Meagan's Marine (Halos & Horns) (20 page)

chapter 23

Hulks and Heroes

Mitch sat in an empty lot near the middle
of the block, waiting for the trick or
treaters
and
their parents to catch up to him. Red and Tiffany had decorated a trailer with
lights and bales of hay for everyone to sit on. The method of dropping them off
and waiting had kept the cumbersome vehicle out of the heavily trafficked areas
for most of the evening.

Halloween night in Small town, USA had
changed in one significant way. Judging by the number of cars on the streets,
nobody walked anymore. Hell, when he and Sarah were kids, they’d set off on
foot with their dad to visit the houses on their block. 

Mitch watched nervously from the side
view mirrors of his truck, cringing as the silhouettes of costumed children
stood out in relief against the headlights of multiple vehicles. He prayed everyone
was watching their children closely.

He raised the volume on the country
station radio he’d been listening to just in time to hear Trace Adkins belting
out
Swing
. He smiled to himself, picturing Tex on the bandstand at the
club a couple of nights ago. To Mitchell’s surprise, the big man had swung his
hips and lip-synced his way through
Ladies Love Country Boys.
His looks
and mannerisms had been close enough to the real Trace that he’d walked off
with the club’s “Look Alike” cash prize of $100. He shook his head, remembering
how women were hanging off that son of a bitch by the end of his ‘performance’.

Mitch hadn’t discovered until the next
day that he’d narrowed the swarm down to one woman. Tex had shown up at his place,
wearing a remarkably sheepish, though somewhat satisfied grin. As it turned
out, he’d spent the entire night acquainting himself with
Niki
,
Meagan’s roommate. Mitch assumed Tex had taken her to one of the two hotel
rooms he and Haley had booked for the night.

Mitch had spent the better part of
fifteen minutes chewing his friend’s ass out. He’d tried to make Tex see that a
one-night-stand with
Niki
could only mean trouble
between Meg and himself.

“How?” Tex had asked. “You have nothing
to do with this. I barely even saw you all night. Besides,” he’d thrown in,
“Nicole is thirty years old. Plenty old enough to know what she wants.”

“That doesn’t matter, and you damned
well know it! If you hurt her, I’ll be guilty by association—plain and simple.”

Haley had shrugged and eventually agreed
with him, telling her brother that the bonds of friendship between women didn’t
always have to make sense…they just were.

Something had been off with Tex since
then. Some strange look on his old bud’s face had signified a change, a shift,
in the paradigm of Tex’s former attitude toward women. Yep. He definitely
sensed a shift—major or minor—it still wasn’t clear to him.

Mitch popped a butterscotch candy in his
mouth and frowned at his reflection in the rearview mirror. Change, good or
bad, was always cause to be on the alert.

“Don’t run, Buck!”

Meagan’s voice cut through his
contemplations like a hot knife to butter. He stepped out of the truck in time
to see her make it back to the trailer first.

Buck held up his glow in the dark trick
or treat bucket like it was a prizefighter’s gold belt. “I got candy, Mitch.”

Mitch lifted him onto a bale of hay
circling the edge of the trailer. “Hey, let me take a look at that haul.” He
made a show of checking out Buck’s container full of goodies. “Yep, you got
enough there to keep your dentist happy for a good while.”

Meagan pulled her son’s foot closer so
she could retie his sneaker. “And his mother broke and exhausted.
Every
overly energetic almost-four-year-old boy needs more sugar in his diet.”

“Aw hell, Meg, we did it and our folks
survived. Besides, if it weren’t for Halloween, you may never have discovered
how good your son looks in hulky green muscles.”

“I
gotta
admit
he’s a handsome little devil.”

“I’m not a devil. I’m the Hulk.”

Mitch laughed. “That’s right, and
whatever you do, Mom,
don’t
make him angry—”

“—because you won’t like me when I’m
angwy
,” Buck finished. He faced Mitch and roared, bowing
his bulked up plastic green arms. Mitch roared back at him, bowing his arms as
well. The two of them joined forces and roared in unison.

