Once a Good Girl...

Tori barked in warning.

Kyle lunged forward, caught Victoria by the back of her lab coat and, thank you, God, slowed her fall just enough so he could hook an arm around her waist milliseconds before she face-planted onto cement. Sitting on the bottom step, breathing heavily, part exertion, part fear, she could have been seriously injured. He cradled her on his lap and rested his chin on her silky curls, giving his pulse a chance to slow. As much as she deserved to pay for what she’d done, Kyle had no desire to see her physically hurt.

“You’re okay,” he said to reassure himself as much as to reassure her.

There were names for men like him, and they weren’t ones Victoria would want uttered within her hearing. Why, after that terrifying choking incident and when she was obviously in a rush, did he have to lob the question that’d been dragging down his subconscious for nine long years at her back, where she couldn’t see it coming? And within minutes of their meeting up again.

She tried to scoot off his lap.

“Sit for a minute,” he said, inhaling the scent of melon, sweet cantaloupe grown in the warm sun, picked from the vine at peak ripeness. She’d always smelled good. Clean. Fresh. Different from the beer-drinking, cigarette-smoking, heavy-perfume-wearing girls he’d been used to.

The feel of her, light and soft, brought back memories of innocent times, holding hands, walks in the woods, the sheer pleasure of having her close, of touching her to confirm she was real and not a dream. Because girls like Victoria didn’t fall for guys like him. And yet, in some fluke blip of altered reality, she had.

For a time, Victoria had been the only good thing in his life. She’d made him believe in hope and possibility, until she’d betrayed him in the worst possible way.

She’d been destined for great things, had been all but formally accepted into Harvard, the alma mater of her father and brother. Pre-med. She’d talked of specializing in neurosurgery or maybe going into research to find cures for cancer, multiple sclerosis, diabetes, and a dozen other medical conditions. With her tenacity, he’d had no doubt, if there were cures to be found, Victoria would have been the one to find them. So what was she doing still in Madrin Falls, working as a nurse?

She tried to wriggle out of his arms again. He tightened his hold, not ready to give her up. And what was that all about? He despised her. But damn if she didn’t have him thinking about working off his mad in a few rounds of angry sex.

Because she looked good, better than he remembered. Hotter. Pixie cute, but with class. Her black hair short and perfectly mussed. Minimal makeup. Slender figure. Her fashionable tan slacks and cream-colored blouse covered by an immaculate, wrinkle-free lab coat, high-end shoes on her tiny feet. She liked her fancy clothes, that’s for sure.

“You’re squeezing me too tight.” She started to struggle in earnest. “I don’t like being restrained.”

He let her go.

She slid off his lap to the other side of the step. “You are a jinx.” She fluffed her hair. “Bad things happen to me when you’re around.” Using the railing to pull herself up, she stood and winced when she attempted to bear weight on her right foot.

He reached out to support her.

“Don’t touch me.” She swatted his hand away and tried to take a step, quickly relieving the pressure on her right foot. She looked up to the ceiling. “I don’t need this right now.” Her frustrated yell echoed off the walls.

Kyle thought he may have seen a tear form in the corner of her eye, which sent him flashing back nine years to the last time he’d seen her. Hysterical crying as the sheriff had helped her into the front passenger seat of his patrol car. To spare her the embarrassment of anyone knowing exactly what’d transpired between them, Kyle picked up her panties, used them to clean up the small smear of blood from the loss of her virginity, and stuffed them in his pocket, where the deputy had found them a short time later.

Spending the night in jail had given him plenty of time to think about what they’d done. And she’d come to him willingly with her little moans of pleasure, her desperate pleas for more. Anger worked its way in as he pondered the other possibility that’d plagued him. Had she made the accusation to escape her father’s wrath, to save herself from punishment and penance with a total disregard for what may happen to him as a result?

He emerged from his memories, the residual mix of guilt and lingering animosity not quite abated. “You know I didn’t force you into doing anything you didn’t want to do.” So why the hysterics afterwards? It didn’t make sense.

“I can’t believe we’re even having this conversation.” She put her hand up to the juncture of her left lateral neck and shoulder, swiveled her head, trying to work out a kink, and locked eyes with him. “I never told anyone you raped me. Look, we had sex. It was my first time. You’re huge. I’m not. I panicked. So what? No permanent harm done.”

