SWNOVELS Taken by the Major: Chapter 4
“Will you get me a refill, darlin’?” Mac held up his paper cup and waggled it in my direction. The ice cubes clacked about as much as ice can rattle against paper. Had that cup been glass, the noise would have been loud and pulled everyone’s attention in the dining room to him.
I was a row of tables over sweeping up French fries after some kid threw them around. I swear there were more fries on the floor than that kid could have possibly eaten. “It’s not that kind of restaurant, Mac. Get your own.”
“But it tastes better when you do it, Kenzie,” he cajoled.
I would say he was whining, but did men in their fifties whine? Ruby whined, and it had a very similar grinding feeling in my ears.
“After everything I’ve done for you, the least you could do is refill my Coke.”
I hated it when he pulled that card. The ‘I helped you, now you help me.’ Sure, he stepped in when my parents died. But wasn’t that what people were supposed to do? Be helpful after tragedy strikes?
I let out an exasperated sigh. “Give me a second.” I lifted up my broom and dustpan to show him I needed to put my tools away.
“My tongue is gonna curl up and turn to dust by the time you get back here.”
“Then get it yourself,” I quipped back.
“You keep me on my toes, girl. I like that about you. But you know, you’ll catch more flies with honey.”
“I’m not sure what’s funnier, your thinking I want to catch flies or your not realizing you just called yourself a fly. Bug is about right.”
Mac laughed. I wished I had been trying to be funny. I wasn’t. He was bothering me, and somehow, every time I tried to brush him off, I only ended up encouraging him more.
“Kenzie, you really do make me work for your attention. When are you going to stop being so hard on me?” Mac Campbell had been friends with my father. Somehow, I couldn’t help but think if my dad were still around, Mac wouldn’t talk to me this way. Or maybe he would. But if Dad had lived, I would have finished school, and I wouldn’t be stuck working in fast food where Mac could come and pester me with his order of fries.
“Now, Kenzie, that’s no way to—”
“Hey, Kenzie, you have a call back in my office,” my manager, Will, called out.
“Sorry.” I made my eyes go wide and shrugged at Mac.
I scurried back to the Employees Only door and pushed into the back kitchen area of the place. “Thanks for rescuing me from Mac. He won’t leave me alone. Can’t you do something about him?”
“He’s harmless, Kenzie. He’s been a friend of your family for years. If you want him to leave you alone, you’ll just have to figure it out.”
“If you talked to him, I wouldn’t have to. But this works too. I can find something to do back here until he leaves.”
Will shook his head and pointed to his office. “I didn’t call you back here to get you away from Mac. You have a call. It sounds serious.”
“What?” I ran into the back. Ruby knew she wasn’t allowed to call me unless it was urgent and she couldn’t get herself to the restaurant. It was late enough that it wouldn’t be one of her teachers, not that Ruby’s teachers ever needed to call me. But I couldn’t think of why anyone would be calling, let alone something that would sound serious.
“Hello?” My heart pounded in my throat. The word came out on a squeak.
“Kenzie? I’m here with Ruby, hold on.” the voice was deep. Was he a cop? Why was Ruby with a man?
“Ruby?” I yelled.
“Don’t get mad, Kenzie,” Ruby started.
Mad? I wasn’t mad, I was panicked. “Where are you? What’s going on?”
“I fell, and he insisted, and it’s not my fault.” I heard voices and then it wasn’t Ruby on the phone anymore.
“Kenzie? I insisted on bringing Ruby in to the ER. She fell and broke her wrist.”
“It’s not broken,” I heard Ruby moan in the background.
“Where are you?” I asked.
“We’re at Shasta County Hospital,” the man said.
I hung up the office phone and ran. I paused long enough to grab my purse and keys. “Will, Ruby is in the ER. I have to go, sorry.”
“You can’t just run out of here. You’re on the schedule,” Will started.
I paused long enough to glare at him “My little sister is in the ER with a stranger. She’s all I’ve got.” I kept my eyes locked with him, daring him to say anything, daring him to fire me.
