Bodyguard/Husband (26 page)

Holly laughed, a little hiccuping sound. “He never gives up, does he.”

“That’s how the Ice Man is.”

She wiped her eyes and looked up at him. “Ice Man?”

Mitch’s clear blue eyes went round. “He didn’t tell you his nickname?”

She shook her head. “No, but I can see why people might think of him that way.”

“People who don’t know him.”

Holly smiled and nodded. “People who don’t know him,” she agreed. Then she sobered. “Do you know if Stanley made it?” She couldn’t believe she had actually stabbed him with his letter opener. But he had been attacking Jack, and she’d had to do something to stop him.

“Hanks is upstairs in surgery. Your stab wound punctured his lung, and Jack’s second shot hit a rib and glanced off his side. He’ll live to stand trial.”

“Thank God I didn’t kill him,” she breathed. “Although, for a minute there…”

Decker patted her hand.

A doctor came into the waiting room, and the sight of him sheared Holly’s breath. But he stepped over to another family. “Oh God, I can’t stand this. I need to see him.”

“Let me see if I can use my influence.” Mitch disappeared.

About twenty minutes later, he returned, took her hand and sat down with her in the corner of the waiting room. The terror that had grabbed hold of her when she’d first realized what Stanley had done now squeezed her insides. She could barely speak.

“What’s wrong?” she whispered, not wanting to know the answer.

“Jack is very sick. His body is fighting off the effects of the venom, but he may be going into renal failure. We’re helicoptering a specialist down from Jackson. And as soon as he can be moved, I’m taking him back to D.C.”

Holly’s eyes brimmed over with tears. Just as she’d
known from the beginning, Jack would finish his job and leave. He had a life, a career that had nothing to do with her. She was just an assignment, although she could have sworn at times that she meant more to him than that.

But the most important thing was that he was all right. “He’ll be alive, won’t he?” Her breath caught in a little sob. “Can I see him?”

Mitch’s soft blue gaze held hers. “I’m not sure you should right now. He’s intubated. He’s going to look pretty bad, and he can’t talk.”

Tears flowed down Holly’s cheeks. “I just need to see him for a minute. I just need to—” She paused.

Mitch waited.

“Touch him.” More tears spilled over.

“Come on.”

Mitch took her through the ICU doors and into a room on the left. There was a nurse fiddling with an IV pump, but Holly saw no one but Jack.

He was intubated, and a ventilator helped him breathe. His right hand had an IV line in it. His chest was bare, the scars on his shoulders bright red.

She studied his face. His eyes were closed, lashes resting against his hollowed cheeks. His face and neck still bore a few spots of red.

She touched his hand. “Oh, Jack.”

His fingers twitched but he didn’t open his eyes.

“He’s asleep, Mrs. O’Hara,” the nurse said on her way out of the room. “He probably won’t know you’re here. He might be more alert the next time you come in.”

Holly leaned over and kissed Jack’s stubbled cheek.

“I’ll wait outside,” Mitch said.

She pushed Jack’s hair back from his forehead and
smoothed the corner of a piece of tape on his hand. He looked thin and vulnerable in the white hospital bed. And his face was so pale.

“Jack, the nurse said you don’t know I’m here. That’s probably good, because I have to say something to you, and I’m not real sure I could say it if those icy gray eyes were staring at me.” She smiled through tears.

“Thank you, Jack O’Hara. Thank you for making me feel safe and protected. Thank you for making me feel like I was the most important thing in your life. Thank you for treating me like an equal, and not letting me feel sorry for myself. Thank you for sharing a part of your life with me that I don’t think you usually share.”

She sobbed and clamped a hand over her mouth. “I swore I was not going to…cry.” She wiped her eyes. “And I’m not.”

Sitting up straight, she caressed his forearm above the IV site. “I know you’re very sick, but I also know you never give up. So I know you won’t give up this time, either. Special Agent Decker is going to take you back to Washington so he can take care of you.

“If I know you, you’ll be back on the job in no time. Save as many of them as you can, Jack. It’s what you do best. And thank you for saving me.”

A nurse tapped on the glass door of the room.

Holly looked up and nodded. “I have to go now, but I’ll be back during the next visit schedule. I’ll be here as long as you are.”

She stood, then leaned over and kissed his cheek gently. “I love you, Jack O’Hara.” She wiped her tear off his cheek, then left.

E
VEN BEFORE THE GRUMPY
evening-shift nurse informed him, Jack knew he wasn’t being a good boy. He was sick of the hospital, sick of the tests and sick of the nurses that came around every fifteen minutes to check his vitals.

He knew he should be grateful and appreciative, and he was. But he wasn’t sick anymore. He needed to get out of here. Decker had informed him that he was taking Jack back to D.C. this morning. Jack had protested, but Decker was firm.

“It’s not like I’m injured,” Jack had insisted.

Decker had given him his patient look. “No, it’s not like you almost went into renal failure and died.”

“That’s just it.
I didn’t.
”

But Decker had won the argument by default, because an orderly had come in to wheel Jack downstairs for some final tests.

