediately.”
“Wouldn’t have to if you just wore your coat like a normal, sane adult.”
“Okay, Mom.” I cracked a small smile. “You and Gage should really start a support group for dealing with me.”
“You think we don’t already have one?” Her eyes softened. “We all just want what’s best for you. We care about you. Worry about your well-being.”
“I’m gonna take a guess you heard about Jackson, then.”
“Heard what?” She feigned ignorance, but I could see it written all over her face.
I rolled my eyes. “You don’t have to play dumb.”
She reached across the bar and covered my hand with hers. “Of course I heard, sweetheart. You live in a town with less than ten thousand people and very little that serves as news around here. Gossip like that flew through this place like a jackrabbit on fire.”
“Good to know.”
“Like I said before, everyone only wants you to be happy. Everyone who’s ever met you knows you deserve that.”
“I’m fine.” How many times had I said that in the last two weeks? I’d lost count days ago, but I figured eventually I’d actually mean it.
“I know you are. Of course you are. All I’m saying is that you’ve got people who love you, and maybe this guy wasn’t right for you, or maybe he was and he’ll come around. Either way, you’re meant to be happy, and I have faith that things are going to work out for you. You’re too good not to get your happily ever after.”
My throat was tight. I swallowed hard. I absolutely refused to break down over this, in public at least. There had been some less than proud moments in the privacy of my own home, but I needed to move on. It had been two weeks without hearing anything from him. He wasn’t coming back.
I knew that.
As though Jane knew I was about to lose it, she dropped the subject. She’d made her point anyway. “Hungry?”
“What day is it?”
Jane laughed. “Bud’s off today. His daughter’s in town, so he’s taking her to Ron’s place to pick out some souvenir carvings to take back home with her.”
“I can’t wait to hear Ron bragging about it next time I see him.”
“Yeah, if she buys more than three, we’ll be hearing about it for the next decade.” She grinned. “We got a special today on fish and chips. Reggie makes it better than anyone.”
“Okay, sure. I’ll have that.”
“Reg!” Jane called into the back. “Throw another cod on!”
Jackson
I’d thought about this for days, weighing out the pros and cons, and decided it was worth asking.
“Holden Prescott.” The voice came over the line, and even though I’d only met Holden a few times, the sound of him speaking still made my mind jump to Logan. I tucked away the wobbly feeling and focused on what I needed to do.
“Hey. It’s Jackson.”
“Hi, Jackson. What can I do for you?” I listened for a hint of animosity but didn’t hear any. There was no way Logan hadn’t told him what happened, no way he didn’t know all the details, but he sounded as professional as he had the first time I’d met him.
“I have a favor to ask you.”
“Since you’re calling me at the office, I’m guessing you want to be transferred to another surgeon?”
“Uh, no, actually. I know my surgical appointment was made when I came for the initial consultation, but I was hoping to find out if it could be scheduled for a time when Logan wouldn’t be at the hospital.” I knew there was a good chance he’d say no. I probably shouldn’t have bothered asking in the first place, but I reassured myself that I was avoiding any awkwardness at the possibility of running into him.
Sawyer’s Ferry was a small fucking place, and being in the hospital was too close for comfort if Logan was going to be working. I told myself it wasn’t a position I wanted to put him in, but the truth was, I wasn’t ready to see him either. In fact, never seeing him again would probably be the best thing for both of us.
I pushed away the thought and waited for Holden’s ruling.
“Ah.”
The sound was noncommittal, and I couldn’t tell what Holden thought about the whole thing. There was another beat of silence, and I wondered if he was waiting for me to plead my case. Well, if I needed to beg, I would. The surgery wasn’t an emergency. I could have waited and seen another doctor in New Mexico, but I’d already gone through the hoops I needed to to get it done here, so if that ship hadn’t sailed, I wanted to be on it.
“I know I’m putting you in an uncomfortable position, and you don’t owe me shit. I just—”
“No, I understand,” Holden said. “Gimme a second.”
I heard a couple of clicks, and then he was back.
“Logan’s out until next week, and I have a couple of procedures I could probably move around. Give me a few minutes, and I’ll call you back.”
I hung up with Holden, rabid with sick curiosity. I wanted more than anything to ask where Logan had gone, who he was with, but it was none of my fucking business, and the sick feeling I had thinking about him with someone else was completely fucking hypocritical. I’d tried to hook up with someone else the day after we broke up. I didn’t go through with it, but the intention had been there.
