Buch lesen: «The Doctor's Cowboy»

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Dear Reader

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Epilogue

Extract

Copyright

Chapter One

Wyatt Kelley stood on the edge of the bucking chute, looking down at the monster bull. Beelzebub. From what he’d heard of the bull’s nasty attitude, the demonic name fit. Yeah, this had “easy ride” written all over it. The moment he mounted the two-ton bull, ol’ Beezy let him know exactly what he thought of having a rider by twitching, fidgeting, snorting. Basically saying, “Your butt is toast.”

“I don’t think he wants to be your best friend,” said one of the cowboys manning the chute.

“What?” Wyatt patted the bull on the side of his neck. “This little guy is a sweetheart. We’re going out for drinks afterward.”

As if to disagree, Beezy stomped the dirt and shuddered beneath him, causing the bell hanging from the lower part of Wyatt’s bull rope to clang.

“Next up, we’ve got a cowboy out of the Cowboy State,” the rodeo announcer said as Wyatt readjusted the rope, getting his grip just right. “Wyatt Kelley will be riding Beelzebub.”

Wyatt took a deep breath, let it out, then nodded. The moment the chute opened, Beelzebub shot out and began bucking as if Wyatt were a nest full of angry hornets. The arena around him became a dirt-brown blur as the bull spun and kicked so hard it nearly jarred the teeth out of Wyatt’s head. As if ticked off that he hadn’t gotten rid of Wyatt’s weight yet, Beezy switched directions and kicked even harder.

Wyatt held on for all he was worth, pretty sure this was the longest eight seconds of his career. And he’d ridden more bulls than he could count. In the next moment, his hat went flying. Sensing victory, the bull seemed to corral all of his intense power and did a belly roll, coming completely off the ground as he kicked all four feet out to the side. Wyatt felt himself slide but he tightened his hold on the rope and his legs pressed against the bull’s sides. By some miracle, he stayed on.

But as soon as the bull landed on his feet, he went into a spin that spelled doom. In less than the blink of an eye, the bull bucked Wyatt off into the well, the center of the rank bastard’s spin. Wyatt’s heart rate accelerated when he realized his hand was caught in his rope, adrenaline fueling panic. He fought to free himself, but before he could Beezy caught him with a horn.

Pain shot through the lower part of his side just before he went airborne and was flung to the other side of the bull. Wyatt was still fighting to free himself and not succumb to the pain when the bull caught him again, this time across his abdomen just below his safety vest.

This was not good. Really not good.

Wyatt felt like a rag doll, one that might well soon have its guts spilling over the dirt of the arena. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t thought of dying like this before, but the reality sure did suck a bushel of lemons.

His body slammed against the ground before he realized his hand had finally come loose from the rope. His vision dimmed, and he didn’t think he could move even if he saw the bull’s hooves heading toward his face. But it wasn’t the bull that came into his line of sight but rather the painted face of one of the bullfighters.

“Hang on, buddy.” The man’s words sounded off, as if they were having to move through water or maybe thick syrup to reach Wyatt’s ears. “We’re going to get you some help.”

The bullfighter shifted away to speak to someone Wyatt couldn’t see. Wyatt stared up at the sky beyond the lights of the arena and blinked slowly. He wondered if he looked down would he find that the lower half of his body was no longer attached to the top half and they just hadn’t told him yet.

He wasn’t sure how much time passed, but it seemed between one blink and the next paramedics appeared. He glanced to the right and saw an ambulance. At least it wasn’t a hearse. Guess that meant he wasn’t dead. They fitted him with a neck brace without too much trouble. But when they started to slip a backboard beneath him, he cried out without even thinking about it. That tended to happen when it felt as if your gut were being sliced open with a flaming hot machete.

In the next moment, the two paramedics and what must have been half the cowboys in attendance were lifting him and carrying him to the ambulance. Somehow the muffled applause of the spectators reached him, and the guy from the chute smiled down at him.

“Hear that? You’re going to get a lot of ladies after this.”

Wyatt wasn’t entirely sure that the body parts that would interest the ladies weren’t long gone. And when they loaded him in the ambulance, causing a fresh hell to tear at his middle, thoughts of the ladies were the furthest thing from his mind.

Everything seemed to send a new shock wave of pain through him. The slamming shut of the ambulance door, the driver climbing into the front seat, the jouncing of the rig as it left the arena. When the ambulance made the turn out of the rodeo grounds onto the road, black dots appeared in front of Wyatt’s eyes.

