Small-Town Dreams (25 page)

Hope gave him a sour look. “It’s clear that even with Mr. Dever’s help you’ve been unable to get as far as the tub. Today all that will change.”

Jeff spat out a foul oath and reached for the phone. Hope was faster. He watched in horror as she yanked on the cord and pulled it out of the wall then tossed the phone over the terrace railing.

“Heads up, Manny!” she shouted as his only means of rescue sailed off for points unknown.

“This is kidnapping,” Jeff charged.

Hope raised that infernal eyebrow that always made her look so imperious and stared at him. “So far I haven’t had you moved even an inch.”

“I’ll have you tossed in prison. Your father would just love it if you followed in big brother’s footsteps. I’ll tell the police I’m being held against my will and that you misrepresented that agreement. That’s fraud!”

She folded her arms. “Prove it,” she challenged. “Emily signed as a witness. Are you going to toss her in jail, too? Just for caring about your welfare?”

Okay, indignant didn’t work. Maybe pitiful would. “Hope, you can’t do this. How can you take advantage of me like this?” he asked, pitifully. He could have sworn twin flames replaced Hope’s blue eyes. He stared at her, his eyes still not quite focusing correctly.

“I can do this because I care about you, Jeff. I’m
not
letting you go on this way.”

Jeff watched in helpless dread as she bent, opened the fridge and scowled. As if having her yank the phone out wasn’t bad enough. “No!”

Hope bent over him till they were nose to nose. His sweet Hope had turned into the drill instructor from his worst nightmares. “Oh, yes. You want to stop me? Get out of that bed and make me.”

“You know I can’t do that!” To his humiliation, his voice broke. To cover the emotions Jeff fought on a daily basis, he flopped back in the bed and looked away.

“What I know is that you’re not
trying
to get out of that bed. You’re wallowing. In grimy sheets. In trash and dirty clothes. In filth! And worst of all, in self-pity. And it ends. Here! Now!”

Oh, he was really mad. Who did she think she was standing there—
standing
there—telling him he was wallowing in self-pity? So what if he was? He had a right. If she couldn’t see that, it was her problem.

“And how do you think you’re going to get me to do what you want? Are you going to haul my carcass out of this bed? Are you going to change the sheets? Give me a bath?” he taunted, expecting her to blush and run from the room.

But he was wrong. Again. A tap on the door drew their attention, but not before Hope glared at him instead of cowering, her expression annoyingly determined. Her complexion hadn’t darkened even a shade, either.

“Come in, Curt. Join the party. This is your patient, Jeffrey Carrington. Jeff, this is Curtis Madden. He prefers to be called Curt.”

Jeff watched in horror as a large man with muscles on his muscles, wearing navy surgical scrubs, strode into the room. On his pleasant face was a warm smile. Jeff scowled at the man.

“Do me a favor, will you, Curt?” Hope said. “Haul that nice little fridge out to my cottage. I could use something to keep soft drinks by my bed. It’ll make those middle-of-the-night refrigerator raids much easier.”

Jeff watched in amazement as the big hulking blond strode in and removed his lifeline to oblivion. He wouldn’t miss the lousy taste, just its mind-and body-numbing effects. Just as Madden stepped into the hall, what she’d said cut through the rest of the fog in his brain. Her cottage? He narrowed his eyes.

“What cottage?”

“The cottage out back. Lavender Hill’s homestead house. It was your grandparents’ home, if memory serves.”

“You aren’t moving in there.”

“Too late. Already have,” she quipped.

“Then move out. Ross’ll be furious. He’s liable to fire you.”

“Too late. Already is. Already has.”

He groaned. If Ross hadn’t been able to stop her, nothing he said would dissuade her from this campaign of hers. But he could still do plenty. Like resist. Like make her life miserable. The only problem was he’d cut off his association with her to keep himself from making her miserable. Well, what was the old saying? Sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind.

“You’re pathetic. How desperate are you for a man if you’ll go this far to get one—even one who’s worthless? Didn’t your aunt Meg teach you that it’s gauche to throw yourself at someone?”

Jeff congratulated himself when anger flared in her blue eyes. But his triumph withered and died as soon as she gave words to her fury—disappointing words.

“I won’t listen to you calling yourself worthless. You say that one more time and I swear I’ll put pepper on your tongue.”

“You and what army?” he replied, then looked up as the hulk—Kirk, was it?—strode into the room. “You going to get the captain here to hold me down?”