By the time Mitch turned his watchful
eye on Meagan, she was trying hard not to laugh at their antics, but losing the
battle. She broke finally, ruffling her son’s hair above his green painted face
and grinning at him. “You’re such an adorable little mutant!” She stifled a
yawn and rested one booted foot on the trailer. “I don’t know about you Mr.
Hulk, but I’m ready to call it a night. I’ve still got some studying to do.”

“But you haven’t made it to the haunted
house yet. I think that’s our next stop.”

“Yeah, I want to go to the haunted
house!” Buck started jumping up and down on the bed of the trailer.

“Okay. We’ll go, but that’s the last
one. You already have enough candy there to last you until next Halloween.”
That seemed to satisfy the miniature Hulk enough to sit still for a minute.

“Jeez-Louise! You’d think he’d had
enough of haunted houses, wouldn’t you? Being that…well… you know,” she
finished weakly, before biting her lower lip.

Mitch tried, he really tried, to stop
the spontaneous snort from erupting. He failed miserably. Before he knew it, he
and Meagan had both doubled over in hysterical laughter, while Buck watched on,
looking thoroughly confused.

Meagan wiped the tears of laughter from
her eyes. “I can’t breathe,” she said, gasping for air as she straightened and
held her sides.

“Oh God…that timing couldn’t have been
more perfect if you’d planned it!” Mitch wiped his eyes on the cuff of his long
sleeved shirt.

“I didn’t,” she insisted.

“I know you didn’t. That’s what made it
so damn funny.” Without thinking, he pulled her into his arms and gave her a
long, lingering kiss on the lips. Her guttural groan made him pull back
suddenly. Clueless as how to explain himself or justify his actions, he simply
set her away from him. He took two steps back and turned to go sit in the
truck.

After instructing her son to stay right
where he was, Meagan met Mitch in the front of the truck. She pulled him
around, her face a perfect composite of anger and hurt. “What the hell, Mitch?”
she hissed.

“I know…I didn’t mean…I’m sorry.” His
words sounded lame to his own ears. He could only imagine how they sounded to
her.

“You know, I’m a little tired of your
mixed signals. One minute you act as though you want me, then you push me away.
I have had about all the rejection I can take from one man. I don’t think this
‘friendship’ of ours is healthy for me, Mitch. Maybe you’d better keep your
distance from both me and my son from now on.”

“Meagan, wait…” He grabbed her arm to
stop her from walking away. The crunch of tires meeting pavement caught his
attention as a small sports car turned down the street, its rpms revving at an
entirely too high rate of speed for a street crowded with trick or treating
children.

“Buck?”

The single word had his head whipping
around to where the child should have been seated, but wasn’t.

“Buck,
noooo
!”

The screech of tires and a sickening,
bone-breaking thud preceded Meagan’s horror-filled scream.

chapter 24

Halloween Hell

The lights of Lake Coburn winked and
sparkled in the night sky. Meagan stood there, her head pressed against the
large plate glass window, just outside the 3
^rd
floor surgery waiting
room.  The room itself was full—too full—of people, and she couldn’t take
it, had to get out. She knew they meant well. They were all concerned about her
son.

The fact remained, that if Buck didn’t
pull through this surgery, it wouldn’t be their loss. It would be her loss. Her
loss and her fault—hers—and hers alone.

Her eyes drifted closed, shutting out
the steady ribbon of car headlights travelling over the I-10 bridge.

“Megs.”

She didn’t need to see him to know the
voice. Mitch stood behind her, torn up, blaming himself, wanting to make things
better for her. He couldn’t. Not this time. And if Buck didn’t come out of this
surgery perfectly fine, he never would, but she didn’t blame him in any way,
whatsoever.

“It’s not your fault, Mitch. It’s mine. He’s
my son, and I should never have taken my eyes off of him—not even for a
second.”

“Can you turn around? Please?”

