Explosive Attraction - By Lena Diaz Page 0,74
were both extremely lucky.”
“You do realize I was stabbed, right?” Nick asked in a grumbling tone.
“So was Rafe. In his arm and his chest.”
Nick snorted. “He had a scratch across his ribs, hardly a stab wound. He might have gotten more stitches than me, but I’m the one who had a knife in the gut.” He grinned. “I know what will make me feel better, though. Come here, Darby.”
She started to cross to him but Rafe grabbed her hand. “I don’t think so.”
Darby glanced between the two brothers, wondering what she’d missed. Rafe glared at Nick. Nick looked as though he was about to burst into laughter.
“Well, I...ah, wanted to thank you,” she told Rafe.
He raised a brow. “Thank me?”
Why was he making this so hard? “Yes, thank you. You saved me, again. You’ve risked your life countless times for me now. I’ll never be able to repay you for that.”
His jaw tightened. “I don’t want your gratitude.”
“You don’t?”
“No, I don’t. I want—”
A knock sounded on the door. It opened to reveal a petite woman, the same woman Darby had seen in the pictures on Nick’s bookshelf. Rafe and Nick’s mother.
The woman let out an excited shriek. “They’re both in here. Come on.” She waved her hand and the room seemed to fill all at once with people talking and laughing and crying.
More people poured into the room, and Darby found herself pushed back to the corner by the door. She waited through the tears and hugs, trying to catch a glimpse of Rafe again, but there were too many people. And as usual, everyone around her was taller than she was.
Maybe it was better this way. No prolonged goodbye. No awkward conversation.
She pulled the door open and stepped into the hall. Her feet dragged, even though she should have been relieved to leave. This hospital held no good memories for her. Rafe didn’t need her. And Mindy... Darby swallowed against the tightness in her throat. Poor Mindy had a long, hard recovery ahead of her and had been moved to a rehab facility. There was no reason for Darby to want to stay.
She moved toward the elevators at the end of the hall. But when she passed one of the waiting rooms, a familiar voice had her pausing at the doorway.
Jake.
He was wearing his hospital gown because he was still a patient. Was he sitting in the waiting room, working up his nerve to see Rafe? Darby stiffened when she realized who was sitting beside Jake—the reporter Robert Ellington. The same reporter whose sloppy reporting had poisoned the relationship between Jake and Rafe.
Darby marched into the waiting room.
Five minutes later, she stepped out the door, feeling very satisfied with how things had turned out. She stopped at the elevator. When the doors opened, Captain Buresh was standing there.
He smiled and shook her hand. “Dr. Steele. Going home already?”
Home. A week ago that would have sounded good. Today it just sounded...lonely. “I guess I am. Thank you for everything.”
“Wait a minute. I have something for you. I was hoping to catch you.” He dug into his jacket pocket and pulled out a sheaf of papers.
“What is this?” Darby asked.
“Rafe called when you two were at his cabin. He asked if I could have one of the guys look up something for him. With everything going on, I forgot about it, but he called me this morning before the sun came up and asked me whether I had the information yet. So here I am.” He handed the papers to her. “You take care, Dr. Steele.” He saluted her and headed down the hall, toward Nick and Rafe’s hospital room.
More than anything Darby wanted to follow him, to see Rafe one more time. Instead, she shoved the papers into her purse and stepped into the elevator.
Once she was in her car, she took the papers out, curious what Rafe had thought was so important that he’d called Buresh about it this morning.
She unfolded the stack, and immediately stilled. The first page was a photocopy of an old newspaper story. The headline read Local Girl Found in Well After Exhaustive Search. And underneath it was a picture of her, twenty-six years ago.
Search? She didn’t remember anyone searching for her. And they hadn’t found her. She’d clawed her own way out.
Hadn’t she?
She scanned the story, and the next one, and the next one, and by the time she was done, tears were flowing down her face so hard she couldn’t see to read