As others crowded the opening behind him, Zach turned to KC and Jacob, who both wore concerned expressions. “How is she?” KC whispered.
Zach answered at the same volume, for some reason not wanting Sadie to know they were talking about her. “Very unhappy in the face of treatment.” An unusually strong panic had graced her features every time any mention was made of going to the hospital. She seemed to only want to go back to the B and B and pretend she was fine. Zach did not care for the curiosity leaking into his thoughts. “And she’ll be even more unhappy when she realizes what happened to her camera.”
There was a general chorus of winces before the nurse joined their little group. “She’ll need some stitches for that cut on her face. The hard hat did its job. Still, I’d feel better if she wasn’t gonna be alone tonight. Especially once she’s got some pain meds in her.”
There were a lot of logical solutions to this problem. Sadie could stay at Blackstone Manor with Aiden and Christina. After all, Christina was a nurse. But she was pregnant and Ms. Blackstone, the brothers’ mother, had been fighting some kind of infection lately.
KC—or hell, even Zach’s mother—could take care of Sadie overnight.
So why did he hear himself saying, “I’ll do it.”
He ignored the myriad glances that swung his way. “She’ll be more comfortable at the B and B with her own stuff,” he said, offering a fairly reasonable excuse. “And I’m the only single person with no kids in this bunch.”
Marty gave him a nod, as if this were the given option. “I’ll get some instructions put together, but I imagine you know what warning signs to look for?”
He sure did. Zach’s military background had trained him for this and a whole lot more. Unfortunately, he’d had to put that knowledge into practice a time or two. Times he’d prefer to not just forget but to completely obliterate from his memory.
Marty went back to his patient and the others talked quietly together in that intimate way couples had. Zach watched as Bateman lumbered in across the small space. He knelt by Sadie’s chair, the movement oddly humble in a man his size.
Sadie smiled at the older man, then immediately winced. As they talked, Zach thought back to earlier, to Sadie’s comforting hand on Bateman’s arm, to her push to get him out of the direct path of the falling debris... All those things matched the Sadie he remembered from before she’d pulled her disappearing act.
The new Sadie had been more of a challenge, demanding, secretive almost—instead of just sweet. He didn’t want to be intrigued, yet he was.
What had brought on those changes? Obviously there was some of that sugary-sweet woman in there somewhere—so where had the new spice come from?
Zach suddenly realized Sadie was staring at him, her big moss-green eyes uncertain and almost fearful. The nurse must have told her about tonight’s sleeping arrangements. He didn’t care if it was the coward’s way out; he made a quick exit.
There was still work to do—and if it helped him avoid any questions, all the better.
But he couldn’t avoid Sadie a couple of hours later as he drove her slightly dopey self back to the B and B. He’d gotten her key before they’d left the mill.
When they went inside, there was no nosy landlady in the lobby to ask too many questions. Sadie leaned into him on the stairs. He told himself it would be rude to make her climb them on her own in her current shaky state. If only he could just ignore the softness of her body as it pressed against his—in such an achingly familiar fit. The light caramel scent of her hair stirred an all-too-base hunger. He felt the echo of anticipation from another time when he had been leading her to bed.
No matter how many times he told himself it couldn’t happen between them again, his urges were steadily drowning out the voice of reason.
“You don’t have to do this,” Sadie said in the same sexy drawl that featured in his memories of that one emotion-charged night five years ago.
“I take my job very seriously,” he said as he unlocked her room and led her inside.
“I see that,” she said, swaying slightly where she stood. Apparently Sadie couldn’t handle pain meds very well. “You’ve always gone above and beyond.”