The Soldier She Could Never Forget

CHAPTER TWO

CLINT FORCED HIMSELF to stare over her shoulder rather than at the mouthwatering jiggle of her ass. The woman was no longer the stick-thin figure he’d known once upon a time. Instead, she boasted soft curves that flowed down her body like gentle ocean swells and made his hands itch to mold and explore.

Forget it, jerk. You’re here for one thing only. To help Jessi’s daughter and others like her.

No one had been more shocked than he’d been to realize the beautiful woman sitting across from him, worry misting her deep green eyes, was none other than the girl he’d lusted after in school.

The one he’d kissed in a rare moment of weakness, her tears triggering every protective instinct in his body.

The woman he’d handed off to the boy she’d really wanted—the one she’d married.

Unfortunately for Clint, he still didn’t seem to be immune to her even after all these years.

He’d wanted to protect her.

Only he hadn’t been able to back then. He couldn’t now.

The only thing he could do was his job.

They reached Chelsea’s room, and he shoved aside a new ache in his gut. The one that had struck when he’d realized the young woman’s age was close enough to a certain deadly encounter to make him wonder whose she was.

Three months earlier and this story could have had a different ending.

No. It couldn’t.

He’d done what he’d had to do back then—left—and he had no regrets.

Jessi glanced back and caught his look, her brows arching in question.

Okay, maybe he had one regret.

But it was too late to do anything about that now.

His fingers tightened on Chelsea’s chart, and he started to push through the door, but Jessi stopped him. “I’ve been hearing things about the VA hospitals, Clint. You need to know up front that if I feel like she’s not getting the treatment she needs here, I’ll put her somewhere else.”

His insides turned into a hard ball. He cared about his patients. All of them. No matter what the bean counters in Washington recommended or the hospital administration at whatever unit he was currently assigned to said or did, he treated his patients as if they were his comrades in arms … which they were. “It doesn’t matter what you’ve heard. As long as I’m here, she’ll get the best I have.”

“But what if the hospital rules tell you to—?”

One side of his mouth went up. “Jessi May, always worried about something. Since when have you known me to play by anyone’s rules?” A question they both knew the answer to, since he’d challenged almost every regulation their high school had been able to come up with.

“Would you please stop calling me that?”

His smile widened. “Is it a rule?”

“No.” Her whole demeanor softened, and she actually laughed. “Because it’ll just make you worse.”

“I rest my case.”

A nurse walked down the hallway, throwing them a curious look and reminding him of the serious issues Jessi was facing.

He took a step back. “Are you ready?”

“I think so.”

Clint entered the room first, holding the door open for her.

Sitting in a chair by the window, his patient stared out across the lawn, not even acknowledging their presence. Hell, how could he not have seen the resemblance between the two women?

Chelsea had the same blond hair, the same pale, haunted features that her mother had once had. Only there was no way the young woman before him today could have survived basic training while maintaining that raw edge of vulnerability, so it was new. A result of her PTSD.

It affected people differently. Some became wounded and tortured, lashing out at themselves.

And some became impulsive and angry. Hitting out at others.

Clint wasn’t sure which was worse, although as a teenager with a newly broken pinkie finger, he could have told you right off which he preferred.

Only he’d never told anyone about his finger. Or about his father.

And when he’d found Jessi crying outside the school building because of something her own father had done … he’d thought the worst. Only to have relief sweep through his system when it had been something completely different.

He drew a careful breath. “Hi, Chelsea. Do you remember me from earlier today?”

No reaction. The waif by the window continued to stare. He glanced at her chart again to remind himself of the medications Dr. Cordoba had prescribed.

He made a note to lower the dosage to see if it had any effect. He wanted to help Chelsea cope, not turn her into a zombie.

Jessi went over to her daughter and dropped to her knees, taking the young woman’s hands in hers and looking up at her. “Hi, sweetheart. How are you?”

“I want to go home.” The words were soft. So soft, Clint almost missed them.

Jessi hadn’t, though. Her chin wobbled for a second, before she drew her spine up. “I want that, too, baby. More than anything. But you’re not ready. You know you’re not.”

“I know.” The response was just as soft. She turned to look back out the window, as if tuning out anything that didn’t get her what she wanted.

Clint knew Chelsea’s reaction was a defense mechanism, but having her own daughter shut her out had to shred Jessi’s insides even though she was absolutely doing what was right for Chelsea.

He pulled up a chair and sat in front of the pair, forcing himself to keep his attention focused on his patient and not her mother. “I’m going to adjust some of your medications, Chelsea. Would that be okay?”

The girl sighed, but she did turn her head slightly to acknowledge she’d heard him. “Whatever you think is best.”

