Anytime Darlin' (31 page)

Despite the fact that Franz was dying, Jake grabbed the pistol from his limp fingers and tossed it out of reach along with the shotgun. Devlin reached out to him, and he scooped her off the ground, racing for the car. By the time they made it to the front yard, he heard the sirens.

* * * *

Two hours later, Jake called Mike from the local hospital. Jake filled in the blanks from his end, while Mike provided the sequence of events that led up to Franz’s appearance in Grinnell.

“Oh,” Mike added, “I almost forgot. Mary had a little boy. She and the baby are doing well.”

Jake shook his head when he heard about Janice’s role in warning them all of Franz’s return. He asked Mike to thank her and said he and Devlin would talk to her personally when they got back in town.

“How’s Dev holding up?” asked Mike.

“Complaining. The doctors want to keep her here overnight for observation, just in case she has a concussion. She banged her head pretty hard.” Jake paused for a second and ran a hand along his jaw. “My God, Mike, she kept her cool. We might both be dead if she hadn’t managed to grab those scissors. I don’t even want to think about it.”

“Yeah, well, I’m guessing you weren’t a slouch yourself. Thank God it turned out the way it did.”

“You leaving on your honeymoon?”

“Nah,” replied Mike, “I think we’ll wait ’til you and Dev get back. We’ll both feel better when we see you with our own eyes.”

“Mike, thanks. If you hadn’t called when you did, I might have been too late.”

“No problem. Give our love to Devlin, and get your asses back here as quickly as you can.”

“Yeah, we will.”

Jake hung up the phone and returned to Devlin’s cubicle. He found her asleep. The ER doc had stitched the scalp laceration. It took thirteen stitches to close. Devlin refused to allow him to shave the area, so Jake told the doctor he’d help her get the dried blood out of her hair later. The doctor wouldn’t touch her lip, though. He was concerned he’d leave too big a scar, so he called in a retired plastic surgeon to do the repair. It looked good. Jake didn’t think Devlin would care much either way. He knew he didn’t. Franz was dead. Nothing else mattered.

Dev opened her beautiful eyes and looked up into Jake’s face.

“Thank you,” she said, her words slurred slightly by the Novocain. “Thank you for hearing me. Thank you for killing him.”

Jake lowered the safety bar and scooted her over on the gurney. He squeezed in beneath her, folding her in his arms and holding her tight.

“Anytime, darlin’,” he murmured in her ear. “Anytime.”

THE END

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