— TWELVE —
THE alarm clock went off at six, far too early when all Jake wanted to do was hold Dani close. Three days had passed since their fight and subsequent making up. Three days of whispered I love yous and tentative Valentine’s Day discussions. He’d had his weekly training night the evening before and bought a pair of tickets to the ball. Matt and Tom had both been there when he bought them, and he hadn’t had any guilt about who he wanted to bring.
He hadn’t told them, though, either.
As much as it was killing him to be patient, it would pay off. And Dani had said she’d go with him. It was just the logistics of how and when to tell people that hadn’t been sorted out fully. Or at all.
When the snooze period ended and the alarm sounded again, she rolled over him and hit it herself. “Go to work and let me sleep in,” she mumbled.
He kissed her head, threw himself into the shower, then reluctantly dragged himself outside. It was hovering around zero, but there was a storm coming. The day before the Karpinskis had a heavy tree branch fall on their roof, and it had busted their attic window. They’d tacked up a sheet of plywood and some plastic, which would hold, but it was visible from the road and they had a Bed & Breakfast.
Jake sighed to himself as he slid into the parking lot at Mac’s. Dani was making him soft, not that he was complaining. But being busy with work was never something he’d begrudged in the past. He shoved his hands in his pockets as he hustled into the diner.
Inside he found Olivia Minelli sitting at the counter, drinking a cup of coffee and scrolling through her phone.
“You’re up early,” he said, sliding onto the stool next to her.
“So are you.”
“Storm’s coming, may need to close up our job sites mid-day.”
“Yeah, I was just emailing with my boss. We were supposed to go out for the day and do a site tour, but they’re packing up and heading back to Toronto before the rain comes.”
“Rain?”
“Didn’t you hear the forecast this morning? Weird front, temperature’s going up and then it’ll plummet overnight. Looks like we’re going to be getting more ice than snow.”
He nodded when the new waitress brought the coffee around, and took a couple of long sips while he thought about all that would impact. Couldn’t have anyone on the roads early tomorrow, either, not until the salt trucks were out. He pulled out his own phone and quickly composed a weather alert memo to his employees.
By mid-morning, he was glad he’d done that, because the weather was turning quickly and the radar map looked nasty. He made his apologies to the Karpinskis, promised them a new window as soon as the storm passed, and headed to his office for a quick check-in with his clerk before heading home.
Where Dani was still blissfully sleeping.
He stripped off his clothes and climbed into bed.
She woke up and rolled into him. “What are you doing home?”
“Storm’s looking bad, so we’re hunkering down.”
God, he liked how she said home and meant his house. “Oooh, that sounds fun. Board games in front of the fireplace kind of fun.”
“Or naked under the covers kind of fun?”
She laughed. “Sure. We can alternate.”
His phone rang and he cursed, but she waved him toward it.
“I’ll take a quick shower. Find me one of your t-shirts and some work socks to wear.”
“Work socks?”
“One of my Jake fantasies. Humour me.”
He took the call from Johnny first, then found them both warmish clothes. As warm as Dani could be with bare legs, because she wasn’t the only one with fantasies still on the docket. He was going to taste every last inch of her legs as he spread her out in front of the fire—
Right after he answered his phone. Again.
This time it was Matt. And the first words out of his brother’s mouth did a perfect job of killing Jake’s hard-on. “Hey man, is Dani there? She’s not answering her phone.”
Jake’s eyes jerked to the bathroom. “Uh…”
“Look, it’s urgent, so I don’t have time to play this fucking game. I’m pretty sure you guys are sleeping together, and we need her to come in to work tonight.”
“Yeah, she’s here.” Jake’s pulse thumped painfully in his throat. “She’s in the shower. I’ll get her.”
“Thanks. Tell her to call me. She’s got a few hours, but the storm is going to get worse, so they want more buses out there overnight.”
“Sure.” Jake swallowed hard around that growing lump. “Matt…about Dani…”
Silence filled the phone line. His brother cleared his throat. “I don’t think anyone else knows.”
“How…”
“I came by your place last week. Her car was out front. And I overheard her telling our dispatcher about a new guy. I put two and two together and came up with ‘I’d rather not know’.”
“Appreciate the discretion, man.”
“When this shit is over, you guys might want to think about just telling people. Unless it’s just a casual thing.”
“It’s not a fucking casual thing.”
“Good, because Rafe would kill you. And I’d help.”
“Fuck off.”
The shower turned off as he hung up the phone, and Jake yanked on a pair of sweatpants. Then a t-shirt. He had a hoodie in his hands when Dani sashayed into view wrapped in a towel.
“Did you find me some sexy wool socks to wear?”
He laughed. “I did, but I’ve got some…news.”
“Should I read the word bad into the pause?”
He jerked his hand toward the bed, gesturing for her to sit. “Maybe. I don’t know. Matt just called.”
“Is everything okay?”
“He just called you.”
“Did you answer my phone?” Her voice pitched up at the end of the question, as if to ask are you a complete idiot?
Since he wasn’t, and he didn’t, he just shook his head and waited.
“Oh, shit. He called you. Looking for me.” She pressed her lips together and drew the towel tighter around her body.
Jake nodded. He couldn’t bring himself to do it grimly, because Matt was a good test balloon. But control was important to Dani, and she’d just realized she didn’t have any on this front.
“Work?”