“He’s here to help you. I don’t need help. Now I imagine it’s bath time. I’ll see you boys later.”

Jeff growled as she left then turned his gaze on Madden. “So, how much am I paying you to humiliate me?”

The young man in the surgical scrubs stood at the foot of the bed and crossed his meaty arms. “I’m not here to humiliate you, Mr. Carrington.”

“Come on, Captain Kirk, you’re apparently going to see me in my altogether. Make it Jeff. Why stand on ceremony?”

Madden nodded. “All right. Jeff it is then. And I’m Curt, or Curtis, or nurse. Not Captain Kirk—unless
you’re
trying to embarrass
me.
You asked why I’m here. I’m here to either help you get better or to help you learn to cope with your disability. I’m an RN and I have a degree in physical therapy. And I specialize in cases like yours.”

Jeff frowned. What kind of life was that for a twenty-something, good-looking guy? “Helping cripples learn to go on in the world? Is that your thing?” Jeff asked, pulling sarcasm around him like a shield. Madden’s blue eyes seemed to see too much, though, and it made Jeff decidedly uncomfortable.

“No. I specialize in tough cases, Jeff.”

“Ah. Now I see. Cases that don’t have a snowball’s chance at the equator of getting better. Like me.”

Madden leaned down and braced his hands on the footboard of Jeff’s sleigh bed. “No, Jeff. Cases where the patient won’t try and can’t seem to care enough to see what their self-pity is doing to those around them. You ready for your bath?” he asked. “I’m told you don’t get fed till you’re clean and smelling fresh as a daisy.” He sniffed the air. “I’d say we have a lot of work in that area.”

Hope waited till Curt let her know he had Jeff in the tub before she stripped the bed. She had finished clearing the debris from the bureau and chest and making the bed with clean linens when the therapist came in looking for a clean towel and clothes. Luckily there were plenty of both.

Half an hour later, Jeff had still not appeared in the breakfast room. Mrs. Roberts, excited that he’d be eating downstairs, had gone all out with his favorites—an omelette, fruit salad and fresh coffee cake. Not knowing whether to be worried or annoyed, Hope returned to his clean inner sanctum, and all thoughts of worry fled when she overheard him talking to Curt.

“I eat in my room. I told you. I’m not well enough to be dragged up and down the stairs all the time. Just go get me a tray. I’m hungry. And I haven’t had my coffee.”

Hope turned on her heels and went to the kitchen. How could he care so little about Emily? Jeff had never treated her like anything other than a grandmother, and suddenly he’d begun treating her like his parents had. Like the help.

Well, fine. If he wanted to be treated like an invalid, she’d feed him like an invalid. Maybe that would wake him up!

She stalked into the kitchen and pulled out a pot. Next she hunted up the oatmeal she knew had to be there. Not because Emily would ever serve it for breakfast but because she made the best oatmeal cookies in two counties. And they weren’t nearly as good as her omelettes. Jeff didn’t know what he was missing.

But he soon would.

“What on earth are you up to now?” Emily Roberts asked, worry evident in her voice.

“He says he’s not well enough to come down. With a little change in the menu I’m going to demonstrate the difference between being well and being so sick you’re confined to bed.”

Luckily, Emily stocked quick-cooking oatmeal, so Jeff’s breakfast was ready in less than five minutes. Hope loaded a tray and carried it upstairs and into his room.

“You’re not up to coming down yet, I hear,” she said, her voice full of sympathy. “So I brought up some breakfast fit for an invalid. I think you’ll enjoy it. I brought mine along so we could visit.”

Hope made a great production of settling the tray across his lap then she lifted the plate with her omelette and handed Jeff his spoon.

He frowned, dipped into the oatmeal and lifted the spoon, tilting it to the side and letting the contents plop into the bowl. “What’s this? And what am I supposed to do with it? Hire a paperhanger?”

Hope chuckled. At least some of his sense of humor was still intact. “It’s oatmeal. Not wallpaper paste. Aunt Meg always says hot cereal really sticks to your ribs. And I added some nice stewed prunes. And tea with a drop of milk. Just what your delicate constitution needs.”

Jeff’s frown turned to a full-fledged scowl. “But you have one of Mrs. R’s omelettes.”

“Yes, I do. But then I’m not the one too weak to go to the breakfast room.”

His eyes lit with fury. “Torture! You’re trying to torture me. That’s it! Admit it!”