He spent fifteen minutes watching the pair interact, making notes and comparing his observations with what he’d read of her past behavior.

She’d slashed her wrists. Jessi had found her bleeding in the bathtub and had fashioned tourniquets out of two scarves—quick thinking that had saved her daughter’s life.

A couple of pints of blood later, they’d avoided permanent brain and organ damage.

Unfortunately, the infusion hadn’t erased the emotional damage that had come about as a result of what her chart said was months spent in captivity.

Trauma—any trauma—had to be processed mentally and emotionally. Some people seemed to escape unscathed, letting the memory of the event roll off their backs. Others were crushed beneath it.

And others pretended they didn’t give a damn.

Even when they did.

Like him?

Jessi had coaxed Chelsea over to the bed and sat next to her, arm draped around her shoulders, still talking to her softly. He got up and laid a hand on her shoulder.

“I’ll give you a few minutes. Stop in and talk to me before you leave the hospital.” He didn’t add the word okay or allow his voice to change tone at the end of the phrase, because he didn’t want to make it seem like a request. Not because he wasn’t sure she’d honor it, but part of him wondered if she’d head back to the front desk and demand to have another doctor assigned to the case.

Clint had to somehow break the tough news to Jessi that she was stuck with him for the next couple of months or for however long Chelsea was here. There just wasn’t anyone else.

So it was up to him to convince her that he could help her daughter, if she gave him a chance. Not hard, since he believed it himself. Clint had dealt with all types of soldiers in crisis, both male and female, something Dr. Cordoba had not. It was part of the reason Clint had agreed to this assignment. His rotations didn’t keep him anywhere for more than six months at a time. Surely that would be long enough to treat Chelsea or at least come up with a plan for how to proceed.

If he’d known one of Dr. Cordoba’s toughest cases was Jessi Spencer’s daughter, though, he wouldn’t have been quite so quick to agree to return to his hometown.

Being here was dangerous on a number of levels.

Jessi’s not the girl you once knew.

He sensed it. She was stronger than she’d been in school. She’d had to be after being widowed at a young age and raising a daughter on her own. And according to the listing on Chelsea’s chart, Jessi was now an ER physician. You didn’t deal with trauma cases all day long without having a cast-iron stomach and a tough emotional outlook.

He’d seen a touch of that toughness in his office. Her eyes had studied him, but had given nothing away, unlike the Jessi of his past, who’d worn her heart on her sleeve.

Just as well. He was here to treat the daughter, not take up where he’d left off with the mother. Not that he’d “left off” with her. He’d had a one-night stand and had then made sure her beau had known that to win her heart he had to be willing to give up his dreams for her.

Evidently he had.

That was one thing Clint wouldn’t do. For anyone.

If he could just keep that in mind for the next couple of months, he’d be home free. And if he was able to help Chelsea get the help she needed while he was at it, that was icing on the cake.

He corrected himself. No, not just the icing. It was the whole damn cake. And that was what he needed to focus on.

Anything else would be a big mistake.

“And how long will that be?” Jessi’s mouth opened, then snapped back shut, before trying again. “I don’t want Chelsea’s next doctor to give up on her like …”

Her voice faded away as the reality of what she’d been about to say swept through her: Like Dr. Cordoba did. Like Chelsea’s father did when he took off into the night.

“Are you talking about Dr. Cordoba?”

She blinked. Had he read her mind? “Yes.”

“He didn’t give up on her.” His voice softened. “His wife is very ill. He had to take a job that allows him to be home with her as much as possible. He couldn’t do that and continue working long hours here. He knew his patients deserved more than that.”

Oh, God. Her ire at the other doctor dissolved in a heartbeat. She’d been so caught up in her own problems that she hadn’t even stopped to think that maybe he had been dealing with things that were every bit as bad as hers were. Maybe even worse. “I …” She swallowed. “I don’t know what to say. I’m so sorry.”

The events of the past months were suddenly too much for her, and her heart pounded, her stomach churned.

Please, no. Not now.

She’d had two panic attacks since Chelsea’s hospitalization, so she recognized the signs.

Pressing a hand to her middle, she tried to force back the nausea and took a few careful breaths.

“I thought you should know.” Clint leaned forward. “If you’re worried about me suddenly taking off, don’t be. I’ll give you plenty of notice.”

This time.

The words hung in the air between them, and for a horrible, soul-stealing second she thought he was hinting for her not to get her hopes up.

