ANGEL MEETS THE BADMAN Read online

  Fiona took paper towels from the nearby sink, wet them and washed the worst of the blood away. Then she took off her own jacket, a smallish blazer that was way too pretty to be used on a bloody, gunshot victim, and slipped it over Sara's shoulders, buttoning it once in front. She made a sling from the sleeves of Sara's discarded blouse, and had her arm in it, saying the less Sara moved that arm, the less bleeding there would be.

  "Enough already. What're you, the surgeon general or something?" Trent impatiently tugged her away.

  "I'm a damn good nurse, and I'm married to a damn good doctor," Fiona snapped. "Maybe, if you're lucky, I'll still be around to help patch you up once those men outside get through with you."

  Trent rolled his eyes. "You're one mouthy woman, aren't you?"

  "Yeah, I'm a real pain in the ass," she muttered, but she went back to the children, a soothing smile pasted on her face. "Miss Brand is going to be just fine," she promised them. But Sara could hear the doubt in her voice. Damn. The wound must be even worse than she'd thought.

  "You never got to read them that story, did you, Fiona?" Sara managed to ask, hoping it might distract Bubba from the fear she could see growing ever larger in his eyes.

  "No, I guess I didn't. Would you like that, children?"

  Bubba nodded, but they all looked doubtful. Then Sara said, "The Brementown Musicians, Fiona. It's … on my desk."

  Fiona looked at her a little oddly, but she got the book and began reading it to the children, softly, in a soothing voice that seemed to make the pain a little less.

  Sara thought about the shed in that little Cajun town. About the donkey and the rooster, and her last few hours with Jake…

  And then she thought maybe she was letting herself slip again, because his face hovered before her eyes.

  Focus, dammit!

  She blinked and tried to shake herself awake. But he was still there. Peering at her from just outside the door. He lifted a finger to his lips, pressed it there.

  Oh, God, he was real! He was real, Jake was here!

  Sara blinked her eyes slowly instead of nodding to tell him she understood. His gaze moved over her body, lingering on her chest, and she saw his jaw go tight, his lower lip tremble.

  Trent still crouched in front of her with his gun on her, and his back to the doorway. He was riveted to the windows, watching the men out there lining up to blow him away. He was afraid.

  He should be, Sara thought. Every Brand in seven counties was probably out there by now.

  Trent started to turn, as if to glance behind him toward the door.

  "Trent, wait," Sara said. Too fast. He eyed her, then turned to glance at the door. Jake had pulled back, though, and was out of sight. Seeing nothing, Trent faced Sara again.

  "What do you want?"

  "I want to know why," she managed. "Why did you kill Vivienne?"

  "Oh, come on!" His face twisted with bitterness. "She was sleeping with every man she met. Making a fool of me, spending every dime we could make at that plantation, making a huge dent in Flossie and Bert's savings. All the while never contributing a thing."

  He paced, throwing his hands in the air, but was still careful not to cross in front of the windows.

  "I know she wasn't a nice person," Sara said. She winced. It hurt to force enough air from her lungs to speak.

  "That's putting it mildly."

  "But what about Jake?" she asked, her voice soft.

  Trent stopped pacing, faced her dead-on. Jake popped around the corner again and motioned to the children. Fiona saw him, nodded once, and began inching the kids closer to the door. They slid along the floor on their backsides. Fiona stayed where she was and kept on reading. Just as if they were still there. The kids didn't make a sound as they slid. Bubba was bringing up the rear, urging them along silently when they got too scared to move every once in a while.

  "What about Jake?" Trent asked.

  "He was your friend. And you were going to let him take the blame for murder."

  "Hell, that was the plan." Trent tipped his head backward, staring at the ceiling. "Don't you get it?" he asked, fixing her with his gaze again. "My inlaws were going to leave that entire place to Vivienne, which meant it would have been mine. Then they changed the will to include my buddy Jake. Cutting my inheritance by half. And with Viv running around the way she was, how the hell could I even know I'd get that much? She could have up and left me at any moment!" He shook his head slowly, started to look toward Fiona and the spot on the floor where the kids were supposed to be. They wouldn't be there. Little Amy was at the door now, with Billy three feet behind her and Bubba a couple more feet away.