A sadness so profound fell like a shadow over Hope, and she nearly burst into tears. No one ever warned her that tough love hurt the one on the administering side more than the receiver. Jeff was genuinely angry and, from his point of view, rightly so. She was the usurper, never mind that she was only trying to help, and to his mind he was doing just fine.

Hope took a deep breath and stood. “I’m trying to show you that there are things you can do to lead a productive, useful life and that you aren’t doing them.”

“Whose idea of a productive life? Yours? What do you know about what I’m capable of doing? I’m not
able
to do a thing on my own! Nothing. And you know nothing whatever about me or my capabilities.”

She shook her head and walked to the bed, carrying the untouched omelette. She put it on the tray and picked up the cereal bowl. “Here’s your breakfast, Jeff. I was just trying to make a point about how
well
you really are. And there’s another point to eating downstairs. Do you think it’s easy for Mrs. Roberts to schlep your trays up and down that flight and a half of stairs three times a day? Why don’t you take the rest of the day to sulk up here? Curt can work on beginning your therapy today.”

Hope took a deep breath and stiffened her resolve. Hard or easy, she couldn’t back down yet. He was worth every second of her own pain and discomfort. “But it’s a one-day reprieve,” she continued. “Tomorrow you find a way to get downstairs or I’ll know the reason why not!”

O
n her way to convince Jeff to eat the evening meal downstairs, Hope heard Curt’s voice float into the hall outside the room.

“Come on, Jeff,” he urged. “Try one more time.”

Jeff expelled a quick breath seconds later, and she heard the crisp sheets rustle. “I can’t do it. My arms feel like jelly. I can’t even get myself into a wheelchair.” Jeff laughed, but it was once again sadly a bitter sound. “How worthless is that? I even fail at being a cripple.”

Hope closed her eyes and blocked out Curt offering to lift him into the chair and Jeff’s sharp negative retort.
Lord,
she prayed,
it hurts to hear him sound so down and discouraged, but he has to keep trying. Giving up on life isn’t an option. What do I do to show him the way?

What she really wanted to do was to go in there and hug him. To offer comfort. But that was what
she
wanted. One by one scenes from earlier in the day replayed themselves and she stiffened her resolved. Comfort wasn’t what he needed. She’d done what she’d done so far to help him. And help him she would.

Turning on her heel, Hope followed the wonderful scent of Emily’s cooking to the kitchen. She’d warned him, she told herself. He wouldn’t be able to say she hadn’t.

“Yum. That smells wonderful,” Hope said as she lifted a pot lid and sniffed the gumbo Emily had been preparing for hours. “I don’t think Jeff’s going to be down for dinner tonight, either. But don’t worry. I’ll take it up to him.”

“That’s nice, dear,” Emily said as she bent, pot holder in hand, to peer into the oven. “I’ll have the baguettes out of the oven in two shakes of a lamb’s tail. If you put a little butter on a bread plate, they’ll be ready to go.”

Hope took care of the butter and the bread plate then dished up a serving of Emily’s famous gumbo. With the full dish, she walked calmly to the spice cabinet. She wouldn’t need to have Curt hold Jeff down at all. He was about to dole out his own consequences all by himself. She felt her lips twitch.

“What are you doing?” Emily asked.

“Keeping a promise,” Hope explained and shook out a few healthy splashes of jalapeño hot sauce onto the top of Jeff’s dinner. She stirred it in only enough to disguise its presence, then picked up the tray as Emily settled the plate holding the fresh baguette and a pat of butter. “I’d have a big glass of milk ready. But don’t bring it up right away. His object lesson shouldn’t end too soon.”

Hope sighed. The older woman’s frown and worried eyes gave her pause. Maybe she shouldn’t. She looked at the laced gumbo. “He said it again. Called himself worthless. It hurts hearing him so down on himself, especially when I caused the accident. I just want him to stop and think before he says something so untrue about himself. Maybe if he isn’t saying it, he’ll stop believing it.”

“Jeffrey doesn’t blame you in the least. As for the hot sauce, maybe he does need shaking up. He can’t keep repeating and believing his father’s criticisms or he’ll waste away in that bed. Hearing him call himself worthless is like an old nightmare come back to haunt me. I thought he’d gotten far beyond all those childhood hurts, but I guess children never lose the scars of their early years.”

Hope silently denounced Addison Carrington for his cruelty. The man hadn’t been a father to Jeff, but a scourge, and his negligent mother hadn’t been much better. Glancing at the doctored gumbo, Hope grew more comfortable with the course of action.

