Race to the Altar Read online

  “He was looking for his little sister, who’d chased after a runaway cat. When he saw the collision, he lost his balance and fell off his bike.”

  Molly nodded, then returned her attention to the man on the gurney—Chase Mayfield.

  “He’s coming to,” Betsy said. “Hi, Chase. You’re in a hospital. You’ve been in an accident. I’m Dr. Nielson. How are you feeling?”

  He grimaced.

  “Your injuries aren’t life threatening,” Betsy told him, “but we’re going to run a few tests. We also want to keep you in the ICU tonight for observation.”

  His only response was a moan.

  Betsy went on to probe and clean his head wound. After telling him what she was about to do, she began stitching it shut.

  Dawn, who’d ordered an MRI, reentered the room just as Betsy finished the last of ten or twelve sutures over Chase’s left eye. “Doctor, the boy arrived and is waiting with his guardian.”

  Betsy nodded. “I’ll be finished here in a few minutes.”

  The man moaned again.

  “Chase?” Betsy asked.

  No response.

  “Wake up, Mr. Mayfield.”

  Chase cracked open his good eye. “Where…what…?”

  “You’re in the hospital,” Betsy told him again. “You were involved in an accident. Do you remember?”

  He seemed to be trying to process the information. “Oh…yeah.”

  “Can you tell me what happened?” the doctor asked.

  Molly knew Betsy wasn’t interested in details of the accident. She was actually trying to assess the extent of his head injury and his cognitive function.

  “A dog…a kid…a truck…” His eyes opened momentarily, then closed again. “I had to pick one…”

  He’d opted for the truck, Molly concluded.

  “Good choice,” Betsy said. “At least, for the sake of the kid and the dog.”

  Chase grumbled. Or perhaps it was a groan.

  “Rumor has it you might be the Chase Mayfield,” Betsy said. “The race car driver.”

  “Rumor has a big mouth.”

  So, Molly thought, he had a sense of humor. And apparently, he was the man in question. She drew closer to the bed. “Karen still hasn’t arrived, Doctor. So I can finish cleaning him up and put on his gown.”

  “Thanks, Molly. I really appreciate you coming in to pinch hit like this.”

  “No problem.” She glanced at the patient.

  He opened his eyes. Well, actually, he opened the one that wasn’t completely swelled shut, and it was the prettiest shade of blue Molly had ever seen. Like the color of the stone in her mother’s sapphire ring.

  “We can transport you to Houston,” Betsy told him, “if you’d rather be in a larger hospital.”

  “No.” Chase turned to the doctor and reached out, grabbing Molly’s arm by mistake, gripping her with an intensity that shot her adrenaline through the roof. “I don’t want to go to the city.”

  “No problem,” the doctor said. “You can stay here, if you’d rather.”

  “I don’t—” he winced “—want word to get out…about this…if it can be helped.”

  “We’ll do what we can to ensure your privacy,” Betsy assured him. “But there were witnesses to the accident. The media could find out, although we certainly won’t make any statements, if that’s what you’re concerned about.”

  “I want to…fly under the radar.” He opened his eye a crack. “Use my middle name, Raymond, instead of Chase. Maybe that’ll throw people off.”

  “We’ll issue a request for discretion.” Betsy turned to Molly. “I’ll let you take it from here. I’ll order some Demerol and let ICU know he’s on his way up.”

  “All right.”

  Chase closed his eyes and blew out a sigh.

  “Is there someone I can call for you?” Molly asked. “Someone who’s expecting you at home?”

  “No.” He blew out another ragged breath. “Damn, my head…hurts.”

  “Dr. Nielson is ordering pain meds. I’ll go and get it for you.”

  Ten minutes later, after giving Chase an injection, Molly had managed to fill out the forms and have Mr. Mayfield formally admitted to the hospital—under his middle name, Raymond.

  She’d returned to his bedside to tell him, but he’d fallen asleep—his eyes were shut, his breathing even.

  Good, she thought. He’d feel better in dreamland.

