Finding Home (26 page)

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Authors: Lois Greiman

BOOK: Finding Home
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C
HAPTER
27
“H
e thinks
I
did it.” Casie's fingers were cold, her mind numb. She laughed, startling herself. The tone was eerie, echoing off the bland walls of the waiting room to which they had returned. “He thinks I hit her.”
“He didn't say that.” Colt's tone was quiet, soothing.
“I would never hurt her, Colt. I swear I wouldn't.”
He stared at her for an endless eternity, brows raised slightly. “Are you serious?”
“What? Yes. She and I—”
“Are you seriously thinking I might believe you would hurt her?”
She held his gaze, saw the ridiculousness of the thought in his eyes, and felt ashamed. “No. No. I guess not. I'm just . . . I'm all whacked out.”
His gaze held hers. “Because you're worried Ty might have done it?”
She let herself think about that for a second. Let her mind run free, remembered the time they'd first met . . . his solemn expressions, his quiet voice, the pain in his eyes. “No,” she said finally and let her lungs expand, let her head fall back a few inches as if a weight had been lifted from her chest. “Because I'm afraid other people might think he did.”
Colt shook his head, eyes worried. “His family life . . . He's swimming upstream, that's for sure. His father's an ass and his mother's . . .” He shrugged, exhaled heavily. “Do you have any idea where he might have gone?”
“No. But he didn't do it. I'm sure of that.”
“Why?”
She shrugged, feeling calmer. “I just know.”
She watched him glance toward the exit and wondered what memories hospitals held for
him
. The life of a rodeo cowboy was fraught with hazards.
“He's been abused. There's no doubt about that,” he said.
“So?”
“From what I understand, an abused kid is pretty likely to become abusive at some point in his life.”
“He's not abusive.”
“And you know that because . . .”
“Because of his hands.” She drew a careful breath, glanced toward the front desk. “Because of the way he calms Angel.”
He raised one dark brow. “The old mare.”
“Did I ever tell you that he came by the night after I bought her?”
He shook his head.
“I heard a noise in the barn, threatened to shoot if he didn't come out in the open.” She wiped her nose with the back of her hand, remembering the fragile belligerence on the boy's face. The way he looked at the horse with such tender caring. She cleared her throat. “He'd come all that way in the dark just to make sure she was okay. Rode his bike, he said.”
Colt reached to his left, pulling a box of tissues from a nearby table. She took one and balled it in her fist.
“It's not that far to bike between your farms.”
“He didn't have a bike,” she said and drew a deep breath. “It took me a few days to realize he'd lied. Then I offered him an old three-speed I found in the hip shed. He said he didn't need one. His worked fine.”
Colt's gaze remained steady on her face.
“Don't you see? He didn't want me to know he'd walked all that way just to make sure Angel was all right. He didn't want to seem vulnerable, but inside he's still a little boy.” She remembered how he'd looked with the magenta bruising under one eye and felt anger and sadness rush through her in equal measures. She lost her voice, cleared her throat. “Inside he just wants to be loved. Just like . . .”
Their gazes caught and held, burning with unbidden thoughts.
Colt pulled his gaze away first. “Maybe he just likes horses more than he likes snotty little rich girls.”
“It doesn't matter,” she said. “He didn't do it. It wouldn't even make any sense to bring her to the hospital if he had hit her.”
“I don't know if that's true,” Colt said. “I mean, theoretically he could have lost his temper, then gotten scared and brought her here.”
She lowered her brows, anger sprinting through her. “Well,
theoretically
—” she began, but he stopped her.
“I believe you.”
“What?”
“If you say he didn't do it, I believe you.”
She blinked, momentarily speechless. “Why?”
His lips hitched up a quarter of an inch. “Because you've got good instincts. You're a good judge of people.”
She scowled. Was that true? And if so, why did she doubt Brad? Why did she doubt
herself?
“If you're honest with yourself, you do,” he added.
She shook the thought away, almost relieved to turn her mind back to more immediate problems. “Well, maybe I'm not being honest. Maybe I'm lying through my teeth. Maybe it was me who . . .” She closed her eyes and exhaled shakily, ashamed of the way she'd felt about Sophie in the past. “She can get under a person's skin.”
He laughed. “You going to take the bullet for the boy now?”
“There is no bullet.” She was immediately angry again. When had she become such a loose cannon? “Because he didn't do it!”
“Dammit, Case,” he said, voice as calm as his expression. “I told you I know that.”
She scowled. “Just because I believe in him?”
“No,” he said and let the seconds tick silently away before he continued. “Because he believes in
you
.”
She stared at him, trying to straighten out the kinks in his logic, the uncertainties in her own mind.
He shook his head as if amazed that she didn't understand. “He might hate every bone in Sophie's well-groomed little body, but hurting her would hurt you.” He shrugged. “He wouldn't risk that.”
She stared at him a second. The second turned into a lifetime. She drew a long breath through her nostrils and studied him, head tilted, until she felt a modicum of peace steal through her. “When did you become a nice guy, Dickenson?”
He laughed. “You
are