He didn’t like the way she turned away when she said, “No permanent harm done.”

Aside from the euphoria of experiencing the best sex of his young life with a girl he’d managed to fall in love with, and the rage of having to choose between standing trial and possibly spending years in prison or leaving town for good and never contacting her again, he held little recollection of the specific details of that fateful night. Except for the sublime feel of her, which he’d never managed to duplicate with any other woman.

“Did I hurt you, Tori?” The thought he might have made him sick.

“Don’t call me that,” she snapped. “Any physical discomfort went away a lot sooner than the pain of you leaving me without a word as to why.”

She had no idea what he’d gone through after she’d been taken home? “The sheriff told me you accused me of rape. He dragged me off to jail, let me sit in that stinking cell for hours.” While he’d summarized the evidence against him and recounted stories of what prison inmates did to rapists.

To her credit, Victoria looked genuinely surprised.

“It scared the hell out of me.”

Her eyes narrowed.

“Well, it did.”

“If you’d known me at all,” she said. “If you’d loved me as much as you said you did, if you’d trusted me at all, you should have known in your heart I’d never have done such a thing.”

But she’d been inconsolable, wouldn’t talk to him. She’d pushed him away when he’d tried to hold her and comfort her, fought her way out of the car—just as the sheriff had pulled up beside them. He’d had no idea what was going through her mind.

“At the very least,” she added, “I deserved the benefit of the doubt and a phone call to clue me in to what was happening.”

“How was I supposed to call you?” Didn’t she get it? “I was in jail. And a seventeen-year-old boy with no parents to stand up for him and a twenty-year-old sister too busy partying to care what happened to him didn’t get the proverbial one phone call in this town. I was given two choices. Take my chances with a trial or leave town.” A kid like him with a bad reputation and no one reputable to stand up for him would never have won a court battle against a family from the upper echelon of Madrin Falls. “I didn’t see any way out but to leave. When I was released from custody, a deputy followed me home. I had ten minutes to pack and he escorted me out of town.” And followed him another hour after that.

“You haven’t been near a phone any time since?” Victoria asked. “Weren’t you at all interested in how my father reacted to finding out his only daughter had tumbled, half-dressed, from the back seat of your car when she was supposed to be studying at the library?”

Honestly, as angry as he’d been, he’d still suffered twinges of guilt, wondering. Her uber-strict father was not a nice man. Kyle had thought about calling her. But never had, lowlife loser that he’d been, too busy, working to survive by day, boozing it up and releasing his rage in bar fights at night. Too intent on cultivating his hatred of the establishment, the haves who controlled the have nots, to realize until now that if the sheriff truly believed him guilty there’s no way he would have let him leave town. Idiot.

“I loved you,” she said. “I believed you when you said you loved me.”

“I did.”

“You did not. Or you would have found a way to get in touch with me to make sure I was okay.” The hurt in her eyes coaxed him forward. The familiar urge to soothe her and make her smile kicked in. She held up a hand between them. “Don’t. It doesn’t matter anymore. I’m over it. So there’s nothing more to discuss.”

She looked at her watch, inhaled deeply, exhaled, then pulled her cellphone out of her pocket and dialed. Keeping her eyes closed, she pinched the bridge of her nose.

“Hello, it’s—” she said into the phone.

A woman yelled back at her.

She held the phone away from her ear. “I know. Strike one. I’m sorry.”

More yelling.

“I’ll get there as soon as I can.” With a press of a button she cut off the irate voice in mid-rant.

“I’ve got to go,” she said to Kyle. Balancing on her left foot, with one hand on the railing, she bent to pick up her purse and briefcase with the other. She looked so sad he actually felt bad for her. “Let me help you,” he offered, reaching for her briefcase.

She clutched the strap to her shoulder. “I don’t need your help.” She mumbled something under her breath that sounded like “Not anymore.”

“At least let me examine your ankle. You may need an X-ray.”

“I don’t.”

He watched her limp to the door leading to the fourth floor. “It’s unsafe for you to drive.”

“Go back to work, Kyle.”

“I’m done for the day. How are you going to press on the gas and brake pedals? Let me take you where you need to go.” Give him a chance to make amends.