  "So you thought that with Vivienne dead and Jake doing time for her murder…"

  Trent's head swiveled back again. "They would leave it all to me," he said, his attention on her fully. "They didn't have anybody else."

  An arm came around from the hallway and swept little Amy out. She never made a sound.

  So Jake wasn't alone. He remained in the doorway, his eyes fixed on Trent most of the time, but darting every now and then down to Sara. To the jacket and the bandages showing in front, and the bloodstains starting to seep through, and the blood smeared all over the floor and coating her hands. Little Billy scooched closer to the door.

  Jake's gaze met Sara's and held it. And she wondered again how his eyes ever got to be so brown and so perfectly shaped, so thickly fringed. His face was damp. He looked scared to death…for her, she knew. He wasn't any more afraid of Trent than he had been of that gator.

  "So you were willing to let Jake go to prison just so you could have the plantation?" she asked.

  "Jake should have stayed the hell away. He was … taking my place in that family. Flossie and Bert were starting—" He gave his head a shake, lowering it quickly.

  "Starting to what, Trent? Love Jake more than you?"

  He lifted his head and stared at her, and she had to forcibly resist the urge to look past him at Jake. Billy had made it to the doorway. Someone snatched him out into the hall. Only Bubba remained, and he inched closer and closer. But she couldn't look. If she looked, she would give it all away.

  "What the hell do you care about any of this?" Trent asked her. Then his eyes narrowed on her. "You probably slept with him while the two of you were playing fugitive together. Didn't you? Hell, I thought you were different."

  "So did I," she whispered.

  "Well, you're not. You turned out to be just another easy tumble, like the rest of the women who throw themselves at Jake Nash."

  She shrugged. The weakness was getting worse and worse now. Her mind was fading. Her voice getting softer. Maybe this was it. Maybe her words now would be her last ones. "I guess I did," she said. "But seeing how things turned out, I have to tell you, Trent, I don't regret it."

  "No?"

  She shook her head, managed a crooked smile. "I'd have hated to die a virgin," she whispered, hoping Jake could hear her.

  Trent looked troubled by those words. Then, just as Bubba reached the door, his foot hit a chair, making it bang against a desk. A small sound, but as loud as a gunshot in the silence.

  Trent whirled, lifted his gun and fired, just as Jake dove in front of the child. Wes appeared behind Jake, and Trent took aim again. But even as Sara tried to get up, tried to help, managing to lift only one arm, a chair came crashing down on Trent's head … and as he fell to his knees, Sara was amazed to see Fiona pulling it up to bring it down again.

  Wes hauled Bubba out of the room, shoved him out of the line of fire, and Jake got to his feet and surged forward. He and Trent struggled, but only for a moment. It was over that fast. The gun was on the floor, Trent was on his back, Jake was straddling him, and Wes was standing above with his Bowie knife in his hand.

  "You can let him up, Jake. I got him," Wes said.

  Jake nodded once and got off the man. Then he was beside Sara, even as Wes hauled Trent to his feet, turned him around, cuffed him and slammed him down into a chair.
Wes spoke into a radio.

  Jake knelt and cupped Sara's head, lifting her slightly, searching her face. "Are you all right?"

  She smiled weakly. "What took you so long?"

  "Does it matter?" he asked her. "I'm here now."

  He stroked her face, and she felt herself slipping again, fought to hold on, but knew this time it was a losing battle. "You're here," she whispered. "But for me, Jake? Or for Trent?"

  People came charging in then. Officers first, in riot gear, wielding rifles and ordering everyone to the floor. Jake ignored them and was shoved away from her for his trouble. That was about all she was clear on. After that she seemed to fade out, and it angered her that she would lose her grip on life when she was so close to her heart's desire.

  She tried to tell Jake that she loved him. That was foremost in her mind, to tell him that she loved him, because she was pretty sure she wasn't going to get another chance. But she never knew if the words bursting from her heart actually made it to her lips or not.