“I’m not expecting you to stay forever.” The sensation in her chest and stomach grew, heat crawling up her neck and making her ears ring. Her vision narrowed to a pinpoint. And then it was too late to stop it. “I think I’m going …”

She lurched to her feet and somehow made it through the door and to the first stall in the restroom before her gut revolted in a violent spasm, and she threw up. She’d been running on coffee and pure adrenaline for the past several weeks, and she hadn’t eaten breakfast that morning. The perfect set-up for an attack.

That had to be the reason. Not finding Clint sitting behind that desk.

Again and again, her stomach heaved, mingling with tears of frustration.

When she finally regained control over herself, she flushed the toilet with shaking hands before going to the sink, bending down to rinse her mouth and splash water over her face. She blindly reached for the paper-towel dispenser, only to have some kind of cloth pressed into her hand.

Holding the fabric tightly to her face and wishing she could blot away the past two months as easily as the moisture, she sucked down a couple more slow breaths, her heart rate finally slowing to some semblance of normality.

“Thank you.” She lifted her head, already knowing who she’d find when she opened her eyes. “You shouldn’t be in here.”

“Why? Because it’s against the rules? I thought we’d already sorted all that out.” He added a smile. “Besides, I wanted to make sure you were okay.”

The words swirled with bitter familiarity through her head. They were the same ones he’d said the night of their high-school graduation ceremony when she’d suddenly veered away from the rows of chairs and rushed out into the parking lot and then down to a nearby creek. Thankfully neither her dad nor mom had seen her. And an hour and a half later, when the ceremony had been over and the reception had been in full swing, she’d returned. With the lie that Clint had told her to use trembling on her tongue … that she’d been sick with nerves.

Her dad had bought it, just like Clint had said he would.

Only when she’d said it, it had no longer been a lie, because she had felt sick. Not because of nerves, but because the boy she’d always wanted—the boy she’d lost her virginity to—would soon be on his way to the airport, headed for boot camp. Leaving her behind forever.

“It’s just the shock of everything.”

“I know.”

She shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. Clint made no effort to take off his jacket and drape it around her. It was a good thing, because she’d probably dissolve into a puddle all over again if he did.

“Have you eaten recently?”

“What?”

“I get the feeling you’re running on fumes along with a heaped dose of stress. Which is probably why—” he nodded at the closed stall “—that just happened.”

Leave it to him to point out the obvious. “I can eat later.”

He nodded. “Yes. Or you could eat while we go over some treatment options. I skipped breakfast this morning and could use something, as well. Besides, some carbs will help settle your stomach.”

Before she knew it, she found herself in the hospital cafeteria with a toasted bagel and a cup of juice sitting in front of her.

A hint of compassion in his voice as he detailed the treatments he’d like to try told her this wasn’t going to be an easy fix. It was something Chelsea would be dealing with for the rest of her life. He just wanted to give her the tools she needed to do that successfully.

It was what Jessie wanted, as well. More than anything. As a mom, she wanted to be able to make things better, to take away her daughter’s pain. But she couldn’t. She had to trust that Clint knew what he was doing.

He certainly sounded capable.

“And what if she tries to do something to herself?” She set the bagel back down on the plate, unable to leave the subject alone.

“I’ll take steps to avoid the possibility.” He steepled his fingers and met her gaze with a steadiness that unnerved her. The man was intimidating, even though she knew he wasn’t trying to be. Despite his reassurances, she still wasn’t convinced Clint was the man for the job. Especially considering their history—which, granted, wasn’t much of one. On his side, anyway.

What other option did she have, though? An institution? Bring her home and hope Chelsea didn’t try to take her life again?

No. She couldn’t risk there being a next time.

She’d do anything it took to help bring her daughter back from wherever she was. That included seeing Clint every day for the rest of her life and reliving what they’d done by the bank of that creek.

Decision made.

“I want you to keep me informed of every move you make.”

One brow quirked. Too late she realized he could have taken her words the wrong way. But he didn’t throw a quick comeback, like he might have done in days gone by. Instead, he simply said the words she needed to hear most: “Don’t worry, Jessi. Even if we have to break every rule in the book, we’re going to pull her through this.”

And as much as the word we made something inside her tingle to life, it was that other statement that reached out and grabbed her. The one that said the old Clint was still crouched inside that standard issue haircut and neat-as-a-pin desk. It was there in his eyes. The glowing intensity that said, despite outward appearances, he hadn’t turned into a heartless bureaucrat after years of going through proper channels.

He was a rule-breaker. He always had been. And just like his bursting into the ladies’ restroom unannounced, it gave her hope, along with a sliver of fear.

She knew from experience he wasn’t afraid to break anything that got in the way of what he wanted. She just had to make sure one of those “things” wasn’t her heart.

CHAPTER THREE

JESSI HAD JUST finished suturing an elbow laceration and was headed in to pick up her next chart when a cry of pain came from the double bay doors of the emergency entrance.