  She reached into the cupboard and took out one of the hospital gowns. Then she proceeded to pull down the sheet to Chase’s waist, noting the broad shoulders, the sprinkle of dark hair across his chest, the well-defined abs, the…

  Oh, wow. The whisper of a sexual rush buzzed through her veins, and she did her best to shake it off.

  She’d seen countless naked men in her life—professionally speaking, of course—but she’d never had a purely feminine response to a patient.

  Until this moment.

  Doing her best to ignore the unwelcome physical reaction, she slipped his arms through the gown, then proceeded to lift his shoulder just enough to tie at least one of the strings.

  “Ow. What’re you doing?”

  Startled, she gently rolled him back on the mattress. “Getting you dressed.”

  Did he realize his nakedness had unbalanced her?

  Surely not.

  “You dozed for a few minutes,” she said, trying to get her mind back on track. “How are you feeling now?”

  “Like I…got hit by a…Mack truck.”

  “I think you did.” She smiled at his joke, letting down her guard just a little. “A sense of humor should help you recover quickly, so I’m glad your funny bone wasn’t fractured.”

  “What do you know? A pretty nurse…and witty, too. I…like that…in a woman.” He managed a faint smile.

  She couldn’t help but wonder what one of his smiles would have looked like before his face had been swollen and bruised.

  His eyes—well, the one that had actually opened—closed again. She hoped that meant he was really drifting off to la-la land.

  She sure hoped so. She really needed to be done with this shift, done with him. She didn’t like the unprofessional turn her thoughts had taken. So she straightened, eager to pass him on to another nurse. One who knew how to keep her feminine side in check.

  Before she could pull the curtain aside, Betsy peeked in on them. “How’s he doing?”

  “I’d say he’s on the road to mend.”

  “Good. If all goes well in ICU tonight, we’ll be sending him to the third floor in the morning.”

  So much for being able to pass him off to someone else. That’s where Molly would be tomorrow, and with her luck, she’d probably be assigned to his room for at least part of the time he was in the hospital. Unless, of course, she could figure out a way to talk her way out of it.

  “I promised to do what I could to protect his identity from the media,” Betsy said. “So I’m reluctant to let anyone else come in close contact with him.”

  “How are you going to do that?”

  “I’m going to suggest that he be assigned to you for the entire time he’s here. That should be the easiest way to maintain confidentiality.”

  Molly tried not to roll her eyes or object. “How long do you expect that to be?”

  “A week maybe, unless there are complications.” Betsy’s gaze intensified. “Do you have a problem with this, Molly?”

  “No, not at all.” She was a professional. She did her job and took care of whatever patient had been assigned to her.

  It’s just that this patient was different. According to the paramedics who’d brought him in, he’d been speeding and had, at least indirectly, caused a young boy to be injured. So Chase and his accident brought back a painful sense of déjà vu.

  She could deal with that, she supposed.

  As she walked around to the side of the gurney, kicking off the brake, he reached out and clamped a hand on her wrist. The hint of a smile crossed his ba
ttered face. “No speeding, okay?”

  “I’ll keep it under a hundred,” she said as she maneuvered the gurney out the door and into the hall.

  “Be careful,” he said. “I don’t like to ride in the passenger seat.”

  Interestingly enough, neither did Molly. She’d been asleep when her family’s minivan had spun out of control and ran off the road, unable to shout out a warning or grab the wheel.

  Not a day went by that she didn’t ask herself what would have happened if she’d been the one driving, if she’d been alert instead of asleep. Would she have been able to steer clear of an accident?

  Would her family be alive today?

  She guessed she would never know for sure, but either way, she didn’t trust anyone behind the wheel except herself.

  “Are you married?” he asked.

  “No.”

  “Got a boyfriend?”

  “Not at the moment.” She glanced down at the battered face of her victim, wondering if he was flirting with her or if the concussion and the Demerol were making him chatty.

  “Guess that makes it my lucky day,” he said.

