Here Comes Trouble (37 page)

She needed to go check on Jenny and Chase.
Walking to the nurse's station, she found the charge nurse. "I'm
Terri Cassidy and my fiancé, Joel Rhodes is in that trauma room,"
she lied and pointed to the room where they had taken him. "My soon
to be sister-in-law is on the labor and delivery floor, I need to
go check on her."

"I'm sure it will be a while before we have
news," the nurse told her kindly. "If we need you, we'll find you
up there."

Terri breathed a sigh of relief then headed
down the hall to the elevator. She hoped that Curly finished up
with the police soon, so she could get up here. If she missed the
birth of her grandbaby, she was going to be fit to be tied. And if
they brought Joel into surgery, without talking to her, she would
bring down the house. Terri wouldn't want to be the one on the
receiving end in either one of those situations.

When she got off the elevator on the third
floor, Terri asked the nurse at the station where Jenny was located
then made her way to the room. Before she walked in, she heard
Jenny grunt then moan loudly, before she started panting. That told
Terri before she walked in this wasn't a trial run and Jenny
probably wasn't far from delivering.

Chase stood by her head and was holding her
hand, his face was pale and beads of sweat dotted his forehead. He
looked relieved to see Terri, and tried to force a
smile.

"Bout time you got here," he told her
weakly.

She glanced at Jenny then back at Chase and
asked, "Your mama call you?"

"No, not yet. I called and told her when we
got here, but she hasn't shown up yet," he told her and Terri
realized he didn't know about Joel yet. After tossing it around in
her head a couple of times, Terri decided she needed to tell him,
but not in front of Jenny. She had enough on her plate. Chase did
too, but he'd be pissed if she didn't tell him.

"Did the doctor give you any idea on how long
it's gonna be?" she asked feeling out the situation.

"He said since it's our first, it could be a
while even though she's fully dilated. The contractions are about
ten minutes apart now," Jenny told her then smiled. "I didn't tell
Chase until they were fifteen apart this time."

"Smart girl," Terri told her with a grin. "Um,
Chase can you go downstairs and help me bring something up from the
truck...it won't take but a minute," she asked.

He snorted and his eyebrows lifted in
disbelief. "I'm kind of tied up right now, Terri. I'll help you
after we have the baby."

Dragging him from Jenny's side was going to be
difficult she could see that now. But she had to make him come with
her. "I really need to get it now, it's hot outside and it'll go
bad if I leave it out there," she pressed.

"I promise not to have the baby before you get
back. I'll be fine, Chase," Jenny told him and Terri wanted to kiss
her friend.

Chase looked undecided, but Jenny pushed him
away from the bed with a firm, "Go!" and he kept his eyes on her
until Terri dragged him out the door and into the hall.

"You don't think this could have waited," he
ground out and his steps turned to stomps as he moved toward the
elevator.

Terri stopped him with a hand on his arm, "No,
it couldn't wait. Your brother had an accident," she started then
shook her head and corrected, "Not an accident, someone tried to
shoot him, and the four-wheeler he was on turned over on
him."

Chase's face paled, then he yelled, his
breathing short and shallow, "Holy shit!
Where is he
?!?"
Chase put his hand to his chest and rubbed then leaned over on his
knees. "Oh, god I might pass out."

Terri put her hand in the center of his back
and rubbed. "Breathe, Chase...slow it down. That's it, honey. He's
downstairs in the ER right now. His leg is pretty messed up, and
they'll probably have to do surgery," she informed then added, "I
know you need to be with Jenny, I just thought you needed to know.
I didn't want to upset her."

"Thank you...can I see him?" Chase asked
her.

"No, they're assessing him right now, but I'll
come back up and let you now what's going on as soon as they tell
me something. Your mama isn't here, so I...uh, told them I'm his
fiancé, so they'd give me information."

"Good thinking...he's gotta be okay," Chase
groaned and shoved a hand through his hair. "Who the hell was
shooting at him?" His face turned red and a muscle worked at his
jaw.

"We don't know, but I think maybe your mama
took out the guy who was shooting at him. The shooting stopped
after she fired a few times. I don't know what the situation is
there, because we left to bring him to the hospital."

Chase forced a smile, then said, "That's my
mama."

"Okay, you go back to your wife, just tell her
we left the package at the nurse's station and I went back
downstairs to the cafeteria or something."

"Okay...thanks," Chase said and leaned down to
kiss her cheek. "You're gonna stay with him, right?" Chase asked
looking torn about not going downstairs with her.

"Every minute they'll let me," she promised.
Terri wasn't going to leave his side.

Three hours later, Curly, Ethan and his crew,
police officers, all the hands from the ranch, and several other
people she didn't know were crowded into the waiting room. The
noise level was deafening, and Terri just needed some space to
think...to worry.

By the time she'd gotten back downstairs they
were prepping Joel for surgery, and he was so hopped up on pain
meds, he was out like a light. She didn't even have the chance to
tell him she loved him, before they took him away. Well, she'd
whispered it in his ear and kissed him, but he was
unconscious.

That was something she was going to fix as
soon as he woke up. He needed to hear it, and she needed to say it.
If things worked out with them, that would be ideal, if they didn't
at least she'd said what she needed to say. There would be no more
hiding her feelings from him, or wondering how he felt about her,
or being afraid.

If he didn't feel the same about her, or still
didn't want a relationship with her, she would just deal with it
and move on after he was on his feet again.

Terri's stomach was in a knot, her body filled
with so many emotions it felt like her insides were on fire, and
her brain felt like there was a rubber band around it, as she paced
the floor of the surgery waiting room and worried.

Someone squeezed her shoulder and she looked
to see Curly there. "He's gonna be okay, sugar. They're going to
fix him right up," she said.

