The Bride Wore Denim (14 page)

H
ARPER MADE
B
JORN
take her straight to the hospital from the airport without stopping at home. The terror eating like acid inside her had only slowed its burn as they neared the VA medical complex, and then it had only quieted because she knew she’d finally be able to talk to the experts herself. There wasn’t much of her family there to give her details. She trusted Leif, Bjorn, and Cole to tell her everything they knew, but after imagining the worst for twelve awful hours, firsthand information would be a gift.

She’d been disappointed that Cole hadn’t picked her up, as he’d said he would, even though she had no right to expect it from him. Bjorn explained he was basically running the ranch at the moment, and in the past eighteen hours he’d spent most of his time trying to figure out how to be two places at once.

She absolutely couldn’t hold that against him.

Bjorn parked in the massive lot at the front of the hospital. Panic hit Harper anew as they entered the cheerful but imposing medical center lobby. Beautiful paintings depicting each branch of the military hung in solemn watch near the doors. Two American flags and a Wyoming state flag flanked the pictures. Warm colors and natural-wood furniture softened the military presence.

“Mom was in the National Guard,” Harper said in a whisper as they headed for the elevator bank. “After fifteen years of service, I get why she’s eligible to be here. But the only tie Joely has to military service, as far as I know, is her husband, and she said he isn’t in the picture anymore. Doesn’t she have to be in a civilian hospital?”

“Yes,” Bjorn replied. “But this is a far better equipped trauma center and was closer to the accident. They flew both your mom and Joely together.”

“Will they move Joely?”

Bjorn grimaced. “They can’t yet, Harper, honey. They don’t dare.”

The words twisted the knife of fear deeper into Harper’s heart. Oh, God, she prayed. How could this be happening again?

They reached the ICU on third floor, a huge, open space with a futuristically designed nurses’ station in the center and glass-walled rooms around the perimeter. Soft lights bathed everything except the rounded counters and overhead light fixtures in the middle. Harper marveled at the mix of sterility and warmth some designer had managed to achieve.

After they registered at the desk, the male RN who took them toward her mother’s room treated them with such careful respect, Harper wanted to shake him. His demeanor hovered too close to sympathy, and that was scarier than the thought of what she’d see inside the room.

The first person she saw was Leif. He sat in a recliner at the foot of the bed, feet on the floor instead of elevated, elbow propped on one chair arm, his chin cradled in his hand. He looked naked without his cowboy hat, his bushy gray hair starting to need a trim. His head popped up when the nurse knocked softly on the open door.

“Harper. Darling.” He practically bolted from the chair and had her in his arms seconds later. For the first time, she wept. She hadn’t even looked at the bed yet. “I’m sorry you have to come home again for this. But I’m awful glad you’re here.”

“I’m afraid to ask how she is.”

She knew the list of injuries her mother and Joely had each sustained. Her mother’s were the least serious on the surface: a hairline fracture above the left eyebrow, a severe concussion, a broken leg, a bruised spleen. It all sounded horrific, but she’d heal if the swelling in her brain got no worse. Right now, they were trying to prevent hematomas from forming and hoping the swelling would go down without surgery.

Leif released her and placed a firm-but-wrinkled hand on her cheek. “She’s sleeping. They have her pretty well sedated due to some swelling around the brain. But she’s been awake, honey. She’s a tough bird, your mama.”

“Have you been here the whole time?”

“No, we all take turns. But she hasn’t been alone. Joely either. Go on, take her hand. She looks bad, but don’t let that worry you.”

She didn’t want to see her beautiful mama any way but as she always was, glossy-haired, much younger looking than her fifty-nine years, perpetually positive, and agreeable. What she saw when she faced the bed pulled a gasp from the pit of her stomach.

“Oh, Mom! Oh no.”

Her mother’s beautiful chestnut hair tufted out from a swath of gauze around her forehead. Almost no unmarked skin was left on her face—every inch seemed covered by a scrape, a small cut, or a brown pockmark. It took a long moment and a deep breath, but finally Harper bent and kissed one damaged cheek.

“I love you,” she said. “I’m so sorry this happened. I’m sorry I wasn’t here.”

