And Playing the Role of Herself... (28 page)

It never came, but neither did the hoped for profession of love.
Jeez Caid, what do you expect? A minute ago you were relieved to not know, and now you're frustrated?
I hid my disappointment, and tugged her into the house. "Come on. Why don't you jump in the shower, and I'll fix you breakfast for a change."
She smiled seductively and pulled me back towards her. "How about you join me in the shower, and we skip breakfast?" she murmured, laying a light line of kisses along my neck.
I quashed my immediate reaction to her words and nearness, feeling a certain hollowness in her offer. My body was willing but at the moment, my heart just wasn't in it and I wasn't sure hers was, either.
"We'd never make it out of the shower," I joked lightly in an attempt to ease the disappointment and confusion that flashed across her face as I pulled away. "You have a long day ahead of you and need to eat." I pointed to the hallway and pushed her gently in that direction. "Away with you."
"Caid…" She frowned, her expression still betraying her confusion.
"Go on." I tilted my head up and kissed her lightly on the forehead before pushing her towards the hallway again. "I'll have something ready for you when you get out."
She hesitated a moment longer, staring at me intently, and then nodded slowly and walked past me and down the hall.
I sighed and walked into the kitchen, taking stock of what kind of ingredients we had on hand to make breakfast. There were eggs and some left-over seafood mixture from Robyn's lasagna that would make a decent enough filling for an omelet, and french bread for toast…I nodded to myself and pulled the items out of the refrigerator.
I rooted around in the cupboards and drawers for a skillet and a small mixing bowl, my movements getting slower and slower, until they stopped altogether.
What in the hell was I doing?
The woman I was in love with was naked in the shower, and I was about to make an omelet? I shook my head in disbelief. Robyn asked me to share the last of our time together making love, and I had said no.
Caid, you are a dumbass.
I put the food back into the refrigerator and walked down the hall, a smile building on my face until I entered the master bedroom and saw that Robyn wasn't naked in the shower at all. In fact, she was standing in the middle of the room, fully dressed, and apparently fully packed. The small duffel she had brought was slung over her shoulder, and she looked to be in the process of checking for any stray items she might have missed.
I stopped abruptly in the doorway and stared at her stupidly. "Wha…what are you doing?"
"Leaving," she said briskly, taking one last glance around.
"But…you were showering…we were going to have breakfast…" I frowned in confusion. "Why are you leaving?"
She hitched the bag higher on her shoulder, finally looking at me. It was then I realized how angry she was. "I won't be manipulated."
That did not help my confusion at all. "What are you talking about? I'd never try to manipulate you."
"That's what I thought, too, until a few minutes ago." She shook her head sadly. "I really thought you were different, Caid. Stupid of me."
She moved towards the door and I stopped her with a hand on her chest. She gave the hand a look of distain that made me cringe, and looked at me coolly. "Get out of my way."
"Not until you tell me what the hell I did wrong!" I was starting to get worry now; I'd been on the receiving end of that look before, the night at her house when she'd told me nothing could happen between us. It was cold and resolute, and just like that night, I had no idea how to counter it.
"I won't let you use sex to manipulate me into saying what you want to hear. I enjoy you, Caid - I enjoy being with you. But sex is sex, and I can find it elsewhere. Remember that." She moved my hand and brushed past me roughly.
I didn't stop her, too shaken by the thought that maybe she was right. Not about the sex is sex part; that was a bunch of crap. I knew whatever was between us was something special, and went much deeper than physical. But her accusation of my withholding sex because she hadn't told me what I wanted to hear…
was
that why I had refused her? As some kind of punishment for not returning my feelings?
I thought back to what I'd been feeling and shook my head. No, that hadn't been the reason. I'd refused because it felt…wrong. Like…she was trying to distract me, to avoid having to discuss issues that needed to be discussed.
She
had been the one that tried to use sex to manipulate.
My worry was displaced by anger, and I followed her into the living room, grabbing her arm and turning her around. "I told you I loved you, damnit, because I do. Very much. And I thought you should know. I'm not trying to manipulate you, regardless of what you think. I didn't, and still don't, expect anything from you except honesty."
