In the Line of Fire: Hot Desert Heroes, Book 1 (23 page)

* * * * *

Delaney exited the elevator onto the surgical floor, flanked by Rafe and Gabe. As soon as she saw Ty, she made a beeline for him, barely aware of Quincy and two other men nearby. “He was shot by a man who had his hands cuffed behind his back?” She rocked to a halt in front of him and latched on to his shirt with her fists. “He shouldn’t be in this kind of business,” she cried.

“Now, Laney, that could’ve happened to any one of us,” he told her, curling his hands lightly over hers, his tone as gentle as she’d ever heard it.

She gave him a shake. “And if it had happened to any one of you, I’d tell you the same thing. If a man with his hands tied behind his back can shoot you, you should not be in this business!”

She heard a snicker and turned her head to see a tall man with salt-and-pepper hair and soulful, brown eyes, which the humor displayed on his lips did not reach. When he realized she was staring at him, he sobered and said, “Pardon me. You must be Beck’s girlfriend. I’m Supervisory Deputy Marshal Kai MacMillan.” He held out his hand. When she placed hers in it, he squeezed her fingers and held on to her hand as he said, “Beck’s injury isn’t severe, but they did have to operate to remove the bullet. You have a very brave man in there, I hope you know that.” He let go of her then and moved away to the other side of the room.

“I’ve never questioned his bravery,” she muttered. “Just his sanity.” She closed her eyes briefly, shaking her head. Looking once again at Ty, she said, “I didn’t mean that. I wanted him to go after Germano. I did
not
want him to get hurt.” She swallowed. “Germano’s really dead? It’s over?”

Ty nodded. He put one arm around her and led her to a row of chairs in the waiting room outside the surgical suite. “It’s over.”

He sat beside her in one of the two love seats in the small room, keeping an arm around her. It helped, not only because the air-conditioning seemed set to arctic temperatures but also because she needed the support. Even so, she couldn’t stop tears from welling up. A box of tissues was thrust under her nose and she looked up, blinking, to see Quincy standing there. She gave him a wavering smile and took the box. Yanking a tissue out, she tried to mop up the waterworks, but it just kept on flowing.

Quincy sat down in a chair next to her. “He’s gonna be all right, Laney,” he whispered. “He may be a bastard, but he’s a tough bastard.”

That surprised a laugh out of her and she quickly regained control.

Ty introduced her to the other man in the room, an old friend of Beck’s named Alex Kemp. She was happy to meet him and surprised to hear he and Beck had known each other since grade school because Beck had never mentioned him.

He sat on the other side of Quincy and started sharing stories of him and Beck from when they were kids. When he told them about Beck’s parents dying in a car accident when he was ten and him going to live with Alex and his parents, who’d been named as his guardians, something inside her withered. That seemed like such an important event in Beck’s life, and such an easy thing to share. Yet here she was, hearing for the first time that Beck had been orphaned at ten years old.

She blew out a sigh. Of course. This was merely another instance of Beck not sharing his past with her, even though it was clear Alex was still close to him.

When Gabe had told her that the Frenchman had managed to shoot Beck before he’d been killed, her breath had stopped while her heart had begun to gallop. Even if her mind hadn’t come to a decision about Beck, her body seemed to know he was integral to its well-being.

Now, sitting in this room, waiting to hear how he was, her mind was back in control and she was just as torn as ever. This situation had made her realize that she wanted to be with him, even if he was doing a job that could get him killed. What he did helped others, and she was proud of him. One thing that the day had accomplished was making her realize she’d grown in the last three years and was strong enough to survive without Beck.

She didn’t want to.

And so she’d decided to take him as he was. He could keep her shut out of his past, keep his demons close, and she would love him and accept what he gave her. It had taken him getting a bullet in that big, beautiful body of his for her to come to that decision, but she’d finally gotten there.

It was two hours before the surgeon came out into the waiting room. “Beck Townsend?” he called, asking for his family.

Delaney shot to her feet. “I’m his fiancée,” she lied through her teeth. “How is he?”

