Chapter Thirty-Two
Natalie closed her eyes and tried to ignore her mother’s quiet chatter in the corner with Vivienne. The topics had ranged from interesting events Vivienne had managed over the last few weeks, to the latest gossip at the retirement center she spent so much time at. While she appreciated her mom’s efforts to keep things light, all she really wanted was quiet. Quiet for her head and quiet for her thoughts.
The muffled voices of the nurses, doctors and aides on the other side of the closed curtain were oddly soothing, a reminder of days when she’d been proud of herself. Of her path forward in life and her judgment.
Oh, he’s good all right. Good at smuggling in those dirty products you were so quick to condemn me for.
Wyatt’s taunt slipped through her mind on constant repeat.
As if sensing her internal brooding, Trevor squeezed her hand. He hadn’t let go of it since he’d gotten here except the times Zeke had kicked him out to check her over and when they’d carted her off for a CT scan. Through it all, not once had he let go of Levi, either holding his hand, or letting him doze against his chest. So supportive. So solid.
Surely, Wyatt’s claims weren’t true. Wyatt was a liar. A manipulator so skilled no one ever saw through his machinations.
Told you I’d do anything for you. I meant that. For you and Levi.
Countless times he’d said it. Now she couldn’t help but wonder just how far that claim reached.
The trauma room curtain whisked to one side, and Natalie opened her eyes.
Zeke ambled in with the confident gait of a man thoroughly in his element. He’d changed out of the jeans and T-shirt he’d met her ambulance in and sported a pair of blue scrubs that looked like he’d thrown in on a few other emergencies while he’d waited for her results. “How’s our girl holdin’ up?”
She licked her dry lips and tried to muster the energy to talk. The Lortab he’d ordered for the pain had been a godsend, but left her mouth parched and sticky. “Pain’s almost gone. You get the results?”
“All good. Just a mild concussion.” He squeezed her free hand. “You know the drill. Any memory problems, confusion, blurred vision, nausea—I want to know.”
Trevor sat up taller in his chair. The act woke Levi, who glanced around the room as though trying to get his bearings. “She can go home?”
“Yep. She needs to take it easy for a day or two. No heavy lifting. No wild nights out on the town. No mud wrestling.” He grinned at Trevor, a touch of sympathy blending with his teasing expression. “Seriously, bro. She’s fine. Tonight when she’s sleeping, you’ll want to wake her up a few times and make sure there’s no slurred speech or memory loss, but my guess is she’ll be fine.”
“Well, that’s a relief.” Her mom let out a relieved sigh, stood, and held out her hand to Zeke. “Thank you so much for looking out for her. I’m not sure she’d have come in if you hadn’t been here.”
Trevor stood and hefted Levi up on his hip, but still kept a tight hold on her hand. “Yeah, she didn’t get a choice in that.” He motioned toward the entrance. “Can I go get the car?”
“How about you give me a few minutes with Natalie before we wrap this up. Wanna go over some things with her.”
Trevor’s face blanked and a prickling wariness danced between him and Zeke. “Something wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong. Just going to have a talk with my patient and I’m going to do it with her bristling Neanderthal out in the waiting room.”
The wariness escalated to something closer to aggression.
“Stand down.” Zeke waved him off and jerked his head toward the curtains. “Get out and let me talk to Natalie, or I’ll lace all your booze at Haven with a laxative.” He waited a beat for Trevor’s shoulders to relax. “I’m your brother. Get out and let me do my job.”
Mouth pinched in a tight line, he jerked a tight nod, leaned in to give Natalie a soft kiss on the top of her head, then held Levi aloft so he could do the same. “I’ll be back.” He pinned Zeke with a hard look. “Five minutes.”
“That’s enough.”
Her mom bustled out in front of Trevor and Levi, then pulled the curtain closed behind them.
Zeke hung his head a second, chuckled low and lifted his head to show a soft smile. “You know, I’d feel bad for him if I hadn’t watched him avoid serious relationships for so long. All I can do now is look at that hound dog expression of his and laugh.” With a last glance back toward the curtain, he perched on the edge of her gurney. To anyone walking in, they’d think he was a close friend settling in for an easy chat. They’d be wrong. The man who stared back at her now was all doctor, focused and gauging her every response. “Now, you told me how the pain is. How about you tell me how you’re really doing.”
“I’m fine.” She took a slow, calming inhalation and smoothed her hand across her stomach like that might somehow unwind the knotted tension in her belly. “I just need to rest. I’ll be up and around before you know it.”
He stared back at her, not giving an inch in his razor-sharp gaze. “I see abused women every day, Natalie. There’s a lot more to what happens in cases like yours than what’s on the surface. Wyatt might not have gotten more than a few hits in, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t strike deeper.”
If he only knew. Though in her case it was less about the consuming self-doubt Wyatt had created over the years and more about the storm he’d ignited around Trevor.
“Want you to promise me you’ll talk to someone,” Zeke said. “Trevor. Your mom. A counselor. Hell, Gabe would be more than happy to talk with you. She’s got demons she’s still fighting, but she’s a good listener.”
Rehashing today was the last thing she wanted. If she had her way, she’d wipe it from her thoughts entirely and go back to that blissfully ignorant place she’d been twelve hours ago. Still, Zeke had a point. Stuffing questions and doubts never worked. The only way to face her issues was to push forward. Whatever that looked like. She nodded. “I promise.”
“Good girl.” He patted her leg and stood.
Before he’d reached the curtain, Natalie blurted, “Can I ask you a question?” The second the question came out, she wished she could reel it back in. Questions came with answers. Answers she didn’t necessarily want to hear.
He waited, eyebrows lifted in silent encouragement.
She swallowed as best she could and fisted the sheet across her lap. “Trevor told me he’d do anything to keep me safe.”