She glared at my hand but I continued to hold on to her - I wasn't finished. "Maybe you should take a look at your own behavior before you go accusing me of shit. I tell you I love you, and you don't want to deal with it, so what better way to distract me than to drag me off into the shower? You know the effect you have on me, and you tried to use it to your advantage. So don't give me righteous lectures about using sex as a weapon."
She shrugged my hand off angrily and grabbed her purse and keys from the table. "The cleaning service comes at three - make sure you're gone by then. Leave the key in the mailbox," she told me icily, and stomped to the door.
"Robyn." I had one more thing to address.
To my surprise, she stopped at the door and turned back, her expression stony.
She wouldn't be manipulated, but I wouldn't be threatened. "If you do find sex elsewhere…despite how much I love you, you'll never be with me that way again. I told you before that I don't like to share. Remember
that
."
A muscle in her jaw twitched, and she stared at me for a long moment, and then she was gone.
##
I thought
-
I hoped - that she would come back.
I actually sat on the couch for another half an hour, hoping, but was finally forced to face the reality that Robyn's fight or flight tendencies were going to take a lot longer than a weekend to counteract. I wasn't giving up quite yet…we didn't get this far to allow a misunderstanding as stupid as this to tear us apart.
I started planning my assault on Fortress Robyn as I changed into my running clothes, and as I set off down the hard-packed sand near the water, heading north and hoping the beaches connected for at least a few miles, my head was filled with nothing but thoughts of how I could get her to talk to me.
I waved at a man with binoculars on the beach one house over; nodded sympathetically to a couple overseeing four children building sandcastles several houses after that, and patted a few friendly dogs on the public beach I ran onto that ended sooner than I'd hoped, but was far enough to make it worth the run.
The run back went quickly, and once I'd gotten back to 'our' beach, I stood for a long time, looking out at the water, remembering what an amazing weekend it had been, and vowing to do everything in my power to make it happen again.
I eventually started towards the house, but stopped when I saw the man with binoculars from next door climbing slowly over the rise between the houses, struggling in the deep sand with a walking stick and a pronounced limp. He looked to be in his sixties, with a wide brimmed hat and Bermuda shorts that seemed to be the uniform of the older tourists in the area.
Curious as to what his mission was, and wondering if I could somehow help in his struggle through the sand, I started towards him.
"Hi." I called out, receiving no response, just resolute progress over the rise and onto the beach in my general direction. When I got closer, his face finally lifted to meet mine and I realized he wasn't as old as I thought - late forties, maybe - with pale blue eyes that stared at me with an intensity that made me uneasy.
"Hi," I said again when I was within a few yards. "Can I help you with something?"
He stopped and smiled, watching me approach. "As a matter of fact, you can."
If I hadn't had other things on my mind, if I'd been in the city, if I'd been expecting trouble…maybe things would have gone differently. As it was, I smiled expectantly, and watched as he flipped the walking stick into the air, caught it in both hands, and swung.
I realized what was coming at the last second - not nearly enough time to dodge the swing or even get my arm up in defense. Pain exploded in my head as the stick struck me across the jaw, spinning me around and sending me stumbling across the deep sand and dropping to my hands and knees.
What the
…stunned from the blow, I stared dumbly at the blood on the sand beneath me, unable to comprehend what was happening. Another blow came down hard on my back and I hissed as pain shot from the point of impact and down my legs.
That can't be good.
A foot in my stomach knocked the wind from my lungs and I collapsed onto the sand as he kicked a few more times and took a few more swings with the stick.
All six of the main cast members of
9th Precinct
had gone through a modified police academy curriculum, with self-defense and subduing techniques a large part of the training. I'd been good at it, and confident that I could use the knowledge if the need arose in real life, but none of that training had prepared me for the violence of this attack; it had been too swift; too unexpected. The only thought in my mind was to get away.
I rolled onto my stomach and struggled clumsily in an attempt to get back to my hands and knees, but a hand yanked my head back by the hair, and I stared into wild, feverish eyes.
"I saw you with her. I saw you touch her, you filthy bitch. You're sick! I saw you touch her! She's mine!"
He punched the side of my face, driving it into the sand. My vision blurred, and my face throbbed.
Thank god Robyn left…
it was the last thought to flit through my brain before another blow struck hard across the back of my head, and then…nothing.

