Deception (Southern Comfort) (5 page)

From Justin’s lower perspective, he most certainly caught an eyeful.

After Sam clamped the damn thing around her knees and found the nerve to glance his direction, the look on Justin’s face left no doubt that he’d put it all together.

Well, the man wasn’t a trauma surgeon because he was stupid.

He looked at Josh, whose dark scowl suggested that he was not pleased with the little show the other man had been given, and then cleared his throat while he ascended the steps, pausing next to her before heading inside.  “I’m just… going up to say hi to Clay.  And my brothers.”

His brothers. Well wasn’t that just perfect?  She’d just shaken her groove thing in front of Justin’s whole family.

Sam felt his hand rest on her shoulder and she wanted to crawl in a hole.  “It was good to see you, Samantha.”

Yeah.  Saw a lot more than you’d bargained for, huh Doc?

This was like her own little personal nightmare.  All of those naked-and-can’t-find-my-high-school-locker scenarios had absolutely nothing on this night.

The door shut with a soft click, and then it was just her and Josh on the stoop.  The salty breeze died down, leaving only the faintly putrid odor of rotting garbage wafting in from the nearby dumpster.
  “You know Justin?” Josh asked from behind her.  There was definitely more than curiosity in his voice.  Maybe a note of accusation underneath.

What?  Did he think she’d been turning tricks or something?  Maybe the doctor was a regular client?

Or maybe he was jealous because…

No.  Do not go there.

Squeezing her eyes shut against the sudden ache in her heart, Sam ignored the question and opted not to turn around.  She didn’t need to see whatever emotion was on Josh’s face, because she couldn’t bear his disappointment. “I gotta go,” she said with finality, forcing her legs to carry her down the ramp.  “Take care, Josh.”

This time, he didn’t follow her.

And she figured it was just as well.

CHAPTER FOUR

THE
hospital was blissfully quiet.  Aside from the usual blips and hum from the monitors and the occasional squeak of wheels as stretchers and cleaning carts were maneuvered down the halls, this bland little cubicle of space was a sanctuary.

Although not one Sam would ever have chosen.

However, as she’d worked a double at the bar that her brother had had the dubious distinction of managing before his unfortunate encounters with first a bullet and then a bus, being off her feet in a calm, peaceful atmosphere was a wonderful change of venue.  As soon as she had time, she’d find herself a better job, but for now that one was paying the bills.  Well, some of them anyway.  And she was afraid if she quit she’d lose the benefits the place had extended Donnie, and then where would they be?  She was doing battle with the insurance agency at every turn as it was, and if they denied the claim altogether…

Good Lord, she didn’t even want to think about it.

But somehow, she’d get them through this.  Hopefully without taking off her clothes.

The manager of the “entertainment” agency she’d signed on with had called her today, telling her she’d received a glowing compliment from last night’s client.  Probably because Rogan Murphy was embarrassed by the whole thing and wanted to make it go away as painlessly as possible.

Sam couldn’t have agreed more.

The money had been good, but it sure as heck hadn’t been easy.

There had to be a better way.

Swallowing a yawn, Sam opened her book to the next to the last chapter.  She and Donnie had been reading this one for a little while, as her dyslexia made the process slower, but she was anxious to see how it ended. She’d just started to make some headway when a soft knock sounded on the metal pole that held the privacy curtain.  Private rooms were way out of budget, so her brother shared his space with several other long-term patients.  She looked up from her book to find Justin’s familiar face peeking around the curtain.

“Hey,” he said as he pushed the barrier aside.  “Do you mind if I join you?” 

“Not at all.”  Which was a lie, but she figured she might as well get this over with.  She’d been expecting this conversation ever since she ran into him outside Murphy’s last night.  Over the past few months of painful setbacks and even more agonizing lack of progress with her brother’s condition, she’d come to think of Justin as a friend.  He was no longer technically her brother’s doctor, but he always managed to make himself available.  He’d answered endless amounts of questions as Sam had familiarized herself with traumatic head injury, and they’d shared coffee and some pathetic hospital cuisine on more than a few occasions.  He’d been helpful and respectful and engaging, and she genuinely liked and admired him.

