Wild Ride: Lance and Tammy (33 page)

“You honestly don’t have to be,” he said after a long stretch of silence.  “Remember, alpha male.”

She laughed. “That’s hard to forget.” He glanced at her again and she could see that the anger was gone.

“Some good news for you.  The wedding invitations are here.”

Oh lord, there was a reality check.  She was so deeply in love with this man and he seriously was going to marry her.  She kept playing things over and over in her head.  She felt that she didn’t deserve him.

“I love you Tam.”

She popped her head up not realizing she was wringing her hands.  She smiled wide and he returned it. It was a long wait, but her dreams were finally coming true. Then everything erupted into chaos.  The last thing she remembered was the horrible sound of crushing metal and shattering glass—then an impact.  All went black.

She smelled gas.  Then she could detect the coppery taste of blood in her mouth.  She opened her eyes.  Her chest was in agony, her ears were ringing and everything was hazy.  After a moment of looking around she realized that she was hanging upside down.

Lance!

She looked over at the driver’s seat and he was there upside down and bleeding.  There was blood pouring down his face and dripping off his hair.  She reached over. “Lance!” and squeezed his arm. God her chest hurt!

No response.

She sobbed. “Lance please wake up.  Please be alive.”  She fumbled for her seatbelt.  Surprisingly it popped out despite the tension on it.  She hit her head when it released and yelped in pain.  It really hurt when she folded up on the ceiling of the truck. It was caved in.  She did her best to straighten out and started to shake Lance.  She knew it was something you should never do in case of a neck injury, but she could still smell gas. “Lance, wake up!”

He groaned.

Oh thank God!

“Please, please be okay.”

“I’m alive,” he murmured opening his eyes.  Then he swore—a lot.  “Tammy get out of here.”

“No. I’m not leaving you.” She turned and crawled out through the broken glass of her door, around the front of the truck, to the driver’s side.

She spent the next five minutes trying to pull open his door.  Her hands were getting cut on the broken glass, but it finally popped open.

Lance managed to undo his own seatbelt and crumpled like she did onto the roof of the truck.  He cursed again.

“Is anything broken.”

“I don’t know. I fucking hurt everywhere.” He reached for her and she helped him out. 

Surprisingly he was able to stand, unsteadily.  “Can you stand?” he asked.

“I think so.” She cried as he helped her up.  Her incision was bleeding and her ribs were killing her.  Being restrained by a seatbelt during a crash certainly didn’t help the healing fractures of her ribs.

He framed her face in his hands and studied her. “Are you okay baby?”

“I think I look better than you.” Lance’s face was covered in blood.  He had a large laceration over his left eye.  It was probably glass from the windshield because both front airbags and the side impact ones deployed. “There’s a laceration about two inches long over your left eye.”

“Well, I don’t feel it yet. At least we’re alive.  I will never doubt airbags, ever.” He took her arm. “Let’s get away from here before this thing blows.”  He ended up helping her up the edge of the ditch to the gravel road.  Once there, he searched for his phone, pulled it out and called emergency services.

“Lance we need to stop your bleeding.”

He nodded, and while on the phone, managed to remove his suit jacket, and then his shirt.  He gave it to Tammy who tore a piece from the cotton material to wipe blood from his eye and forehead. Then she balled a bit up in her fist and held it over his eye. “Are you okay?”

“I’ll be fine.  Just jolted my ribs.”  She lied.  She was in agony.

He studied her for a moment, and his expression told her he didn’t believe her, but he nodded and continued speaking into the phone.

“Lance?”  Tammy pointed to an object a hundred yards past the totaled ranch truck.  It was a van, on its roof, like the truck and smashed to hell. The rear wheels were still spinning.  She made to go toward it and he gripped her arm shaking his head while still talking on the phone.  He gave the dispatcher information on the second vehicle.

“Someone could be hurt.”

“You are not playing rescuer to whomever is in there.  They tried to kill us,” he said tersely.

She never stopped to think of the circumstances that led to the crash. “Do you think?”

“I know.  They can burn to death for all I care.  Your well-being comes first.  The ambulance and cops can deal with whoever that is.  He came out of a side road behind the trees over there.” He waved his hand toward the trees guarding the entrance of a scarcely used side road.  “He purposely waited for us.”

She certainly couldn’t let someone perish no matter who they were, or what they did.  As she was thinking that, she saw someone crawl out from around the van.

“Oh my God!”

“Jesus,” Lance said beside her.

There were sirens in the distance now.  It would only be a few minutes before they reached them.

“That son of a—”

Tammy scrambled in front of Lance and grabbed and clung to him. “We’re alive.  Can we please let it go?”

“I should have killed him when he hit you.”

“No Lance, he’s—” She suddenly felt very faint and started to sway.

“Ah hell.”  He tightened his arms around her and made her sit down.  It was perfect timing for the ambulance.  “Christ, Tam, you’re bleeding from the abdomen.”

“I’m okay, I just tore the sutures.”

He waved one of the attendants over.  “She needs to go to the hospital quick.”

“Hey Tammy,” said one of the EMTs recognizing her.  His partner went down to check on Richard who was laying belly down outside the van and not moving.

“She’s bleeding.  She has two cracked ribs, maybe more from the seatbelt.” He gave her a look of disapproval.

Tammy now knew for certain that he knew she wasn’t all that truthful.

The man set a bag beside her. “Hi.”  He greeted her again.

Tammy smiled. “Hi Stan.” She knew he was trying to keep her calm by talking to her.

Several police cars pulled up then, including Duncan’s.  Right behind them was one of Sulphur Springs fire trucks, they had two, and a fire and rescue.  Well, everyone was here now.

“Stay with her.” Lance demanded.  He stood up and walked over to Duncan.