“He’ll be fine,” the tired doctor assured her. “There’s no major damage. He’ll be in recovery another couple of hours; then you can go in and see him. One at a time,” he cautioned. “He’ll still be very groggy from the effects of the anesthesia.”

She nodded and thanked him then sat back down with a thud. He was all right. He was going to be all right.
Thank you, God.

It was another two hours before a nurse came out and called for Ty. “Mr. Townsend is awake and asking for you,” she said. When Delaney came to her feet, the nurse told her, “Just Mr. Thorne.”

Delaney watched him go with the nurse and moved into the hallway to see which room Ty went into. After waiting another five minutes, she couldn’t wait a second longer. As she started down the hall, she heard Gabe’s cautionary “Laney…”

She stopped and looked at him. “I’m just going to poke my head in the door,” she told him. “I won’t interrupt them. I just have to…” she bit her lip, “…I need to see him awake and breathing.” She turned and kept going.

As she reached Beck’s room, she heard him say to Ty, “I don’t want Laney to know about that. Ever. Your word, brother.” His deep voice was slurred, no doubt from the effects of the drugs still in his system. What exactly didn’t he want her to know? She went from wanting to see him alive and kicking to wanting to kick him herself.

“She won’t hear it from me, buddy,” Ty responded evenly. “But you’re not doin’ right by her. She’d understand.”

“She might,” Beck mumbled. “Can’t take the chance she won’t. She fell apart over the bomb incident. Who knows how she’d react to that situation?”

What situation?
She willed one of them to actually mention what it was she wasn’t supposed to ever know about.

“Cut her some slack,” Ty said. “It was her first bomb. Nobody reacts well to their first bomb.”

Beck chuckled. Delaney almost went into the room then because he sounded so weak. But he said, “Go get her, would you?”

“Sure. You need anything?”

Delaney grimaced and hoofed it back to the waiting room, trying to look innocent and ignoring the narrow-eyed look she got from Gabe. She turned toward Beck’s room and hoped that, when Ty came to get her, she’d just look like she was hanging out, waiting for her turn to see her boyfriend.

And that must have been the case because he didn’t appear to think anything was amiss when he made it back to the waiting room. “He wants to see you now,” he told her.

She gave a nod and headed back to Beck’s room, heart in her throat, palms sweaty. When she went into the room and saw him lying in the bed, the head of it slightly raised, she had to swallow a cry. His face was nearly as white as the bed linens and he had an IV port attached to the back of one hand and a pulse oximeter on the index finger of his other hand. He looked weary and worn, a fallen warrior, and her heart nearly burst with the love she felt for him.

She approached the bed quietly. It appeared he’d fallen asleep again, and she didn’t want to wake him. As she settled into the chair at his bedside, he didn’t stir. She gingerly slipped her hand between his palm and the bed and curled her fingers gently around his hand, careful not to dislodge the pulse oximeter.

As she watched him sleep, she said another prayer of thanksgiving. Over the next hour Gabe, Rafe, Quincy, and Alex poked their heads into the room, saw that Beck was sleeping, and finally told her they were heading out but would come back later. Ty was staying in the waiting room and would take her back to the condo whenever she was ready. She hated to have him sit around like that, because she didn’t think she’d ever be ready to leave Beck’s side.

Chapter Twenty

Beck swam to consciousness. The first thing he became cognizant of was the vicious ache in his left shoulder and the dryness of his mouth. Then the soft touch of a hand curled around his filtered into his awareness. He turned his head on the pillow and opened his heavy eyes to see Delaney’s dark head resting against the bed, her hand holding his.

“Laney.” Her name came out in a gravelly husk, but she heard it and lifted her head.

Her eyes were soft with love and relief. “Oh, Beck,” she whispered and came up out of her chair to lean over him, never letting go of his hand. She reached out and stroked her fingers down his jaw.

He heard the rasp of the stubble on his face and wondered just how long he’d been out. God, his mouth was so dry. “Water,” he croaked.

“Just a few sips,” she said as she held the cup up and put the straw to his lips. After he’d drawn on it a couple of times she pulled it away.

