fighting to the very end, because that’s what he did, he fought. Always.
“Never give up,” he muttered.
Drugs, weariness and pain all weighed on him, pushing him down toward oblivion, but he struggled to stay awake, to stay in control.
“I can do this,” he told himself, trying to believe that he could survive yet another setback. He had already survived more pain, disappointment and loss than many people knew in a lifetime. But this…this could be the end.
“It’s all right,” a voice whispered. “Just relax.”
For a moment, he was confused. Was that his mother’s voice? Aunt Lianna’s? No, of course not. She hadn’t spoken to him since Nick’s death.
A man’s deep voice said, “Doesn’t look like he’s been doing too well.”
Stephen roused, wondering when his father had come. “I’ll do better,” he vowed. “I’m not a pansy,” he insisted, shaking his head. “Not a mama’s boy. I can do it.”
“Yes,” said that sweet voice in his ear. “You can do it. You are doing it. Rest now. Just rest.” Gentle hands pushed him down. Relief swept through him.
Rest. He could rest now. Tomorrow was soon enough to get back on his skates. Tomorrow he would prove himself. Again. But first, he would rest. Gratefully, he sank into unconsciousness.
When he woke again—it might have been minutes or hours later—they were off-loading him from the ambulance, and Kaylie Chatam was there, her small, delicate, feminine hand clasping his.
“I was dreaming,” he muttered.
The smile that she rained down on him warmed every tiny corner of his heart.
“I know,” she said sweetly. “I know. We’re going to do something about that.”
A pair of shapeless green scrubs and a working knowledge of the local hospital granted a gratifying amount of access in a process that might otherwise have relegated Kaylie to the role of distant observer. Instead, she’d been allowed to accompany Stephen in the ambulance. His mutterings had broken her heart, but she didn’t have time to really think about what they had revealed.
As promised, she spoke to the EMT crew before they departed for their station, making it clear how important confidentiality was in this instance. They joked that they would avoid risking their careers for the price of autographs.
“Sure, sure,” Stephen responded groggily. “Game tickets even.”
“But later,” she insisted to a quartet of smiling male faces. “We’ll be in touch.”
Thankfully, no one questioned her right to stay at Stephen’s side. The emergency room physician was too concerned with Stephen’s physical condition to care about such things. He was not someone Kaylie knew well, but he seemed to accept her presence without question and allowed her to provide the necessary information pertaining to previous injuries and prescription drugs.
No one said a contrary word when she accompanied Stephen to X-ray, not even when she squeezed into the lead-shielded operations niche with the technician or studied the developed pictures. Every time she returned to Stephen’s side, his hand groped for hers, and she always gave it to him, understanding well that she had become, by sheer default, his lifeline in this situation.
While they waited for the doctor to report his findings, Stephen blearily asked her to tell him what to expect. She could have put him off with medical mumbo jumbo or disclaimers about her personal expertise, but she chose instead to give him the truth.
“I think you’re looking at surgery, Stephen. There’s a new break above the cast, and the old break appears to have been dislocated. It looked to me like you have some fragmenting there. That sometimes means a shortening of the bone.”
What color remained in his face drained away, and the grip on her fingers became almost punishing. “So it really could be the end of everything,” he rumbled.
“Of course it’s not the end of everything,” she told him firmly. “Many people naturally have one leg that’s slightly longer than the other. Most don’t even know it. Few doctors even try to treat it if the discrepancy is less than three centimeters.”
“Three centimeters,” he echoed hollowly. “As little as three centimeters and I might never skate again. Oh, God.”
“At least you’re looking in the right direction for help,” Kaylie told him, bending close and smiling indulgently. She was discovering that the man beneath the tough exterior had fears and concerns like any other and that he responded to a compassionate touch with a silent, secret hunger that clutched at her heart. “Would you like to pray about it?”
His gray eyes, foggy and bleak now, plumbed hers. “I—I don’t think I know how.