The little color that remained in her cheeks drained out. “No.” Her voice cracked. “Really, I’m fine.”

They entered the half-full elevator.

Looking straight ahead, Victoria asked, “Shouldn’t your dog be wearing a vest or something to make him look … more … ?”

“Service dogs wear vests,” Kyle explained. “She’s …” he reached down to pat Tori’s head “ … a therapy dog. Therapy dogs are meant to be petted and cuddled. A vest interferes with that.”

When the doors opened, Kyle and Tori followed Victoria out. As she hobbled through the lobby, Kyle noticed she didn’t acknowledge one person she passed, and no one went out of their way to acknowledge her.

In the parking lot she stopped next to an old black Camry that looked a lot like the one her Aunt Livi had bought a few weeks before he’d left town.

He made one last attempt to convince her not to drive. “So, who’s this Jake and why’s he so important you’d risk your life to pick him up rather than accept a ride from me?”

CHAPTER TWO

OKAY. That’s it.

Victoria tossed her briefcase on the back seat of her car, slammed the door shut and waited to the count of five before turning on Kyle. She spoke slowly, fought to maintain an even tone. “Jake is none of your business. My life is not your concern and I’ll thank you, in advance, to stay away from me for the short time you’ll be in town.”

“Like it or not, most of my patients are on your floor and, once my therapy dog program is approved, I plan to accept the full-time staff position I’ve been offered.” He leaned toward her. Challenging. “The next time I leave town it will be on my terms.”

“You make it sound like approval for you to bring your dog to work is a given. It’s not. We’re firm at three for and four against. I’m against.” As was her mentor, the director of nursing.

“We have four weeks to change your mind.” He patted his dog’s head, looking unconcerned.

“No one can be as good as the two of you are touted to be. The patient outcomes and lengths of stay will speak for themselves.”

“Oh, we are that good, honey,” he said confidently.

“Don’t call me …”

“Come on, Tori,” he said as he turned to walk away. His dog trailed after him.

She sucked in an affronted breath. “You named your dog after me?” she called out.

He glanced over his shoulder. “She was a stubborn little thing when I started working with her. Reminded me of a girl I used to know.”

Victoria resisted the urge to scream. Having Kyle Karlinsky around was going to be an exercise in self-control. And secrecy. At least until she decided whether to inform Jake that his father, who she’d promised to help him search for when he turned sixteen, had returned to town eight years ahead of schedule.

Using the utmost care not to bang her now throbbing foot, Victoria slid onto the cold leather driver’s seat.

No doubt Jake would be thrilled to finally meet the man whose picture sat on his night table. He deserved a chance to get to know his dad. At some point. Was now, when he was so young and impressionable, the best time? Until she could learn a bit more about Kyle, where he’d been, why he was back, and maybe gauge his reaction to having a son, she would not risk Jake getting hurt.

Although the drive to school turned out to be a bit more difficult than anticipated, Victoria avoided any major problems. Thank the Lord two pedestrians crossing at Third Street saw her in time to jump out of the way.

The second she got out of the car and set her right foot on the ground for balance, pain exploded in her ankle, the intensity on a par with labor contractions. She eyed the distance from her parking spot to the door of the cafeteria. It may as well have been the length of a football field rather than the twenty or thirty feet it actually was.

Eleven minutes late, she couldn’t afford to be any later. Clenching her teeth hard enough to crack a filling, she made a limping dash towards the school. Halfway there Jake exited the building, in the process of pulling on his hat, and without looking at her walked directly to the car.

The afterschool program teacher—Mrs. Smythe—followed.

The temperature dropped a few degrees.

“I had to take care of a choking patient. Then I twisted my ankle rushing to leave,” Victoria explained.

“If it wasn’t that it would have been something else,” the evil woman replied. “I have a life outside my job, you know.”

Was it common knowledge that, aside from Jake, Victoria didn’t? “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” she said as she, too, walked past Victoria without looking at her. “Be on time.”

She would do better, Victoria decided when she climbed into the car, glimpsed into the back seat and saw the unhappy pout on her son’s precious face. Jake, the most important thing in her world. “I love you,” she said.

He stared out the window.