It was why it was so humiliatingly painful that she’d run into him last night.

He lowered his long body into the cramped plastic chair, heaving out a sigh as he collapsed back against it.  “Man.  Sometimes there is just nothing better than sitting on your butt, you know what I mean?”

Despite her trepidation, Samantha laughed, and Justin ran his fingers through his perpetually mussed hair before sliding his gaze toward her lap. His eyes widened at the Highlander with the improbable pecs brandishing a broadsword from her book’s cover. 

“Well.  That’s an interesting change from Tom Jones.”

Sam resisted the urge to make a flippant comment about strippers and their smut.  “It’s actually a wonderful story.  And since reading Donnie’s favorites was doing no good, I thought I’d shake him up a little.  I like these historical romances.  And having his sister describe another man’s sexual prowess out loud should be enough to bring any guy around, just so he can shut her up.”

Justin grinned, and Sam’s tension eased. 

“How long have you been at it?”

“A little over a week now,” she admitted.  “It takes me a long time to read.”

“More time to enjoy it.  Me, I’m a speed reader, which has its benefits when it’s a medical journal.  But then I wait months for a new Dean Koontz to come out and I finish it in a few hours.”

“I’m surprised you have time to read,” she told him honestly.  It seemed like he pretty much lived at the hospital.

“Yeah, well, it’s either read or have a social life, and reading takes a lot less effort.  Dean doesn’t mind if I fall asleep while I’m in the middle of a conversation.”

Sam laughed, and he offered another of his rare smiles.  It was a shame he didn’t share them more often.

When his smile slid away and he sucked in his bottom lip, Sam knew he was ready to discuss the giant g string-clad elephant lurking between them.

“About last night –”

“Don’t.”  She put her hand on his arm, warm beneath his scrubs.  “You know what I was there to do, and I think you know why, so there’s really no reason to rehash it.”

“But Sam –”

“No.  Don’t you but me.  There was plenty of butt to go around last night.  I don’t think we need any more.”  

Recognizing her play on words, Justin laughed, which was even rarer. But it was more rueful than amused.  “It’s just… man, Sam.  I wish there was something I could do.  Are they still balking about Donnie’s care?”

“Same story, different day.”  She put her arms above her head and stretched.  “They’re pushing for me to move him to some kind of institution, like they’ve already written him off.  There’s a window of only so many months they’ll allow for hospitalization, and we’re coming up on it fast.  But what happens when he gets an infection, like the one he had a few weeks ago, and there are only semi-trained nursing aides to take care of it?  I’m afraid he’ll die if I move him to one of those places.  And he’s not going to be in here much longer anyway.  I’ve seen signs that he’s coming out of it.”

Justin stared straight ahead, his expression a remote mask, and Sam swallowed a sigh of frustration.  “Don’t tell me you’ve gone over to the Dark Side.  I thought you were stronger than that, Luke.”

Justin’s smile this time was thin.  “There’s been… progress,” he admitted, though he couched his words.  She hated it when he went all professional on her.  “But Sam, you know as well as I do that that doesn’t mean he’s coming down the home stretch.  Response to painful stimuli and spontaneously opening his eyes are not necessarily positive indicators of a coma reversal.  They could mean any number of things.  We’ve discussed that.”

“Yes, but I can feel him, Justin.  And I know it sounds crazy, but for a while he just wasn’t there.  But lately –” She shook her head because she knew he secretly thought she was ridiculous.  “He’s in there, Justin.  And he wants to come back.  Every time I leave, I almost sense his tension.  When I’m here… look, I know it sounds crazy, but he’s relaxed.  He’s happy that I’m with him.”

Sam didn’t have to be a brain surgeon to know what was going through Justin’s head – looney alert at three o’clock.  She punched his arm and rolled her eyes.  “Just because I can’t scientifically prove what I’m telling you, you think that I’m full of crap.”

“I’m a scientist,” he defended.  “It’s sort of my thing.  And I don’t think you’re full of crap, Sam.  I think you’re full of hope.  Which is a good thing, as long as you’re also realistic.”