  * * *

  Chapter 17

  « ^

  Jake was cold. And he shouldn't be, because he was crammed in between Wes and Garrett Brand in Garrett's big pickup truck. Chelsea and little Bubba were in the back seat, and Jake wondered if the little guy could breathe at all, as tight as his mamma was holding him. Sara's brother, Marcus and his wife, Casey, were following in their own car. The rest of the Brands were more than likely en route. But the paramedics had taken off so damned fast with Sara that Jake hadn't had time to force his way into the ambulance with her, as he'd fully intended to do.

  None of the Brands had managed it, either. So she was alone, and that was killing him. Garrett could drive, though. Jake had to give him that. He had caught up to the ambulance, even though the cops had held them up at the scene for a minute or two that had seemed endless. And then he skidded the pickup's dual tires to a stop, crossways in the parking lot next to the El Paso ER. They all piled out.

  Two paramedics wheeled Sara through the automatic doors at a dead run, one of them holding a plastic IV bag above his head, another pressing an oxygen mask to her face. They blocked most of her from Jake's view, but not so much that he couldn't see the way she was thrashing around on the gurney. Jake surged forward, flanked by Brands, but the third paramedic got out of the driver's door, blocking their path.

  "Is one of you guys Jake?"

  Swallowing hard, Jake nodded. "I am. Why?"

  The paramedic clapped him on the shoulder, looking down at the floor briefly before meeting Jake's eyes. "Hang in there, man. You've got yourself a fighter. She might just pull through yet."

  "Might?" Jake's blood ran cold. He gave the man a nod of thanks, then moved past him, feeling dazed. He pushed through the hospital doors, headed straight for the room where he'd seen them take Sara and went through those doors, as well. But he saw only the pale-green scrubs that surrounded her, fighting to hold her still, and one blood-streaked, pale arm flailing wildly. He heard his name on a wheezing breath, over and over again.

  Someone grabbed him, went to shove him away.

  "No, dammit!" Jake shoved back, and the next thing he knew he was at Sara's side, both hands clasping hers, bending low, leaning close. "I'm here, Sara. I'm right here."

  Someone grabbed him again.

  Someone else said, "No, let him be! Look at this."

  Sara's thrashing stopped. Her eyes remained closed, lips moving slightly, forming his name, though no sound came out. The rapid beep of the heart monitor slowed. The tension in the room seemed to ease immediately.

  "I'm right here, Sara. I'm right here. It's okay."

  He glanced up at the nearest face. A dark-eyed man nodded at him from behind his mask. "Keep talking to her, son."

  He did, while someone fixed the IV that had been torn loose and someone else refastened the oxygen mask and a half dozen others did a half dozen other jobs. Eventually Sara seemed to sink into sleep or unconsciousness or … he wouldn't think further.

  The dark-eyed doctor met Jake's eyes over his mask. "She's out. We need to get her to surgery, and you can't come with us there."

  Jake still clung to Sara's limp, cold hand. "Is she … is she going to…?"

  "There's a bullet near her heart," the doctor said, and his accent was Spanish. "Every time she moves, the bleeding starts up again and she risks death. We have to get it out. It's risky … she's lost a lot of blood already … but if we don't try…"

  Swallowing hard, Jake nodded. He didn't need the doc to finish.

  "New to the family, aren't you, son?" the man asked, guiding Jake into the hall as the nurses pushed Sara out of the room and toward an elevator.

  Jake just watched her go, watched the doors slide open. "I'm … I'm not family. I'm … uh … I'm no one."

  "He's family," someone said.

  Jake looked up, surprised to see that the voice belonged to Garrett, who was still wearing a badge on his shirt. "Doc, maybe you could take a look at Jake's arm, there, while you tell us what's going on with Sara?"

  The doctor frowned, and Jake glanced down at where he was looking. He'd only been vaguely aware of the soreness in his upper arm, and he'd attributed the blood on his shirt to Sara's injuries.

  The doctor steered Jake to a chair and tore the sleeve wider to look at the wound. "What happened here?" he asked. Wes came over to stand beside Jake, looking down at his wound with what might almost have been a hint of concern in his eyes.

  Jake shrugged.

  "He took a bullet for my son," Garrett said, his eyes fixed on Jake's. "Yeah, Wes told me all about it. You probably don't realize it, but that qualifies you for honorary membership in the clan."

  Jake sucked in a breath as the doctor poked at him.

