Save Me, page 11
She sat up. “Lord, but I dread walking.”
“You’re not walking. I’m carrying you into the bushes. As for the rest, I’ll close my eyes.”
As soon as he had moved enough brush, he grabbed a roll of toilet paper from his pack.
She stared. “What else do you have in there?”
He grinned. “Enough to get by on, and I know what I’m doing, so hush your worries. Today, we blow this Popsicle stand.” He handed her the toilet paper, then scooped her up in his arms and headed for the bushes. “Okay, I’m going to ease you down on your feet. I know it’s not going to feel good, but those thick socks will help. I’ll turn my back, and you let me know when you’re done, then I’ll go.”
He put her down, then held on to her until she’d steadied herself.
“I’m good, and we’ll both pee in the bushes. This is my bush. You go find your own.”
He was grinning as he walked a couple of yards to comply with her orders, then waited until she called him.
“I’m done.”
She was holding the roll of toilet paper when he turned around. It was the first time he’d seen her standing, and he could tell how beautiful her woman body had become. In two strides, she was in his arms again.
“Your Uber has arrived. Where to, lady?”
She smiled. “First pile of brush on your right, please.”
He kissed her cheek. “The affection is complimentary. There’s no charge for that.”
She was still smiling when he put her back down on the sleeping bag, and then reached into the magic backpack again and pulled out a little bottle of liquid hand cleaner. He squirted some in his hands, then handed it to her.
“Wash up, darlin’. Breakfast coming up. We have beef stew with potatoes and vegetables, or chicken and rice with vegetables.”
“Chicken and rice, please,” she said, as she cleaned her hands.
He glanced at the time, then felt her forehead. It was still too warm, but better than yesterday. He wouldn’t rest easy until he had her in the hands of the medics.
But Lainie saw the worry on his face. “It will be okay, Hunt. You already did the hard part. You found me. Once they start pumping me full of antibiotics, then I will be fine.”
“You better be,” he said, as he opened her food, handed her a spoon and set her drink within reach before choosing beef stew for himself.
Lainie took her first bite, sighing in quiet delight to have food in her belly again. She chewed, swallowed, then licked her spoon.
“You do know that in other circumstances, camping out with you would be a dream. A tent in lieu of dirt. Real food, and a big teddy bear to sleep with. A girl couldn’t ask for more.”
He was almost smiling. “So, I’m your teddy bear now?”
And just like that, Lainie’s teasing ended. “You’re my everything. The next time we sleep together, we will make love.”
His eyes narrowed, and when she began drawing him a picture, a muscle jerked at the side of his jaw.
She waved her spoon in the air, like a conductor leading an orchestra, illustrating every comment. “I will look and smell pretty then. I will have had a bath and brushed my teeth. My hair will be clean and shiny, and I will wear something sheer and sexy just so you can take it off me.”
Hunt’s gaze never left her face. “And I will have showered and shaved off this beard, and you must be prepared for me to peel that sexy whatever off of you with my teeth...if it so pleases you.”
She shivered. “It pleases me.”
“Then it’s on my agenda. However, it will please me now if you finish your food, instead of giving me an itch I can’t scratch.”
“I can do that,” she said, and shoveled another spoonful of food into her mouth.
Once they finished eating, Hunt gave her more meds, then settled her on top of the sleeping bag to rest while he went about packing up camp. After that, he sat down beside her and cradled her head in his lap. They talked about nothing, and everything, and he watched her fall asleep in the middle of a sentence and thought he couldn’t love her more.
About an hour later, he began hearing voices, and then caught a glimpse of men in the distance, moving toward them through the trees.
“Lainie, honey. They’re here.”
She rolled over and sat up. “Now what?”
“They’ll pack you back to the trail and carry you down to wherever the chopper can land.”
“Can you come with me?” she asked.
“Not in the chopper. I’ll go back down with the rescue crew after you’re loaded, then as soon as I get down the mountain, I’ll head straight to whichever hospital they’re taking you.”
“Surely it will be Denver Health, where I work. If you see my parents down at the trailhead, tell them to go home. I don’t want to see them.”
“I’ll find you wherever you are, and I will send them packing, I promise.”
She could see the men now, coming toward them at a jog. “Don’t disappear on me.”
Hunt stood and then picked her up in his arms. “Don’t get lost from me, again.”
She wrapped her arms around his neck and started to cry.
“It’s okay, love. It’s okay,” he whispered.
“I know...it’s just scary letting go when we just found each other again.”
“No more hard decisions to make here. We were always attached at the heart, and nothing has changed. I’ll come straight to the hospital. I’ll find you there a hell of a lot easier than finding you here.”
And then the crew arrived, with Ranger Scott Christopher in the lead. They were elated to see their missing hiker, and praised her for her fortitude, but wasted no time. As they were strapping her down on the stretcher, one of the men handed her a park ranger cap.
“To keep the sun out of your eyes while we’re carrying you down,” he said. “If it hurts the wound on your forehead, we can adjust the size.”
