Presently Fo came out and tried to get her to speak to him. Even with him talking to her it was several minutes before she was able to get herself even partially under control. Fo went to touch her on the shoulder to get her to look up at him and she winced and started to cry harder all over again. Whatever Tyree had done to her shoulder was excruciatingly painful and she cried all the harder when they tried to ask her just what had happened.
Finally, Luke sat on the edge of the feeder and pulled her right onto his lap and tipped her chin up and said gently, "Charlie, you're okay now. I've got you. Fo's right here. Calm down and get control of yourself. You're okay." He put a big hand softly on her hair and pulled her head against his shoulder again. "You're okay. We've got you. You're okay."
Somehow his direct bluntness, and his telling her she was okay over and over made it through, and she was able to nod and pull herself together somewhat. She wiped her tears and looked up and then closed her eyes and concentrated on taking several deep breaths to steady herself. When she opened them, Richard and several more of the hands were there and Luke and Fo were both looking at her intently. Gently Luke asked her the same question he had started out with, "Are you all right?" She nodded. "Are you hurt?" She nodded again.
With her good arm, she tried to push away and Luke helped her to stand up. They bumped her other arm and she winced again. "Something is wrong with my shoulder. He was pulling on it so hard." She felt her lip quiver again and Luke reached a hand for her other shoulder.
"You're okay, Charlie." She looked up into his eyes and took another deep breath and turned away from them as the tears welled in her eyes again. Luke reached for her good arm and he and Fo led her away from the crowd that had gathered.
Richard and Tuckett came up to them and Richard said, "A deputy Sheriff will be here in a few minutes." He looked at Charlie. "Are you up to answering questions?"
She nodded through the tears she couldn’t seem to stem and Luke said quietly, "He hurt her shoulder. After she talks to the Sheriff, we need to take her in to the emergency room."
Richard looked at her with the saddest eyes, "I'm so sorry about this Charlie. I never dreamed you weren't safe right here in the ranch yard. I'm so sorry."
Looking up at him, she shook her head and tried to tell him without her voice cracking, "This wasn't your fault Richard. And I'm okay." She glanced over at Luke and he met her eyes and reached up to gently wipe the tears from her cheek. She turned back to Richard. "While the police are here can we have them search Tyree's stuff and bust his butt for possession as well and get rid of him for a good long time?"
"You can be sure we will." Almost as one, the four of them turned and looked at Tuckett and he looked down.
Charlie sighed as she struggled not to cry. He glanced up at her again and she said tiredly, "I'm disappointed in you, Tuckett. You're smarter than to smoke. Especially drugs. If my shoulder wasn't so hurt I'd trounce you right this minute. As it is, I have about half a mind to haul your butt off to jail too."
Richard added, "I may do it for you Charlie. It would about be what he deserves. Tuckett Lawrence Langston, if you ever pull something like that again there will be repercussions you'll regret for the rest of forever."
Tuckett looked up at Richard and then at the rest of them. "It'll never happen again, I promise, Dad. I didn't even really want to do it anyway. I should never have hung out around Tyree." He turned to Charlie. "I'm sorry about tonight Charlie. I had no idea he would hurt someone like this. I'm sorry we didn't get here sooner."
She reached up and patted his face with her good hand and said as her tears began to fall again, "It's okay, Tuck. Just don't ever do something that could hurt you so, so much ever again. You're too good a kid to get caught up in a mess like drugs."
The sheriff showed up then and Fo and Luke stood by her as she answered his questions. Fo was horrified and Luke was furious when she glanced at them and then haltingly told the deputy the things Tyree had been threatening to do to her. She could feel the anger roll off of Luke. She was glad Tyree was already locked into the back of the squad car so Luke couldn’t get at him and wondered if he was mad at her as well.
By the time she had answered the sheriff’s questions it was after one o'clock in the morning, and her shoulder was hurting her so badly she could hardly take a deep breath. Luke and Fo saw the officer off and then gently helped her load in to run in to the emergency room to have it checked.