“More,” he whispered.

She obligingly brought the straw to his mouth again, this time waiting until he tipped his head back, signaling he was finished. She set the plastic cup on the narrow overbed table. Leaning down, she kissed him, a soft, sweet meeting of lips that was over too soon. He might be down, but he wasn’t dead.

He noticed her bloodshot eyes. “You okay?”

“I should be asking you that,” she said.

He grimaced. “Shoulder hurts, but I’ve had worse.”

She sat back down but retained hold of his hand. With a scowl, she muttered, “Oh yeah. The bitch fiancée.”

He had to grin. She was so damned cute. When her scowl didn’t lessen, his smile faded. “Laney?”

“I’m fine, I’m fine.” She fluttered her free hand in front of her face as if to stave off tears.

He didn’t know why women did that. Did flapping their hands around actually succeed in stopping the waterworks?

She got herself under control. “Rafe, Quincy, and Gabe were all here. They went home a few hours ago, once they knew you were all right.” Guilt flashed across her face. “Ty’s still here, out in the waiting room. I told him he could go home, but he said he’d wait until I was ready to go, and I didn’t want to go until you woke up and I got to talk to you.” Her hand tightened slightly around his. “Your friend Alex was here too. Why didn’t you ever mention him to me?”

He shrugged then cursed under his breath as the movement jarred his shoulder. “Never came up, I guess.”

“He said you lost your parents when you were ten, and went to live with his family.”

He had nothing to add to that, so he stayed silent.

She opened her mouth then closed it again. “We’ll talk about it later,” she finally said. “I don’t want to upset you.”

“I’m not upset,” he retorted. He didn’t know why he hadn’t told her about his parents. About Alex. He just hadn’t.

“Okay,” she said in a soothing voice that grated on his nerves.

“Fuck, you act like I’m lyin’ on my deathbed. You wanna talk about my parents dyin’ in an auto accident? You wanna talk about Alex? Then let’s talk about my parents and Alex.” He glared at her.

She blinked then gave him wide eyes. “Why are you like this? I just asked you a question, Beck. I didn’t mean we had to talk about it right this minute.”

“You brought it up, sweetheart,” he said. Even to his own ears his voice sounded harsh. Much harsher than it needed to be. He needed to shut the fuck up before he said something he’d regret.

“Well, I’m sorry I did,” she muttered.

“I’ve been tellin’ you all along, Laney, if you can’t accept there are some things I can’t talk about then there’s no future for us. You need to decide because I don’t want to keep goin’ through all this back-and-forth with you. When I’m ready, I’ll tell you. But until then I’d appreciate it if you’d stop hassling me.”

She rolled her lips between her teeth and looked down. After a few seconds she whispered, “Don’t worry. I won’t be hassling you anymore.”

“Good.” He started getting drowsy again. He closed his eyes and dug his head into the pillow. “Need a shot of morphine,” he muttered. “Shoulder’s on fire.”

She withdrew her hand. “Here,” she whispered and placed a small cylindrical device under his palm. “That’s the controller for the infusion pump. Just press the button at the top.”

He fumbled around until he found it. He pressed it, and even though he knew it was too soon for the drug to have hit his system, he felt nearly immediate relief.

Delaney sat a few moments and watched him drift to sleep. Her heart was like a wad of lead in her chest. Beck had just made it very clear to her where she stood. If there were happy and light moments in his life, he was willing to share those. But when he had troubled times, difficult times, even from his childhood, he shut her out.

That was not a healthy relationship. And she’d already had an unhealthy relationship. She did not want, did not need, another one. She rose from the chair and leaned over him. Brushing hair away from his wide forehead, she leaned down and pressed a kiss to his damp skin. “We could have had a spectacular life together,” she told him softly. “I will always love you, Beck, until the stars fall from the sky and the sun refuses to shine. Goodbye. My only love.”

She straightened, unable to contain a sob, and picked up her purse from another chair against the wall. Turning toward the hall, she stopped upon seeing Ty standing in the doorway. From the look on his face he’d been there awhile. “I’m ready to go now,” she whispered and brushed past him.