“Thank you,” Lainie said. “Much appreciated, and it will be fine.” Then she looked around for Hunt.
He was standing just beyond the stretcher with the magic backpack on his shoulder, his gaze focused on her, and everything they were doing.
“I’m here,” he said. “The path will be narrow, so even if you can’t see me, remember I’ve got your back.”
Then they picked her up and started walking.
Hunt gave the giant brush pile one last glance, thankful it had been a shelter and not a grave, then fell into step.
* * *
BOTH SETS OF parents were on the scene, but sitting on opposite sides of the parking lot.
Greg and Tina were still fussing.
Chuck and Brenda were silent.
None of them knew Lainie was being airlifted, or that it would be Hunt who reached the trailhead alone. They kept glancing at each other and then looking away. They’d come to this place because of guilt and duty, but everything about this day felt wrong. They’d gate-crashed a reunion to which they no longer belonged.
* * *
IT HAD TAKEN the recovery team a little over an hour to hike out of the woods and back onto the trail. They’d been walking it for a while when Hunt began hearing the familiar blade slap of rotors. His pulse quickened, and then he heard Scott talking to Lainie.
“The chopper’s inbound. We’re almost there, Miss Mayes. Are you okay?”
“I’m okay. Where’s Hunt?”
He glanced over his shoulder. “Behind us. He took the flank position, but you will see him before you leave. He’ll help load you up.”
Her throat tightened with yet another overwhelming urge to cry, but she wouldn’t. She didn’t want his last sight of her here to be in tears.
A small clearing on the south side of the trail became visible as they came out of the trees. A Classic Air medical copter was already down, rotors still spinning, with the doors open, waiting to hot load. The recovery crew immediately left the trail with Lainie and headed toward it.
Hunt dropped his pack on the trail and ran to catch up. She reached for his hand the moment she saw him, and then he ran the rest of the way with her. One quick kiss, and then he helped lift her up into the chopper. He got one last look at her face before the doors shut between them, and then he was running to get away from the downdraft as it lifted off.
Scott and the recovery crew were already heading down the trail when he grabbed his backpack and caught up.
“Where are they taking her?” he asked.
“Where she works—Denver Health Hospital,” Scott said. “They will be waiting for her.”
“I’ll find it. A big thanks to all of you, but here’s where we part company,” he said, and started down the trail at a lope.
“Damn, does he think he’s going to run the whole way down?” one man asked.
“He’s Army, man. He can probably run circles around us and then some,” Scott said. “Besides, I think he’s got a woman to see about the rest of his life.”
Chapter Six
Lainie felt the chopper lift off, and then an EMT began taking vitals, while the nurse on board started an IV. They were talking to each other on their headsets, but the noise inside the chopper made hearing them impossible, so she laid still and closed her eyes. The end of this journey was where her healing began.
The trip was brief. The landing, little more than a bump, and they were down. The doors opened then they were pulling her out on the gurney and pushing her toward the hospital on the run.
The spinning rotors whipped the air into a frenzy, while the heat coming off the roof washed over her in a wave. She closed her eyes against the glare, and only knew they were inside the building by the sudden waft of cool air and people saying her name. Then they were on the move again, pushing her to the dedicated elevator that would take her down to ER.
* * *
IT WAS CHARIS’S day off, but she’d heard the new update early this morning that Lainie had been found alive, and the rescuers would be bringing her down the mountain today.
Charis had cried buckets when Lainie went missing, and now, knowing she had been found by the man she’d loved and lost, was like something out of a fairy tale. She was guessing they were using a chopper to pick her up somewhere along the trail, but without knowing the schedule or the ETA, she just went straight to the emergency room to wait for her arrival.
A couple of hours passed before they got word the chopper had landed. At that point, the ER erupted in a scurry of doctors and nurses readying for her arrival, along with a detective from the Denver PD, and a crime scene investigator.
Suddenly the paramedics appeared with their patient and rolled her into an exam room then transferred her to the bed as they were debriefing the waiting staff on her stats and condition.
Between the pain and fever, the trip down the mountain and then the chopper noise, Lainie arrived in the ER with a pounding headache and was on the verge of nausea. The room was spinning, and she was afraid she’d pass out when she suddenly spotted Charis at the door.
“Charis. I need to talk to Charis.”
Charis hurried into the room. “I’m here, honey... I’m here.”
“Hunt will be coming. Can you watch for him, and tell him what’s happening and where I am so he doesn’t tear up the hospital looking for me?”
“Of course, but how will I know him?” Charis asked.
“Look for tall, dark and handsome, ice-blue eyes, devil-black hair and stubble to match, and if you hear Louisiana coming out of his mouth, that’s him.”
“Consider it done,” Charis said, and left on the run, while one of the other nurses looked at Lainie and groaned. “Dang, girl. Does he have a brother?”
“No, and hands off,” she mumbled.
All of the staff in the room knew Lainie, which made what was happening personal to everyone, including her, but when they began cutting off her clothes, she had no recourse but to let it happen.
