amount of blood and needed a transfusion during surgery. Her surgeon removed a few bone fragments but observed no other major damage. He was confident she’d make a full recovery with some rehab, although he warned her she’d probably have a small scar. He stuck around to speak with her in person, even though she’d been asleep for hours. Caroline wondered if he would have extended the same courtesy to someone who wasn’t a member of Congress.
Jack stroked her hand. “So, how are you feeling?”
“Better, now that I’ve heard what the surgeon had to say. And now that he’s given me permission to use my voice.”
He smiled. “I was being overprotective, I guess. I still want you to mostly listen to me, though.”
Caroline didn’t have enough energy to argue with him. “Fine.”
“Marguerite and Sophie are with the Sullivans at your house. They’ll be here first thing in the morning. I called Christine while the nurse was giving you more meds.”
She didn’t want to start crying. There would be plenty of time for that later. “Are they okay?”
“They want to see you. They tried to stick around until you woke up. It took some effort to convince Christine that they all should go home and get some sleep.”
“I’ll bet.”
“As you might expect, I didn’t touch that one. It was all Tom.”
Caroline laughed softly, then winced.
Jack rubbed her good shoulder. “Oh, sweetheart. I’m sorry. I won’t make any jokes.”
“How is that different from the way you usually are?”
“I’m glad to see the aftereffects of surgery have not dampened your wit,” he said, but his voice had an unmistakable edge.
“Is everyone really okay?”
He tucked her hair behind her ear. He seemed obsessed with having constant physical contact with her. She wasn’t about to complain about it, when it comforted her so effectively. It took him a moment to speak.
“It was not a fun evening. But Tom kept the girls reasonably calm. I did my best too. From what he told me, their flight was pretty rough, even though I assured him that your injuries weren’t life threatening.”
“Flight?”
“Tom took my jet up to Massena. He brought your children home from camp.”
Did he mention a jet? Privately owned aircraft had never come up in any of their conversations before. She must have misheard him. Probably the morphine. “You did that for them?”
Jack gave her a shy smile. “Your daughters are very important to me.”
They wouldn’t be the only ones affected by her injury. Caroline knew to ask about the usual suspects. Kathleen would be fine but everyone else was a question mark. “What about Chrissy? And Jen?”
He took a very long sip of coffee. “Katie and I had to convince her to change her dress and clean herself up a little before she saw the girls. She was not in a good place. Neither was Jen. You’ll probably need to hug them or something when they get here tomorrow morning.”
It didn’t hurt to ask. “Katie’s okay?”
He gripped the cup a little tighter. “She’ll be fine. Held most of us together, as I’m sure you expected. You had a lot of people checking on your condition, and she herded them all around since Jen was a little shaky.”
Caroline took a good look at him. His face was drawn and pale, almost gray. Had anyone checked on him? “How are you doing?” she asked.
Jack set the cup down and closed his eyes. It was a while before he opened them again. She could have sworn she saw his lip tremble. He turned away from her and cleared his throat before reaching over to squeeze her fingers.
“I am very, very glad to be here with you right now,” he said softly. He slid her hand in between both of his, careful to avoid the IV needle. “And I’m not going to waste this opportunity while I have it.”
“You don’t have to worry. I’m literally not going anywhere. I don’t have any clothes here and I think they’d notice me trying to escape.”
Jack didn’t laugh at her cheap attempt at humor. “Do you know why I was so mad at you about what you said about me during the campaign?”
He didn’t want to waste too much time with small talk, did he? Caroline leaned back into the fluffed up pillow on her hospital bed. She didn’t want to talk about that speech. Not now, not ever. “Jack-”
“Don’t, Caroline. I know what you’re going to say. I really have forgiven you for giving that speech. I mean it. And I