The sound of my phone ringing almost had me jumping.
“Hey, it’s Holden,” he said when I answered. “I think I’ve worked it out if you can be here today.”
“Today,” I repeated.
“Yeah. I know it’s short notice, but I have an opening tomorrow, and there are some tests we need to run before we get you into s
urgery. If you can be here later today for those, then we can fit you in tomorrow.”
I ran through the list of things I’d need to get in order, but there was nothing that couldn’t be done quickly. “Yeah, that shouldn’t be a problem.”
“Good. We’ll see you in a few hours. Just check in with the triage nurse in the ER when you get here. They can get you where you need to go, and then tomorrow we’ll need you here for 6:00 a.m. for preop and your surgery will be at ten. Nothing to eat or drink after midnight.”
“And Logan?”
Holden’s voice gentled. “We sent him home and threatened to give him nothing but colonoscopies for the next month if he comes back in before Tuesday. You should be in the clear.”
“Okay.” I cracked the first smile I’d managed in two weeks.
“Do you need a place to stay tonight?”
“No. Thanks, though. I’ll figure it out.” The more I thought about this, the worse the idea seemed. But Holden had already bent over backward to make accommodations for me, and I wasn’t about to back out now.
“Okay. Let me know if you do. We’ll get you in, do the procedure, and get you discharged before he knows you were ever here. You got someone who can drive you? Because you won’t be able to drive for a few weeks after the procedure.”
I ran through my list of people in my head, positive I could convince one of the guys to give me a ride home with the right bribe. Ollie or Spence would probably do it, and Witt definitely would, no questions asked. “Yeah, I can make that work.”
“Okay. I’ll set it up.”
“Thanks, Holden. I know your loyalty lies with Logan on this one, so I appreciate you doing this for me.”
“I think you’re both being stupid, but it’s not my place to say so.”
I huffed a weak laugh. “You just did.”
“Yeah, well, no one ever said I was good at keeping my mouth shut.”
There was never much traffic on the roads between Belcourt and Sawyer’s Ferry, and this time, there was next to none. We made it to the ferry terminal in record time, but the sail over felt like it took decades. The closer I got to town, the more knotted my stomach became.
Driving down Main Street, past the square where we’d spent Thanksgiving weekend, past the Starlight Diner and Pacey’s Pizza and even pulling into the parking lot of SFRH, I had flashbacks of memories so vivid they knocked the wind from me. Maybe because they were so fresh. Maybe because I’d spent two weeks burying the images. But everything came flooding back, and I decided that Holden could cut me open without anesthetic and it would hurt less than this.
What the hell had I been thinking?
And how fucked-up was it that I was more nervous to run into him than I was to go into surgery. Then again, I’d had surgery before. Major surgery. And the recovery had been easier than this.
“You sure you don’t want me to call him?” Witt stared at me from the passenger’s seat of my truck as we parked outside the only hotel in town. The ferry didn’t start running until after I was due at the hospital, so once I’d gotten off the phone with Holden, I’d scrambled to make arrangements.
Luckily, Witt had been available and happy to come along. Now, this was the third time he’d asked me about Logan since we’d left Belcourt, and I was starting to regret not asking Ollie to come instead.
“If I wanted him to know I was having surgery tomorrow, I woulda told him myself,” I said, immediately feeling like a dick for how harsh it had come out. I hadn’t meant to bite his head off, but the whole thing was starting to really get to me.
Maybe I should have just gone through the whole process over again once I arrived in Santa Fe.
“I don’t mean to be pushy about it.” Witt shook his head. “Obviously, it’s your call.”
“I know. And like I told you before, Logan and I are done. There’s nothing to say. Telling him about the surgery isn’t going to accomplish anything.”
I just needed to get in, get the bullet removed, and get out of town before I ran into Logan somewhere. How hard could it be?
Logan
Being at home, away from work, away from the people who normally kept my day-to-day life interesting, was boring as hell. Not for the first time, I thought about selling my place and moving somewhere closer to town. Sawyer’s Ferry might not be the hub of exciting activity, but it was livelier than acreage out in the middle of nowhere all by myself.
Maybe I could move closer to Gage and Holden, really cement my status as the third wheel.
My phone rang as I emptied the last of the water into the reservoir of the coffee maker. Leaning over, I grabbed my cell, my gaze sweeping across the SFRH number illuminated display.
I felt a tick of annoyance as I hit the green button to answer. They’d banished me from the property, and now they were calling for God only knew what. “Whatever it is, I’m sure Holden and Gage have it covered.”