“To hell with this,” he thought before letting himself pass out.

* * *

DR. CHLOE BRODY dropped the coins into the snack machine then looked through the glass front at her choices. The granola bar or bag of apple slices were the wisest choices, but the chocolate cupcakes seemed to be singing a siren song to her. Come on, you know you want to, that devious package of sugary goodness whispered. You can run off the pesky calories later.

Giving in to temptation, she punched the appropriate buttons and watched the cupcakes drop.

“Hey, Doc,” called Lori Dalton from the ER nurses’ station. “You want to enter the pool?”

Chloe grabbed her cupcakes and walked toward the trio of women behind the desk. “I’m afraid to ask. What’s the pool for?”

Sophie Wells, a petite blonde, looked up and smiled. “On who Verona is going to target next.”

Chloe laughed as she leaned against the wall that separated the nurses’ station from the four curtained trauma and triage areas. Verona Charles was Blue Falls’s version of Cupid. Her favorite pastime was seeing which couples she could match up. While she sent many happily single people fleeing, she did have a remarkably good rate of success. Last year alone, she’d not only successfully matched her niece, Elissa, but also Elissa’s two best friends, India and Skyler. And she’d probably had her hand in a few more couples ending up together.

“You all are tempting fate,” Chloe said.

“I already have a man,” said Lori as she flashed her engagement ring.

Chloe gestured toward Sophie and Jenna Marks, who normally worked at the clinic with Chloe but was picking up some extra hours at the hospital. As usual, the nurse had her dark brown hair pulled back in a thick ponytail that swayed when she moved. “Yeah, but these two don’t.”

“Well, you could help with Jenna,” Sophie said. “She’s had the hots for your brother forever.”

Jenna swatted Sophie’s arm.

“What? You do. Every time you see Garrett, you practically drool all over yourself.”

Jenna huffed. “I do not.”

“Whatever.” Sophie returned her gaze to Chloe.

“Oh, no.” Chloe shook her head. “I’m not getting in the middle of that.” She gestured toward the notepad on which Lori had written several names. “Who are the choices?”

“My money’s on Greg Bozeman,” Sophie said.

Chloe laughed again. “You’ve got to be joking.” Greg was the biggest flirt in town, more so than even her younger brother, Owen.

“Think about it,” Sophie said. “It would be the biggest feather in her cap so far.”

Chloe shook her head. “I’ll believe it when I see it. What are my other choices?”

“Daisy Ford,” Lori said, naming one of the waitresses down at the Primrose Café. “Jesse Bradshaw, Andrew Canton.” Lori read off a few other names before tossing in Bernie Shumaker, who had to be as old as Blue Falls.

“Okay, now I know you all have lost it.”

Sophie shrugged. “Got to do something. It’s a slow night.”

They all froze.

“You did not just say that,” Lori said.

They all looked toward the emergency entrance as if Sophie’s words would tempt a herd of sick and injured to start flooding the ER. When the doors remained free of patients, they breathed a collective sigh of relief.

“What about you, Chloe?” Jenna asked, grinning. “You’re single. Maybe we should put your name on the list.”

Chloe lifted her package of cupcakes. “On that note, my new best friends and I are headed to the break room.”

She’d just sat down and ripped away the plastic wrapping when she heard the siren. Considering one of the hospital’s two ambulances sat outside the ER, this one had to be coming from the rodeo. Leaving her snack behind, she hurried back to the ER just as the paramedics were unloading their patient.

“What have we got?” she asked Dale Marsh, one of the paramedics.

“Male, thirty-one, name Wyatt Kelley. Took a bull horn to the side and the lower abdomen.”

As she got her first look at the cowboy, she noticed his shirt soaked with blood. “Put him in trauma one.”

Chloe started directing the nurses to remove both the cowboy’s protective vest and his shirt so she could assess the seriousness of the guy’s injuries. He’d been out cold when they wheeled him in, but when they lifted him he moaned in agony. As they laid him back, his eyes shot wide open and locked on her.

“Are you trying to kill me?” he asked, his voice breathless and strained.

She smiled, hoping to calm him. “Quite the opposite, handsome. You’ll be good as new before you know it.” A lot of doctors she’d worked with remained detached and clinical when working with patients, but that wasn’t her style. She’d tried, and just couldn’t stick to it. Wanting to help people and caring about them were the reasons she’d become a doctor in the first place. Maybe she’d burn out sooner, but she’d deal with that when the time came.