He stared back, but his eyes dropped away before I blinked. “I’m just saying, you didn’t clear this with me first.”
“What part of an emergency gets scheduled in advance?” I left him with that nugget of logic.
I white-knuckled the steering wheel the entire drive to the county hospital.
“Oh, come on!” I couldn’t find a parking place once I arrived.
By the time I found parking and managed to run into the ER waiting room, I was panting. My heart hadn’t stopped racing since the man said he took her in. I more than half expected to see her sitting with a cop. Who else would pick a kid up off the ground and take her to get her wrist X-rayed?
Apparently, that guy. I stopped breathing for a second as I saw who Ruby was sitting next to. She looked tiny curled up on the seat, feet tucked in under her. She cradled something in her arms like a baby and was tucked in under the man’s arm.
He sat with a protective arm around her, and he looked, well… so many thoughts raced through my head all at once. He looked fierce, someone whom maybe I should be afraid of, but he was stunning. And I’d seen movie stars come through town on their way to the ski slopes, and this man was even better-looking than some of them.
Hot man occupied my thoughts for a second or less. Ruby was hurt, and he was sitting there protecting her. I owed him.
“Ruby?” I skidded to my knees in front of her. I didn’t care if I got my uniform dirty. The floors at the hospital were probably cleaner than anyplace else, anyway.
She lifted her head and looked at me. She looked pale.
“The pain started to really kick in about fifteen minutes ago,” the man said.
I looked up at him then. His eyes were so kind. How had I thought he was intimidating?
“Why haven’t they given her anything?” I asked.
“They won’t give her anything until they take her back,” he said.
I didn’t like that answer. I pushed to my feet and stormed over to the triage nurse. “My sister is in a lot of pain.”
“I just explained to them that we can’t give her anything out here. They will determine a course of treatment once they get her back.”
“How soon is that going to be? How long has she been here?”
The triage nurse looked at me like I was getting on her last nerve. “I don’t know, I checked her in maybe twenty or thirty minutes ago. Look, we’re busy this afternoon. Be grateful they didn’t take her straight into the back. At least that way, you know she’s not critical.”
Not critical. Ruby’s injury could wait. Part of my brain latched onto that and found comfort in it. Another part of me thought that it was Ruby. A splinter was critical. They should be treating her immediately. I slumped my way back to the seats. I sat next to Ruby. She didn’t shift. She continued to lean into her rescuer and not me.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t get your name. What happened?” I asked.
“Tate Bowers. Sorry we couldn’t be meeting under better circumstances.” He reached across Ruby and took my hand.
His hand was rough. He worked with his hands. The skin around his eyes looked like he spent a lot of time outdoors. He could have been a lumberjack, or in construction. As he continued to hold my hand, I became keenly aware that I smelled of fry grease.
“Ruby was skateboarding, and I think she hit a curb. She went down right in front of my truck. She didn’t want to come in. Said you’d be mad. I’ve seen a break or two in my line of work. If you need to be mad at anyone, be mad at me. I insisted.”
“I’m not mad.” I laughed with relief. Ruby would have tried to hide an injury from me. She wouldn’t have admitted that she had been hurt at all. “This is going to cost so much. Hopefully, the insurance will cover it.” I wasn’t really talking to anyone, just thinking out loud. I couldn’t work any more shifts at the Burger Jeff, but maybe I could pick up more work from Sally’s Bridal. I could always get a third job.
I covered my face with my hands and tried to disappear for a moment. I didn’t want to deal with any of this right now, not the future hospital bills, not Ruby being hurt, and definitely not the hot man who was still hanging out with us.
“Um, Tate, I’m sorry. We have taken up so much of your time. You don’t need to wait around here any longer. I’m sure you were in the middle of doing stuff when you brought Ruby in.”
He shook his head. “I think I’d like to stick around until I know they’ve taken her back there to be treated, if you don’t mind. I always stay with a fallen soldier until I know they are in good hands.”
Soldier? “Are you in the Army?”
“Recently retired.”