So much noise…so many voices…and pain…
"Caid, baby, stay with me. Damnit, don't you leave me…" The frantic voice came from far away - it was familiar, I knew the raspy tones, wanted to respond…
"…need to load her in the ambulance now, ma'am…"
My body jolted and pain erupted in my head. I slipped back into blackness.
##
"…nurse, I specifically said family only. Why is this…woman…still here? Call security, right now."
The loud, unwelcome voice pulled me groggily from unconsciousness.
Who…
The voice was familiar.
Sebastian?
My mind slowly came back into the land of the living and once it did, all I wanted to do was to go back to nice, pain-free darkness.
God, I hurt. And I was so, so tired.
"Mr. Harris…calm down. I'm sure we can work something out," an unfamiliar female voice spoke soothingly. I could have told her that wouldn't do any damn good - Sebastian always got his way.
I kept my eyes shut, cataloging the hurts. The pain in my head was excruciating…nauseating. It made it hard to think, hard to hear, hard to breath. And other areas of my body were chiming in on the pain meter, too. My lower back, my stomach, my left wrist…I winced, and the movement brought a whole new set of aches to my attention - my nose, cheek, and jaw felt painfully swollen.
What happened? Why…
"Go ahead and call security. I'm not going anywhere." The voice was low and husky, tinged with irritation.
Robyn
.
I wanted to giggle. No one talked to my brother like that.
At the sound of her voice, the throbbing in my head eased to a somewhat tolerable level and I let my eyes flutter open a little, finally finding something in this situation worth sticking around for. Bright light and colors hit sensitive eyes and I shut them again as my stomach roiled. After a moment, I took a shallow breath and tried again. When my head didn't explode, and my need to hurl up whatever might be in my stomach passed, I opened them wider. Or at least as wide as I could, since I could feel that one was nearly swollen shut.
Christ, what had happened to me?
The blurred images around me gradually gained focus and I stared in dazed bewilderment at my surroundings. I was in a long room - a very white room - and weak light streamed through several narrow windows. On either side of me, stacks of instruments and machines beeped and pinged regularly, and a pale blue curtain stretched across the space to my left, bunched on a ceiling rail towards the end of the bed. My eyes dropped to my arms and I felt my brow furrow in confusion. My left wrist - the one that ached - was wrapped in some kind of splint and there was an IV line running out of the back of my other hand and something clipped to my finger.
Hospital. Something happened…
I tried to get my brain to work, to piece together what was going on, but couldn't make any sense of the jumble, and trying made the pain in my head worse.
I shifted my gaze and focused on the man speaking across the room. Sebastian. My brother. This I remembered, but not why he was here. His dark hair was beginning to gray at the temples, but the square, strong jaw, thin, pinched mouth and intense green eyes were the same. He stood stiff with anger and outrage, glaring down at a dark-haired woman slumped in a chair.
Robyn. I let my gaze linger on her. I loved her. This I remembered, too.
A woman in brightly patterned scrubs hovered next to Sebastian, looking worriedly from one to the other. A nurse, I assumed, but didn't recognize her.
"Don't think I won't," Sebastian was saying. "I don't care how famous you are or what connections you have…"
Robyn's eyes wandered in apparent boredom as my jerk of a brother railed at her, eventually coming to rest on me and widening in sudden realization. She was out of her seat and across the room in seconds.
"Caid? Honey?" Her voice was hopeful and desperate, and she reached out a hand to touch me but drew back and grabbed onto the rail of my bed instead.
I blinked slowly. "He…" I croaked, my voice weak and raspy. I swallowed, and licked my lips with a tongue that felt three times too big for my mouth, flinching when I passed over a tender area that felt split. I tried again. "Hey…Rob."
Her face broke into a beautiful smile, and a tear slid slowly down her cheek. "Oh, baby," she whispered, gripping the rails of the bed tightly. "I'm so glad you're awake. God, you scared me…"
I tried to smile back, but it hurt, and I closed my eyes again.
"Caid? Baby?"
I was so tired…her words flowed around me and I let the beckoning darkness washed over me again.
##
"…I don't want visitation changed. I don't care who they are, Perry, they are not her family."
"But these are her friends! It might help her to hear their voices…"
"I said no, and that's final! She doesn't need to be around those kind of people right now. She needs her family, and our faith in God…"
The arguing voices drew me rudely from the safe, pain-free arms of unconsciousness into the distinctly non-pain-free world of consciousness. I groaned involuntarily in disapproval.
