Blue Clouds (41 page)

As if the thought had conjured her, Pippa's voice soothed his ear. Eager to escape the nightmare, Seth quit struggling.

“Wake up, Seth. You're scaring everyone to death. I know you're in there. You won't let a little head banging stop you. I have to call Chad and tell him you're just fine. Don't make me lie.”

His pounding head couldn't translate all the words, but they sounded a hell of a lot better than his usual nightmare. Relaxing, concentrating, he sought the patience and soothing honey of Pippa's drawl slipping through what remained of his consciousness.

“I can't sing, Seth, so I can't use a siren song to wake you up. And reading you one of your books would scare me into nightmares, so I'd better not try that. I nag well, though. If you don't wake up soon, I'll stand here and nag until you wake just to get rid of me. Please, Seth, I promise not to tease you anymore. I'll be the world's most efficient assistant. I won't draw mustaches on your covers again. Just squeeze my hand so I know you're in there.”

He could hear the pleading in her voice. Pippa never pleaded. She ordered. She laughed. She yelled. She never pleaded.

Something wet and warm hit his bare arm.

Pippa was crying. He didn't like that. He'd seen her cry over Chad and it had scared him half to death. Why was Pippa crying? Was Chad ill?

The murky fog slowed his brain, but fear for Chad cut a channel through it. He sought a light at the end of the tunnel, anything, just let him out of here and back to Pippa, to Chad.

A gentle palm stroked his brow. Fingers clung to his hand, the hand he couldn't move. A cool, herbal fragrance wafted through his senses. Pippa. Pippa was here. It wasn't a new nightmare. He remembered that nightmare now. Natalie had been in it. Pippa had driven that nightmare away.

“If you don't wake up soon, I'll remove these blasted bars, and climb up there and sit on your chest, Seth Wyatt,” the voice said.

He heard the warning, although not the sense of the words. Tentatively, he wiggled his fingers, seeking Pippa's.

Two hands gripped his as her voice poured excitedly over him again.

“Yes! You're awake. You're there. Come on, Seth, you can do it. I can hear the rusty cogs of that brain of yours grinding. You don't want to leave Chad with Natalie and Darius, do you?”

A wheel clicked. Anger spurted straight through him with the icy blast of a fire hose.

He crushed Pippa's hand and jerked her toward him.

But as he tried to speak, his words failed him.

Tears streamed down Pippa's face. Not tears of relief. She knew too much about head injuries to believe Seth was out of the woods yet, even if he was in the best hospital in L.A. Tears of hope, maybe, just at feeling the life in his hands.

Carefully, she unwrapped the tie holding still the arm with the IV. Then she lowered the bar and sat on the bed beside him, still squeezing his hand. “Don't try too hard,” she whispered. “You need to rest. Would you like some water?”

He grimaced, and a rusty sound she recognized as “whiskey” grated past his lips.

She laughed with nervous relief. One hurdle cleared. He could still speak. Whiskey. Like Chad demanding Coke. Oh, damn, but she loved this miserable, cantankerous creature.

Which scared the hell out of her.

She leaned over and kissed his suntanned cheek anyway. “If a little wine can make you drunk, I'll not recommend whiskey.”

The hand she didn't hold reached up and grabbed a hank of her hair, pulling her toward him. Seth's eyes opened, and the bottom fell out of her stomach as she stared into stormy gray.

“Chad?” he demanded.

Pippa propped one elbow across the hospital gown covering his muscled chest. Releasing his hand, she stroked the tight line beside his mouth. “Chad's fine. He knows nothing about the accident. He's with Doug and Lillian right now.” She watched Seth's eyes cloud with confusion, and the pain of love within her ached even greater. She really had no sense whatsoever when it came to men. “You ran your car off the road and rammed your head when it flipped over. The Jag is mincemeat, you've twisted your ankle and bruised your ribs, but otherwise you're only banged up a little. Say prayers of thanksgiving for seat belts and air bags.”

