First Lady (45 page)

The men guarding the door straightened at the sight of the President and barely had time to step aside as Devlyn whirled past them like a mini-tornado, opening the hospital door so violently that it slammed shut behind her.

David, who was only two seconds behind her, remained outside the room. He ordered everyone to stay clear except in the event of an emergency and began quietly conferring with Lauren’s doctors.

Startled, Lauren looked up to find Devlyn bursting in. She hadn’t expected Devlyn to be here this soon or looking this distraught. She was in bed, but still wearing her slacks under her mint green hospital gown, having only been brought to this room a few seconds ago.

Devlyn ran up to the foot of the bed and stopped dead in her tracks to stare at her partner, her breaths coming in quick bursts. A white bandage stood out starkly against the summer-tanned skin of Lauren's forehead, and she was sporting the beginnings of a nasty black eye. Blood still stained the side of her face and chunks of her hair were sticky with it.

Sheepishly, Lauren smiled at her, embarrassed at the tremendous fuss the hospital was making. She’d skipped the emergency room all together, going right to a private room where an entire team of doctors had been waiting. They had ordered about a million tests that were due to start at any moment. And all she wanted to do was go home and wash the remnants of blood from her hair, neck, and face and collapse into bed. “You look worse than I do,” she said, not unkindly.

“Are—?” Dev rubbed her eyes, making very sure that what she was seeing was real.
 
She’s breathing. She’s talking. Devlyn reached out and grabbed hold of a nylon-covered foot, squeezing gently, feeling chilled but living skin beneath her fingers. “Are you all right?”

Lauren frowned. Devlyn looked as though she might pass out. “I’m okay, honey, really.” Her gaze softened with sympathy. Thinking of Devlyn in the hospital last year still filled her with a helpless, panicky feeling that made her throat close and her eyes sting. “You wouldn’t believe the headache I have. They’ll know if for sure if I have a concussion after some more tests.” She reached out for Devlyn’s hand. “Darlin’?”

“What else?” Dev asked, her voice grim and tight. She remained at the foot of the bed, her entire body tensed as though readying herself for a punch to the gut.

Lauren blinked and lowered her hand, stung and confused by Devlyn’s implied rejection. “Okay. They said I still need a few stitches and something called a live-skin cell patch for scarring, and a CAT scan to rule out anything else.” She sighed, wishing they’d been able to give her something for her throbbing head. “Other than that—” She paused as her partner’s skin went from ashen to pale green. “Devlyn, honey?”

Dev bent at the waist and let out a low groan as the stress and heart-wrenching worry caught up with her all at once. Her knees turned to water and hit the floor with a loud thump.

“Devlyn!” Lauren’s eyes went round as saucers and she scrambled to the end of the bed, reaching for Devlyn but not quite making it in time. She jumped out of bed, fighting the temporary vertigo the action caused and ignoring the sharp sting as her IV was torn from her hand. Lauren was at Devlyn’s side just in time to steady the taller woman’s shoulders as she turned her head and vomited all over the hospital floor.

Lauren hugged Devlyn from behind and murmured words of support and comfort as the President heaved out her stomach’s contents. “It’s okay, baby. I’m so sorry to have worried you like this.”

“It— it’s not your fault,” Devlyn said fiercely, between retchings.

“Madam President?” David’s disembodied voice sounded through the door.

“We’re fine, David,” Lauren called back, closing her eyes against the pain she caused herself by raising her voice. The words were still echoing in her head. “We just need a minute.”

Dev began to dry heave.

“You’re sure?” David questioned with renewed urgency.

“I’m sure,” Lauren answered. “No one comes in until I say so, David.”

The relief in his voice was palpable. “Yes, ma’am.” David nodded to himself, pathetically grateful that Lauren wasn’t seriously hurt, but also that she was able to reassure and comfort Devlyn now. It was, he knew, his friend’s nightmare come to life, and finding out that Lauren was relatively unharmed now couldn’t erase the damage that had already been done.

When Devlyn was finished, Lauren pressed her lips against the back of Devlyn’s head and whispered a tender “I love you.” She tried to get up and go for a towel, but Devlyn reached blindly for her, holding in her place.

