World Enough and Time (18 page)

In his blind panic, Dante stumbled, going down to one knee before throwing himself upright, but he lost his balance again and slammed into me, his shoulder pinning me against the wall. For a split second, he was off me, only to crash into me again with even more force. My vision clouded and everything became a blur of pain and motion.

The quick-release must have finally given, because I was suddenly alone. I sank to my knees, only vaguely aware of my kneecaps cracking against the hard rubber mats. I fell forward and caught myself on one arm, holding the other across my chest. There was pain somewhere, so distant it registered much like a memory of past pain. Or a promise of future pain once this more immediate and more terrifying concern passed:

I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe
.

My lungs became leaden slabs that could neither inhale nor exhale. I tried to cough. Again. Nothing.

Can’t breathe. Can’t breathe. Can’t breathe
.

Movement around me. Voices. Something touching me. Panic inside. Panic outside. Panic.

Can’t. Breathe
.

At last, a cough broke through and the paralysis snapped. I gulped in a few deep breaths, each more painful than the last as my ribs protested, but I could breathe. Mentally, I did my usual post-fall body part inventory: Fingers moved. Toes moved. Head turned. Nothing numb. No head injury. No neck injury.

But pain. Dear sweet Jesus,
pain
.

Susan’s voice broke through the red haze. “Dani, talk to me.” She squeezed my shoulders and I wondered how long she’d been holding them. “Dani?”

“I’m okay.” I coughed, tears blurring my vision and fire searing every inch of my ribcage.

“Gavin, call the paramedics,” Susan said.

“Is she all right?” he asked, his voice adding a layer of teeth-grinding rage to the pain.

“Yes, she’s just fine, that’s why she needs a fucking ambulance,” Susan snapped. A moment later, she said to me, “Can you sit up?”

With her hands steadying me, I sat back, still protectively holding my chest with one arm. She eased me back against the side of the trailer, the support offering both relief and fresh pain when metal nudged bruises. I closed my eyes and rested my head against the wall, breathing as deeply as the pain would allow.

“Where’s Dante?” My voice sounded like it came from somewhere else.

“Gina’s got him,” she said. “She took him back to the barn.”

“Is he okay?”

“He’s fine,” she said. “Scraped his leg a little on the way out, but he’s fine. You don’t need to worry about him, though. Now look at me.”

I opened my eyes. She ran through a few drills to make sure I didn’t have a head injury or nerve damage: Making my eyes track her finger, having me squeeze her hands, wiggling my toes. Though I had already done the same and was certain my head and neck were fine, I couldn’t deny the sense of relief every time a limb or digit did what it was supposed to do.

“Can you take a deep breath?” she asked.

“I can,” I said. “But I really don’t want to.”

“How bad is the pain?”

“Bad.”

“
How
bad?”

I took a semi-deep breath and closed my eyes against the resulting fire. “Bad enough I’d fuck Gavin if it made it stop hurting.”

Susan snorted with laughter. “That bad?”

“That bad.”

“Yeah, I think you need to go to the hospital,” she said, only half-joking. “You might have some busted ribs.”

“Just what I need.”

Susan let out a sharp huff of breath. “I’m going to have a serious talk with Leslie tonight. Gavin’s lucky he didn’t get you killed.”

“No shit,” I said. “There’s no way I’m loading another horse with him around. And I swear to God, Dante panics just hearing that man’s voice.”

“I don’t blame him,” she muttered. “Damn it, we’re never going to get that horse to load calmly again.”

“We will, it’ll just take some time and patience.” I glared in the direction Gavin had gone earlier. “As long as someone isn’t within earshot.”

“Yeah, good luck with that,” Susan said. “But I’ll talk to Leslie. This is getting ridiculous.”

I shifted slightly and winced. “It’s gone well past ridiculous.”

About ten minutes later, a diesel engine rumbled in the distance, drawing closer, following the familiar curve of the farm’s driveway.

“That would be your limousine,” Susan said. “I’ll be right back. Don’t move.”

“Not moving.”

She got up and stepped out of the trailer. Gravel crunched under tires, then stopped. The diesel engine idled while doors slammed and unfamiliar voices asked questions, which Susan answered. A moment later, two EMTs stepped into the trailer.

