“Hello.” She forced a smile over her lips when she really just wanted to stare awhile longer, and doggone it, there went her mother’s voice again about rude manners. “I don’t know if you remember—”
Long lashes swept down over his chocolate brown eyes and up again in his first sign that he’d actually noticed her. “You’re a memorable lady, Nola.”
Thank God, thank God, thank God he remembered her name and she hadn’t just made a total idiot out of herself.
Then a smile twitched at one corner, just a hint but enough of the man she’d known to help her relax her grip on the Tupperware container she’d forgotten she held.
“Why thank you, Rick.”
“And you’re here because?” He released one bar and held on single-handed.
He looked more “okay” that way. She couldn’t gauge the extent of the injury to his legs since he wore dark blue sweatpants and a gray T-shirt with Air Force logos imprinted. Whether or not his sudden easy stance was an act for her benefit she didn’t know, but it eased some of the tension inside her. She understood about “brave front” acts.
“I have a list.” She blurted.
Sheesh. She was a mature woman. A seasoned combat veteran, trained to fly multimillion-dollar cargo jets and here she was acting like hormonal mush.
All right. Maybe not hormonal. More like knocked off balance by the whole hospital scene and seeing his pain. Remembering her own. Knowing how pride hurt more than any needles.
Rick shifted from one foot to the other and studied her through narrowed eyes. “They took me off the painkillers a long time ago, so my brain’s clear. Still, you’ll need to run that by me again, because you’re not making a bit of sense.”
She couldn’t help but notice how he continued to grip the bar, his arm not even shaking, but his complexion beginning to pale beneath his tan.
More of that pride.
She scanned quickly for one of those industrial-looking uncomfy sofas they always had everywhere in places like this, and sure enough there was one right behind her. She plunked down to sit and hoped Rick would cut himself some slack and do the same.
“I was in town, heard through the grapevine that you were here and thought I would stop in to say hi for old time’s sake.” She lifted the aqua-and-white Tupperware container full of chocolate chip M&M’s cookies, raising it at just the right level where he would have to come to the sofa if he wanted a chance at a cookie. She hadn’t met a male yet who could say no to cookies. “Hospital food usually sucks, so I figured you might like this.”
Actually, she didn’t recall much about the hospital food since she hadn’t been able to keep anything down during chemo. But every man she’d met worshipped food, so she’d figured cookies would be a decent icebreaker.
Rick shuffled with studied practice—holy guacamole, this guy had pride by the buckets—until he dropped down beside her. Sweat dotted his upper lip but somehow he managed not to sigh when he sat.
“Thanks, you’re right.” He took the cookies, brow furrowing. “This is still…uh…unexpected.”
“I imagine so.” She knotted her fingers in her lap, wishing she had that container back so her hands wouldn’t feel so empty.
“I should let you get back to work.” He nodded to her flight suit.
“I’m done for the day.” She didn’t want to reference her own swing by the hospital to gather old lingering paperwork and say farewells to some remaining staff members. “What about you?”
“Me, too, but then I’m stuck here. Don’t you need to head home?”
“Nope.”
“No boyfriend or husband to call?”
“God, no.” Her eyes fell to his ring finger. Still bare. Her stomach did that little flip again. “Do you really think I would bring cookies to a guy if I had a boyfriend or, heaven forbid, a husband?”
“Why ‘heaven forbid’?”
Her ex shouldn’t still have the power to hurt her. She didn’t love the bastard anymore. But still, his defection when she’d needed him most cut deeper than any surgeon’s knife. “Been there, done that, got the scars and divorce papers to show for it.”
“Ah—” he popped open the container of cookies “—so you’re a card-carrying member of the Marriage Sucks Club, too, huh?” He shoved a cookie in his mouth and offered her one, as well.
“You could say that.” She selected a cookie and weighed her words and finally asked the question that had been nibbling at the edges of her mind the same way she nipped around the cookie. “Want to tell me what happened with the legs?”
He swallowed his treat. “Hurricane Katrina cleanup was hazardous.”
The simple words painted a vivid picture. “I’m sorry.”
Nola could also tell from his stony face the subject was closed. She understood the reticence well and had to respect the boundaries.
She should probably pack up and go—cookies delivered. Mission accomplished. Page turned and book closed. Except… She couldn’t make herself get up off the uncomfy sofa.
“When do you get sprung from this place?”
“Soon.”
“You’re such a crummy liar.”
He shrugged. “I really am out soon. I just have to hire a babysitter and then they’ll cut me loose.”
“I take it from your tone you don’t think you need one.”
“Don’t want one.”
Awkward silence settled, kind of like that first meeting, but they’d already exhausted the wrong-first-date topics. She reached for her purse beside her. “I should go and let you get a shower or something.”
Shower? Sooo not a memory from the past she needed right now with him all sweaty and hot beside her, with her going on five years of abstinence, with his touch the last she’d felt. She clenched her fists to keep her hand from protectively covering her scarred breast. Yes, she’d had reconstruction, but she wasn’t the same by any stretch.
Stop. She wasn’t going there today. Except how could she not?
Ah hell, this was gonna be a long night with more than likely a few tears. She was human and closing this book was hard.
Rick grabbed for his crutches at the end of the bars and nodded for the sergeant to pick up the cookies. “I’ll walk with you to the door.”
She started to tell him no need to bother but then thought of that prickly male ego and opted to keep her yap closed. Let him do what he pleased. She stayed silent while he worked his way to his feet, shuffling to reach for crutches in what must have been a painful maneuver, yet he never even winced.
He nodded toward the hallway and began thumping his way down the hall alongside her. The awkward silence grew heavier with each step down the hall closer to the door. The crisp November air outside along with the bright sun did nothing to lighten the moment.
“Thanks for the cookies.”
He cocked his head to the side, quizzical. Not rude enough to glance back at the rehab clinic, but she could sense his itchiness for her to leave.
What had she expected? A resurrection of the relationship? The attraction was still there, but Rick’s walls were high. More of that pride. He undoubtedly just wanted to get her in her car and return to his room without falling on his face. The longer she waited, the harder she made things for him.
She needed to quit being selfish. “I know it seems strange, my showing up like this out of the blue. I probably