She sat with her mother, talking and murmuring words of encouragement without regard to time. The longer she stayed the easier it got to be there, even though her heart still hurt. The regular rise and fall of her mom’s chest was comforting, and the color behind her bruises and cuts at least made her look alive, if painfully so. She didn’t notice the others had left her alone until she looked up to find the room, with its muted light, quiet and empty.

“She’s gonna be all right.”

Harper spun her gaze to the door as Cole stepped through it. No thoughts, no analysis preceded her leap from the bed. He met her in the middle of the room and caught her into the folds of his soft shearling-lined denim jacket, letting her burrow into it as she prayed to escape the reality in the room.

“I thought you were out with the cattle,” she said.

“I was. But Rico, Neil, and Bjorn sent me packing. I’m sorry I missed your plane.”

It didn’t matter. Only this mattered—the combination of his wind-scented coat; the cradling warmth of its lining, the warm, musky scent of his skin; and the hard heat of his chest beneath her cheek. She wanted nothing more than to be part of him, to never leave this sanctuary, and maybe to weld his arms to her body so he’d never be able to let her go. For the first time this trip, she let herself forget about Mia and indulge in fantasy.

“That’s nothing to be sorry for.”

Warm lips rested on the top of her head. Slowly her body molded to his, tension drained from her shoulders and spine, and reason returned. Her brain kicked back into gear. With huge effort, she relaxed her python-squeeze on his torso. He lowered his kiss to her forehead.

“Hi,” he said. “You okay?”

“I’m okay.”

“Have you seen Joely yet?”

Oh, God, Joely.
She hadn’t forgotten, she’d just pushed her sister far to the back of her mind until she’d come to grips with her mom.

“No.”

“Melanie is sitting with her now. I sent Leif down to get something to eat. I can wait here when you’re ready to go visit her.”

“No!” She latched back onto him again. “Please come with me. Everyone says she’s much worse than this.”

“It’s not good, sweetheart.”

All she let herself hear was the
sweetheart
.

After a moment more of indulging her childlike helplessness, Harper pulled away again, hating her fear, hating her need for someone else to show the strength.

“I’ll go. I need to see her. But does it make me awful that I don’t want to?”

“Of course not. None of us wanted to come yesterday either—not to see this.”

The walk to Joely’s room across the ICU floor took thirty seconds that dragged like a broken clock. Everything felt broken in this place—a place that existed only because of damaged and shattered people.

Melanie stood when they reached Joely’s door. Her smile was wide and sincere as she embraced Harper as Leif had. “She’ll be glad you’re here.”

Such a silly, clichéd thing to say, Harper thought absently, avoiding looking at the bed. Joely couldn’t be glad about anything at the moment.

“It’s wonderful of you to be here, Mel. This is above and beyond when you have a family.”

“Above and beyond Christian charity and duty? Nonsense. And it’s only a duty because it shouldn’t have happened. We love you all—Joely and your mom are family to us, too. Now, you two go in. Be warned. Don’t get freaked out if buzzers go off and people come running. She’s fighting hard right now.”

Those words nearly sank what remained of Harper’s bravado. She only nodded and took Cole’s hand. Melanie edged out of the room and, finally, there was no choice but to face the truth.

It wasn’t Joely lying in the bed. The person there had purple-and-yellow skin, eyes swollen shut, a head swathed in bandaging, a disfigured jaw, and tubes snaking everywhere as if attaching the body to the Matrix. Nothing of her sister, save the relatively unscathed hand lying atop the covers, looked like the stunning beauty that was Joely Crockett.

Harper’s stomach roiled in unacceptance. “No!” She began to cry. “Oh, God, how can she survive this?”

“She will.” Cole drew her close and murmured into her ear.

He let her creep forward to take Joely’s uninjured hand but held her from behind, his arms securely around her waist, his body a brace at her back.

“Joely,” she whispered. “It’s me, Harpo. I’m here now, and I’ll stay as long as you need me. The other girls are coming, too. We’ll take care of you.”

“That’s exactly what you needed to tell her,” Cole said. “She’ll know. I believe that.”

He was pulling out all the cowboy poet stops. Had he always been this way? She didn’t remember. Maybe her brain was muddled when it came to him, too. Whatever the case, childhood now seemed a million years ago—shattered by the all-too adult truth surrounding them.

