Serious Cowboy (Cowboys of Duncan Ranch #2)

Chapter 14

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

After a week, Zeke’s condition stabilized, and they moved him out of the ICU. He still hadn’t awakened, but this change to a different room meant that Callie could now go in to see him. At first, she’d been staggered by his appearance.

His face had been bruised that it looked like he’d gone one-on-one with a prize fighter. He wore one of those neck braces and had a cast on his left leg from his hip to his ankle. The break in his thigh bone had been so severe that they’d had to add screws and pins, and once he could get up and around, he’d require physical therapy just to walk again.

If he could get up and around again.

But no, he would. She was convinced of it. She refused to believe anything else.

Every single day, she’d drag over one of those awful plastic chairs and sit next to him. At first, she’d been nervous about touching him—it looked like any physical contact might be painful—but eventually, she couldn’t stand not having some sort of confirmation that he was still in there. She reached for his hand first, it was bruised too, but not as severely as his face.

His fingers were warm, and this simple sign of life nearly made her lose it all over again.

Then, she spoke to him. “Zeke, it’s me. It’s Callie. Just wanted to let you know I’m here. I hope you don’t mind.” She swallowed. “So, you’ve been here a week now, but you need to wake up. The weather will be warming up, and you don’t want to miss that. The flowers will be blooming soon.”

As the days progressed, she let more and more intimate details enter their one-sided discussions.

“I found out more about Maria. And your lost baby. I’m sorry, and I promise I didn’t go snooping, but Erika said you were in school together, and she knew about it. Don’t be mad at her for telling me, okay. I’m sure she didn’t know you wanted that kept under wraps. Just like I didn’t know. I care about you a lot, and I hope we get another chance—that I get another chance—to prove that to you.”

Another five days passed with him remaining in his coma, but Callie kept showing up anyway. She stayed as long as she could each day, but she wanted to be there for him even if he might not be aware of her presence. To make sure she didn’t leave the pediatric practice high and dry, she brought her laptop and worked from the hospital when she wasn’t checking in on Zeke. Tim was supportive of her need to be there even though they were broken up.

After that first day, his parents made their exit with his dad showing up one more time, and his mom twice. Tim or Amanda came every other day or so, but only Callie was there every day for the duration.

She’d been asleep on this cushioned bench in the closest waiting area to his room when a commotion awakened her. It was about four in the morning and pitch dark outside the windows. But several members of the medical staff had started to race through the hallway. And their destination was Zeke’s room.

Heart in her throat, she hurried behind them.

“What is it?” Had he flatlined? Had something gone horribly wrong?

With his room full of hospital personnel, she stood right outside, waiting for news on pins and needles. A few minutes later a nurse named Martha stepped out and saw Callie standing there. All the staff knew her at this point.

“He woke up, Callie,” the nurse sounded so grave. “But he’s tremendously disoriented.”

“He woke up?” Callie echoed, hardly daring to believe it.

“Yes, but he’s out of it.”

“That’s understandable, I would think.”

They stepped forward to stand in the doorway which allowed Callie to overhear what was being said.

“Sir? Sir, can you look at me?” a man in blue scrubs was asking Zeke. “Good. Now, can you tell me your name?”

“Name?” he rasped out, his expression one of total bewilderment.

“How about what month it is?”

Zeke merely blinked at him.

“What color is my shirt?”

Very slowly, Zeke spoke, the word sounding like a question. “Blue?”

“Excellent. Good job. Okay, can you read my nametag?”

“Henry.” Zeke still sounded unsure.

“Yes. Perfect, buddy.” Henry patted his patient’s arm in encouragement.

Callie felt encouraged, too. Right up until Henry pivoted toward her, and asked Zeke one more inquiry. “Can you tell me who this lady is?”

Zeke peered at her, studying her closely. But his gaze was almost blank. Uncomprehending. There was no recognition in it whatsoever.

“No. Do I know her?”

And Callie felt like falling straight through the tile floor.

Amnesia. That was the official diagnosis.