It wasn’t until they were walking out of the hospital that he said, “He was under the influence of the drugs; you do realize that, right? He didn’t mean what he said.”

“Where are you parked?” she asked, choosing to ignore his words.

He pointed and she headed that way.

“Laney.”

She clenched her jaw. “It’s not the first time he’s said that to me, Ty. So under the influence or not, he meant every word. Now, can we not talk about this and you take me home?” She had a tenuous grip on her emotions and talking about it would only make her cry. She’d been doing too much of that today. She didn’t want to do it anymore.

God. Home was Beck’s condo. She was, in essence, homeless. Well, she had friends. As soon as she had her sobfest she’d call one of them, pack a suitcase, and go couch surfing until she found another place. She’d started over once before, she could do it again.

* * * * *

The drive to downtown was accomplished in silence. When she reached the door to Beck’s condo, she murmured her thanks to Ty and bolted inside. She barely made it two feet before she crumbled into a heap on the floor. Her heavy heart broke when she hit, and she sobbed like she never had in her life. When the storm broke, her head felt like it was stuffed with cotton, and it hurt. She got to her feet and shuffled to the guest room. Dropping her purse on the bed, she pulled out her cell phone and called her oldest and dearest friend. When Rachel answered, Delaney whispered, “I need you to come get me.”

“Honey, what’s wrong?”

Delaney felt the tears start up again. “I can’t…” she swallowed and fought for, and won, control, “…I can’t talk about it right now. Just… Will you come get me? I need to spend the night somewhere that’s not here.”

“I’m on my way,” her friend responded.

“I’ll wait for you by the ramada.” Delaney said goodbye and ended the call. Then she hauled one of her suitcases out of the closet and threw in some clothes, not really paying attention to what she was packing. She dumped a couple of pairs of shoes into the case, then went into the guest bathroom and brought back an armful of her toiletries. She snapped the suitcase shut and carried it out into the small foyer. Backtracking to the kitchen, she pulled the key to the condo off her key ring and laid it on the countertop. She grabbed a pen and pad, one she usually used for the weekly grocery list, and jotted off a quick note to Beck, folding it and placing the key on top of it. Then she grabbed her suitcase and walked away from her life with him.

* * * * *

The next morning Beck stared at Ty. “What?”

Ty’s dark eyes stared right back at him, but unlike the shock Beck figured were in his based on what his friend had just told him, Ty’s eyes held disgust and no little fury. “You told her you were tired of all the back-and-forth, that you didn’t want her hasslin’ you. And this you told her after she asked about your parents and Kemp, somethin’ I know about you but you apparently never shared with her.”

“I…” Beck shook his head. He vaguely remembered Delaney being there, and had just as vague a recollection of having a conversation with her, but he didn’t recall the content. Fuck.

“She assured you that she would not be hasslin’ you anymore.” Ty crossed his arms. “I did not get a good feelin’ about that. And it appears I was right, because when I went downstairs to the office this mornin’, at the front desk there was a nice young woman named Suzanne who was from a temp agency. So I decided to check your place. Looks like some of Delaney’s clothes are gone, and for sure there’s no women’s stuff in the bathroom. Either one of ’em.” He paused, then added quietly, “She left a note for you, man. I didn’t read it, but the key to your place was on top of it.”

Beck threw back his covers with a muttered curse. “Where are my clothes?”

“Don’t think you’ve been discharged yet.”

“I. Don’t. Care.” If he’d said all that to Delaney, he’d fucked up with her in a bigger way than usual. He had to salvage their relationship now. He maneuvered out of bed, swaying slightly once he’d found his feet. “Where’re my clothes?” he asked again.

Ty shrugged. “Check in there.” He pointed to the small dresser against the wall, between the two beds in the room.

Beck yanked open the top drawer, cursing when the action sent a twinge of pain through his shoulder. There were his clothes, bloody and wrinkled, but they’d have to do. Hell, if he had to he’d walk out of the hospital in this fucking gown. At least he had underwear on.