whacked out, aren't you, Head Case? You'd better be careful or next thing you'll be telling me I'm not a poopy face anymore.”
For a moment she almost considered making him admit that he'd grown up. Grown nice. While she had just gotten bitter and . . . She shook her head and glanced toward the front desk, where the nurses had gone back to gossiping and laughing. “Why don't they tell us something?” She wrung her hands. “And how can they laugh when Sophie's life hangs in the balance?”
“Come on,” he said and took her fingers in his. “You're overreacting.”
“Overreacting?” She forced a laugh. “Are you nuts?”
“Probably,” he said. “And a poopy face.”
She huffed some sound between laughter and tears. “She's
unconscious
.”
He shook his head. “Hell, in rodeo that's not even considered an injury. Once Nate Gennings came off his bull-dogging horse headfirst. Was out for a week.”
She tilted her head and searched his face for some sign of hope. “But he was okay?”
“Said it was the best rest he'd ever had.”
She scowled at him and opened her mouth, but he interrupted her.
“And Groat Tilbert. His heeling horse went straight over backward. He was pinned under the saddle horn for a half an eternity. That old dog was out for a coon's age.” He paused.
“And . . .”
“When he come to he was smarter than ever. 'Course . . .” He made a face. “That ain't saying a heck of a lot in Groat's case.”
“What about you?”
“I'm afraid he was always smarter than me.”
She smiled a little. “Were you ever knocked unconscious?”
There was almost a moment of seriousness in his eyes, but it passed like the flight of a dove. “Every other week or so.”
“And you're okay.”
Maybe he was tempted to make a joke, but he resisted. “I'm okay.” He nodded toward the hospital room. “She will be, too.”
“Promise?” It was a stupid question, like a two-year-old to her daddy, who could make anything better, but she couldn't seem to stop herself. Couldn't pull her gaze from his.
“Promise,” he said, and taking that half a step that remained between them, lowered his lips toward hers.
She felt the kiss coming, felt it in her fingertips, in her soul, in every tingling nerve ending.
“Excuse me.”
Casie jerked her gaze to Dr. Jacob, who was walking toward them. Embarrassment flooded her cheeks. “Is she awake?”
He shook his head. “No. I'm sorry.” He was tall, skinny, young, with an Adam's apple that bobbed when he talked and a long white coat that made him look even skinnier and younger. “We did a CT scan. There doesn't seem to be any internal bleeding, and as far as we can tell, the spinal cord is uninjured. Her vital signs are . . .” He paused a second, wobbled his head. “. . . decent.”
“Decent?”
“Her blood pressure is a little lower than we'd like to see, but it's not life threatening at this time.”
Oh God. “At this time?”
“I'm afraid there's nothing else we can do right now. But we'll keep you apprised,” he said and turned away.
“What are you talking about?” she demanded. “You're a doctor. There must be something you can do. She's unconscious.”
“We're monitoring her vital signs, and I'll be available for the next six hours or so. But right now I have to see to my other patients. Please excuse me.”
“Excuse you!” she said, but she was talking to his back, charging after his swinging lab coat.
Colton reeled her back in.
“Case.”
She found his eyes. Her own stung with tears. “She's just a kid,” she hissed.
“I know.”
“Just a little girl.”
“I know,” he repeated, and suddenly she was crying. He pulled her against his chest. His hand felt warm and broad against the back of her head.
“I should have been watching her.” The words were muffled against the wear-softened fabric of his work shirt.
“You can't be there every second.”
“I never should have let her work those horses alone.”
His hand paused on her hair. “Do you think that's how she got hurt?”
She drew a long, shuddering breath through her nose. “She had the grullo out of the barn when I left.”
“Damn.”
“I know.” She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and pulled away from the shield of his chest. “I should have stayed with her.”
“It's not your fault.”
She shook her head, but he gripped her arm, squeezing gently. “It's not.”
“Well . . .” She drew a shaky breath. “I . . .” She cleared her throat, feeling foolish. “Thank you.”
He stared at her a second. A muscle jumped in his jaw. “For what?”
“For making me feel better.”
“Case,” he said and turned toward the window, body tense. “If that horse hurt her it's
my
fault.”
“No.” She blinked at him, surprised by this lack of logic. “No, it's . . .”
“More than it is yours, anyway,” he said solemnly. “So I don't really think thanks are necessary.”
She exhaled carefully, glanced at the hallway down which people in lab coats kept disappearing. “How about thanks for keeping me from jumping the doctor, then?” she asked.
He stared at her a second. A corner of his mouth twitched up. And suddenly she could breathe again. As if she'd been waiting to see him smile.
“Good God, Carmichael,” he said, eyes bright, “when did you become such a she wolf?”
She snorted and turned toward the window. “I just . . . I'm worried, that's all.”
“Yeah, well . . . you should get some rest. She's going to need you when she comes to.”
She found his eyes again, saw the assurance there, and laughed out loud. “I can't rest.” She shook her head. “But I probably should get home. I'll take care of things quick and come right—”
“Now who's nuts?”
“What are you talking about? I have to come back.”
“You're not going home. I'll take care of things at the Lazy.”

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