Jesus. Those two never stop arguing
. My eyes fluttered open, and blurry images gradually gained sharpness. Three startled sets of eyes were staring at me - two familiar, one not.
I tried out my voice - it was weak, but audible. "Will you…two…shut up."
"Caid! You're awake!" Perry hurried forward to hover uncertainly by my bedside.
"Hard…to sleep…with you two…ragging…at each other." I croaked out and swallowed, wishing for some water and some more nice, pain-free darkness.
He smiled tremulously. "How do you feel?"
I would have laughed if I wasn't sure it would have hurt like hell. Instead I grunted.
"Jesus Christ, Caid, you scared the shit out of me."
"Sorry…" I whispered, although I wasn't sure what I was sorry for.
Sebastian moved up beside Perry, frowning in disapproval. "Perry, you will not take the Lord's name in vain…"
I winced at the tone. "Jesus Christ…Sebastian…shut up." I told him wearily, and thought I heard a titter of laughter from the other room's occupant who I assumed was a nurse.
The disapproving eyes turned to me, narrowing in annoyance. My brain might be muddled, but pissing off Sebastian was second nature. "Well hello to you, too, Caidence. Nice to see the attitude survived intact. And you're welcome. I dropped everything to come down here to be with you and this is the thanks I get?"
I stared at him unremorsefully, blinking tiredly. We hadn't been civil to each other in years - I didn't see any point to starting now. Whatever his reasons for being here, I doubted my welfare was one of them.
The nurse pushed both men out of the way with practiced ease and moved up beside me. She glanced over at a console of machines to my left and smiled down at me. "Hello there. Glad to have you back with us. How are you feeling?"
I blinked slowly. "Crappy."
She smiled sympathetically and patted my hand gently. "Yes, you took quite a beating. You look a lot better than you did two days ago, if that's any consolation."
Beating? Two days?
"Wh…what happened? I don't remember…" I frowned, trying to concentrate and the pain in my head intensified. I hissed softly in pain and closed my eyes.
"Shhh…don't worry. It'll come back to you. Just relax, and I'll be back a little later with the doctor."
I nodded, sleep already tugging at me again, and heard her move away.
"Gentlemen, could I speak to you outside please…"
##
"Caidence? Miss Harris?"
My eyes jerked open quickly and I flinched in pain, blinking up at a blond, athletic looking woman in a maroon scrubs with a stethoscope looped around her neck. She flashed a wide, friendly smile while light brown eyes swept over me in quick, professional perusal.
"I'm Doctor Reese. How are you feeling?" She looked down at a clipboard in her hands, flipping through pages, and then back up at me.
I coughed slightly and winced at the resulting twinge in my back. I cleared my throat carefully. "I've had better days."
She put the chart back with a chuckle. "I bet you have. Would you like some water?"
"Please."
She nodded across the bed and I noticed another person in the room, the nurse from before. "Gail, could you grab that?"
The woman picked up a small pitcher on the table next to me and filled a plastic cup, dropping a straw into it and handing it to me. I drank gratefully, the liquid trickling down my throat in blissful coolness.
The doctor pulled the stethoscope from around her neck and fitted it into her ears, speaking briskly as she gently pulled aside the neck of my gown and laid the cool metal against my chest.
"Gail tells me you might be a little confused about what happened. Do you remember anything at all?"
I shook my head slightly. "No…nothing. My head - everything is so fuzzy."
She nodded. "I'm sure Gail told you that that's normal. You took quite a knock on the head. What's the last thing you remember?"
I frowned, trying to gather my stray memories into some kind of order.
A paddle in my hands, turning my head and laughing at Robyn behind me…
"I…we went kayaking…"
Robyn across the table from me, smiling sweetly at a young girl and her mother who asked for an autograph…
"We went into town for dinner…"
A possibility suddenly occurred to me and I straightened, trying to sit up and grimacing at the pain in my back. "Robyn," I ground out. "Is she okay? We were together…"
"Whoa there," the doctor gently pushed me back on the bed, her hands on my shoulders. "Just relax. Your friend Miss Ward is fine. A little ticked off at your brother right now, and worried sick about you, but she's fine." I relaxed, and after watching for a moment to ensure I wasn't going to try to jump out of bed again, she released my shoulders and straightened. "Let me fill you in a little, okay, and maybe it will help a little with your memory."