He got one foot into the leg of his jeans and almost fell flat on his face. He would have, had Ty not leaped forward and caught him. “Fuckin’ stubborn bastard,” his friend muttered. “Sit down before you face-plant on the floor.” He guided Beck to the chair Delaney had sat on the day before and helped him to sit with much more gentleness than Beck knew he felt at the moment.

Ordinarily he’d be irritated at being cast by his friends as the bad guy in his own life, but in this case he was afraid it was warranted. Ty got his feet through the legs of his jeans and yanked the material up to his knees. “Stand up,” he instructed. When Beck got to his feet, Ty matter-of-factly pulled his jeans the rest of the way up. “You’re on your own for the rest of it.”

Beck reached with his good arm and tried to fasten the copper button at the waist with one hand and couldn’t quite manage it. When he brought his left hand down, he sucked in a sharp breath at the burst of pain and kept his arm bent at the waist to take the strain off the injured muscles of his shoulder. He looked at Ty in frustration. “A little help here.”

“Man, you can’t even fasten your pants; you got no business checkin’ outta the hospital.”

“Tyrell, this is important,” he said, as serious as he’d ever been. “Gettin’ Delaney back is probably the most important thing I’ll ever do in my life. Help me. Please.”

Ty sighed and with minimal fuss fastened his jeans for him. Holding up the ripped and bloodstained T-shirt, he shook his head and said, “This is history, buddy.” He held up the suit coat, which was also bloody, with a bullet hole in the shoulder. “You’re hard on suits,” he commented.

Beck grimaced. Two bullets to two suit coats in only a couple of months. Maybe it
was
time to rethink the services REG provided. “I guess I’ll just keep on the gown,” he muttered. “Help me tuck it in.”

“Christ.” Ty started shoving material under the waistband of Beck’s jeans. “You owe me.”

“Yes, I do.” Beck stared into his friend’s eyes. “Big-time.”

Ty pursed his lips. “Naw, man, you don’t. This I do out of friendship. But if I have to kick your ass again when it comes to Laney, I guarantee you won’t like it.”

Beck nodded. “My cell phone and wallet are in the drawer. Would you get them, please?”

Ty retrieved the items and handed them to Beck. Just as he was shoving his wallet into his back right pocket and his phone into the front right one, someone knocked on the door.

Without waiting for an answer to the knock, a nurse walked into the room. When she saw Beck standing and ready to leave, she waggled her finger at him. “Now, Mr. Townsend, the doctor hasn’t discharged you yet.”

“Then put me down as discharged against medical advice,” he retorted. “I’m leaving.”

She kicked up a fuss but finally backed down, only to say, “You’ll leave in a wheelchair.” When he started to protest, she overtalked him. “I insist. It’s hospital policy.”

“Just agree, brother,” Ty muttered. “Otherwise the old battle-ax will keep you here ’til God knows when.” He winked at the older woman, who blushed then laughed.

“Oh, you,” she said. “Wait here,” she told Beck with a stern glance.

Within five minutes an orderly was there with a wheelchair. Beck signed discharge papers with a clear “AMA” marked, and ten minutes later he was buckled into the passenger seat of Ty’s car and they were on their way.

* * * * *

He entered his condo with impatient strides. Ty followed more slowly and stood just inside the entry as Beck went to the note Delaney had left. He pocketed the key and opened the note.

Dearest Beck,

You’re the finest man I’ll ever know. I love you. I’m sorry I couldn’t be what you needed.

Love,

Laney

He swallowed the emotion clogging his throat. He’d been such a goddamn fool. He hoped to hell he hadn’t fucked it up with her so completely he couldn’t fix it.

His legs started shaking. With a muttered imprecation he pulled out a barstool and sat his weak ass on it. He glanced at Ty. “Need to find out where she went,” he said. “This might take a while if her friends are feelin’ uncharitable.”

Ty shook his head and closed the door, then went into the living room and plopped down on the couch. Grabbing the remote to the TV, he clicked it on then must have muted it because the sound cut off almost right away.