“I’m so shallow,” she said, loud enough for both Cole and Joely to hear. “All I can think about is how broken her beautiful face is. I don’t want her to be disfigured.”

“You know what? That means you’re thinking positively. It’s better than despair. The universe is telling you something.”

For the first time, she smiled. “You sure are in touch with your feminine side today, Mr. Wainwright. You don’t have to make stuff like that up for me.”

“Who says I’m making it up?”

She leaned back for a few seconds against his solid, safe chest, still not thinking in any depth about what she was doing.

Melanie headed home, and Cole insisted Leif do the same, insisting they could keep an eye on both Joely and Bella until after dinner. For two hours they alternated between the ICU rooms. Twice, a response team rushed to Joely’s side, pushing drugs, stopping terrifying seizures. Each time, Harper lost a slice of faith. Each time, Cole shored it back up.

They played cribbage in her mother’s room. They played Go Fish at Joely’s bedside. They talked about pregnancy testing the cows, about the aborted old-fashioned roundup, and about hospital coffee.

They avoided the topics of oil wells or selling the ranch.

Even more assiduously, they refrained from talking about the saddest part of the accident so far—the mare Joely had been bringing to Wyoming that hadn’t survived the terrible accident.

Harper found the hospital and all it held a terrible world—more surreal than the experimental drug times that had gotten her kicked out of college. She never talked about them, and yet she’d go back to her wasted years and shout her weaknesses to the universe if it meant guaranteeing Joely’s and Mom’s recovery.

“Are you sure you don’t want to go back to the ranch?” she asked Cole as the dinner hour neared. “This has to be excruciatingly boring for you.”

“It’s not boring at all. You’re here.”

At that one line, she panicked.

“Cole. Don’t. Don’t say that, I feel guilty enough. I need a rock and you’re it—the safest place I know right now. But the emotions are so raw—like at Dad’s funeral. The feelings don’t mean—”

“Harpo. Stop. You’re overthinking again. I said I’m with you, so it isn’t boring. I like being here with you and for you. That’s all. I didn’t propose.”

His smile, amused and tolerant, sent her sinking, embarrassed, into the recliner in her mother’s room.

“Man,” she said. “I’m sorry. I’m such a wreck.”

“You have every right to be. But trust me, then, to have your back. There’s time much later to sweep you off your feet.”

Oh, if only you could. Or maybe you already have.
“Good luck with that.”

“How little you really know, Miss Crockett.”

“How little any of us knows about the Crockett sisters.” The surprised voice from the doorway made them both turn.

Amelia stood there, dressed as haphazardly as Harper had ever seen her in a pair of dark-blue sweat pants, a pink turtleneck beneath a multicolored ski sweater, and a pair of red cowboy boots. She hadn’t been due in until the next day, and for an instant Harper stared at her, waiting for the know-it-all, take-charge sister to appear. Instead a tear traced down her cheek.

It took no more effort to run to her than it had to run to Cole. They grabbed each other, and to Harper’s astonishment, Amelia squeezed tightly.

“Is she okay?”

“Mom seems stable.” Harper straightened. “How did you get here so quickly? I thought you had surgery scheduled.”

Amelia shook her head. “It wasn’t life-threatening. I rescheduled and rearranged everything for the next two weeks, pulled what clothes I had in my hospital locker out, and got on the first flight I could.”

“Who picked you up here?”

“I took a cab. I didn’t want to make anyone take time to come get me when I wasn’t expected.”

She didn’t add anything about needing to be here to check on the medical staff’s decisions, not trusting anyone to organize things, or being indispensable. Harper chalked it up to shock and the weird mind tricks the ICU played on them all.

Once she and Cole walked Mia through the shock of seeing both patients, some of Mia’s medical calm surfaced, but it turned out to be a welcome comfort. Giving a rare glimpse of her true bedside manner, Mia engaged the staff with intelligent questions Harper never would have thought to ask, even managing—with sweet talk and dogged logic—to peek at the charts; something she definitely shouldn’t have been able to do without another doctor’s approval. By the time she’d been at the hospital for an hour, everybody had in-depth knowledge about the true nature of Joely’s and their mother’s injuries and prognoses. Not that the knowledge was encouraging.