Terri had heard it from the doctor, from the
nurses and now from Curly. She'd believe it when she saw it,
because she had seen his leg. The doctor said both bones were
broken, the fracture was displaced and it was an open wound, a
triple threat.

Being a nurse, Terri knew what that meant and
how serious it was. Pins and rods were in his future, as was months
of physical therapy so he could get use back. He was damned lucky
that four-wheeler hadn't landed higher up on his body.

She
was lucky. If that had happened she
would have lost the man she loved, before she could even tell him
how she felt about him. He would have died thinking she was leaving
him. Terri wasn't going anywhere except back to that ranch and take
care of him until he was back on his feet. Then she'd think about
what the future held.

"You know we're going to have to pull together
again to keep the ranch going. He's going to be laid up for a long
time," Terri told Curly.

They'd probably have Joel in a wheelchair for
a while, and he wasn't going to be able to manage the ranch. Joel
would hate that.

CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN

At three a.m. Terri was shaken awake where
she'd fallen asleep in a chair in the corner of the waiting room.
An hour ago, when she collapsed in this chair from exhaustion and
relief, Joel had just gotten out of surgery, and was in the
recovery room.

After her vision cleared, and she realized it
was Curly who had wakened her, she vaulted out of the chair and
grabbed Curly's shoulders.

"Is he out of recovery? Everything okay?" she
asked in a strained hoarse croak.

"He just woke up and they're moving him into a
room in a little bit. But that's not why I woke you up," Curly
informed and her face almost disappeared beneath a huge proud
grin.

"We have a baby?" Terri yelled and let out a
whoop, then danced in a circle.

"It's a boy, and he's a big 'un...Caleb
Jackson Rhodes," she told Terri proudly and then grabbed her up in
a tight hug.

Terri groaned and said, "Oh, god--not another
Jack." Chase's grandpa and his father were both named Jack. That
would get awfully confusing for sure.

"No, they're going to call him Caleb and he is
just the most precious baby in the whole nursery," Curly told her
and her eyes welled up.

"Congratulations, Curly...I'm so happy for
you," she said and squeezed the older woman. Terri's eyes wandered
around the now empty waiting room, then she stepped back and
yawned. "Looks like everyone cleared out, huh?"

"Yeah, your brother and his friends headed
back to the ranch, and the police were finally satisfied with the
answers I gave them. They want to talk to Joel when he's up to
it."

"Did they find the guy in the woods?" Terri
asked hoping like hell they did so that fear wasn't hanging over
them when they went back to the ranch. There definitely was a
killer on the loose, and now he was aiming his sights at Joel. Ice
cold fear poured through her at the thought.

"They found a lot of blood, and a trail where
he dragged himself out, but they didn't find him. They think he's
shot pretty bad though, so he'll turn up somewhere." As if reading
her mind, Curly assured her, "I don't think he'll be in any shape
to shoot anyone else."

"If you hadn't come out there when you did, I
don't know--"

"I did and it's all fine now," Curly cut her
off. "They'll catch him. The police think it was Joel's ex-business
partner. Some of the stuff they found in the bunkhouse led them to
believe that, but they wouldn't tell me what they
found."

Terri sucked in a breath, "Really?"

"Yeah, they're pretty confident he killed
Karen too, but there are some forensics reports they're waiting to
get."

"I guess we'll find out when they have all
their evidence together. It's just damned good news that Joel is
off the hook," Terri told her and huffed a relieved
sigh.

Terri knew that Joel hadn't done it in her
heart of hearts, but guilt poured through her anyway for even
thinking it for a moment. Joel Rhodes was a good man, an honest
man, who'd been hurt by a woman who didn't give a shit about anyone
but herself.

"Curly you asked me the other day if I loved
Joel. When I told you I didn't, I lied," she admitted and her voice
shook over her next words, "I do love him and I'm not leaving. I'll
be here for the long haul to make sure he gets better."

"Well, thank the Lord," she said and hugged
Terri fiercely. "It's about time you woke up, now it's time my son
did too. If you give him time, he'll come around," Curly told
her.

"That's all I've got now while he recovers, so
we'll see what happens. I'm just scared he's going to hurt me,"
Terri told her and felt her eyes burn.

"Oh, suck it up girl, life is nothing if you
don't take chances. He loves you, just give him time. That woman he
was married to did a number on him."

Terri nodded then grabbed her arm. "Let's go
make sure he's not giving the nurses hell."

"Yeah, he comes by that naturally," Curly said
with a hoot and walked with her to the elevator.

***

"Ya'll take it easy," Joel complained and
sucked in a pained breath as Dylan and Matt lifted him from the
back seat of his truck and lowered him into the wheelchair that
Terri was holding steady.

"Oh, quit being a baby, Joel. I've got some
good pain meds for you once we get you inside," she told him with a
wink.

"Baby hell...have your damned leg crushed like
a grape then tell me to suck it up," he grumbled, then sighed when
he was finally settled into the chair.

He'd been in the hospital for a week, and had
gotten grumpier every day. The nurses were ready to get rid of him
by the time the doctor released him this morning. Chase, Jenny and
the baby had stopped by on their way home a few days ago, and Joel
got to hold Caleb for a few minutes. The proud and awed look on his
face when he did had Terri fighting back tears, so did the thought
of him holding their baby one day. She knew that was a fantasy,
because they didn't even have a relationship, but Terri couldn't
help herself.

Unlatching the brakes on the wheelchair, Terri
pulled him back away from the truck. When she started pushing him
forward toward the front porch he looked up and shaded his
eyes.

"Damn, even the buzzards are circling, hurry
up and get me inside," he said then dropped his hand to his lap.
Terri stopped for a moment and looked up too. She hadn't ever seen
that many buzzards before. They floated around in a big circle over
the woods.