It was her left arm and as they went to pull out, she said tiredly, "You guys both have to work in the morning. I can run myself in. I can drive fine with my right arm." Both of them looked at her as if she was on drugs herself and she said, "Then at least one of you stay here. I don't need both of you."
They talked about it for a minute, and because Fo was the one that had to be in to the very hospital they were headed to the next morning at seven, he got voted to go to bed while Luke took her in. They pulled out and down the gravel road in the deep darkness of early morning and she tried not to wince when he hit a chuckhole. He turned the radio on low and she tried to focus on the music to forget the pain and prayed this trip would go quickly.
The hospital was on the near edge of town and Charlie had never been so thankful for a gentle, steady, strong arm to help her out of the truck in her life. Once inside, the attending physician asked her how she was feeling. When she started to cry again as she hesitantly admitted that she was miserable, Luke put an arm around her shoulders. The doctor hooked her up to an IV and gave her a dose of morphine for the pain even before he sent her to have an MRI taken of her shoulder. The pain relief was so welcome and she was so tired and upset that as soon as the pain subsided, she closed her eyes and went to sleep on the exam bed while Luke stood beside her.
The next thing she could remember, Luke was trying to wake her up to load her back into his truck in the parking lot. On the way home, he started to explain to her what the doctor had said, but then he was waking her up in front of the main ranch house to bring her inside. He brought her one of Angela's silky night gowns that she could get on over the sling they'd put her arm in and then helped her into a vacant guest room. He sent her to bed with the promise that someone would check on her if she needed anything in the night.
****
It was dark. Someone was there. She knew that Tyree was there, but she couldn’t get the light to go on, or move to run. No sound would come out as he suddenly grabbed her. She tried to scream. There was no sound but that of her terrifying struggle. She hit him with the bottle, over and over, but he only laughed and wrenched on her shoulder and she couldn’t scream. She couldn’t scream.
Luke’s quiet voice cut through the fear and his touch helped her to wake up and realize that it was just a nightmare. Pulling her to sit up, Luke sat right on the bed to hug her, telling her over and over that she was okay and that he would be there to protect her. She closed her eyes and clung to him as tried to calm herself. It was only a dream. Luke was here and Tyree wasn’t. She was safe. Luke was here.
With a shuddering breath, she could feel herself calm and settle back into the cottony oblivion of the medicine. Luke was here. He would protect her from Tyree.
In the middle of the night, she woke again and at first didn't know where she was. Between the pain and the strange place and the half awake flashbacks of the night before, just for a few moments she was horribly frightened and cried out. Luke answered her. The sounds of both her voice and his were intensely comforting after so many times trying to scream without being able to.
Struggling to wake, she sat up and put a hand to her chest. She tried to will her heart to stop pounding and her breathing to slow as she realized again that Luke was right there with her in the chair beside her bed.
He touched her and spoke to her quietly, then stood up next to her bed and pulled her over to lean against his chest until her heart quit racing so. He was telling her she was okay again and after a second, she laid back and calmed down, knowing she was fine with him there beside her. Part of it must have been whatever they had given her at the hospital the night before because she wasn't usually the type to be afraid like this.
The pain was brutal again and when she finally was aware of where she was, she went to get up to go to the kitchen to take something. He stopped her with his voice low there in the dark and asked where she was headed.
She let out a big breath. "I have to go take some ibuprofen. I'm dying, Luke." She stood up and then staggered slightly and leaned against the wall for a second while she got her balance.
Reaching for her good elbow, he gently pulled her back. "You get back in the bed and I'll bring you one of the pain pills they sent with you last night."
Absolutely grateful for his gentle care, she carefully eased back onto the mattress. "Thank you, Luke. You're a saint, do you know that?"
A few minutes later when he came back, he handed her a glass of milk and a pill and a couple of pieces of cheese and some crackers on a small plate. "You're going to need to eat with it or it might make you sick." She took it and within only a few minutes she could begin to feel that wonderful weightlessness that helped to ease the pain.