Another nod, and this one he accompanied with the clothes he’d pulled out for her. She tugged on the socks first, then the t-shirt. She ignored the boxers, and stood, holding out her hand. “Coming?”
“You don’t want to know what he said?”
“Come tell me in front of the fireplace. If it was more urgent than that, you’d have already told me.”
He reached out and took her hand. “I love you. Never forget that, okay?”
She gave him a small smile. “Same.” She took a deep breath. “Okay, so that’s one down, five to go. I’ll tell Sean, you tell the rest of them?”
He smacked her ass playfully. “Sean’s the only one who won’t care.”
“How about that.” She batted her eyes at him.
“You’re okay?”
“With people knowing that I love you? Yeah. I can deal with that.”
— —
Despite what she’d told Jake, Dani had still been nervous when she drove to the EMS station in Wiarton. But Matt wasn’t there when she arrived—he’d been on the day shift, and was still out on a call. She was partnered with Will Mickelson, and now they were halfway between Wiarton and Pine Harbour, heading for yet another motor vehicle accident—what sounded like a simple slide off the road due to the now freezing and slippery road conditions.
Made getting there a bitch, too. But the call in had been from the responding police officer, not the driver, and they had good information. No need to rush.
The Jeep was off the road, nose down in the ditch at a precarious sixty degree angle. The first responder, an OPP officer, stood beside the driver’s open door. He waved them down. Dani grabbed the back board and scrambled down the embankment after Will.
She hung back as the senior paramedic greeted the constable, a guy Dani recognized but whose name escaped her. “What do we got?”
“Conscious female, strong vitals. Some confusion and nausea following a single vehicle MVA. No visible head trauma.” They knew that from the call, but it was good to re-confirm the situation on arrival.
Will glanced back at Dani before asking his next question. “Any alcohol or recreational drug use?”
“None observed or suspected.”
The woman in the car moaned and Will moved closer. “Hey there. I’m Will. What’s your name?”
He pulled out his pen light and examined her pupils.
“Nat…” She trailed off and tipped her head back, pressing her lips together.
“Can you wiggle your toes for me?” Will nodded as he observed her. “And push down?” It was fucking cold and pitch black, and Dani knew he was doing his due diligence because the backboard would be unnecessary if there was no cause—and on a night like tonight, it would be a shitty way to spend a few hours before hand-off to the ER staff.
But it was still cold and dark, and the sooner they got back in the rig the better.
“Good job, Nat.” He ran through a few more questions, got her to squeeze his hands, then reached in and unbuckled her seat belt. “Okay, we’re going to get you out and look you over more thoroughly in the ambulance.”
The tow-truck arrived as they crested the ditch, and then the rain started again—it had been a minor miracle that they’d had a break while down at the car. Dani moved the ambulance ahead twenty feet, then they climbed in and got Nat out of her wet coat and covered in blankets.
Even with the extra warmth, she started to shake as shock set in.
“Where are you from?” Dani asked to distract her.
“Tobermory.” The northern tip of the peninsula. “I was heading home. It was stupid, I should have stayed in Port Elgin last night.”
“Do you have any existing medical conditions?” This question was from Will, who’d finished taking her vitals and running through the neuro tests again.
“Uhm…” She pressed a hand to her stomach. “I’m pregnant. It’s early still.”
That might explain the nausea. Adrenaline messed with most people. It did an extra trick or two to pregnant bodies. “Do you have someone you want to call?”
She shook her head. “Only my parents, and they’d want to come get me. I’m fine, right?”
Will nodded at Dani, giving her the practice at this spiel. “Given that you’re alone, and with your pregnancy, we’d recommend transport to hospital. If someone can’t come get you, the hospital can arrange a taxi to take you to your car in the morning. I’ll find out where it’s going to be towed.”
Right on cue, the officer knocked on the back doors. Dani took Nat’s purse, and the officer’s card and a copy of the accident report. She told him they were heading to Wiarton General just for precautionary measures, then once Will gave her the good-to-go sign, she flipped on the lights and pulled onto the highway.
At the hospital, Will gave a brief report to the triage nurse, but Nat was well enough they didn’t need to hang around until a doc saw her. Dani handed over her card as well as the paperwork from the responding officer, and wished her well.
And if Will hadn’t gone to grab them coffee, and she hadn’t stopped to talk to Nina Henderson, the admitting clerk and a friend from high school, she wouldn’t have heard any of the triage assessment conversation. It was supposed to be private. She shouldn’t be listening at all.
But then the nurse said, “Right now we’re looking at an eight-hour wait, are you sure you don’t want to go to Owen Sound instead? Or at least call someone to wait with you and take you home?”
Dani’s ears perked up. Partly professional concern—dispatch had nixed the transfer plan, because the labour and delivery triage in the larger centre only took women past the halfway point in their pregnancy—and part human decency, because she already knew that Nat didn’t have anyone to go to the larger city with her. Or to sit and wait with her.
“Uhm, I guess I thought I would take a cab,” the woman said, her voice shaking.
“You don’t have anyone you could call? How about the father?”
“He’s not…okay, I’ll call someone.” Dani felt awful, but it wasn’t her place to interject, and Will was waiting for her. But she stepped back anyway and pulled out her notebook, pretending to be busy.
“Who will it be? I’ll give their name to reception in case you get called back before they arrive.”
Nat took a deep breath and Dani felt the prickle of understanding before she heard the next two words. “Jake Foster.”