Chloe squeezed his hand then got back to work flushing his wounds. She pulled out a sliver of horn that had broken off and directed the nurses to start antibiotics so the bacteria from the horn didn’t do the guy in. When she was able to see the wounds better, a deep laceration just below where his safety vest had ended and a puncture wound in his left side, she knew he needed surgery.

She made eye contact with Jenna. “Get Dr. Pierce in here.”

Jenna nodded and hurried out of the trauma area.

“Please tell me Dr. Pierce isn’t in charge of the morgue,” the cowboy said.

Despite the pain he was in, the guy still managed to hang on to his sense of humor. She was pretty sure she’d be howling in agony.

“Not for this little scratch, cowboy.”

“Wyatt.”

She nodded. “Nice to meet you, Wyatt. I’m Dr. Brody.”

He gritted his teeth against a wave of pain. “Gotta say, you’re way prettier than most of the ER docs I’ve seen.”

She shook her head. “See, you’re not hurt too badly if you can flirt.” The reality was his injuries weren’t minor, but she didn’t need him freaking out about how he wasn’t going to be sitting on a bull anytime in the near future. These guys lived pretty spare unless they were in the big money, and Blue Falls hadn’t quite made it to the big-time rodeo circuit yet.

“Hon, there’s always time to flirt until you stop breathing.” As if to contradict himself, he caught his breath as his injuries sent another jolt of pain through his body.

The good thing about Blue Falls being so small, it didn’t take Dr. Pierce, the surgeon, long to reach the hospital.

Chloe took Wyatt’s hand. “We’re going to send you to surgery now and get you fixed up. Dr. Pierce will take good care of you.” She gestured toward where the surgeon was walking by on his way to prep for surgery.

“He’s not as pretty as you,” Wyatt said, drawing a chuckle from Chloe.

When she started to step away, Wyatt squeezed her hand with a surprising grip considering the shape he was in. When her eyes met his, her heart skipped a beat. Damn, he was good-looking, even dirt-and blood-covered and with his face pale from the pain and blood loss. An unexpected heat rushed through her before she grabbed on to some professionalism and gave his hand a quick squeeze before releasing it.

“See you on the other side, cowboy.”

Wyatt gave her a crooked grin. “Promise?”

She just smiled and sent him off to surgery.

“Yep, we definitely need to add you to the pool list,” Lori said. “In fact, I think you just jumped to the top of it.”

“Wyatt and Chloe sitting in a tree,” Sophie said in a singsong voice. “K-i-s-s-i-n-g.”

Chloe made as if she were going to throw one of her used surgical gloves at Sophie, sending the nurse scurrying away with a laugh. “Hard to pair me with someone who doesn’t live here.”

“India’s and Skyler’s husbands didn’t live here, either, when they met them,” Sophie called back.

Jenna deposited her used gloves in the hazardous waste bin. “And they just happened to be hot cowboys, too.”

Chloe rolled her eyes and disposed of her own gloves. After thoroughly washing her hands and arms, she left the ER with a wave to the nurses. “I’m going to go finish my date with a cupcake.”

“Save one for that delicious cowboy,” Sophie called down the corridor.

She wasn’t sure if it was the nurses’ teasing, Wyatt Kelley’s flirting, or the way her heart had stuttered when he’d held her hand and met her eyes, but she kept thinking about him throughout the rest of her shift. The cupcakes didn’t distract her. Neither did dealing with a toddler who’d eaten an electric-lime crayon. When she tried to focus on anything else, her mind kept sliding back to the rugged angle of Wyatt’s square jaw and those blue-gray eyes that had watched her with more interest than anyone with his abdomen ripped open should have been able to muster.

Even after her shift was over, she hung around. She figured the nurses would have a field day with that, but she didn’t care. She kept telling herself it was professional interest, that she wanted to make sure her patient made it through surgery. She was so wrapped up in trying to convince herself she wasn’t interested in Wyatt Kelley for anything other than medical reasons that she nearly ran into Dr. Pierce as he came out of the short corridor that led to surgery.

“You’re still here?” His forehead wrinkled as he glanced at the clock on the wall.

“Yeah. Just checking on a few things before I leave.” She nodded toward the surgical area. “How’s Mr. Kelley?”

“In one piece, though he’s not going to be riding in the foreseeable future. Maybe ever.”

She didn’t know Wyatt, but her heart hurt for him at that bit of news. She’d been around enough cowboys in her life to know they didn’t like having to face hanging it up.