“Wouldn’t want to leave and piss him off,” Stan teased, while pulling up her shirt and looking at the wound.  He clucked his tongue. “You are an accident waiting to happen.”  He put a blood pressure cuff on her and checked the rest of her vital signs.

“It’s superficial.”

“I think I’ll make that call.  Why’d you faint?”

“I didn’t.”

“I saw you sway Tammy—syncope.”

She sighed. “My ribs are killing me. I’m in pain. I didn’t want Lance to know.”

“Uh-huh.  From the look you got, I suspect he does anyway.” He reached into his bag and drew out a package and opened it.  He then retrieved a vial. “I’m putting in a line and giving you a shot of Demerol before we move you.  You’ve lost some blood, and your pulse is through the roof.”

“I’m going to need it for the tongue lashing from Lance anyway.  I wasn’t honest.”

He turned and looked over his shoulder at Lance. “Is that the fiancé I’ve heard about?”

She nodded and smiled.  Only in a small town would rumor spread so quick.  The staff at the hospital knew when she ended up in there last week, especially with Lance hovering around.  Now the whole town probably knew.

“Nice catch.”

She laughed and winced.  Stan clucked his tongue again while he put the IV in and gave her a push of Demerol through it. “Just enough to take the edge off.”

Oh, that worked. He grinned from ear to ear seeing the drug take effect.  Her features started to relax.

“Come on Tammy, you should have a c-spine on but since you’ve been up walking around, I think we’ll just get you back to the hospital.”  He helped her stand and led her to the ambulance.  He made her sit on the stretcher and lay down. Lance appeared at the rear doors still holding the torn shirt over his eye.  “Duncan told me I have to get stitches.”

“What about Richard?”  She expected him to be angry asking, but instead he looked sympathetic.

He got in the ambulance and sat on the bench alongside Stan who was hooking up the IV to a bag of saline. “I’m sorry Tam.  I know you had faith in the man, but he didn’t make it.”

“
What?
”  Oh why was she crying?  He tried to kill her.

Lance leaned in and held her. “It’s unfortunate, and I know you want to grieve for him, so you go ahead,” he murmured in her ear.

“Mr. Hartley, you might as well ride along,” Stan said.  “Rob and I have to take Tammy in because she dehisced.”

“She what?”

“Stanley!”  She really didn’t want him to know.  He would give her hell for not letting him know.

“Her sutures tore,” he answered ignoring her protest.  Then he looked at her in warning. “Tammy, he’s going to know anyway, you’re bleeding all over the dressing and into your clothing.” He lifted her shirt and took another look.  Then he grabbed a clipboard and made some notes.

Tammy rolled her eyes.

“Enough Tam,” Lance scolded seeing it. “This is serious.”

“I’ll live.  The pain meds Stan gave me—” she stopped talking.  It seems that Demerol gave her loose lips.  Her eyes widened.

Lance stared at her angrily.  “I see that we still have some issues to work out.”

Stan bit his lip to keep from grinning. Tammy was strong willed.  “Good luck with that.” He got up and left the ambulance.

“How much pain are you in?” His expression became concerned.

“Not much now,” she answered sheepishly.

Lance leaned over and put his elbow on his knee to support the arm holding the shirt.  He cursed.

At that moment Stan came back, put several bags of equipment away, checked the IV and sat next to Lance again.  Rob got in behind the wheel.

Stan opened a package of sterile gauze, moistened it with sterile saline and told Lance to replace the torn shirt piece he held over his head wound.  “I’d actually appreciate it if you could wear it again.  I have an urge to go to the gym.”

Lance didn’t feel the humor and just turned his head to looked at him.

Stan’s smile faded and he gave Tammy he’s-a-tough-audience look.

She lifted her brows as to say what-do-you-expect?  They were just about killed.  It was her ex-fiancé, and she didn’t tell Lance the truth about the injuries she received.  Yup, things weren’t looking up.

Once at the hospital, the doctor on call restitched the wound after he determined there was no further intervention needed.  Lance got six stitches. 

“I’d like to keep you overnight for observation Tammy,” the doctor said.

“She’s going home with me.  Jake’s going to take the night and stay with us at the house.  She needs to be around family right now,” Lance interrupted appearing in the doorway.  He had a bandage over his left eye.

“I suppose Jake could handle her well enough.” He winked at Tammy

“You do realize I’m capable of making my own decisions.” She glared past the doctor at Lance.

“Not tonight,” he said sternly.

She bit her lip to stop from saying something she’d regret.

He waited seeming to know but seemed satisfied and turned to the doctor. “Thanks.”

“Take care of her. She’s one of the best.”

“I know she is,” he said still looking at Tammy, his expression unreadable. He shook the doctor’s hand before he left.  He then entered the room and stood next to the bed.  “Colt’s coming to get us.”

“You are so bossy!”   She was aggravated, hurt, devastated and exhausted.

“Yes. I told you I was,” he said calmly.

The lawyer. She sighed and stared at the white panels of the ceiling. “How am I going to tell Melanie?”

“I phoned your brother and told him.  He’s going to sit her down and tell her.”

She should have been angry over his control over things, but she was surprisingly relieved. She knew why. She was so used to being in control of her emotions, but this was happening to her, and Lance was amazing. He was her rock. Tears leaked from the corners of her eyes. 

“Hey baby.” He leaned over and kissed them away.

His mouth lingered on each cheek longer than expected.  His lips were warm, and the shift in him warmed her heart.  He knew exactly how to take care of her.  Her eyes met his when he lifted his head.  She knew they were raw with emotion.  All her feelings, her weaknesses, everything was visible for him to see.  It was something she never revealed to anyone in her life.  She knew he could see it.  He smiled slightly and nodded ever so subtly.

“You’ll get through this love.  You are made of really tough material.”