“Why don’t you let me run you a bath?” he suggested, moving toward his double jacuzzi. “But this time you’ll have to stay and soak in it, okay? I have some Epsom salts which is good for muscle aches.”
“Tav, something’s wrong,” she moaned. “This isn’t normal.”
He resisted the urge to ask her how she could possibly remember, biting hard on his tongue. It wasn’t right to downplay the pain she must be in, but a hospital wouldn’t help matters. It didn’t matter what they gave her for the pain, she would still have to endure her first shift the following night, and there was nothing anyone could do about it.
“Please, Octavius,” she begged, her tone breaking his heart just slightly. “This can’t be right. I think something’s really wrong.”
Tav plugged the tub and turned on the faucet before turning back to her, sympathy written all over his face.
“The roads are pretty bad out there with the storm,” he lied. He could have taken her if need be, but he was not going to risk it when she was so close to turning. “Why don’t we see how you’re feeling after your bath, and I’ll see if I can’t wrest up a painkiller from somewhere.”
“I found a bottle of Advil,” she told him, but Tav knew that wouldn’t scratch the surface of her pain.
“I can probably do better than that,” he assured her, turning away. “Do you need me to put you in the bath?”
She started to shake her head, but her luminous eyes welled up with tears and her breaths suddenly escaped in short, laborious gasps.
“It’s all right,” he told her quietly, dropping to the floor to carefully undo her blouse. She had never changed into the track suit he had left for her, but he knew that the tightness of her own clothes weren’t helping matters.
She really will feel better after a bath, he thought, stripping her clothes away tenderly. For as beautiful as she was, he was more struck by her vulnerability than her nakedness, and he did not look to her like someone with whom he had been intimate with but as someone he needed to protect and heal.
“There you are,” he murmured, sliding her lithe form into the bath and feeling her relax as he did. When she looked up at him again, her face was less constricted in pain.
“I’m okay,” she mumbled as if she suddenly realized that she was naked in front of him. Tav’s eyes lingered on her for a moment before nodding and backing away.
“I’ll see if I can find you something to take the edge off,” he said, his voice husky as he tried not to look at her. But by now, Lora’s body had slipped below the high porcelain, and he moved to start the jets on the jacuzzi. The noise filled the bathroom, and Tav disappeared into the hallway, wracking his mind for where he might find a painkiller without leaving the house.
As if on cue to his thoughts, he heard his cell phone ringing from the living room, and he hurried downstairs to answer it.
“Where the hell have you been?” Andreas grumbled. “I’ve been trying to reach you all day.”
“Believe it or not, Drea, some of us do have other things going on,” Tav growled back, but as he spoke, he realized that Andreas was just the man who could help him. Immediately, he softened his tone. “Where are you?”
“Me?” Andreas asked, sounding surprised. “Why?”
“Do you think you could do me a favor?”
“That depends,” Andreas replied coyly. “Did you talk to Benny for me?”
Tav cringed. He had forgotten all about his brothers’ spat, whatever it was about.
“I didn’t,” Tav sighed, wondering if this was going to make his task more difficult.
“Will you talk to Benny if I do you this favor?” Andreas asked cajolingly.
“Yes!” Tav replied happily. “Yes, I will. I need you to find me some painkillers—the stronger the better.”
Andreas snorted.
“What?” he laughed. “Something wrong with your threshold for pain?”
“Can you do it or not?”
“Sure, I can, but so can you. Moreover, what the hell use are they to you? You have too much of a tolerance, and how much pain do you really feel?”
“They aren’t for me, and I can’t leave,” Tav growled, wishing that he didn’t need to tell his brother so many details.
“Does this have anything to do with that woman you asked Rhodes about?” Andreas asked lazily. Tav tensed.
“What?” he demanded, face flushing that Rhodes had spoken to Andreas out of turn.
“You needed a background check on a woman, right? And a couple guys?”
“So what?” Tav barked.
Why did I answer the damned phone? This is excruciating.
“So are you getting pills for her? Because I gotta tell you, bro, that’s not a good idea. If she’s already popping pills—”
“Oh for gods’ sake, Drea, can you get them or not?”
“Of course I can,” Andreas retorted, sounding offended. “I can get anything. I just want to make sure you’re not hooking up with some bad news woman.”
“Why don’t you just worry about your own bad news,” Tav shot back. “I’m at the house. Hurry up.”
“Yes, sir.”
Tav disconnected the call and immediately phoned Rhodes. His younger brother answered on the second ring.
“I don’t have any answers for you yet,” he told Tav by the way of greeting. “You know I’ll call you if I do.”
“I’m not calling about that…well, not really.”
“Oh. What then?” Rhodes asked.
“What did you tell Drea about what I told you?” Tav demanded. “What did you say?”
“Nothing. He called me to ask if I’d heard from you, and I told him that you had called looking for background checks. Why? What happened?” Rhodes sounded perplexed by the accusation, and Tav instantly felt contrite. He should have known that Andreas would manipulate words to hear what he wanted to hear.
Of course Rhodes didn’t say anything. That’s Andreas’ style.
“He’s a bastard, our kid brother,” Tav sighed. “Nevermind.”
“I always wondered about his paternity,” Rhodes jested. “He never did quite fit in with us, did he?”
“He is the baby,” Tav joked, but his heart was still relatively heavy. “Now that I have you on the line, though…”
He trailed off and Rhodes chuckled.
“I already told you, there’s no real news.”
“No real news?” Tav echoed hopefully, leaning forward on the sofa to listen with keener interest. “That sounds like you’ve learned something.”
“Well, yes and no,” Rhodes conceded. “I mean, I still haven’t heard anything about this Oliver Church via the New Mexico authorities or anything personal about this Lora Young.”
“But?” Tav pressed, feeling like he might have to force the information out of his somewhat elusive brother. “I feel like there’s a big ‘but’ coming in there, Rhodes.”
Rhodes tittered again.
“But…I can tell you for certain that there is no Adam or Andrew Young in New Mexico or Colorado who is missing a wife at this time, however. Does that help at all?” he concluded.