“I’m sorry I’m late.” Victoria started the car and changed the radio to Jake’s favorite station.

He lunged over the front seat and turned it off.

Except for the heat blasting from the vents, a tense silence filled the car.

She looked at him in the rearview mirror. “Put on your seat belt.”

He didn’t.

“Jake, I said I was sorry. You understand why Mommy has to work so hard, don’t you?”

Nothing.

It was going to be a long night.

“I’m talking to you, Jake Forley. And we will not leave this parking lot until you answer my question.”

“Because it’s just the two of us,” he said, still looking out the window. “And you need money to pay bills and send me to a good college.”

“And so you can play baseball in the spring.”

He jerked his head, his eyes went wide. “Really?” He scooted to the front edge of his seat. “You’re going to let me play?”

An impromptu, anything-to-cheer-him-up decision she would likely live to regret but, “Yes. And you’re going to need baseball pants, a bat and glove, and shoes.”

“Cleats, Mom,” he said with an eye roll and an air of eight-year-old disgust at her ignorance of sports lingo. “Baseball players wear cleats.”

“After dinner we’ll go online and do some research.” To figure out what cleats were. “Sound good?”

“Sounds great! Thanks, Mom!” He leaned forward and kissed her cheek. “I love you, too.”

“I know.” But she’d never tire of hearing him say it.

The next morning, her purplish, swollen right ankle elevated on an overturned garbage can and propped up on a pile of folded towels, her neck stiff, and her right knee almost twice its normal size, Victoria felt like she’d been selectively beaten by one of the dozens of baseball bats she’d viewed on the Internet the night before. With everything she needed to consider—barrel, taper and grip size, length and weight, as well as material makeup: wood, aluminum, or composite—choosing the correct bat was more complicated than calculating a biochemical equation. On the plus side, she now knew baseball cleats were little more than fancy sneakers with molded rubber studs to increase traction on the field.

She smiled. After a difficult start, she and Jake had had a super-terrific—his words, not hers—evening together. He was now an officially registered little-leaguer assigned to a team in the Madrin Falls Baseball League, practices to start next week, the season opener three weeks after that.

It would require creative scheduling, but she’d find a way to squeeze in everything. Work. Jake’s school. Her school. Religious school. And now baseball. Her stress level spiked up a notch just thinking about it.

“Knock, knock,” a familiar male voice said from her office doorway. “How’s the ankle?”

Victoria turned her head in that direction, forgetting her neck felt fine as long as she didn’t try to move it. “Go away.” She lifted her hand to the stabbing pain and tried to work out the cramp.

Kyle walked in, towered over her, filled her tiny office. He set two cups of coffee on the desk, and squeezed into the small space behind her. His body pressed against her back, pushing her ribs into the desk. She couldn’t move. “Wait.”

As if his fingers had the ability to shoot potent muscle-relaxer beams deep into her screaming elastic tissues, the spasm lessened with the contact of his big, warm hands on her skin. A pleasant tingle danced along her nerve endings, made her wish he’d branch out a bit. Lower.

Heaven help her, she still loved the feel of his hands on her. Strong. Knowing.

She forced her eyes open. This had to stop. But it felt so good. She let them drift closed, again. One more minute. Maybe two.

But, on the cusp of total relaxation, Victoria’s memory kicked in and transported her back in time. Something had her wedged in place. Confined. Squished. She couldn’t expand her chest. Couldn’t breathe. Could not pull air into her lungs. Please. Not again. She needed to get away. Escape this place. She was an adult, refused to be imprisoned. Never again.

“What’s wrong?” Kyle’s concerned voice sounded far away. His face appeared in front of hers. Kind. Searching.

She returned to the present standing on both feet, the garbage pail lying on its side. She shifted her weight to relieve the pressure on her right ankle, the move so quick she lost her balance and grabbed on to the desk for support. Her chest constricted, floaters dotted her vision, a wave of dizziness threatened to tip her over.

“You’re okay.” A strong arm wrapped around her upper arms and basically held her up. “Come on. Breathe. In and out. Move my hand.” Which he’d placed over her diaphragm. “That’s it.”

“I need …” She tried to push away from him.

“You need to sit down for a minute.”

Not again. Not now. It’d been nine years, for heaven’s sake. Why was his voice, his touch, sending her back in time?