  “It wasn’t lucky earlier.” She couldn’t help chuckling as she pushed the gurney down the hall.

  “How’s the kid?” he asked.

  “Which one?”

  “Both, I guess.”

  From what she understood, a little girl had dashed outside and into the street, chasing after a cat that ran away. And her brother went after her on his bicycle. “You didn’t hit either of them. The girl is fine, and her brother fell off his bike. He may have broken his wrist, but nothing serious.”

  As Molly continued pushing the gurney toward the elevator that would take them to ICU, one of the wheels froze then wobbled.

  “Watch it,” he said. “One accident tonight is all I can handle.”

  “Don’t worry. I’ll be very careful.” And she wasn’t just talking about transporting him through the hospital corridors. Whether she was willing to admit it or not, she found herself drawn to the race car driver whose lifestyle should be a great big turn-off to a woman who didn’t like to take any unnecessary risks. A patient who’d been battered in an automobile wreck and whose cuts and bruises ought to make him completely unattractive.

  So what was with the unexpected feminine interest in Chase Mayfield, a man sure to make her life miserable?

  Chapter Two

  Chase had no idea what time he’d been transported from the ICU to a room on the third floor, but since the sun was pouring through his window, damn near blinding him, he knew it was well after dawn.

  He’d had to ask the tall, spindly orderly who’d brought him here to pull the blinds so his head wouldn’t explode.

  As soon as the room had been darkened and Chase could see out of his good eye, he searched for the blonde nurse who’d undressed him last night. If she’d worn a name tag, he hadn’t noticed, but he suspected he would recognize her if he saw her again—no matter how lousy his vision was.

  As he looked around, he spotted a TV, a tray table and a monitor of some kind, but Blondie was nowhere in sight. Instead, another, rather nondescript nurse came to check on him, pour him water and point out the TV remote and the call button, as if he gave a squat about all that now.

  “Can I get you anything else?” she asked.

  He didn’t suspect a new head was possible. “No, I’m okay.”

  Moments later he dozed off again, only to be awakened by a male nurse who was the size of a Dallas Cowboys linebacker.

  Or had there been two of them merging into one?

  “Raymond?” one or both of them asked.

  “Yeah, that’s me.” Chase blinked and looked again. Okay, it was just one guy, and maybe he wasn’t all that big after all.

  “I’ve come to get some blood, Raymond.”

  Maybe it was the man’s quest for blood, but Chase could have sworn he’d detected a Bela Lugosi accent and wondered if he ought to have someone bring him some garlic.

  No, it had to be the Demerol they’d given him. If Bela started flying through his room or hanging upside down from the ceiling, he’d have to refuse any more shots.

  Chase lifted his arm about an inch off the bed, then let it drop to the mattress. “I’d help, but my body isn’t at a hundred percent.”

  “No problem.” Bela placed a blue plastic tote box full of lab paraphernalia on the tray table. Next he took a green band of rubber, wrapped it around the top of Chase’s arm and twisted until it pinched. Then he jabbed and poked at a vein a couple of times until he finally struck blood. “There. That wasn’t too bad, was it?”

  “Bad enough.” Chase’s head hurt like hell, and every bone in his body felt as though it had been run over by a steamroller. A needle stabbing into his arm just added insult to injury.

  If he’d been at all able, he would have busted out of here and gone home to Houston, but as it was he had about as much fight left in him as a baby bunny.

  After Bela left, a wave of nausea swept through him, turning his stomach inside out. He wondered if he ought to ring for the nurse. Instead, he decided to wait it out, knowing that he was having a hard time staying awake anyway.

  He’d no more than faded off again when someone came in with a tray of food and announced it was lunchtime. It was a teenage girl with her brown hair in a ponytail and wearing a pink-and-white-striped dress. She took the plastic domed lid off a plate, sending a smorgasbord of fumes straight to his nostrils.

  “Oh, God,” he said.

  “Do you need some help?”

  “Yeah. Take it away. Just looking at it makes me feel like I’m going to puke.”

  “I’ll tell your nurse. Maybe they can give you something for that.”