There was a pause on the other end, and a weight settled over me as the thought that maybe something horrible had happened—images of the mass trauma from a few years back clouded my mind.
“Dr. Prescott… uh, he wanted me to call you with an update on today’s procedures.” Dawn’s voice was shaking, and I knew my instincts had been right. Holden never updated me on shit. Unless there was overlap with patients, information was exchanged on a need-to-know basis, and that happened during work hours. Since the patients scheduled for that day had been taken completely out of my care until further notice, I couldn’t figure out why the hell—
And then it hit me.
The cold sense of foreboding rushed through my veins.
“It’s regarding Dr. Prescott’s patient. He was schedule for a routine foreign body removal tomorrow.” She didn’t tell me the name. She didn’t have to. I knew it was Jackson, and the more she beat around the bush, the more worked up I was getting. “We were running the preop testing. Bloodwork all came back norm—”
“Get to the point, Dawn.” I didn’t mean to be so short with her. I could already hear the stress in her voice, but my heart was going to beat out of my chest if she didn’t get to the fucking point.
“The patient had a reaction to the contrast dye.”
“Motherfucker.” I slammed the heel of my hand against the counter. “Full code?”
“Yes.” Her response came out as little more than a whisper. “He was down for a minute, but he’s st—”
“Why the hell were you using contrast anyway?”
“Dr. Prescott thought there might have been some vessel—”
“You know what? It doesn’t matter. Tell Holden I’ll be there in ten minutes.”
I hung up and was halfway out the door in a second flat. Reactions were relatively rare, but there’d been cases where they had been fatal. Rage ran through me. If there was a history in his chart, someone was getting fucking fired. I didn’t care if it was Holden or Gage or Diana. Whoever was responsible was getting their ass kicked.
I fumbled with my keys, dropping them on the floor of my truck. My hands were shaking as I grappled for them by my feet, my fingers grazing them more than once before I finally got a grasp on them. It took me three tries to get them in the ignition, but once I did, I had the truck in gear and headed down the driveway almost faster than I could blink.
As I raced down the winding road, the snow-covered trees whipped past my truck. I’d never moved so fast, never hurried into town with such urgency, and never had I ever regretted living so far out more than I did at that moment.
As I drove, the distance between me and the hospital seemed to double, as though the road was stretching and I might never actually make it there. I added pressure to the gas pedal, urging my vehicle into the red as I rushed. Traffic was thankfully light, and I finally made it to SFRH.
I slammed on the brakes, parking askew in my space.
“For fuck's sake,” I growled as my seat belt caught me as I tried to climb out. With frantic hands, I stabbed at the button until it clicked loose, then
all but sprinted through the sliding doors into the ER.
“Where is he?”
Gage was there, his hands up and on me, holding me back before I’d made it halfway to the desk.
“He’s fine. These things happen.”
I could have strangled him.
“Did he code?” I barked.
“Well, yeah, but—”
“You’d just shrug it off if Holden’s fucking heart stopped?” I spat, glaring at him, with enough intensity that he dropped his hands. Employees and patients alike were staring, but I didn’t give a shit. The only thing that mattered was Jackson. Energy was exploding from my body, every cell bursting with the need to get to him.
“Room 215.”
Without another word, I hurried past him, ducking into the stairwell rather than riding the elevator. Taking the steps two at a time, I reached the second floor and almost knocked Craig over in the hallway as I barreled out the door. The moment he saw me, he nodded in my direction and stepped out of the way to let me past.
Room 215 was only a few doors down, and when I walked in, Nadia was there, her clipboard balanced in her lap and her gaze trained on Jackson.
“How is he?” I asked, the adrenaline that had been pumping through me for the last twenty minutes starting to wear off now that I could see his chest rising and falling steadily.
“He’s okay. Stable. His vitals are all good.”
I nodded, crossing the room to stand at his bedside, needing to be closer.
He looked the same as the last time I had seen him, maybe a little less tense, the signs of stress wiped away with sleep. He was still unconscious, but he’d be awake soon, and sore.
“I’ll be just outside if you need me,” Nadia said, resting her hand on my shoulder, then slipped out of the room, leaving me alone with Jackson.
I checked the monitors, my eyes scanning over every number there at least three times, making triple sure that Jackson was alive, that his heart was beating, that his lungs were drawing air. I needed to know that he hadn’t slipped away while I’d been oblivious to the fact that he’d been here in the first place.