She wasn’t being cruel. She was trying to make him see how very much he
was
worth. They called it tough love. Just as military school had broken Cole out of his destructive behavior, she hoped and prayed her version would do the same for Jeff’s brand of the same malignant pattern her brother had once engaged in. Her resolve strengthened, Hope carried the bed tray upstairs and pasted a smile on her face.

“Dinner,” she called as she entered the room. Jeff was still in the bed, and Curt sat next to him in a chair. Both men looked up.

“See? Even Hope doesn’t expect me to make it downstairs for dinner.”

She settled the tray across his still legs. “Tomorrow’s another day. Unless you want oatmeal,” she said and stood back, waiting for him to take that first bite of fire. There would be no guessing when he would realize he’d truly bitten off more than he could chew. He’d challenged her to do her worst that morning, and Jeff Carrington was about to learn how bad her worst could be.

“Oh, Emily, you darling lady,” he said. “The woman puts the best Cajun chef to shame.” He scooped up a fork full and plunged in.

The reaction came quickly and definitively.

“Aah!” Jeff shrieked and searched frantically for something to put out the fire. Something she’d purposely left off the tray. “Water! Milk! Help!”

Hope leaned down and put her nose about two inches from his. “Next time you’re tempted to call yourself worthless, Carrington, remember the walls have ears.” She lifted the bowl of gumbo off his tray and turned away. “I’ll send Emily up with some milk. Notice you put pepper on your own tongue. No one held you down.”

“You’re dangerous!” Jeff shouted at her retreating back. “And I’m adding attempted murder to the list. You’ll be so deep in a prison they’ll have to pump daylight to the lot of you!”

Hope passed Emily Roberts on the stairs. Far from feeling the triumph she’d shown Jeff, she felt awful. “I’ll be along with a new plate for him and one for Curt. But I don’t feel much like eating tonight.”

Emily nodded gravely. “I had to spank him once when he was about five or six for going into a pasture with an untamed stallion. I know how you feel, but you’ve reminded me that his welfare is more important than his immediate comfort.”

“Don’t just stand there,” they heard Jeff yell, she supposed at Curt. “Get me something to drink.”

“And as I’m holding a bit of relief, I’d best run along. The native seems to be restless,” Emily quipped and chuckled. “This could actually be good for morale around here. You bellowed, sir,” Hope heard the housekeeper say as she entered Jeff’s room.

Jeff grabbed the milk like a lifeline. Hope was out of control. He gulped it down and swished it around his burning mouth, hoping all the while that it would quench the fire in his stomach, too. He looked at Emily and tried for his most pitiful expression.

“You have to get rid of her, Mrs. R. She’s dangerous. This is a side of her I’ve never really seen before. You’re the only one I can trust now. Help me?”

Mrs. Roberts stood a little straighter, and Jeff felt a rush of satisfaction. She was going to help! He could see her stiffening her resolve. But then she frowned and sat next to him on the bed. Jeff felt his heart sink into despair at the expression on her face. She hadn’t worn that look since he was eighteen. But he remembered it well. He was about to get a lecture.

“Now you listen to me, young man. I’ve kept my mouth shut, but I see that my silence wasn’t helping you at all. Hope Taggert
is
helping you.” She took his chin in her papery hand and captured his gaze with her own. “That young woman is the best thing to ever happen to you. She cares about you.
You,
not your bank balance. Appreciate it. Appreciate her. She’s got more moxie in her little finger than any of those so-called women you’ve dated over the years. Where are they now, I ask you?”

Jeff looked into the milk glass he still held. He had no answer for that. At least not one she didn’t already know. They were off playing at life. He was too much work now.

“Hmm. That’s about what I thought,” she said of his silent reply. “And that’s all I have to say on the subject.”

Mrs. Roberts stood and was gone.

Jeff looked at Madden. “I guess you think that whole incident was funny?”

He shrugged. “I think you’re a lucky man.”

“Lucky? How can you say that? I can’t walk. My career is over. My friends have deserted me. I need to pay a stranger to help me take a bath!” He swore. “Oh, that’s real lucky.”

“Maybe what you need to do is think about all the things you
do
have. The glass half-full instead of half-empty theory. You have Hope and Mrs. Roberts and Manny, who all care about you. You have a roof over your head—and not a shabby one, at that. You have the money to pay someone like me to come in here and help you get better. And you have your health. You’re injured but not sick. There are guys your age all over this country dying of crippling diseases. Pardon me if I can’t scare up too much sympathy for someone with an eight-figure bank account who had a riding accident when I’ve worked with kids who never got to walk let alone ride a horse.”

