“I’m taking James to the boatyard. He needs to let off some steam.” I pull on some jeans and button the fly before slipping my feet into my boots. “Then we’re going to the club to sort some business.” I go to her and dip, kissing her forehead. “Text me and let me know what Doc says.”
“I’m fine.”
“Text me and let me know what Doc says.”
“Okay.” She exhales over the word. “I will text you and tell you what Doc says.”
I wrinkle my nose and rub it against hers, then grab a T-shirt and pull it on as I walk to the door.
“Danny,” she calls, making me look back over my shoulder. “I still want to find something to do. A hobby, a job. Something.”
Absolutely not. “We’ll talk about it tomorrow.” I leave the room before she can counter my dismissal, pulling the door closed behind me. I find James waiting outside. He shakes his head, telling me not to ask. So I don’t. I don’t need to.
He gets moving, and I join him. “Ready to race?” I ask.
He doesn’t answer.
He doesn’t need to.
10
ROSE
I stay on the bed for another half hour, not physically exhausted, but definitely mentally. You’d think by now, after weeks of constant worry and swaying emotions, my body would be used to it. Accustomed to it. And yet I feel as exhausted now as I did the moment James resurrected Danny after being peacefully dead for three years.
A knock on the door pulls my attention there, and I hear Doc calling through the wood. “One minute,” I say, scooting to the edge of the bed and reaching for one of Danny’s T-shirts on the chair. I slip it on and rummage through the sheets for my panties. “Damn it, where are they?” I mutter. I give up and rush to the closet to find a fresh pair. “Come in.” I climb back into bed and pull the sheets up to my waist.
Doc pokes his head around the door and smiles. “Morning, Rose,” he chirps, pushing the door open to make way for the scanning machine to be pushed in by Fury.
“Morning, Doc,” I reply, catching Fury’s eye. Just the fact he’s helping Doc speaks volumes. He’s without anything to do because Beau is hiding in her darkness. My heart squeezes.
“How is Beau, Doc?” I ask, making Fury look at the old man too, obviously wanting an answer to that question as well.
He starts fiddling with the machine. “I’ll never get used to the fact that patient confidentiality doesn’t feature in my life anymore.” His words prompt me for the first time to wonder about Doc. I know he was retired. I know he ran his own practice for a long time. I know between Danny and James he now earns more than he probably ever has. But something tells me the money isn’t what keeps him here. And, oddly, neither is the possibility of death should he refuse to be on standby for our big, fucked-up family. “She’s in a state of heightened grief,” Doc says quietly, smiling at me as he gets the machine ready. “She’s going to need you, Rose.”
I nod and settle, and Fury leaves us, letting Doc do his thing or, more to the point, Danny’s thing, while I wonder what I could possibly do to help Beau. I come up with nothing, and that just makes me feel like a shitty friend. I know how desperately I want her to find and keep her peace; the blows just keep coming and coming for her, so I can only imagine the level of desperation James must feel. And hopelessness.
“Everything looks just fine,” Doc says, bringing my eyes down to my stomach where he’s dragging the probe across my abdomen.
“You may as well leave that machine in here,” I say, propping myself up on my elbows to look at the screen. “He’ll be ordering another scan tomorrow.” I smile at the gray, distorted blob, my mind going to bad, bad places. “Doc?” I ask quietly, making his gray bushy eyebrows rise in question. “Can you see the sex?” I spit out the words quickly and press my lips together.
“Oh.” He laughs, and then his face is quickly serious. “No, I cannot.”
“You’re lying,” I counter playfully. “You know, don’t you? Come on, Doc, I promise I won’t tell.” I’m suddenly ravenous to know. Desperate. And yet there’s still that side of me that doesn’t want to spoil the surprise.
“No.” He wipes the probe and slips it back in the holder. “I have paused the screen so that your husband may have a peek at his . . .” He fades off, looking out the corner of his eye at me. “. . . baby, if he should like.”
“Spoilsport,” I mutter.
“You and Mr. Black come to me together and make such a request, I will more than happily oblige.”
“It’s my body.”
Doc laughs, pushing the machine to the side of the room. “I don’t think Mr. Black will agree. Now, remember what I’ve told you?”
“Yes, I must take it easy and not stress out.” Landing a tried look on him, I sigh. “Did you miss who I’m married to, Doc?”
“I did not, which is why I am passionate about you taking care of yourself and the baby.” He presents me with a little bottle. “Lavender oil. Put it in your bath, on your pillow, in your purse if you must. It’s soothing, physically and mentally.” He sets it on the nightstand.
“Thank you.” I fall to my back. “Can I ask you something?”
“No,” he says flatly, and I pout.
“You don’t know what I’m going to ask.”
“Exactly. I have always lived by the rule that if someone asks you if they may ask you something, you either won’t like the question or they won’t like the answer.”
“Oh.” I consider his logic for a moment, and I soon think better of asking my question. I can’t, however, decide whether Doc would not like me asking him why he’s here, or whether I would not like the answer.
“How is your palm?” He cranes his head as he packs his bag, and I turn it over to show him the mild red blemish from my frying pan incident.
“It doesn’t hurt.”
“And your arm?”
I look at yet another injury on my body. It’s nothing compared to Danny’s chest. “It’s fine.”
“And Danny’s changing his dressings regularly?”
“Yes,” I sigh, knowing why he won’t let me do it. “Just now before you got here.”
“I’ll leave some more waterproof dressings and fresh bandages here.” He pops some on the nightstand and collects his bag. “Perhaps you could pop in to see Beau now. I believe Mr. Kelly has left the house with Mr. Black.”
I nod and sit up. “Any advice?” I ask.
“Patience.” He smiles as he backs out of the door. “Lots of love and patience.” He disappears, and I get up, taking a shower and throwing on a loose blush-pink sundress and some flip-flops. I coil my hair into a bun, then I call Esther.
“How’s Daniel?” I ask, letting myself out onto the terrace. I cast my eyes around the expansive area, rewinding to three years ago. Three years ago when a missile took the old terrace out with me on it. I flinch, hearing Danny bellowing my name, scrambling to reach me as I dangled precariously off the edge. Scared to let go. But even more scared not to. Because I had fallen in love with the monster who’d taken me, and the repercussions of that were terrifying.