They asked questions about the incident, quizzed me to make sure I had no problems with short or long-term memory, poked and prodded, and ran me through the same drills Susan had already done. Several times they offered me oxygen, but I could breathe well enough. I had plenty of discomfort without a plastic tube blasting cold air up my nose.

They recommended a cervical collar and backboard as a precaution, but I refused that too. My neck was fine, there was no sign of spinal trauma, and immobility would only give my muscles a chance to seize up, which would mean more pain later. For the same reason, I refused the stretcher, insisting I could—and needed to—walk. At least that would reassure me I wasn’t badly hurt. One thing I’d learned from countless spills off horses: if I could walk, I was probably okay.

“Can you stand?” one of the medics asked.

“Probably.”

He put a hand under my elbow and Susan did the same on the other side. With their help, I stood, wincing as every movement made my back and ribs hurt that much more. I took a few tentative steps, pausing when the pain made me dizzy. I doubted I was seriously hurt, but it definitely wasn’t comfortable.

Stepping down from the trailer was absolute agony. Without the presence of a ramp, I had to take the step all at once but as slowly as humanly possible, which required more bending and twisting than my body wanted to accommodate at the moment. When both feet were on the ground, I clung to the side of the trailer and the medic’s arm until the fire receded. Gritting my teeth and taking slow, deep breaths, I started the long trek to the ambulance, which was about fifteen feet away.

I caught a glimpse of Gavin, standing off to the side with his arms across his chest and a scowl on his face. He didn’t speak. He probably didn’t dare.

Entering the ambulance required the opposite of exiting the trailer: a step up.

“Can you make it okay?” the medic asked, adjusting his grip on my arm when a wave of dizziness made me falter.

I nodded, and I was right. I made it. By the time I did, though, the pain was almost unbearable and I finally gave in to the suggestion of a stretcher. At least that made the ambulance ride marginally less painful.

In the emergency room, there was no getting comfortable on the rock hard bed, but it beat the hell out of the X-ray table. Fortunately, I only had to spend a few minutes on the latter. And, since the ER wasn’t terribly crowded, I didn’t have to spend an eternity on the former either. Plus I had Susan to keep me company, which didn’t do much for the pain, but it passed the time.

About three hours after I arrived, after I’d been poked, prodded, and X-rayed, the doctor finally came in with my prognosis.

“The good news is nothing’s broken. The bad news is, it’s still going to hurt for a few days.” A grin played at the corner of his mouth, suggesting he expected me to find some humor in that, but I knew what was in store for me for the next week or so and didn’t find it especially funny.

“I figured it would,” I said dryly.

“I’m going to recommend at least a week off from your job,” he said. “After that, it’s at your discretion, but don’t push yourself or you’re going to be in a hell of a lot more pain.”

I tried not to roll my eyes while he prattled on about rest, relaxation, and all of the common sense protocols I’d heard every time a horse put me in the emergency room. Heat not ice. Don’t lift more than twenty pounds. Call if this or that symptom arises. Same shit, different injury.

“I’m also going to write a prescription for Vicodin,” he said. “That should help for the next few days.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“I’ll be back with your discharge paperwork and you can be on your way,” he said.

After I was discharged, I shuffled out to the parking lot with Susan and gingerly sank into the passenger seat of her car.

“Do you want me to stay with you tonight?” She started the car. “In case you’re all doped up or need to go back to the ER?”

“Aren’t you heading to Wenatchee?”

She shook her head, then looked over her shoulder while she backed out of the parking space. “Gina scratched Dante from the show. She wants to wait a few days before we try putting him in a trailer again. Besides, you’re out of commission now and I’m sure as hell not showing him.”

I sighed and rubbed my forehead with two fingers. “Well, give me a week or so to recover and we can work on him.” I sighed again. “Christ, this is going to set me back for days with all the other horses.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll make sure they’re all worked. You just worry about you.” Then she laughed softly. “Poor Connor, he’s—”

“Oh shit!” I said. “I completely forgot. I’m supposed to get together with him tonight, and—” I looked at the clock on the dash. “Oh Jesus, I’m supposed to meet him in half an hour.”

