Drained (Edgars Family #6) - Suzanne Ferrell Page 0,8

time she ended with coughing and wheezing, almost unable to catch her breath. Brianna exchanged a concern look with Aaron, who nodded towards the door.

Once they’d locked up and were in the car Brianna sat in the back with Stanley in her lap, while Paula sat up front where the heater could warm her as Aaron drove them west to St. Vincent’s. He parked in the lot outside the hospital, then turned to face both Brianna and Paula.

“You guys wait here,” he said and was out the door, leaving the car running.

“Your…boyfriend…is…nice,” Paula said.

“Oh, no. Aaron isn’t my…I mean, he’s a friend, but we’re not…” Brianna realized she was sputtering and acting way too defensive. She stopped to take a deep breath before explaining. “Aaron is a police detective who helped me a few years ago. Since then, well, we’ve become friends and he’s one of the few people I trust, especially when I think another friend might be in serious trouble.”

“I…get…it.” Paula’s wheezing seemed to be getting worse and she leaned back against the seat, the simple act of talking exhausting her. “He…is…nice…though.”

“Yes, he is.”

“And…handsome.”

Brianna nodded. “Yes, he’s that, too.”

“And…sexy.” Paula giggled, then quickly started coughing.

Before Brianna could answer that statement, thankfully Aaron returned with an orderly pushing a wheelchair. He opened the front passenger door, once again scooped up the non-protesting Paula and deposited her in the wheelchair, while Brianna managed to scramble out of the back with Stanley and both her and Paula’s bags.

Aaron reached for the dog leash and nodded to the orderly pushing Paula towards the ER entrance. “You go with your friend. I’ll take Stanley to take care of his business before we join you.”

Brianna paused. “Oh, I don’t think they’ll let him inside.”

“Already cleared it with the charge nurse. It’s amazing what rules people will be willing to bend when they know you’re a cop.”

She opened her mouth to ask more questions, but he stopped her, leaning past her to grab one of the bottles of water she kept in a case in her backseat. “We’ll talk about it inside. Right now, your friend needs someone with her. Given her history, this can’t be easy for her.”

He was right. Paula needed her and her questions could wait. She hurried to the hospital entrance, glancing back to see Aaron squatting down and offering the pup a drink of water from the bottle. Paula was right. Aaron was a nice man. And if she let herself think about it, he was sexy, too. Problem was, she’d been fooled once before by a handsome, sexy man and almost died.

Being friends with Aaron was one thing. Trusting him with more than that? She wasn’t ready to take the chance.

4

Once Stanley finished his outdoor business and could be trusted indoors, Aaron picked him up and carried him into the ER, past the triage nurse’s desk and straight into the private room where he’d asked them to put Paula. Brianna sat in one of the two plastic straight-back chairs against the wall. The center of the room was completely empty.

“They took her to get her chest x-rayed,” she said, looking up from the smart phone she was tapping away on as he came through the door.

He took the seat beside her and set Stanley on the floor on the other side. “Stay,” he said with one stern look at the dog, who curled up on the cool tiles, but otherwise didn’t move. He reached in his pocket and handed the dog a treat.

“Paula’s right. He likes you,” Brianna said. She didn’t smile, but he could hear it in her words.

“I told the charge nurse he’d behave. I’m just making sure he knows that, too. So how’s Paula doing?”

“They whisked her right in here and started asking questions. One of the nurses listened to her chest with a stethoscope and suddenly people were coming and going. They started an IV and drew blood. It was very cool that they could do that with only one stick.”

“How’d you feel about that?” he asked, meeting her blue-eyed gaze and seeing the shadow flit across her face.

She inhaled and slowly let the air out. “I have to confess, it was hard watching the rapid-fire chaos, even from a spectator’s perspective. It brought back some bad memories of the night they airlifted me to the hospital. I never thanked you for being with me through the trip there and those first few hours.” She reached out and squeezed his hand briefly, leaving a warm