He seemed to relax a little. He closed his eyes and tentatively lifted the arm with the IV bandage. “Get it off,” he demanded.

“You've been unconscious for nearly twelve hours. Maybe we should wait.” She wrapped his hand in hers again. “I don't want you conking out on me again. You scared us silly.”

He lay still again, watching her warily from beneath the white bandage covering his forehead. She'd lit only a small light in a far corner of the room so it wouldn't hurt his eyes. Shadows hid his expression, but she thought his mouth softened just a little bit as he looked at her.

“You're crying,” he accused.

She hadn't realized she was still at it. Hastily, she rubbed her sleeve across her cheeks. “I always cry when I'm scared,” she informed him haughtily.

A hint of a smile quivered at the corner of his mouth. “Then my book didn't scare you.”

Oh, damn, she wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. She wanted to throw herself into his arms and pour kisses across his battered face. She wanted to spill all the dizzying love and desire into words and cover the arrogant jerk with her prayers.

She sat up and tapped a warning finger on his chest. “Man- eating gophers don't scare me. Losing my gullible employer does. You need to start drinking liquids. Should I bring you some Coke?”

The ghost of a smile disappeared. “Call Dirk. And the police.”

Now that she'd reestablished the familiar security of their employer/employee relationship, she should feel less shaky, but if anything, the dizzying emotions inside her swirled faster. Biting her lower lip, Pippa hesitated. “How's your head? The nurses can't give you anything stronger than aspirin until you're conscious for a while.”

Wearily, Seth closed his eyes. “My brake lines were cut. Call the police, Pippa.”

The flatness of his voice terrified her, but she followed his orders. Pulling the phone into her lap, she dialed the operator, connected with the police, spoke with the detective on duty, and hung up. Recalling Dirk's number from the depths of her memory, she dialed that and left a message. It was nearly midnight. She didn't expect to hear from him anytime soon. Before she could return the phone to the nightstand, Seth's hand closed over hers.

“Call Doug. Tell him not to let anyone in the house.”

Starting to get scared, Pippa punched in Doug's private extension. He answered on the first ring.

“Seth's awake. He says it wasn't an accident. Keep everyone out.”

She held the receiver away from her head as Doug's expletives exploded in her ear. Even Seth could hear them. He took the phone away.

“Look, I'm remembering some of the night of the first accident. Shut up, Doug, and listen.” The voice on the other end quieted. “I remember a phone call, someone I knew telling me to meet them at that bar, but I can't remember the voice. I was annoyed and told them I had to pick up Chad and didn't have time for games. I vaguely remember whoever it was promising it would take only a few minutes. But listen, Doug, I do remember this—whoever it was never showed. I sat there nursing a beer, and no one ever came.”

Pippa couldn't hear Doug's end of the conversation, just the questioning tone. She wasn't certain she followed Seth's reasoning, but she sat quiet. He was awake and alert. She couldn't ask for anything else.

“No, I can't remember if the voice was male or female, but it was someone I knew. Shut up and let me work it out. My brakes were tampered with while I was at my lawyer's. Have the police check the car and look for witnesses. Maybe we can find a clue this time.”

Pippa held back a gasp. How many people knew he'd gone to L.A. to see his lawyer? Probably everybody in town if Lillian's driver complained about losing his day off.

“It fits the pattern, Doug,” Seth replied to some question on the other end. “Someone set me up at the bar thinking they could have the car tampered with then, but knowing I was picking up Chad and driving back on the coast road served their purpose better. I know it sounds crazy. If you come up with something better, be my guest. I just know I went to a bar where I'd never been before because someone I knew called me. Maybe they hoped I'd get drunk while waiting for them. I don't have a criminal mind, so I can't say. But I figure it gave someone time to find a place out on that road where they knew I'd have to drive after picking up Chad. They knew my routes. I remember the accident now, Doug. A car bumped me from behind, then sideswiped me while I tried to keep control. It was deliberate.”