I nodded gratefully.
"You're at Mid-Key Medical Center in Marathon, Florida. The ambulance brought you in at around eleven on Sunday morning."
"Sunday?" I forced myself to concentrate. Kayaking had been…Saturday. Sunday…what had we done Sunday? I'd been scheduled to fly out early that afternoon, and Robyn was due back on the set…
I throb of pain that seemed to engulf my entire head stopped my memory gathering and I shut my eyes for a moment, before opening them again. "How long…"
She glanced at the watch on her wrist. "It's 9:45 pm, Tuesday."
Nearly three days.
Whoa.
"What happened?" I asked slowly. "Why…"
"You were attacked and severely beaten. Miss Ward came with you in the ambulance, but she wasn't hurt - she apparently found you."
She had found me? Oh, honey.
I couldn't even imagine what that must have been like.
"Beaten?" I said slowly. A flash of memory, and object coming towards my face and a flash of pain along my jaw…
"Is any of this sounding familiar?"
"Maybe…" I shook my head in frustration and she nodded sympathetically.
"I wouldn't worry…I'm confident your memory will right itself in time. Now," She hung the clipboard up and gestured to the nurse. "We'll just do a quick examination, and then we can talk about your injuries, and you can ask any questions, okay? I'm sorry, but some of this is going to hurt."
She was right. They poked, prodded, and maneuvered my body, and by the time they were finished, I had long since stopped trying to hide tears of pain and I was exhausted. She finished with a light test to my eyes, and a few simple questions then wrote in the chart for a minute before giving me her attention.
"Well Miss Harris, it might not feel like it right now, but you're one very lucky woman."
"I'd hate to know what it would feel like if I'd been unlucky," I mumbled.
She looked at me seriously. "Quite frankly, you'd be dead."
Oh.
"You've got multiple contusions on the head, face, abdomen and back, but it doesn't appear that there will be any lasting physical damage from any of it. You're concussed, which is to be expected, but not severely according to scans. That's what's causing the confusion and memory loss you're experiencing...it should be temporary. You have a very hard head." She smiled slightly. "Despite the amount of trauma to your face, no bones were broken, although you sustained a couple fairly deep cuts…luckily we have a plastic surgeon on staff and he stitched them up nicely. If treated properly, they should heal without much scaring. Your abdomen is heavily bruised, but amazingly no ribs were broken and no internal damage…and we were concerned about spinal bruising from a large contusion on your back, but all of your reflexes and sensation seem to be within normal limits. A pelvic exam showed no signs of vaginal or anal trauma and your clothes were intact when you were brought in…"
I sucked in a sharp breath.
Jesus
…
She glanced at me sympathetically and her tone softened. "You weren't raped, which is good news in an attack like this. The most serious injury, besides the head trauma, was a fracture of the ulna in 2 places above the left wrist…you've got a small plate and a couple of screws in there to keep it together while it heals…all in all, very lucky, and you're in excellent physical shape, which should speed the recovery process."
I blinked slowly and suddenly felt very lucky indeed.
"How long…" I gestured at my body with my good hand.
She crossed her arms and cocked her head to the side. "A few weeks for the bruises to fade, five or six days before we take the facial stitches out, and then several weeks for those to heal completely, six to eight weeks for the wrist, and we'll have to see how the back feels when we get you up and around…Your head injury, it's hard to say - we'd like to keep you here a few more days for observation, and once you're released, you might experience headaches, dizziness, light-headedness for anywhere from weeks after to months after. You'll definitely need to take it easy for a while, and you might need a little help for a bit when you're released."
"The best thing for you right now is to rest," she continued. "I'm going to restrict visitors for you for a little while…we've had some…issues, and you need the quiet. I've got you hooked up to a morphine drip…now that you're awake, you can manage that yourself. This button here," she pressed a button on one of the machines by the bed, and a moment later I could feel a tingling in my hand and a delicious lethargy flow through my body, "releases the drug into your system…it's set up to allow you a certain amount an hour. Do you have any questions for me? Anything we can do for you?"
They both looked at me expectantly.