“I don’t want to see anyone right now,
Mitch. I can’t have anyone trying to console me or tell me everything is going
to be fine. And if things go south, I absolutely do not want to hear the words
‘It’s God’s will’ from anyone. So, if you want to help me, you can go in that
room and tell them all not to say that to me…ever. Because if they do, I will
surely…” She clamped her jaw and spoke through clenched teeth. “I
will
…lose…my…shit.”

“I-I can’t keep you from losing your
shit right now, Megs. I’m too damn close to losing my own.”

His voice reminded her of silk running
over broken glass, jagged and catching. She opened her eyes, letting the lights
from outside come into focus, and then turned slowly to face him.

If anyone had told her another human
being could look that miserable over someone else’s child being hit by a car,
she’d never have believed it.  The man was hurting every bit as much as
she was.

She supposed it shocked her so badly
because the contrast was greater. He’d had a much longer distance to fall than
she before hitting rock bottom. Whatever the reason, she couldn’t help but go
to him.

Without saying a word, she looped her
arms around his waist, and laid her face against his heaving chest. Silently,
she willed his breathing to even out, the rapid beating of his heart to slow,
and his tears to stop.

Meagan hadn’t realized until that moment
of seeing Mitch so near broken, how being needed by another adult could be so
empowering. She practically felt her strength seeping into him, melding with
his own, and multiplying, increasing to all-time highs for them both. 
Buoyed by a sudden realization that things
would be
fine, she began to
relax in the knowledge, letting that sense of inner peace seep into every pore
and nerve ending in her body. The two of them stood in silence, holding each
other, united in their concern for Buck.  

You’re stronger together.

Meagan started at the voice, then smiled
as she hugged him tighter. “I think so too, Mitch.”

He put her at arm’s length, stared down
at her, his gaze curious. “Did you hear that?”

Her own gaze narrowed. “That wasn’t
you?” She frowned as he shook his head. “What did
you
hear?”

“You’re stronger together.” He blinked
twice. “At first I thought it was Red, but he’s still in the waiting room with
everyone else. We were totally alone.”

Meagan’s eyes were already on the two
scrub clad figures approaching them. Tiffany McAllister reached Meagan first,
as Tanner Collins brought up the rear, looking as though he wished he had
better news to report.

“I set his leg, Meagan. It was a bad
break but since he’s still growing, that bone should stitch together properly
with time. You can be sure I’ll keep an eye on it for you. The brace on his
forearm from the merry go round incident took the brunt of the punishment to
his arm. I put a cast on it, encompassing the elbow to stabilize it more
thoroughly.” She stepped aside, as though to give Tanner the floor.

“He’s got a concussion, and some brain
swelling…”

Meagan felt Mitchell’s hand tighten
around hers, giving her the strength to quiet the screaming in her own head,
enough to comprehend Tanner’s words.

“It’s not nearly as serious as it could
be considering what happened. I’ve induced a coma until the swelling goes down,
giving the brain time to heal itself.” He shook his head, running one hand
through his hair. “Honestly, the fact that the vehicle hit him just hard enough
to throw him smack dab in the middle of the yard of the month…that was kind of
incredible. I mean that lawn was some kind of thick. If he’d landed on the
pavement we would be looking at a much more serious head injury.”

“And the fact that both of you were
there when it happened, jumping into action as quickly as you did,” Mitch
added. “It all works for him.”

Meagan nodded. “So how long will he be
in this coma you’ve induced?”

“That depends on Buck and how his brain
reacts. It could be as little as two days, or as long as a week.” Tanner placed
a comforting hand on her shoulder. “I wish I could give you a definitive
answer, Meagan, but I can’t. I
can
tell you this. Buck is a strong,
healthy little man, and he comes from a loving home. He’s got everything he
needs to give him the will to fight his way back to you.”

Mitch nodded. “He’s right, Megs.” He
shook his brother-in-law’s hand then pulled him in for a man hug and pat on the
back. “Thanks man.”

Tiffany and Tanner continued on to the
waiting room to talk to their own concerned spouses and friends, leaving Meagan
staring up at Mitch again. He smiled down at her, linking the fingers of both
hands through hers.

“I guess we are stronger together,” he
whispered, lowering his forehead to hers.