knew all of this already, but she didn’t mind having Dr. Trent repeat it. Somehow it was more calming hearing it in his measured, steady voice than from inside her own head.
Then came the question she had half expected and had been dreading.
“Bri? Does he have anyone around here? Because he’s going to need help, but mostly he’s going to need some pretty close observation. Of course, we can keep him hospitalized....”
The idea of Luke putting up with being stuck in a hospital would have been funny under other circumstances. Heck, he was going to be upset enough about the limitations his injuries were going to cause. He was not good patient material.
“There’s just me,” she said quietly. “We’re divorced.”
Trent grimaced. “Not good. Although I guess that’s why he kept demanding we get you. I don’t think he knows what decade it is right now. Well, I can sure understand if you don’t want the responsibility. Just let me know so I can make arrangements after we find out how that leg is.”
Maybe, she thought bitterly, as she stood staring at Luke, she should call Barbara to come watch him.
Bitterness aside, though, something stronger tugged at her. At last she gave in with a sigh and sat on the one chair beside the bed. She tried to focus on the steady drip of the IV into his uninjured arm, but her eyes kept straying back to his face. God, he was a mess! That cheek alone was going to cause him some huge pain.
Sheila came in, nodded to her and checked his vitals. Then she pulled out an ice pack, flexed it to activate it, and rested it gently on his cheek. “Twenty minutes,” she said.
“I’ll take care of it.”
“You haven’t eaten, have you?”
“I just got off shift.”
“Then let me bring you a tray from the cafeteria. They have a passable turkey breast tonight. Potatoes or rice?”
“Potatoes, please. And coffee. Looks like I’m going to need it.”
“You should have heard him when they brought him in. Cussing a blue streak. He said somebody pushed him, but the other guy who was up there with him said no one else was around. Then he kept demanding to see you. He said he had to warn you. I mean, man, he was out of it.”
Bri listened, her heart growing heavy. She knew even mild concussions could cause all sorts of disorientation. It wasn’t unusual for a concussed patient who was conscious to ask every thirty seconds where they were and what had happened. But claims of being pushed? A need to warn her of what? That seemed to go beyond the ordinary confusion.
Rubbing her forehead, trying to ease the beginnings of a tension headache, she felt the first real fear. Earlier she had been concerned, but not afraid. Looking at him, however, she thought of all the deficits that could arise from even a so-called mild concussion. Sheila’s description of his state when he arrived hadn’t reassured her at all.
She wished his eyes would open, that he’d look at her, recognize her and be all right. Bad as things had gotten between them, she wished him no ill. None at all. But she had never expected to ever again fear for him.
Unsettled, she wanted to get up and walk outside, at least for a few minutes, to gather her increasingly scattered thoughts and emotions. Much as she tried to tell herself that she cared about him the way she would have cared about anyone she had known, the response inside her told her she was lying.
There were threads left tying her to him and the past. She had thought them cut, but they remained. She felt as if she were on a pinnacle, suddenly surrounded by the abyss of all that she had thrown out of her life. The pain remained, but something else did, too.
This was not good.
Sheila popped in with a dinner tray and Bri thanked her. She glanced at the clock above the bed and saw that the ice pack needed to remain another five minutes. She wondered what was taking X-ray so long. She wondered if she would be able to eat.
She grabbed the coffee first. Sheila had brought her two covered cups full. She downed them both, then took a stab at the turkey, potatoes and broccoli. The broccoli was a little soggy from being in the steam tray, but otherwise Sheila was right about it being a passable meal.
She paused to remove the ice pack from Luke’s cheek and stood for a minute, just looking down at him. The bruise was still spreading, distorting his face even more. It looked as if he was going to be eating through a straw, she thought.
That little flicker of anger that had started earlier returned, but it was not anger at him. All of it arose from seeing him laid low like this. In the years she had known Luke, he’d always been a powerhouse, always on top of things, always independent. Maybe that had been part of what had bothered her, that he had never seemed to need her in any way. It wasn’t as if she wanted him to be dependent on her, but it would still have been nice to feel needed in some way. Essential.
Wow, that was a heavy thought. She pulled back from the bed and picked up the tray again. She’d wanted to feel essential? Wasn’t that a crock. She liked her own independence and had respected his. Right?
Staring down at the tray, she wondered what was going on inside her. Last week she had yelled at him for always being gone during their marriage. Now tonight she was thinking he hadn’t made her feel important enough?
Whoa. Being around him again wasn’t going to be good for her unless she could find a way to avoid thoughts like these. At this late date, it struck her as just more rationalization, anyway. Since the relationship was over, it was pointless to invent new reasons for its failure.
Her appetite gone, she took the tray out and put it on the meal cart rack in an empty slot. Catching sight of Sheila, she asked, “Who brought Luke in? There was someone working with him?”
“Yeah. I didn’t recognize the guy.”
“Where is he now?”
“He said he had to go back and pick up tools he left because he was in such a rush to get Luke down here.”
Made sense, Bri thought. Just as she reentered the cubicle, Dr. Trent appeared. “Good news. We can wrap the leg—the break won’t need any pins. You want to wait outside? With any luck, we’ll have the cast on him before he starts to wake up.”
And then what? Bri wondered as she went to the small waiting area. He’d stay overnight here, but then what?
Gloom filled her. Her mind scrambled around, trying to find other ways to manage this, but in her heart of hearts she knew she was going to wind up taking care of him, at least until he was ready to travel.
Luke Masters was going to move back into her life.
* * *
Luke was starting to wake when they wheeled him out of the bay. Bri followed, watching him stir and groan.
“You’re sure the concussion isn’t bad?” she asked Trent again as she passed him.
“Do a neuro on him if you want. Pupils are normal and reactive. All other reflexes are fine. He’s just a little addled at the moment, but like I said, we’ll keep him under observation tonight. The more