  The doctor said, "It's only a flesh wound. I'll send a nurse out to clean and bandage it, and you'll need a tetanus shot." Then he glanced past Garrett at the doorway, and his face lit up.

  Jake looked, too, and he saw Fiona, the school nurse, coming through the entrance, arms open wide. The doctor ran to her, enfolded her, hugged her hard. There were tears, kisses.

  "I, uh, I don't believe you've met my wife," the doctor said finally, addressing the Brands.

  Garrett looked surprised. No wonder. The woman was half "Doc's" age, by Jake's best guess. "When did you get married?" Garrett asked.

  "Last month. In Vegas."

  The woman looked past her husband, at Jake and Wes, and she said, "Those two … they saved our lives back there at that school. They saved the children's lives. This one, he dove right in front of little Bubba just when that man shot at him."

  Behind her a camera flashed, and Jake shielded his eyes, squinting at the crowd of reporters coming into the ER waiting room.

  While Jake got his wound patched up, Garrett headed to the double doors to do some crowd control. He had a few words with the reporters and apparently convinced them to leave. But the waiting room remained packed full of Brands—and one outsider who felt like a fraud.

  Nurses who passed kept whispering words like "hero" as they looked Jake's way. But he knew better. Chelsea brought him stale coffee in a foam cup. Little Bubba sat on his lap and looked at him with adoring eyes. Wes and Garrett talked to him as if he were an old friend.

  Marcus, Sara's brother, was quiet. Musing. Deep in thought. And finally, during a long stretch of deep silence, he said, "So are you planning to marry her, or what?"

  Everyone sat there staring at Marcus in stunned silence.

  Jake swallowed hard. "Don't worry, Marcus. I know damn well that I'm nowhere near good enough for your sister."

  Marcus didn't say anything for a long moment. He looked at his wife, then at little Bubba sitting on Jake's lap. Then he said, "You're right, Nash. You're nowhere near good enough for Sara Brand. Then again, neither is anyone else on the planet, in my opinion. But that's all beside the point, don't you think?"

  "Is it?"

  "Yeah, it is. Because if she waits for someone worthy of her, she'll be s
pending her whole life alone. And also, because I'm pretty sure she has her heart set on you." Then he nodded toward the TV that glared down on the waiting room from a corner shelf. "And I suppose a national hero is about as good as she could hope to do for herself."

  They all turned to look at the TV screen, and Jake saw his own image there. The photo showed him sitting on a waiting-room chair, his shirt and arm smeared with blood, his hair a mess. Underneath the photo it said, "Jacob Allen Nash—American Hero. A TV10 Editorial."

  "Turn that up," Chelsea said.

  Someone did.

  "Facts about this American hero, who today risked his own life to save two women and three children from a situation that could very easily have turned to tragedy, are still coming in. But most surprising of all, perhaps, is that this isn't the first time this man has shown such valor. Eighteen years ago, when he was little more than a child, Jacob Allen Nash tried to hold up a convenience store. Why? Because his dying mother needed medicine she couldn't afford. The result? The store owner suffered a heart attack. Nash then called for help and stayed on the scene, attempting to perform CPR on the man, until police arrived to arrest him. He served eighteen years of a twenty-year sentence. And even with that, he never lost his compassion, or his courage. The heroic soul that drove him to sit there waiting for help to arrive, instead of running away to save himself, was the same one that drove him once again to risk it all for the sake of someone else. Jacob Allen Nash … Quinn, Texas, thanks you."

  The photo of Jake vanished, the screen showed a news anchor at a desk with two coanchors. One of the coanchors, a woman, shook her head slowly. "Men like that one don't come along every day. And I hear he's single, Mark."

  The anchor grinned. "Not for long, I'll bet."

  Jake reached for the remote and turned the set off. A nurse leaned over his shoulder, handed him a slip of paper.

  "What's this?" he asked.

  "Messages. Reporters from all over Texas want to talk to you."

  He shook his head, crumpled the paper in his fist. "Any word on Sara yet?"

  The nurse smiled gently. "We should know soon. But I have a hunch she's gonna be just fine, hon. I don't think that ol' reaper could pry her away with a crowbar."