“I’ll...be good.”
As if he could do much else, she thought irritably. Why was she even bothered by this? Right now he was a helpless slab of meat with a devilish look in his eyes. She’d seen that from eighty-year-olds...although they tried to have the male nurses take care of these things.
“I could call a man to do it.”
“Said I’d be good.” He set the coffee on the table. “What am I gonna do?”
Exactly, she thought. He was utterly helpless, which gave her a momentary flash of pleasure. Luke had never been helpless. Never. Her mind suddenly served up a smorgasbord of the ways she could tease him with a sponge bath, drive him out of his mind the way he had so often driven her. Turn him into a helpless sex slave. The image amused her so much that she was able to laugh at herself, even as heat blossomed between her legs.
The knock on the door surprised her. She wasn’t expecting anyone at this hour, but there was Jack, safety bar and tool kit in hand.
“That was quick,” she said.
He shrugged and gave her a shy smile. “I heard about the guy. Didn’t figure it could wait long.”
“I really appreciate this,” she assured him as she let him in.
“Why do you have to take care of him?” Jack asked as he headed down the hallway to the bathroom. She wasn’t surprised he knew where it was since he’d replaced the tile for her last year.
“Do you see a convalescent home within a few hundred miles? He can’t be moved yet.”
“So how’d you get to be it?”
Good question, she thought. “Because I’m a sucker?”
He astonished her by turning sharply, looking angry. “Don’t say things like that about yourself. You’re a nice lady.”
His vehemence surprised her so much that she nearly stepped back. Jack usually seemed so calm and pleasant. But then his face smoothed and he shifted the bar so he could enter the bathroom.
“I used to know Luke,” she said finally. “It seemed like the right thing to do for a friend.”
“Like I said, you’re a nice lady. Where you want this bar? By the commode or in the shower?”
“He won’t be taking showers while he’s here. Just by the commode. To help him move in and out of the wheelchair.”
“He’s pretty messed up?”
“Seriously messed up.”
“Too bad. This won’t take long.”
She was glad, actually glad, to head back to Luke. Something about Jack disturbed her this morning. He didn’t seem quite like himself. But then everything in her life felt strange right now, so why should Jack be any different?
Luke had finished the iced coffee and asked for more when she got back. At the moment she was glad just to be busy. Everything was off-kilter, and ordinary tasks suddenly felt like a lifeline to sanity.
Luke was back in her life, however temporarily; Jack seemed weird; and God knew she didn’t feel at all like herself.
Jack finished up in about twenty minutes. He had her test the bar to her own satisfaction, leaning her full weight on it.
“Great job,” she told him.
He smiled shyly. “It’s easy.”
“Maybe for you.”
That made him beam. “You got a vacuum? I’ll get up the dust.”
“I can take care of it. The store must need you back.” And she needed him out of here, though she wasn’t sure why. Ordinarily she didn’t mind having Jack around when he was doing a job for her, but today...today something was different.
He looked surprised but finished packing his tools and headed out. She’d get a bill from the store at the end of the month, so he didn’t have to even pause for payment. She was relieved to close the door behind him.
“What was that?” Luke asked.
“My handyman, Jack. I had him put a safety bar in the bathroom for you.”
“Sorry. Sorry for imposing. Causing trouble.”
“It’s not your fault.” She could say that much with truth. And at least he seemed to be growing steadily more coherent. Maybe there wouldn’t be any long-term effects from the concussion. God, she hoped not. Mild concussions had been known to mess people up for years or longer.
Then a thought occurred to her. “Luke? Have you worked with Mike Hanson for long?”
“Five, six years. Why?”
“I just wondered.” Because he’d been the only other person out there when Luke fell, and Luke had initially claimed he’d been pushed. “Do you remember any more about what happened?”
“No.”
“Well, that’s common enough, to forget what happened right before.”
“I hear. I guess I stirred up a mess of trouble, saying I was pushed. Wonder where that came from.”
“The concussion,” she said with more surety than she felt. “People can say and do a lot of crazy things.”
“How do you know what’s real?”
She managed a smile for him. “By what doesn’t change.”
“Not true,” he said, his face drooping. “Life changes. All the time.”
“You’re right. It does.” And sometimes that was its saddest part.
* * *
Changing the sheets and sponging him down didn’t prove that difficult physically, but for her it was sheer hell psychologically. She lowered his leg so she could roll him onto his side and sponge his back. She didn’t care if the sheets got damp, but beneath them was a foam pad, what they sometimes called an egg crate, to help prevent pressure sores. That definitely couldn’t get wet.
So she pulled out a rubber sheet, and once she had carefully rolled him to the side, she tucked it beneath him to catch any water. It was then she saw all the bruises that covered his back. She couldn’t withhold a sound of distress.
“What’s wrong?” He was starting to sound pretty groggy from the pain pill.
“Your back is a mess. You must have rolled when you tumbled. Just bruises. Let me know if I hurt you.”
“You already did that,” he muttered.
She had to resist an urge to snap at him, especially since she was sure he wouldn’t have said it at all if he weren’t full of