Susan snickered. “You might want to cancel. I don’t think the good doctor recommends any bedroom rodeo activities in your fragile state.”

“Shut up.” I laughed and pulled my phone out of my purse. “That’s the last thing I’m doing with anyone anytime soon.”

“You said earlier you’d fuck Gavin—”

“Yeah,
if
it would make the pain go away, and until I see a double-blind study showing that sex with Gavin cures pain from bruised ribs, I’m not touching him.” I brought Connor’s number up. “You don’t mind if I call him, do you?”

“Of course not, go ahead.”

“Thanks.” I sent the call and waited for it to connect.

“Hey babe,” Connor said. Even in my pain-fogged state, his voice gave me pleasant chills.

“Hey,” I said. “Listen, I have to cancel tonight. I, um—” Why did I suddenly feel like a wimp for bowing out over an injury? It wasn’t like I’d broken a nail or had ‘a headache.’ Getting slammed into a wall by a three quarter ton animal was a reasonable excuse in anyone’s book.

“Dani?”

I cleared my throat, wincing. “One of the horses knocked me around in a trailer, so—”

“Jesus Christ, are you okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine,” I said. “Nothing’s broken, but I bruised my ribs pretty good. I’ll just be sore for a few days.”

“Ouch. Are you okay getting home? Do you need a lift?”

“Susan’s taking me home. My car’s still at the barn but…” I paused. “Anyway, I’ll figure it out. Don’t worry about it.”

“Well, do you at least want some company tonight?”

“You don’t mind? I don’t imagine I’ll be great company.”

He chuckled. “It’s not like I have any plans, seeing as my date so inconsiderately bailed on me.”

I laughed. “That bitch.”

“I know,” he said with mock disgust. “Anyway, I’m serious. If you want some company, it’s your call. I’d rather spend time with you than not.”

I smiled. “I’ll leave the door unlocked. Just let yourself in.”

“Will do. See you soon.”

Chapter Twenty-Two

I was in the kitchen when the front door opened.

“Dani?” he called down the hall.

“In here,” I said. A second later, he appeared in the doorway.

“Hey you.” He came toward me, presumably to give his customary greeting kiss, then stopped, putting his hands up. “I’m sure you heard this a million times at the ER, but where does it hurt?”

I grimaced. “Everywhere.”

His expression mirrored mine. “You sure you’re okay?”

“You could kiss me and see if it makes it better.”

He smiled, but hesitated. His eyes flicked to his hands, then back to me.

I took his wrists and laid his hands on the sides of my neck. Carefully avoiding touching me except with his hands and his lips, he bent and kissed me so tenderly I almost forgot how much my body hurt.

When he broke the kiss, he gently lifted his hands off me. “So what happened, anyway?”

“Remember that skittish horse I was on the day you came to see me at the barn?”

“Yeah, the one that freaked out on you?”

I nodded. “The very one. I was putting him in the trailer, boss scared the crap out of him, horse freaked, and ended up pinning me against the side of the trailer while he was panicking. Twice.”

Connor grimaced. “Jesus.”

“I was lucky,” I said. “It could have been much, much worse, especially with a horse his size.”

“No kidding. And nothing’s broken or anything? They’re sure you’re okay?”
“I’m fine.” I put my hands on his waist. “Just a lot of bumps and bruises.”

He ran his fingers through my hair. It was a habit of his anyway, but probably also the only thing he could think to do that didn’t stand much of a chance of hurting me. “So I guess a little rough and tumble BDSM action is out of the question tonight?” He tried to look put out.

“I’ll make it up to you, I promise.” I laughed, then winced.

“You okay?”
“Yeah. My ribs don’t approve of laughing right now.”

“And being up and around on your feet probably isn’t helping either,” he said. “Wouldn’t you be more comfortable sitting or lying down?”

“Probably.” I started toward the couch, then stopped. “Okay, I swear to God this isn’t a come-on, but I think the bed might be a bit more comfortable.”

“You’re the one in pain.” He made an “after you” gesture down the hall.

He followed me into the bedroom and kept a hand on my arm while I eased myself onto the bed. Lying back, I bit my lip while my ribs protested every motion. Too late, I realized I’d only grabbed two pillows, even though I needed a third to truly be comfortable.