Several long moments after Dr. Pierce left, Chloe continued to stare down the corridor toward the double doors that led to surgery. She’d spent mere minutes with Wyatt, but she didn’t like the image that formed in her mind of the light going out of his beautiful eyes as his future was ripped away. Why she cared so much, she had no idea. But she did.

Chapter Two

Wyatt started to wake when he heard voices. He couldn’t distinguish actual words through the fog in his head, but the conversation nearby was enough to pull him toward the surface. As he listened, he could gradually make out words from the murmuring voices. Surgery. Out. Night. It was like listening to a radio station that was mostly static with only the occasional intelligible word.

He knew there was something he could do to help make sense of what was going on, but damned if he could remember what it was. So he lay still and listened to the voices—two women—and searched his brain for the answer. Then it hit him. He could open his eyes. But when he tried, that simple act proved to be easier thought than done.

What in the world had happened to him to make his body refuse to cooperate with his brain’s commands?

“Dr. Pierce said the surgery went well last night,” one of the voices said. There was something familiar about it, something that made him desperate to open his eyes. “I’m working at the clinic this afternoon, but let me know if anything changes.”

She was leaving. No, she couldn’t leave, not without him seeing the face that went with that voice. He concentrated on that one thought, the absolute necessity of opening his eyes before it was too late. At first, his eyelids did no more than flutter, but he concentrated harder and they finally lifted. The world around him came into focus bit by bit until his gaze fixed on her, the owner of the voice, the doctor who had joked with him in the ER.

“Will do,” the nurse said.

Another nurse stuck her head in through the doorway. “I need help with Mrs. Walker in 221.”

He watched as both nurses left the room without noticing he was awake. The doctor scanned what must be his medical chart. More of the fuzzy feeling in his head receded as he watched her make a notation on the chart then push her chin-length, reddish-brown hair behind her ear. He’d been in a lot of pain when he’d awakened in the ER, but he hadn’t been so far gone that he didn’t notice she was pretty. And now, as he fought his way out of what had to be a medicine-induced haze, he thought her even more so.

The doctor—what was her name? She’d told him, but he couldn’t pull that information from his memory. Maybe he’d sustained another concussion in addition to the nasty lacerations. As she placed the chart at the end of his bed and turned to head for the door, he tried to say something but found his throat was as dry as cardboard. Instead of words, what came out was a strangled squawk. Yeah, that would get the ladies every time.

But it was enough to cause the doctor to lift her eyes to his.

“Well, hello there, sleepyhead,” she said. She smiled as she moved to his side. “Sounds like you could use a drink.” She poured him a cup of water from the pitcher on the bedside table then handed it to him.

When he reached for the cup, a sharp pain in his side caused him to suck in a breath then grit his teeth.

The doctor guided his hand to the cup and continued to steady it until she was sure he could hold it on his own.

“You’ll want to not make any sudden moves for a while,” she said. “No stretching, no lifting. If you need something, use the call button and a nurse will come help you.”

He nodded though he hated the idea of being dependent. Maybe she was just being overly cautious. After all, this wasn’t his first trip to the hospital, not even his first surgery. Chances were he’d be up and about in a few days. He might have to skip two or three rodeos, a hit on his finances he sure didn’t need, but some things couldn’t be helped. But if taking it easy in the hospital for a day or two helped him heal faster, then that’s what he’d do. After all, he had a pretty doctor to tend his wounds.

The doctor reached to push the button to raise the head of the bed. That’s when he noticed the name tag attached to her white lab coat. Dr. C. Brody. When the bed came to a stop, he brought the cup to his dry lips and took a drink. The water wasn’t exactly cold as he liked it, but nothing had ever tasted so good. He started to down the rest of it when Dr. Brody stayed his hand.

“Go slowly.”

Against his instinct, he did as she said and took another sip, letting it trickle down his throat as he met her eyes, pretty green ones with what looked like flecks of brown. When she broke eye contact and removed her hand from his, his gaze drifted to her lips. She wore a hint of pale pink lipstick, and something about the sight of it made his throat go dry again.

Dr. Brody crossed her arms. “So how are you feeling this morning?”

He glanced toward the window and saw that it was indeed daylight. “How long was I out?”

“Overnight and most of the morning. And you’re feeling?” she asked again.

“Better than when I got here, but I bet that has a lot to do with whatever is in that.” He pointed toward the IV pole that held two bags of liquids that were attached to his arm via tubes.

“Yeah, we kind of have to drug you up when you battle a bull and the bull wins.”