“Ow! It hurts!”

A man holding a little girl in his arms lurched into the waiting area, his face as white as the linoleum flooring beneath his feet. The child’s frilly pink party dress had a smear of dirt along one side of it, as did her arm and one side of her face. That had Jessi moving toward the pair. The other cases in the waiting room at the moment were minor illnesses and injuries.

The man’s wild eyes latched on to her, taking in the stethoscope around her neck. “Are you a doctor?”

“Yes. How can I help?”

“We were at a … She fell …” The words tumbled out of his mouth, nothing making sense. Especially since the girl’s pained cries were making the already stricken expression on his face even worse.

She tried to steer him in the right direction. “She fell. Is this your daughter?”

“Yes. She fell off a trampoline at a friend’s house. It’s her leg.”

Like with many fun things about childhood—climbing trees, swimming in the lake, riding a bike—danger lurked around every corner, ready to strike.

Jessi brushed a mass of blond curls off the girl’s damp face and spoke to her. “What’s your name?”

“Tammy,” she said between sobs.

She maintained eye contact with her little charge. “Tammy, I know your leg must hurt terribly. We’re going to take you back and help fix it.” She motioned to one of the nurses behind the admission’s desk. Gina immediately came toward them with a clipboard.

The girl nodded, the volume of her cries going down a notch.

“Let’s take her into one of the exam rooms, while Nurse Stanley gets some information.”

It wasn’t standard protocol—they were supposed to register all admissions unless there was a life-threatening injury—but right now Jessi wanted to take away not only the child’s pain but the father’s, as well.

Maybe Clint wasn’t the only one who knew how to break a few rules.

But she had to. She recognized that look of utter terror and helplessness on the dad’s face. She’d felt the same paralyzing fear as she’d crouched in the bathtub with her daughter, blood pouring out of Chelsea’s veins. She’d sent out that same cry for help. To God. To the universe. To anyone who would listen.

And like the distraught father following her to a treatment room, she’d been forced to place her child in the hands of a trained professional and pray they could fix whatever was wrong. Because it was something beyond her own capabilities.

But what if it was also beyond the abilities of the people you entrusted them to?

Raw fear pumped back into her chest, making her lungs ache.

Stop it.

She banished Clint and Chelsea from her thoughts and concentrated on her job. This little girl needed her, and she had to have her head in the game if she wanted to help her.

“Which leg is it?” she asked the father.

“Her right. It’s her shin.”

“Did she fall on the ground? Or which part of the trampoline?”

She asked question after question, gathering as much information as she could in order to narrow the steps she’d need to take to determine the exact nature of the injury.

Gina followed them into the room and was already writing furiously, even though the nurse hadn’t voiced a single question. That could come later.

“Set her on the table.”

As soon as cold metal touched the girl’s leg, she let out an ear-piercing shriek that quickly melted back into sobs.

As a mother, it wrenched at her heart, but Jessi couldn’t let any of that affect what she did next. Things would get worse for Tammy before they got better, because Jessi had to make sure she knew what she was dealing with.

“Gina, can you stay and get the rest of the information from Mr …?” She paused and glanced at the girl’s father.

“Lawrence. Jack Lawrence.”

“Thank you.” She turned back to her nurse. “Can you do that while I call Radiology?”

Once she’d made the call, she made short work of getting the girl’s vitals, talking softly to her as she went about her job. When she slid the girl’s dress up a little way, she spied a dark blue contusion forming along her shin and saw a definite deformation of the tibia. The bone had separated. Whether they could maneuver the ends back in place without surgery would depend on what the X-rays showed.

Within fifteen minutes, one of the radiology techs had whisked the five-year-old down the hall on a stretcher, her father following close behind. His expression had gone from one of fear to hope. Sometimes just knowing it wasn’t all up to you as a parent, that there were others willing to pitch in, made a little of the weight roll off your shoulders.

So why did she still feel buried beneath tons of rubble?

Because Chelsea’s injury went beyond the physical to the very heart of who she was. And Jessi wasn’t sure Clint—or anyone else—could repair it. There was no splint or cast known to man that could heal a broken spirit.

A half hour later Tammy and her father were back in the exam room, and an orthopedist had arrived to take over the case. The urge to bend down and kiss the little girl’s cheek came and went. She held back a little smile. She didn’t need to break all the rules. Some of them were there for a reason.

Hopefully, Clint knew which ones to follow and which ones to break.

He did. She sensed it.

He wouldn’t go beyond certain professional boundaries. Which meant he would try to keep their past in the past. If one of them stepped over the line, he’d remove himself from Chelsea’s case.