He guided her into her chair. “Here.” He handed her one of the cups of coffee he’d brought. “Drink this.”

In a daze she lifted a cup to her mouth.

“Careful. It’s hot.” He removed the lid and blew on it like a parent cooling his child’s hot cocoa. Like he would have done for Jake had he been around for the past eight years. Clarity returned.

“I’m fine.” She took the cup from him, even though she didn’t drink coffee. “Thank you.”

He picked up the other cup, took a careful sip and watched her. “What just happened?”

Rather than answer, she countered with a question of her own. “Where’s your dog?”

“In with a patient.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be with her at all times?” Per hospital protocol developed specifically for his and Tori’s probationary period.

“Patients open up to Tori. Part of what makes me so good at my job is knowing when I’m in the way.”

“Typical man,” she said, feeling back to normal, “letting the woman do the work while you go for coffee.”

“I brought the coffee up with us. Do you have panic attacks often?”

Not recently. She took a sip of coffee. “It wasn’t a panic attack,” she lied. “More like an allergic reaction to a new irritant in my life.”

He smiled, unperturbed by her verbal jab. “Guess I’d better start carrying around some antihistamines in my pocket.”

“I have things to do. Did you come here for a reason?”

“To check your ankle.” He squatted down, picked up her right foot in his hand, and slid off her shoe.

“Impressive colors. But look at these.” He pointed to depressions in her edema. “Your shoe is too tight.”

“No, it’s not.” But, boy, it felt good to have it off.

He gently rotated her foot watching her face as he did. “Decent range of motion. Moderate discomfort. How’d you sleep?”

Woke up every time she’d changed position. “Like a baby.”

“Keeping it elevated?”

She pointed to the garbage can. “As much as I can. I’m a nurse, I know how to treat a sprained ankle, Kyle.”

“You’re sure that’s all it is?”

She hoped. “Yes.”

A loud bang followed by frantic dog barking echoed through the hallway.

Without a word, Kyle placed her foot on the floor and ran from the office.

Victoria slipped on her shoe and followed.

Kyle slammed into room 514 where he’d left Tori with Mrs. Teeton, a fifty-four-year-old female, ten days post-op radical abdominal hysterectomy for treatment of stage II cervical cancer. Undergoing combination chemotherapy and radiation. Suffering from severe adjustment reaction to her diagnosis, debilitating fatigue, and deconditioning. Completely dependent for all ADLs—activities of daily living.

The balding woman sat with her bare legs on the cold hospital floor, her upper torso, arms, and head draped over Tori’s back. “Mrs. Teeton. Are you okay?” he asked, dropping to the floor beside her.

“I’m so weak,” she said quietly, her cheeks wet with tears. “Can’t even sit up by myself.”

Kyle handed her a tissue from the bedside table. “You are going to get through this phase of treatment, and I’m going to show up every day, several times a day, to help.”

“What happened?” Victoria asked as she half ran, half hopped into the room, and, ignoring the bits of food spattered on the floor from the overturned meal tray, got right down on her knees next to Kyle. “What hurts, Mrs. Teeton?”

The pale, sickly woman tried to lift her head, couldn’t, and set it on Tori’s fur. “My pride.”

“Before we get you back into bed I want to check you for injury,” Kyle said. “Can you move your arms and legs for me?”

“I’m crushing poor Tori,” Mrs. Teeton worried.

“A dainty little thing like you?” Kyle asked. “I think she’s mistaken you for a blanket. She looks about ready to fall asleep.”

Victoria smiled, a bright, encouraging smile he remembered from the hours she’d spent tutoring him. The one that used to make him feel all warm inside. And you know what? Still did.

“He’s right,” Victoria said.

Kyle patted the dog’s head. “Good girl.” She opened a sleepy eye.

With his assistance, Mrs. Teeton moved her arms, legs, and head without a report of physical discomfort. “I’m going to lift you into bed.” She felt like a child in his arms. A small woman, like Victoria, Mrs. Teeton had all but stopped eating since her diagnosis three weeks ago, losing an estimated eleven desperately needed pounds. Too weak to participate in her own care and refusing psychological counseling, she had the highest acuity ranking of any patient on Kyle’s roster.