He waved a hand, the sapphire on his pinky flashing in the midday light. The edges of his ever-present smile frayed. “Well, during the excitement last night—” he churned his hands then shrugged sheepishly “—they sort of came down in the scrum. Your aunts thought it best to get them out of the way.”
Kaylie analyzed that and came to the conclusion that whatever had happened the night before had involved a certain amount of violence, which explained why the original nurse had walked out and why she was here at Chatam House, staring at an injured, sleeping hockey player. The idea still did not quite compute. She tilted her head and wondered what was so compelling about this particular patient.
That he was handsome could not be denied, despite the faint slanting scars on his chin and high on his right cheek. Thick, pale gold hair formed a shaggy frame for a rectangular face with large, even features, the eyes set deeply beneath the slashes of incongruently dark brows. The sooty shadow of a beard that hadn’t seen a razor in some days colored his square jaws, cheeks and chin, calling attention to wide, surprisingly soft lips that might have looked feminine in a less aggressively masculine face.
How was she, a pediatric nurse, supposed to deal with a man like this?
Kaylie almost turned around and walked away right then, but her aunts would not have asked this of her if the need were not acute. They had approached Kaylie immediately after worship service that morning, asking her to stop by the mansion at her earliest opportunity. Some tinge of desperation in that request had made Kaylie drop off her father at his—their—house and drive straight here. Only then had she learned of the aunts’ guest and his need for nursing care. She had been shocked, to say the least.
Known for their good works, the Chatam sisters, triplets in their seventies, often opened their historic antebellum mansion to family and family connections, but this was the first time in Kaylie’s memory that they had ever taken in a complete stranger. His situation must be desperate, indeed. She turned to Aaron Doolin once more.
“What is his condition?”
“Drugged,” he replied flippantly.
Kaylie just looked at the man. Of course Gallow was drugged. Obviously so. It was nearly one o’clock in the afternoon, and the man was sleeping as soundly as if two people were not standing in his room talking. She understood that the doctor had been called in during the night to sedate the patient. Such a heavy dose indicated that the poor man had been in great physical distress.
Doolin cleared his throat and got serious. “You want to know about his injuries. Uh, let’s see. Stevie broke his leg and arm. The arm was pretty bad. That and the ribs is why they’ve strapped it to his chest that way, and naturally it had to be his left arm because he is left-handed.” Doolin grinned and added proudly, “One of the few truly left-handed goalies in the league.”
“Is that good?”
The agent goggled at her. “Good?” Shaking his head at her obvious ignorance of all things hockey, he sent her a pitying look. “That, Miss Chatam, is a very good thing, indeed. Especially if said lefty is a big brute with reflexes quick as a cat and the eyesight of an eagle.”
A brute. His own agent called him a brute. She could just imagine how her father, a retired pastor, would feel about that. Hub Chatam considered his youngest son’s participation in pro rodeo barbaric. Chatam men, he asserted firmly and often, were called to higher purposes than mere sport. Chatam men were lawyers and pastors, doctors and professors, bankers and titans of industry who used their wealth and talents for the good of others in the name of Christ. That Chandler chose to dismiss his father’s convictions was a great bone of contention within the family. No doubt, Hub would hold an even less favorable opinion of a pro hockey player, though of course a boarder and patient wasn’t the same thing as a son.
“Sorry,” she muttered to the agent. “Not much of a sports fan. My field is medicine.”
“Medicine. Right. Gotcha. About his condition…Let’s see…Broken bones. Two in the right leg, two in the left arm, four ribs, collarbone. I think that’s it. Internally, there was a lacerated liver, a bruised pancreas, busted spleen…” Doolin tsked and shook his head. “I don’t know what all.”
Kaylie nodded in understanding. “Concussion?”
“Um, unofficially, he got conked pretty good.”
Unofficially? “Was there brain damage?”
Aaron Doolin reared back. “No way! He’s sharp as ever!” The agent smiled. “Mouth certainly works. He’s singeing my ears regular again, but hey, that’s what I get paid for. Right?” He chuckled, only to sober when it became obvious that she wouldn’t join in with anything more than a weak smile.
Stephen Gallow sounded like both a brute and a bully, but who was she to judge such things? Her one concern should be the health of the patient. “What about his lungs?” she asked. “Were they punctured?”
“Nothing said about it.”
“They would have mentioned something like that,” Kaylie told him. “Trust me.”
Nodding, Aaron looked to the bed. “Kid’s got plenty to deal with as it is.”
No doubt about that, Kaylie mused, thinking of her father, who had suffered a heart attack some six months earlier. Compared to all this man had been through, that seemed almost minor, though Hub continued to behave as if his life remained in immediate danger. She wandered closer to the bed.
Stephen Gallow moaned and twitched, muttering what sounded like, “Nig-nig.”
Doolin slid his hands into his pants pockets. “Must think he’s talking to Nick.”
“Nick? Who’s that?”
“Uh, old buddy.”
“He’s dreaming, then.”
“Yeah, yeah. Does a lot of that since the accident.” Doolin churned his hands again, in what seemed to be a habitual gesture. “The trauma of it all, I guess.”
“He’s suffered some very serious injuries,” Kaylie murmured.
“You’re telling me! Man, I thought he’d bought it, you know?”
“How long ago was the accident?”
“Nine, ten days.” He looked at his client, and for the first time the mask of beaming bonhomie slipped, showing genuine concern. “Ask me, he oughta be in the hospital still.”
Kaylie smiled to herself. Patients and family were often of that opinion, but home could be a safer, more restful environment than the hospital.
“But you know how it is,” Doolin went on. “A big sports star draws attention that hospitals don’t particularly appreciate, and when said sports star is trying to keep a low profile…Well, that’s why we’re here, obviously.”
Kaylie furrowed her brow at that. “You mean he’s hiding out here at Chatam House?”
The agent licked his lips warily before admitting, “You could say that.”
“From who?”
“The press, mostly.”
“But