One second and Zeke’s expression blanked.
The ER’s already ridiculously low temperature seemed to drop another five degrees. “How far would he go?” she whispered.
It felt like forever that he stared at her, so many thoughts moving behind his shrewd eyes it terrified her. “I think that’s a question you need to ask Trevor, but I will tell you this—whatever you ask him, you’ll get the absolute unvarnished truth.” He paused for just a moment, then added, “And whatever he’d do for you, every one of his brothers would back him up.”
* * *
Trevor stared out at Baylor’s parking lot, itching to get Natalie out of this place and at home in bed where he could take care of her. In the downtime while they’d waited through Natalie’s CT scan, he and Maureen had planned it all out. She’d head back to the apartment and pack up clothes and necessities for everyone while he carted Natalie and Levi back to the ranch. It was quiet there. Peaceful. Most importantly, Wyatt and what he’d done today couldn’t taint it.
The comforting drone of his brothers, Viv, Gabe, and the moms drowned out all the other sounds around him, anchoring him the way they always had.
Zeke’s voice cut across the room. “Yo, cowboy. How about you go help your woman get suited up so you can get her out of this place?”
Trevor whipped around and crowded into Zeke’s space. “What was that about?”
Not backing down an inch, Zeke planted both hands on his hips. “It was about me doing my job. I don’t tell you how to fly your birds, you don’t fuck with my protocol.”
“Christ,” Jace’s mom, Ninette, muttered from the chair beside them. “There’s too damned much testosterone in this room.”
Maureen snickered behind her hand while all the other women grinned with entertained amusement.
The snarky remark did what Ninette had no doubt intended it to do, slicing through the tension and giving both men the presence of mind to take a step back.
Trevor dipped his head and held out his hand. “I appreciate you seeing to Natalie.”
“Like you need to thank me.” Zeke took his hand and shook it. “Anything for family.”
Jace pushed from his seat. “Amen to that.” He clapped Trevor on the back. “Go get Natalie suited up. Me and Viv are following you out to your place so we can take stock and do a grocery run if you need one.”
No one had to ask him twice. With a quick glance to Maureen to make sure she was good watching Levi for a minute, he strode back to the trauma room where Natalie waited. Careful in case she’d already started getting dressed, he slid back the curtains just enough to ease through and yanked them back in place.
No surprise, Natalie was already dressed in the jeans and T-shirt she’d worn to The Den that afternoon. Only her pretty feet were still bare, though she seemed intent on rectifying that problem in short order. “I see you’re ready to get the hell out of Dodge.”
She looked up and his heart seized. If the bruises on her cheek and jaw weren’t bad enough, the frustration and absolute fear on her face boded for a shit storm.
“What’s wrong?” he said.
Bracing both feet on the floor and her hands on her thighs, she swallowed as though a terrible sentence sat on her lips. “I need to ask you a question.”
He held his place by the curtain, too afraid to move for fear he’d knock whatever fragile balance hung between them off-kilter. “Anything.”
She squeezed her thighs hard enough to make her knuckles turn white, and her voice dropped to a near whisper. “Do you haul illegal substances on your planes?”
Mother fucker.
Of all the questions he’d expected, that had been the last one. Despite the thickening gravity around him, he braced and gave her the truth. “Yes.”
As fast as the word had left his lips, a hard mask slipped across her face. She nodded. “I think you should go. I’ll ask Mom to take me and Levi home.”
Cold pierced him, the same gnawing winter desolation he’d felt the day he found his mom and dad dead that day after school lancing through this soul. “That’s it? You’re not going to ask what kind or what for?”
“I already know.” Her face pinched with bitter pain. “You’re the one who supplied the bootleg stuff to Wyatt, aren’t you? You set him up.”
The cold morphed to blazing fire, billowing up so fast and furious it burned his lungs. “Yeah, I set him up, and yes, I hauled the injectables, but I don’t run the roofies or the ecstasy they found in his place. Those were extras to make sure your slimebag ex couldn’t wiggle out with a slap on the wrist.”
Her jaw fell slack and her eyes watered. “I didn’t want to believe it.”
“Well, believe it. I told you I’d protect you and I did. Not the way I wanted, but in a way that you could use.”
“But Trevor, those drugs...they’re not safe.”
A haggard, ironic laugh huffed up his throat. “Not safe? I ran luxury shit that the government has no business banning in the first place if people are stupid enough to buy it. And the real truth? The real reason I do the runs has nothing to do with the injectables. I do it to bring in drugs for terminally ill people who are out of options and don’t have time to wait for a stamp from the FDA. And for the record, I don’t make a dime off those sales. Everything I profit I give to the families of those who are sick.”
He paced closer, the inside of his throat throbbing as though he’d swallowed double-edged razors for lunch. “I’ve done four runs. Four, Nat. Not a whole damned operation. That’s four lives I’ve helped save, so if you want me to be sorry, I’m fucking not. Less so now that your husband’s got a record you can use to get him out of your life permanently.”
Her head snapped back and her eyes widened.
God, she really thought he was like Wyatt. Dared to lump him in with a man who’d caused her physical and emotional harm where all he’d done was try to protect her. Hell, she hadn’t even asked for details before she’d all but given him a dismissal.
He waited for her to do or say something. Change her mind or at least ask a fucking question. Instead she just sat there, staring at him like he was a stranger. He backed up a step. Then another. “You made a bad call with Wyatt. I get you questioning your judgment now because of it, but this time your bad call wasn’t being with me. It was lumping me in with that piece of shit.” He fisted his hand in the curtain and fought the need to rip it off its tracks. He raked his gaze over her, the woman he’d opened himself to. Trusted to take him like he was. “I appreciate you giving me the benefit of the doubt before you tossed me out with the trash.”