She knew he was still awake with her and when it had dulled to an ache, she tried to turn on her side with a sigh of relief. "Thank you, Luke. For everything. Good night."
When he knew Charlie was finally sleeping soundly with the pain under control, Luke got up and went to the great room and stretched out on the couch. It was four-fifty in the morning, and though he had cat napped the last couple of hours beside her bed in the recliner, it had been an incredibly long day. And what an amazing day! If only Charlie hadn’t been so harmed.
This morning he'd been engaged and had thought someday he'd end up a CPA off in a city somewhere. After his talk with his dad this evening, he now knew the whole ranch would be left in his own hands one day. He wouldn't be the only owner, but he would be the only one in charge of its stewardship and the feeling that gave him in his heart couldn't even be explained. This land was in his blood and he loved it to his very soul. The thought of someday leaving it had made him heartsick.
And as much as he cared about Lindie, knowing that someday he'd be free to marry someone he chose was like releasing him from a lifetime of bondage. Only knowing what Tuckett had been caught up in, and the fact that Charlie had been assaulted could taint the sweet taste of happiness and freedom he'd been given last night. It made him feel guilty to be so grateful when she was hurt and had been so scared earlier. And he still wanted to string Tyree up. He had to fight down the urge to destroy Tyree every time the attack entered his head.
He thought back to that afternoon weeks ago when he'd picked up the phone to hear Charlie's sweet voice saying something about her mother being a tough bird when she'd called to talk to his dad about coming. He'd had no idea then that that funny phone call would change all of their lives in such a huge way. From the very second she'd shown up here everything seemed to shift in a positive direction. She had to be the most dynamic and yet real girl he'd ever met and he enjoyed her thoroughly.
He considered how he had felt when he'd realized she and Fo weren't a couple. Then that knowledge had been incredibly frustrating because of his commitment to Lindie. Tonight, so much had happened so soon after they had decided to call off getting married that he hadn't even had a chance to explore his feelings, but nothing had ever felt so right as the hug he had given Charlie tonight when she was so scared and hurt.
Thinking again of what had happened with Tyree made him feel sad and angry all over again, but it had been a sweet balm to that sadness to be able to help her at the hospital and then here at the house tonight. Even hurt and drugged, she was good and kind and grateful and he was pretty sure he'd been permanently swept off his feet by a happy, quirky girl with long legs and blonde curls. Now he just had to figure out how his whole family could continue to function when she went off to law school this fall. He wasn't sure any of them could live without her anymore.
****
Charlie knew the little girls were here with her, but it was hard to cut through the chemicals in her brain that made her so woozy to tell them good morning. She could hear both Madge and Richard quietly encouraging them to let her rest and then she heard Jamie's cute little voice, but she was so tired. After a while she heard Luke's low, sexy voice and even this out of it she could hear the fatigue in it. He had taken such good care of her last night when she was hurt. The attraction she'd been trying to forget all these weeks had blossomed last night into something warm and sweet that made her want to smile even with her pain medicine and the frightening memories. He was a truly good, truly gorgeous man.
****
She had no idea what time of day it was when she finally woke up. It felt like morning, but the sunshine slanting through the blinds wasn't right somehow. And there were no birds. There were usually tons of birds singing in the morning. She groaned and pulled herself upright and began looking around for her clothes. She could remember Luke handing her Angela's night gown, but that was about it and she really didn't want to parade around the house in it.
The throbbing from her shoulder that had finally woken her ratcheted right up to full blown pain when she sat up, and she decided she'd waltz into the kitchen as is anyway to find some pain medicine. Just as she was about to step out into the hall, she glanced into the adjoining bathroom and saw her clothes. She was relieved until she actually got in there and went to put them on. In the ruckus last night, she'd forgotten she'd been showered in pig milk replacer, not to mention having handled multiple piglets. Her clothes were covered with sticky white spots and smelled like a barn yard.