Clay Wagner, the ER doctor, quickly moved to the side of her bed. “Welcome back, Lainie, and apologies upfront before we start. This is Della Pryor, a detective with the Denver PD, and she’s brought a tech from the crime lab with her. They’ll be taking photos of your injuries to back up their case against Justin Randall.”
Lainie winced as they kept cutting off her clothes. “Whatever it takes to put him away. And don’t lose the car keys in my pocket!”
Wagner continued his examination as every garment was cut away, and when more injuries were revealed, photos were quickly taken. They had her down to socks and panties when Detective Pryor asked them to turn Lainie on her side long enough for them to get photos of her back.
The scrapes and bruises visible there were purple, telltale evidence of the fingerprint bruises on her shoulders and neck where Justin Randall tried to hold her down. Being manhandled exacerbated the pain, but Lainie said nothing, and then they took off her socks.
There was a mutual gasp at the sight and then she heard someone crying. It wasn’t as if they hadn’t seen worse. It was just because they knew her, and knew everything she’d endured to stay alive. Lainie felt tears welling, and blurted out a joke to change the emotionally charged moment.
“Come on, guys, they feel even worse than they look, so nobody gets to cry but me.”
Joking among themselves was how doctors and nurses got through the trauma of what they saw, and the ensuing laughter shifted their emotions.
“Do we need to do a rape kit?” Pryor asked.
Lainie shook her head. “No, ma’am. He only wished. All we had was a nasty wrestling match, and I took him out with a rock before he could unzip his own pants.”
“Noted,” Pryor said. “We do need to collect DNA from beneath your fingernails. It won’t take long.” She then signaled her tech, who quickly gloved up and began taking scrapings from under Lainie’s nails.
“Apologies for invading the ER and your personal space, but I think we’re done here,” Pryor said, and she and the tech left the room.
The staff covered Lainie with a sheet, as a tech rolled in a portable X-ray, followed by a lab tech who’d come to draw blood.
Dr. Wagner moved to the foot of the bed to check her feet and the depth of the cuts, but at the first sign of pressure, Lainie screamed.
Wagner jumped. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize... As I look at the damage here, I think I’ll be better able to treat you if we do this in surgery, so we’re going to put you under.”
Still reeling from the pain, Lainie’s voice was shaking, but it was the best thing she’d heard since her arrival. “I second your suggestion, but you might want to run me through the car wash before you start.”
They laughed again.
“Having spent four days lost on a mountain, you don’t look so bad,” Wagner said.
“It was probably the soaking I took from that last creek I crawled into trying to bring down my fever. You know what they say in Texas about women’s big hairdos? The higher the hair, the closer to God? I can testify in all honesty that God did not pipe in hot water up there.”
They were still laughing when they wheeled her out of the room.
*
BY THE TIME Hunt reached the trailhead, he was exhausted. His clothes were drenched with sweat, and he was in no mood for the reunion he knew was waiting. What he didn’t expect were his parents on the scene, as well, but there they were, all running toward him with panicked expressions on their faces. His first thought was, What the hell? then he tuned in to what they were saying.
“Where’s Lainie? What happened?” Tina screamed.
Hunt dropped his backpack, started to reach into an outside pocket for something to wipe off the sweat, then used his shirtsleeve, instead.
“Nothing happened. A med-flight chopper picked her up halfway down.”
“What hospital? Where?” Greg shouted.
The moment Hunt heard that voice, he turned to face him, his voice deepening in anger with every word that he spoke.
“I told you, never look at me again. Never talk to me. Never speak my name.” Then he stared Tina down until she took a step back. “Lainie sent you two a message. She doesn’t want to see you. She doesn’t want to hear your voices, or see your faces. Ever. You don’t go to the hospital. You don’t interfere in any part of her existence, ever again. You lost the right to her the day she was knocked unconscious in her own bedroom. You kidnapped her like a criminal and locked her up in a velvet jail.”
Hunt’s rage was frightening, and Greg made a crawdad move backward as Hunt moved toward him, so close now that Hunt could see blood pulsing through a bulging vein in the old man’s forehead.
“I don’t know who you paid off to get away with what you did, but I know the truth. You ran your daughter down, rammed the back end of her car and caused the wreck.”
Greg’s face was flushed. His eyes were bulging with a level of fear and anger that he didn’t dare turn loose, then when Hunt took another step toward him, it was all he could do not to turn and run.
“You killed my son. And you tried to kill Lainie because of your bullshit feud with my father. The only reason you’re still breathing is because she’s still alive. Now get in your car and get the hell out of my sight. Both of you!”
The rage in his voice sliced through them. Tina slid her hand under Greg’s elbow as Hunt turned to his parents.
“I don’t even know what to say to you, but I don’t know you anymore. You betrayed me in a way that should haunt you for the rest of your lives. Your silence abetted Lainie’s abduction. Your continuing silence led to the death of your own grandchild. You all fed off a war that had nothing to do with the children you both bore. You gave us life, and then you broke us. Lainie and I were pawns. You tossed us about like grenades, daring each other to pull the pins. And when you finally did, we became collateral damage.”