Now he was pacing his room, waiting for the doctor to write discharge orders and contemplating leaving the hospital AMA—against medical advice.

Someone knocked on the door.

“Come in,” Jack barked, “especially if you have my discharge orders.”

Holly walked in, bringing all the sunshine in the South with her. Jack’s heart did a flip and he couldn’t help but smile. She had on a bright yellow dress that emphasized her delicate curves and left her sleek legs bare.

“Hi,” she said, smiling at him.

He studied her face. Was that sadness back? “Are you okay?”

She pressed her lips together for an instant, then smiled even wider. “Of course I am, thanks to you.”

He couldn’t take his eyes off her. She was so beau
tiful it made his heart hurt. He could see evidence of bruises on her forearms and wrists. Each one was a testament to her bravery and strength. He’d love to hold her close and kiss away the pain.

He lifted his gaze back to hers and felt the arc of fire that jolted him each time their eyes met. He held out his arms.

She came right to him, wrapped her arms around his waist and put her head against his chest. He breathed in the strawberry scent of her hair.

“Look at you,” she said, her voice strained. “You’re all dressed and ready to go. The last time I saw you, you were still groggy.”

He pushed her away so he could look at her. “That’s right. Where have you been the past twenty hours since you visited me?”

Her eyes grew wide. Did it surprise her that he knew exactly how long it had been since he’d last seen her?

“Today was my first day back at work. It was a really busy day. I just came from the Rehab Center.” She looked away, out the window, then back at him. “I wanted to see you before you left.”

Jack felt a strange sensation. He recognized it. He even remembered the last time he’d felt it. It had been a long time ago, when he was just thirteen years old. It was the feeling of tears burning the backs of his eyes. He cleared his throat.

“So I just wanted to say goodbye, and thank you,” she said, smiling brightly again, although he thought he could see a suspicious mistiness in her eyes.

“Holly…”

“When will Special Agent Decker be here?”

She was making this so hard. He assessed her. Was she trying to let him down easily, give him the ability
to say goodbye without any embarrassing revelations? He’d heard her whisper “I love you” in his ear while he was intubated and too weak to open his eyes. Was that just the grateful emotion of a victim whose life he’d saved?

It was too late to worry about that. He had some things to say and he was determined to say them.

“Holly, I’m so sorry.”

“What?” She stared at him in surprise. “Sorry for what? You
saved
me. You could have died, and yet you found me and you fought him and you saved me. There’s nothing in this world for you to be sorry for.”

He shook his head and took a ragged breath. “I didn’t mean to—”

She put her fingers against his mouth. “Please don’t, Jack. Not yet.”

He took her hand in his. “Holly. I need to tell you something. It’s important.” And he had no idea how he was going to do it. How did a man who had never allowed himself to love anyone say “I love you”? How did a man who had lived his life alone ask a woman to live the rest of her life with him?

And how would he live if she didn’t feel the same way?

“I’ve never had much of a family. Always liked living alone. Liked doing my job, then stepping away.” He stopped.

Holly listened to Jack’s halting words and had the urge to put her hands over her ears. She wanted to reach out and take hold of his heart and force him to love her as much as she loved him. She wanted to beg him not to walk away this time, but she didn’t have the courage. He walked away. That’s who he was.

“I made mistakes. Mistakes that almost got you killed. I didn’t mean to get involved.”

His words pierced her wounded heart. “Oh, don’t, Jack.”
Don’t go back behind that icy barrier.
Tears spilled down her cheeks.

“I didn’t mean to fall in love with you.”

She couldn’t move.

“You…what?” Had she heard him right? Hope swelled inside her like the sun rising to brighten a new day. It crept into the dark corners of her heart and pushed out the fear, banished the loneliness.

He tugged on her hand and lay it against his chest, against his heart. “Feel that?”

She nodded, unable to speak. She spread her hand over his chest and felt the steady, strong beat.

“That’s my heart. Unfrozen. Because of you.”

Her own heart soared. Shock and happiness stole her breath. All she could do, it seemed, was cry.

“You made me want to open up.” His gray eyes glittered like silver as he watched her warily. “You slipped inside me, where no one had ever bothered to go. You healed me.”

He reached up, caught a tear on his thumb and looked at it.

“I’ve wanted to do that ever since I met you,” he whispered.

“Do what?”

“Stop your tears.”

She cradled his beautiful face in her hands and kissed him. “Oh, Jack. When did you get to be such a romantic?”

He laughed and pressed kisses along the line of her jaw. “Will you run away with me and love me forever?” he murmured.

“I can’t,” she said, laughing. “I’m a married woman.”

“That’s okay. I’m a married man.”

Holly kissed the rough stubble on his cheek. “I love you, Jack O’Hara.”

He smiled down at her. “I know you do. I heard you the first time.”

ISBN: 978-1-4592-3738-4

BODYGUARD/HUSBAND

Copyright © 2003 by Rickey R. Mallory.

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