No one could tell her whether the condition would be temporary or permanent, and for the next several hours, Zeke disappeared from the room frequently as they ran a battery of tests. Callie debated on if she should return to see him or not. If visiting Zeke only served to puzzle him, maybe she should give him some time away from her presence.

But upon hearing this, Martha offered her an opposing view. “Most forms of amnesia are temporary. I would recommend sharing your time with him. Just don’t expect much, at first. And be patient.” Oh no! Patience is required again. She was determined to give Zeke all the patience he needed no matter what it took for her to give it to him.

Callie did as Martha recommended. It felt surreal to enter that room and have the man she had such strong feelings for eye Callie without knowing her, but she couldn’t give up on him. She refused to.

“Hi, Zeke,” she said, doing her best to be bright. “How are you this evening?”

“Doing okay, I guess.”

She jaunted across the room to straighten the floral arrangements and plants along his windowsill, needing something to do with her hands. On a whiteboard in his eyeline someone had printed out his first and last name, the month, day, and year, his age, and the nurse on duty. The name written there now was red rather than the black of the rest of the whiteboard, denoting that a change of shift had occurred.

An orderly pushing a cart full of dinner meals strode in. “Hello there, Mr. Knight. You’re supposed to be on liquids today.”

Callie knew he’d been receiving all his nourishment intravenously. He’d been given a bowl of some kind of creamy soup, apple sauce, lime Jell-O, and a drink with a straw. Once the orderly set his tray on the little table on wheels, he left without fanfare.

Zeke peeked at his dinner, making a slight smacking noise with his lips. Callie tried not to think about how she’d kissed those lips more than once. Mainly because she didn’t know if he’d ever remember what she did.

Zeke attempted to bring the tabletop over his bed but struggled. “Man, I’m as weak as a kitten.”

Automatically, Callie bustled over to situate it for him. “Being out of commission for a couple of weeks will do that to anybody.” He moved again, this time wincing. “Are you sore?”

He squeezed his eyes closed. “Some.”

Two weeks was far from enough time to heal after the devastating nature of his injuries, and with two surgeries… She twisted toward the door. “Need me to get someone?”

“I… I’ll be all right.”

She made her tone stern. “Don’t you go all macho on me. If you need some pain meds, be honest with me.”

Dropping his chin to his chest. “Yeah, okay. Pain meds might be good.”

Callie clicked the nurse button, and let Gary, the one on duty, know what Zeke needed.

“Yeah, looks like he’s due, anyway. Be right there.”

After pumping a syringe of liquid into his IV, the pinched look on Zeke’s poor battered features smoothed out some.

“Better?” she asked him.

“Better.”

“Ready to try to eat?”

She didn’t know why, but his ability to get down some food seemed vital to her. Like, if he could do that, the healing process would legitimately begin. Callie didn’t even know how much truth to that there might be, but it would at least make her feel as if she were helping.

Tentatively, he scooted the drink toward himself. Rather than lift it, he simply tilted toward his mouth. But he did succeed in sipping whatever it was down. He even answered her question without her having to ask.

“Iced tea.”

“Is it good?”

“Meh,” he said, performing a shrug, then immediately stilled as if even that small motion hurt. She hated this for him so much.

It could be worse , she reminded herself. It could always be worse.

He tried the soup, which he didn’t like since it’d grown cold. But he did eat most of the apple sauce and Jell-O. To her, this was a huge win.

“Look at you getting all of that down. I’m proud of you,” she told him, and to her surprise, he actually smiled as if hearing her encouragement mattered to him.

“Are you…” His pause nearly shattered her. “Do you work here?”

“No. I work with my brother, Tim Blum.” She watched him to note if he made any signs of being familiar with that name, but his expression didn’t light up. It was as if she’d told him her brother was a traffic sign. Oh, well. “I’m Callie Blum.”

Again, she scanned his expression for even a glimmer of something that said he knew who she was, but there was nothing. Except…

“You were here earlier. You were here when I woke up.”

She forced a smile. “That’s right.”

“Do we know each other?”

Callie tried to hide how much of a knife in the gut that felt like. “We do. We’re… friends.”