  Whatever.

  The next time Chase heard footsteps he cracked open an eye, the one that actually worked, and caught sight of the pretty blonde nurse who’d worked on him last night.

  “Chase?” she asked.

  “Call me Raymond. And if you told me your name, I’ve forgotten.”

  “I’m Molly, and I’ll be your nurse today. How are you feeling?”

  He turned his head toward the lull of her voice, only to feel a sharp pull in his neck. “Like hell. But maybe I’ll recover now that you’re back. That other nurse—Bela or whatever his name is—has it in for me.”

  “His name is Eric, and he’s a lab tech.” She neared his bed, took his wrist in her fingers and felt for a pulse. “What makes you think he doesn’t like you?”

  “He kept stabbing me with a dull needle.”

  “Sometimes the veins are hard to find.”

  Chase grimaced, then tried to roll to his side and reach for the bed rail. “Ow. Damn, that hurts.”

  “What’s the matter?”

  “I’m going to need help getting to the bathroom.”

  “I don’t think Dr. Nielson wants you up yet. I’ll get you a bedpan.”

  “Don’t bother. I’d rather hold it until my eyes turn yellow than use one of those again.” Especially with Nurse Molly holding it.

  She smiled, and her eyes—green or blue? It was hard to tell with impaired vision—glimmered. “We can try a catheter.”

  “Not if you want to live to tell about it.”

  She laughed, a melodious lilt that at any other time might have charmed his socks off. But now? Well, the pain and the whole damn situation had done a number on his sense of humor. But he had to admit that the blonde Florence Nightingale beat the heck out of Bela or the candy striper.

  “I’ll call one of the male nurses or an orderly to come and help,” she said.

  He’d never had what they call a shy bladder, but something told him that might even be worse.

  “How long have I been in this room?” he asked. “It feels like a week.”

  Molly looked at her wristwatch, a no-nonsense type with a leather band. “About forty-five minutes.”

  She walked to a whiteboard on the wall, pulled out a black marker and wrote her fi
rst name, followed by a phone number. “This is my pager number. The call button will bring anyone at the nurses’ desk. But if you need me, give me a call, and I’ll come as soon as I can.”

  That seemed easy enough.

  “I know that you wanted to ‘fly under the radar,’” she said, “but are you sure there isn’t someone we should tell that you’re here? Parents, sister, girlfriend, neighbor?”

  “Not unless I’m dying.”

  “No pets at the house that need to be fed?” she asked.

  “Nope.” He turned his head toward her, even though it hurt his neck to do so. “Are you just a soft-hearted nurse? Or are you trying to ask in a subtle way if I’m attached?”

  “Actually, you’re not all that attractive right now. And any sign of personality or charm is nonexistent. So, no, I wasn’t quizzing you for personal reasons.”

  “Too bad.” He tossed her a painfully crooked grin, sorry that he wasn’t at his best and wondering what she saw when she looked at him.

  Molly studied her battered patient, trying to imagine the photo on the ID she’d seen last night—dark, curly hair that hadn’t been matted from bed rest, expressive blue eyes that actually opened and blinked.

  If she knew what was good for her, she’d be a lot more focused on what he looked like now. A nurse had no business being attracted to her patient. And Molly, especially, didn’t need to be intrigued by a race car driver who’d probably had more than his share of women.

  Yet she couldn’t help getting involved in a little flirtatious banter. “So what’s a nice guy like you doing in a place like this?”

  “Are you trying to hit on me?” There was the hint of a grin on his face.

  Molly laughed. “Sorry. I’m not into the footloose, reckless type. I was just trying to make conversation.”

  “Too bad,” he said. “It would be nice to have my own private duty nurse, especially a pretty blonde.”

  “Something tells me, with your occupation, you probably ought to have your own mobile medical unit.”

  “Actually, I’m a very good driver.”

  She crossed her arms, a smile stealing across her face. “Those lumps and cuts and bruises suggest otherwise.”

  “It could have been worse.”