Seth met Pippa's gaze without flinching. Lines of pain etched the corners of his mouth. He looked almost as drawn and haggard as he had the nights of Chad's fever. But certainty had burned off the clouds of fog that had been there earlier. He was alert and operating at full steam. He wasn't delirious. He was saying someone had run his car off a coastal road five years ago, and that someone had quite possibly attempted murder again since then.

Seth hung up the receiver and wearily leaned back against the pillow. Pippa removed the phone from his hand and set it back on the table.

The whole thing seemed unreal, like a scene from some TV movie. She wanted to check over her shoulder for ghosts, for an invisible danger she couldn't name. Instinct and training told her to calm the patient, persuade Seth to drink liquids, and keep him warm and comfortable. Instinct and training told her nothing about crazed murderers.

“You may be overreacting,” she said, trying to assuage his fears as well as her own. “Maybe you should just rest until morning, when your head will be clearer. You took a nasty blow. No one will bother us at this hour.”

“Call security, Pippa,” he warned, not opening his eyes. “The only reason I'm not throwing you out right this minute is because I want Doug staying with Chad and I don't have anyone else to see you home safely.”

Under protest, she called security. And then she rang for the night nurse to let her pour water down Seth. He wasn't her responsibility. Chad was.

While they waited, she turned out the light so Seth could open his eyes without hurting his head.

“Bring your chair over to the other side, away from the door,” he murmured in the dark. “And have them unhook this damned IV. I' m taking liquids on my own. I'll be healthier with my hands free.”

Security arrived shortly after the night nurse had disconnected the IV. Succinctly, Pippa gave the guard a rundown of Seth's fears. No hospital she knew of had sufficient security staffing. The man couldn't possibly park outside Seth's door all night. But she didn't tell Seth that.

After everyone left, she took the chair on the far side of his bed and wrapped her hand around Seth's. He didn't protest the gesture. Perhaps, if he were feeling better, he would have told her he could take care of himself and didn't need nursing. But right now, he held her hand as if he needed it as much as she needed to hold his.

***

A strand of hair tickled Seth's nose and he rubbed impatiently at it before complete awareness set in. As sleep slowly ebbed, he became conscious of soft warm breath on his cheek and a faint scent of herbal soap. Smiling at a memory, he blinked and gingerly turned his head.

Pippa had managed to curl awkwardly in her chair and fall asleep with her head pillowed on her arm on the mattress beside him. He could barely see her face for the fall of thick hair. A strange warmth surged through him at the sight, and the protective tendencies she had cursed awakened stronger than ever. He hated disturbing her, but he didn't think hospitals had changed that much since his last prolonged stay. The racket of rubber wheels rolling down the hall warned morning had arrived.

He pushed a dark strand of hair from her face and brushed her cheek with his finger. “Up and at 'em, sleepyhead,” he murmured. Raising Chad had taught him a thing or two about tenderness, he supposed. Why he should feel it toward this tenacious gnat, he couldn't say. He'd ponder it sometime when he had less important things on his mind.

She stirred sleepily. “Go 'way.” She pushed at the hair tickling her chin.

“I think we're about to have visitors. Do you want to be caught sleeping on the job? In your patient's bed?”

That brought her head up. Blinking to clear the sleep from her eyes, she glared at him. “I'm not sleeping in your bed.”

“Are too,” he answered wickedly, drinking in the sight of a sleepy Pippa, hair mussed and one cheek as creased as the sleeve she'd slept on.

Long lashes flapped dangerously as she studied him, declining to respond to his foolishness. Suddenly, as if the sun had just risen over the horizon, a sultry smile formed along her lips.

“I take it you're feeling better this morning?”

Oh, damn, he didn't know what that smile had shot him full of, but it burst into a thousand fireworks beneath his skin, and he couldn't drag his gaze away. Seth focused on her mouth, those luscious lips that taunted him with their closeness. “Feeling better than what, is the relevant question,” he managed to reply, but he didn't have a single thought in his head beyond the desire to have those lips on his.