Dev turned in Lauren’s arms, hugging her with all her might. She began to cry. “Thank God, you’re okay. Thank you, thank you,” she repeated over and over, bringing tears to Lauren’s eyes. Dev cried for a long time as they sat there together on the cold hospital floor until she felt as though she’d purged a good portion of the misery from her system.

Lauren yelped a little when Devlyn gave her another good squeeze.

“God.” Devlyn instantly pulled back and cupped Lauren’s cheeks. She explored her face with her fingertips, and worried eyes took in every square inch of her Lauren that they could. “I’m hurting you. You should be in bed!” She didn’t think it was possible, but when she saw Lauren’s hand, which was bleeding from the violent removal of her IV, she felt even worse.

“I’m not badly hurt, honey,” Lauren explained, carefully scratching around the bandage on her forehead. “Are you okay?”

Dev didn’t even try to lie. She shook her head “no” and grabbed a tissue from a stand near the foot of Lauren’s bed.
 
With careful hands, she wiped away the slender trail of blood that had trailed down Lauren’s ring finger and painted her wedding ring.

“Don’t worry,” Lauren said kindly, tugging gently on a strand of silky, dark hair. “You will be.”

Wordlessly, Devlyn scrubbed a little harder, trying to remove the blood.

Finally Lauren had to pull her hand away. “Honey,” she drawled quietly, “it’s okay. I can clean it at home.”

Dev tucked her hands under her armpits, unsure of what she should do with them. Then her gaze strayed to the stinky pool on the floor next to her. “Damn, I’m sorry about your room.”

Lauren wrinkled her nose. “At least it wasn’t on me this time, right?”

Dev smiled weakly, recalling a very embarrassing incident involving food poisoning and Lauren being in the wrong place at the wrong moment. “True. Are you really okay?”

“I could be brave and lie.”

“I didn’t,” Devlyn reminded her, reaching back and pulling the blanket off Lauren’s bed to cover the vomit.

“I know.” Lauren sighed and closed her eyes. She didn’t want Devlyn to worry, but she wasn’t sure how much longer she could stay standing. “Everything hurts. I feel like warmed-over shit.”

“Ugh.” Dev wiped her mouth with the edge of the blanket. “Don’t make me barf again.”

They both laughed weakly, but more from relief than humor.

“You know how I feel about doctors, Devlyn.” Her eyes flicked around the room and the horrors of childhood filled with melancholy visits to the hospital to watch over her dangerously depressed mother rushed to the forefront of her mind. “I don’t want to be here.” For the first time today, she sounded very much like a scared little girl.

“I know. C’mon.” Devlyn helped her back into bed, taking time to tuck the sheet around her partner’s legs. She pulled a chair over to the bedside and stared down at Lauren with loving eyes, struggling to remember anything she’d ever heard about head injuries. She traced the edges of Lauren’s bandage with a touch so light, Lauren wasn’t sure she felt it at all. “Were you unconscious?”

Lauren sank deeper into the bed and closed her eyes as she thought. She realized very quickly she didn’t have much idea of what had happened at all. “Outside the car, I think I fainted at the sight of my own blood. I can’t tell for sure what happened inside the car. I… I was confused. I got my bell rung, Devlyn.”

“Mmm…” Devlyn’s brow creased. “You need to have more tests.” Dev took her hand and gently stroked Lauren’s palm.

“I just need you.”

“You have me and you get more tests. It’s like winning the lottery only with breasts and needles.”

Lauren opened one eye and rotated it in her partner’s direction. “Are you sure you didn’t get hit on the head?”

“I’m not sure of anything. I—” Dev’s face crumpled and she began to cry again, sobs racking her entire body. “I w— would have rather it happened to me tha— than you.
 
I love y—you.”

“Oh, Devlyn…” Lauren didn’t know what to say. It had all happened so fast that she hadn’t really had more than a moment or two think about how Dev would react to her accident. Yes, intellectually she understood this would be hard for the older woman. But nothing could have prepared for the low keening sound that filled the room and tore through her heart like hot blades. Or for the outpouring of raw, unreasoning fear painted across her lover’s face in scalding tears. “I’m okay. I promise,” she said, feeling as helpless as she ever had.