He grinned at her. She was so unlike any doctor he’d ever met, funny and friendly. He pointed toward her name tag. “So what’s the C for?”

“My first name.”

He lifted a brow. “And that would be?”

“You know, I think I’ll let you guess. That’ll give you something to do while you recuperate.”

“Caroline.”

“Nope.” With a self-satisfied smile, she turned to head toward the door again.

“Charlotte.”

“No more guesses today,” she called out as she slipped into the hallway and out of sight.

He might be less than twenty-four hours away from nearly getting his guts ripped out, but he found himself smiling. He liked a good challenge, and it seemed the lovely Dr. Brody was giving him exactly that.

* * *

CHLOE FINISHED HER hospital rounds several minutes later after listening to Henry Stillwater complain about everything from how the IV was hurting his hand to the inedible quality of the hospital food. She had to admit, the barely touched lunch on his table didn’t look particularly appetizing. She wasn’t even sure what the glob of yellowish orange goo was supposed to be.

As soon as she made her escape from Henry’s room, her gaze shifted across the nurses’ station to the first room she’d visited on her rounds. Wyatt’s room. She tried telling herself that she was simply glad to see him awake and on the mend, but she could still feel the buzz in her middle that had started the moment she’d looked at him to find him watching her. The buzz that had only increased when she’d helped him grip the cup of water. A strange giddiness had blossomed to life within her when he’d tried to guess her name and she’d decided to keep him guessing.

While she was friendly and often teased her patients in the hope of taking their minds off their pain, her few minutes with Wyatt had felt different. And that wasn’t wise because as soon as he was discharged he’d go home, a home that wasn’t in Blue Falls. She didn’t really know him and shouldn’t care if he left as long as she’d done her job and set him on a path to recovery. But as soon as she’d exited his room, she’d started thinking about the next time she’d see him. Because she would see him once more, tomorrow when she was due to make hospital rounds again.

“You okay?”

Chloe jerked her attention away from Wyatt’s doorway to where Sophie stood on the other side of the desk giving her a curious stare.

“Yeah, just remembered a call I have to make later this afternoon.”

Sophie glanced over her shoulder, straight toward Wyatt’s doorway. “Uh-huh.”

Ignoring the suspicion in Sophie’s voice, Chloe made a show of pulling her phone from her pocket and checking it. “Well, I have appointments at the clinic beginning in ten minutes.” She nodded toward Henry’s room. “You might want to get Henry something sweet from the vending machine. It’ll probably make the rest of your shift more pleasant.”

Sophie nodded. After all, it wasn’t the first time they’d dealt with Henry’s crankiness. “Good idea.”

Chloe made her escape before Sophie could shift her focus back to Wyatt again. Though the left-hand corridor was closer to the exit next to the clinic, it also led past Wyatt’s door. So Chloe made an unnecessary stop by the restroom located down the right-side corridor to give herself an excuse for going that direction. She wasn’t normally a coward, but she’d never been crazy attracted to a patient before, either.

Once inside the restroom, she crossed to the sink and stared at herself in the mirror. Was that heightened color in her cheeks? She shook her head as she turned on the cold water and splashed some onto her face. She had to set aside the attraction before she saw him again. The last thing she needed was to blush like this in front of Wyatt. She could be cool and professional one more day, and then she was off work the following two days. Maybe Wyatt would be discharged by the time she had to walk these halls again.

Her afternoon was filled with so many appointments that she didn’t have time to think about Wyatt or her attraction to the unlucky cowboy. But as she left the clinic at the end of the day, she had to fight the urge to go back to the hospital to check on him. Instead, she turned toward her car. When she was in the driver’s seat, she didn’t immediately start the engine. Though she was tired from a long day, part of her didn’t want to go home, not when she was still feeling strange about a man she barely knew. The last thing she needed was her dad or either of her brothers sensing something was off about her and digging until they found out what it was.

She glanced at herself in the rearview mirror. “Stop being an idiot.”

Even though she told herself to stop thinking about Wyatt, her thoughts kept going back to that grin of his, the one he shot in her direction despite the pain he was experiencing. She’d seen his type before, tough as thick leather and used to charming the pants right off a gal. Well, she wasn’t a buckle bunny happy to draw a cowboy’s attention. If she wanted a cowboy, she didn’t have to wait for one to stroll into town, or be wheeled into her ER. This was Texas, after all. Cowboys were a dime a dozen, even without the regular rodeos bringing them to Blue Falls.