Jeff felt ashamed for the first time in years. How had he gotten so selfish? “I don’t know where to start,” he admitted. “My life’s fallen apart and I just don’t know how to live this way.”

“You do it one day at a time. You learn to rely on God. You become as independent as you can. Maybe that means having a chairlift put on the stairs. Building your upper body strength so you can get in and out and around in your chair. But maybe it means learning to walk again. Maybe…”

“I don’t know if I can live life confined to a wheelchair. At least in bed I feel sick.”

“But you aren’t sick and you may not have to learn how to live that way. One day at a time you’ll either get better or you’ll learn how to live with not walking. But one thing’s for sure, sitting in bed isn’t an option. It’s giving up.”

Curt’s words stayed with Jeff long into the night. He hadn’t spoken to Hope at all when she came in with more gumbo. She’d played a nasty trick on him, and it hadn’t been funny. At least not to him. It hurt to think she might have thought so.

What it
had
done was illustrate to him more clearly than ever how helpless he was. And that she knew how helpless he was.

He hated that she saw him that way, he thought, as he looked at his useless legs. He had nothing to offer her. He’d always felt a woman needed someone she could respect—someone to be strong for her—women’s lib or no. And he could no longer be relied upon. He was handicapped. Crippled. Useless. Worthless. And the woman he loved had seen him as just that.

Her presence was torture. Every minute she was here she reminded him of all he’d lost. Since she knew he was no longer the man she needed, she had to be here out of a sense of guilt. Curt was right when he said not trying was giving up. That’s all he wanted to do. He wanted to crawl in a hole and pull it in after him, and maybe even be allowed to die in peace. That was the biggest problem with having Hope there. She made him feel alive again. And with life came pain. And that was something he didn’t want any more of.

“Good morning.” The object of his thoughts spoke as she sailed in with a bright smile on her face and what smelled like a mug of coffee in her hand. She wore crisp indigo jeans and a baby blue sweater. The color of the sweater made her eyes shine like sapphires.

“Did you sleep well?” she asked cheerily. “Curt said he gave you a massage to relax your muscles at bedtime.”

Jeff tensed. Right. Rub it in. Curt has to put me to bed like a two-year-old. “Yeah. I slept like a baby,” he sneered.

Hope put the mug on the bedside table and stepped back. The message in her eyes was clear. She’d obviously thought he’d be more cooperative this morning.

“Uh. I brought you coffee,” she said, pointing to the rich brown liquid filling the room with its tempting aroma. She opened the terrace curtains then turned to him. “Curt will be up in a minute,” she continued, undaunted. “He’s having his first cup at the breakfast bar. If you think you aren’t any good before a couple cups, you should see him.”

“You two are certainly getting all nice and cozy in my house.”

Hope’s eyebrow climbed her forehead. “I’ve known Curtis Madden for years. There’s no need for us to get cozy. We went to school together. We’ve attended the same church since I was twelve when Aunt Meg moved home and started taking me. We were in youth group, summer Bible school and Christian camp together.”

“Hiring him sounds a little like nepotism, don’t you think?”

Hope pivoted and stalked toward the door. She turned back when she was halfway there. “I hired him to help
you!
” she snapped. “You are the most ungrateful, spoiled
baby
I’ve ever had the misfortune to meet.”

Baby? He was a baby, was he? People didn’t really see red. It was an old stupid saying. Or so he’d thought. “Get out!” he screamed. But she just stood there. Stood there looking down her superior nose at him, thinking he was a baby. On instinct alone Jeff grabbed the plastic tumbler of water Curt had put next to his bed and threw it at her. The water sloshed all over him, but he didn’t care. How dare she rub his nose in his helplessness?

She caught the tumbler easily and threw it at him. It bounced harmlessly to the floor after he let it smack into his chest, just to prove she couldn’t hurt him. Down deep he’d known she would catch it and toss it back, but short of pounding his fist into the mattress and really looking juvenile, throwing it at her was his only option. He was, after all, powerless against someone who could storm out and leave him screaming at the air.

Hope’s next reaction, however, was so uncharacteristic and unexpected that it took his breath. Tears welled in her big blue eyes, making them sparkle like precious gems. Her chin wobbled when she opened her mouth to speak, and she put her shaking hand up as if to hold off a further attack. And then she ran.