Dev shook her head violently, and she wiped clumsily at her wet cheeks. “No. No. No! You don’t know that yet.”

“Yes, I do, darlin’. I can tell.”

“No!”

“Yes, Devlyn. Believe it.”

Dev shook her head again, crying even harder. “I can’t!” Miserably, she hugged herself in mute despair, giving up any pretense of restraint or control. She couldn’t bring herself to even try to hold it together.

Lauren’s heart was breaking, but all she could think to do was to tell Dev that she loved her and reassure her that things truly would be all right. There were several stops and starts before Devlyn’s tears tapered off.

“Better?” Lauren asked, knowing that a good cry could sometimes go a long way.

“I’m not sure,” Dev answered, still seeming very emotionally adrift.

“How are Carol and the agents?” Both men were relatively new to the White House beat, and she hadn’t had a chance to get to know either one of them.

Devlyn didn’t answer for a moment as she tried to remember what David had relayed from the short phone update on the even shorter car ride from the White House to the hospital. She hadn’t paid much attention past hearing that Lauren was stable and being examined. “I think I- I don’t know about the driver, he’s being attended to now. Carol and the other agent were unharmed.”

Lauren let out a relieved sigh. “Thank goodness.”

“Shit!”

Lauren jumped at the unexpected outburst.

“I haven’t given them a second’s thought.” Dev swallowed thickly. “What in the hell is wrong with me?”

Lauren proceeded very carefully, but her voice didn’t waver. “This is about more than the accident, darlin’.” She held Dev’s hand tightly.

“I…” Dev felt like she could cry forever and she had trouble speaking, but she tried her best. “Maybe. I shouldn’t be falling apart. I shouldn’t be but…” She sucked in a quick breath, afraid she might start to cry again.

“Shh… Okay, okay,” Lauren soothed. “We’ll deal with it all. Just one thing at a time, okay?”

Dev sniffed a few times. “I’m sorry—”

“Please, stop saying that.” Lauren cupped Dev’s chin.

“You need to get your stitches.” Angrily, Dev wiped at her own eyes again. “Not me being a baby. I’m sorry. The only reason the doctors aren’t swarming all over you is because I’m in here and they’re afraid to come in.”

“They’re not swarming all over me because I have a tiny cut and a bump on the head and nothing more. And I told them not to come in, remember?”

“You need your doctors,” Devlyn insisted stubbornly. She was still shaking.

To Lauren’s eyes, Devlyn had never looked more lost. She suspected that the unrelenting pressure and stress that Devlyn had placed on herself lately had already left her emotionally tapped out. A white
Toyota
sedan had turned out to be the straw that sent the camel sprawling. “There is something I need,” Lauren insisted, pointedly not letting go of Devlyn’s hand. “It’s what we both need… some time to heal. The shooting, the pressure, the press, they’re still eating away at us both.”

Devlyn’s lip twisted into a sneer, but the gesture was directed inward and Lauren knew it. “At me, you mean.”

“That’s not what I mean,” Lauren corrected, determined to make this happen if she had to get down on her knees and beg. “Please give us the time we need to heal. Please. We both need it desperately.”

Devlyn looked away, her mind still spinning. She needed to talk to David and Liza and Emma and Jane. She needed to tell the kids what had happened, and her parents and Lauren’s father. She needed to bring in the doctors. She needed to get someone to clean up the stinking mess she’d made. And with all that to do, she still wasn’t sure she could tear herself from this very spot if her life depended on it. She wondered with a slightly hysterical, humorless inner laugh if they could do a CAT scan with her still attached to Lauren.

Dev’s entire world still felt all wrong, as if everything were burning around her and she couldn’t see through the blinding, acrid smoke. She cleared her throat gently and clung to Lauren’s hand, trusting her, somehow, to guide her home. “Yeah.” She sighed. “I- I think you’re right.”