“That’s what I have you for.  The Voice of Doom.”

Shaking his head, Justin pushed himself to his feet.  “I have to get back to work.  At least the folks down in the ER don’t mock me.”

“They’re either sedated or unconscious when you meet them.  Wait ‘til they wake up, and then see what happens. ”

“Aren’t you just full of smart remarks tonight?”  He put his hand on the curtain to pull it closed, peering seriously over his shoulder.  “Just be cautious, Sam.  If you continue doing… that, I want you to make sure you’re not endangering yourself.”

“Careful is my middle name.”

Nodding, satisfied for the moment, Justin left her and Donnie alone with the Highlander.  And Samantha looked at her brother’s still form and told herself that she was right.  Donnie was in there, somewhere, and he was trying to get better.  And she’d do whatever she had to, to see that he had the chance.

JOEY
Santone hung outside the emergency room entrance.  Sometimes he got good and tired of watching the chick, listening to her read those stupid books to her stupid vegetable of a brother, but the damn boss said that he had to keep his eye out.  Why they were even still bothering when it was clear old Donnie wasn’t never gonna wake up was anybody’s goddamn guess.  And if the boss was so worried about Don spilling his guts… well, a quick pillow over the face and problem solved.

Except the damn sister would probably go ballistic and stir up a whole hornet’s nest of trouble.

At least she had a smokin’ bod, and he’d more than enjoyed watching her get ready for bed at night on the occasions he’d followed her home.  Chickie had a couple of broken blinds that she needed to do something about.  And last night, when she’d come home, there’d been an unexpected treat under that trench coat.  Unless he was very much mistaken, goody-two-shoes Samantha had taken on a little side job.

Maybe before this whole ordeal was over he’d get to sample some of baby sister’s wares.

But for now it was strictly hands off.

The boss said they didn’t need to arouse suspicion.

Yeah, and suspicion wasn’t the only thing that girl could arouse.

Striking a match against the side of the building, Joey ignored the prissy scowl of one of those stupid volunteers as she left the building, no doubt getting her granny-panties in a bunch because he wasn’t smoking in a designated spot.  Those little glass box things they had all over outside the hospital were about as bad an idea as he’d ever heard of.  Like smoking a cigarette was so bad a crime that he should be penned in like some kind of freak in a cage?  Like what?  They was all gonna get cancer and croak on the spot because they’d breathed in some secondhand smoke?

Shit.  He’d been smoking since he was nine, and it never done no harm to him.

Coughing, Joey blew smoke rings out through his nostrils just to give himself something to do.  No doubt one of those damn nurses was probably lookin’ for his ass, wantin’ him to empty out a trash can or transport a patient or some such shit, and he guessed he’d have to get back in there in a minute.  Wouldn’t do to get fired for slacking on the job, as the boss would be good and pissed.  Said they needed somebody to be the eyes and ears at the hospital, make sure Donnie-O didn’t pull a Lazarus and return from the dead.

Damn.  How many years ago had he learned that shit when his mamma dragged him to church, and he was still rememberin’ it?

Crushing the butt of his cigarette under the heel of his rubber soled shoe, Joey guessed it was true what they said.

You never forget the stuff you learn in childhood.

THE
night was still balmy as Sam emerged from the hospital, pulling her car keys out of her purse.  Visiting hours had ended long ago, but she’d become enough of a fixture around the place that most of the nursing staff were willing to bend the rules.  Light from the harvest moon shone clear and bright, illuminating the advertisements for local festivals fluttering against the lampposts onto which they were stapled.  She gave a brief thought to picking up a pumpkin to sit on the front step of Donnie’s apartment – Halloween was just a few weeks away – but given her reclusive and questionable neighbors and the generally depressed state of the neighborhood, she figured it was probably best to forgo drawing unnecessary attention.  If she’d had any idea that her brother had moved out of the cute duplex he’d been renting and into that dump just so that she could attend classes full time, she’d never have agreed to let him help her with tuition.  But as usual, he’d suffered in silence just because he wanted her to have something better.