“Okay.”

Then she remembered what the doctor had said. He told her to be honest with Zeke when he asked questions. He would need to truth to start remembering.

“Um, we’re definitely friends, but we also were dating.” She looked him in the eyes to try to tell how he took that bit of news. He blinked several times but didn’t respond to that part of the info.

And on it went.

Over the following week and a half, she stayed with him, spending most of her daylight hours at the hospital. Now that he wasn’t in imminent danger of perishing, she remained in her hotel room at night, but when Tim asked her how much longer she’d be gone, she requested an extension.

“I know this isn’t convenient, but I can’t leave him. Not yet.”

Her brother shocked her with his calm response. “No biggie. We’ll work it out.”

Gradually, as a psychologist came to visit, how much of his memory he still might have started to be explored. Initially, he shared memories of his childhood, many incidents that he’d had at school—mostly innocuous—that Callie had never heard. But then, he mentioned his parents and their fighting.

“I don’t know why they stay together when they can’t get along,” he said one day, and Callie ached for him.

He talked about his teenage years, about teachers he liked or disliked, about projects he completed. Zeke became more animated as he discussed those.

“I made this working train set out of matchsticks and used a battery to engage the engine. It even had tracks for it and everything.”

“And it worked?” the psychologist, Dr. Demas asked him.

“Oh, yeah,” he said, his midnight blue eyes sparkling. “Totally.”

Zeke still became worn out incredibly easily and took at least two naps a day. Martha told Callie that was normal for any patient recovering from a physical trauma.

“And with added memory loss, that saps him of even more energy.”

Sometimes Callie would hang out when he slept, but oftentimes, she’d go have lunch or even a nap at her hotel room. And sometimes she needed to work. But she always returned and remained at the hospital throughout the day, afraid that her missing any time might hamper his progress. Zeke was improving, but it was by inches.

On the tenth day after he’d regained consciousness, she’d been strolling down the hallway, and when she noticed that his lights were still out, paused long enough to answer a text from her BFF.

Daisy : How’s your man’s recovery going?

Callie : Slowly but surely.

In actuality, it felt much more like it’d been occurring at a snail’s pace. Some days it was harder to be patient than others.

That was when she heard a groan, followed by a shout of, “No. No, no, no …”

Sprinting down that hallway, she whipped herself into his room, flipping on the lights as she did. He flinched away from the harsh overhead lighting, so she moved to his bed and turned the much dimmer one over his bed on instead.

“What is it, Zeke? Are you in pain?” But one glance at him said that he was. No, not just pain but agony.

“Maria,” he mumbled, his voice full of horror. “Did she really die?”

Cassie froze solid. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t blink, couldn’t move.

“She… she was my wife, but… I think I remember her dying. In childbirth with Hadley, our baby girl. And the baby… Hadley died, too. Is that right? Tell me that’s not actually what happened. Please …” His voice broke on the last word, but he deserved to know the truth.

“I’m so sorry, Zeke, but yeah, that’s what happened.”

A howl of despair poured out of him that sounded more like a wounded animal than a human, and Cassie broke free of her paralysis to hold him in her arms. His pained cry caused the nurse on duty to running into his room, but Callie waved her off, even as sobs broke from Zeke like a tidal wave of sorrow.

Cassie sat with him, gently rocking him for the next hour until he literally cried himself back to sleep, the grief that had flowed out utterly exhausting him on every level. Since it was late afternoon and he’d been sleeping as long as twelve hours at a time, she collected her things and went to her hotel.

She’d shed a couple of tears just listening to him because it was impossible not to be affected by someone she cared about experiencing that degree of anguish. The loss of his wife and little girl had been so enormous, so significant to the rest of his life. To relive it now as if for the first time must’ve been awful.

Callie felt a little fearful of the impact it would have when she entered the hospital the subsequent morning. Ever since she’d known him, he’d been this silent pillar of stoicism, rarely if ever showing emotion. Would he clam up now? Not want her around? Would he act ashamed or embarrassed?

Would he reject her altogether and order her not to come back?