A Baby on His Doorstep Read online

  “I’ll set the phone on your tray table,” Nurse Murphy said. After doing so she took the cap off a syringe, swabbed Rio’s upper arm and administered the drug.

  “Don’t they have pain pills? I hate sh-shlots,” he muttered. But clearly his ability to speak was already compromised.

  * * *

  AT TWO O’CLOCK, after donning a sterile gown, booties and gloves, Binney Taylor entered the ICU room where Rio McNabb lay trussed up like a Christmas goose. She could hear the soft whiffle of a snore indicating her arrival hadn’t wakened him. And that was good. It gave her time to collect her thoughts at seeing him in person again.

  In high school the popular and handsome McNabb twins were crushed on by every girl in school, including her. As someone who didn’t travel in their sphere, she’d been particularly drawn to Ryder McNabb and had loved him from afar. Then in her junior year, Ryder had asked her to the spring dance. Beyond thrilled she’d borrowed a nice dress and then spent money she didn’t have to spare on having her hair done. And she’d arranged for a night off from her after-school job. Ryder never showed up to collect her at the group home. Nor had he called. Later it’d been cruelly pointed out by mean girls at school that he’d taken Samantha Walker to the dance. He had never bothered to apologize, and the rejection lingered until she got to nursing school, where in time she’d learned to value her self-worth.

  She hadn’t run into either twin since they graduated from high school the year before her. She knew they were both following the rodeo. As she gazed at Rio, she was transported back to a time when the very thought of administering care to either of the hot, popular twins would’ve left her feeling awkward. Now Rio McNabb was just another unlucky cowboy in need of nursing.

  Binney opened his computer chart with her access card. Reading over the many injuries diagnosed in ER, her empathy for him grew. His recovery was going to be arduous. It was easy to see why Dr. Layton thought she might hesitate being stuck on such a remote ranch, forced to ride herd on someone the surgeon had indicated could be cantankerous. But she was well trained and good nurses handled all types of grumpy patients.

  She closed out of his record, and glanced up to find the patient in question studying her with serious gray eyes.

  “If you’re here to deliver another shot for pain, forget it. I don’t like how they knock me out. I can’t recover if all I do is sleep my life away. And tell that hospital advocate who came by to say I need to book an ambulance to take me home next Saturday, and rent a hospital bed for a month or so, that the wrangler who works for me will collect me in his pickup. No one’s gonna turn me into an invalid.”

  “Actually, I’m not on your nursing team. Dr. Layton said he told you I’d drop by around two today so we could talk about your home care. I’m Binney Taylor, a private duty nurse. I see you don’t remember me. We attended the same high school. You and your brother graduated a year prior to me.”

  “You’re a home nurse? You look so young,” he blurted. “Layton said we went to the same high school, but I assumed he meant you went there years before me.”

  “I believe age is just a number. But if you have questions as to whether or not I’m competent,” she said testily, “I can provide you with references.”

  “Sorry. I suppose you’re capable. High school was a long time ago for both of us. To be truthful, I don’t remember you.” He closed his eyes. “The shots they give me mess with my head. I wake up fuzzy. I don’t like it, not thinking clearly, I mean.”

  Frankly it irritated her to hear so bluntly that she was totally forgettable, although it shouldn’t surprise her. Back then all kids who lived in the group home were made fun of by cliques of their popular peers. That didn’t mean she had to endure his slights now.

  Taking out her cell phone, she phoned Lola Vickers, the former private duty nurse. “Hi, Lola, it’s Binney. Dr. Layton has a patient at City who’s going to need home care in a week or so. Can you take this job?”

  “No. Arthur called me. I’m retired. My husband and I plan to travel. Why can’t they get that through their heads?”

  “Oh, I didn’t know Dr. Layton had contacted you. Sorry.” She chewed the corner of her lower lip and eyed the man in the bed. “I know you turned the area over to me, Lola. I am free to take this assignment. It’s more that this patient wants a nurse with more experience. But I understand. Enjoy your trip. I’ll talk to you later. Bye.”

  Rio glared. “Did I question your experience? I just don’t want anybody caring for me at my ranch.” He rubbed the furrows that’d formed between his eyebrows. “Can you cut me some slack? I feel like I’m navigating through fog.”

  Binney reopened his record. “I see you are on a heavy-duty opioid. Are you aware that you sustained serious injuries? While you’re here you should let them do whatever they can to keep you pain-free. Really, though, I am happy to hear you’d rather not take painkillers. Once you get home and settled we can certainly start cutting back.” Jerking upright, she keyed out and guiltily met his searing gaze. “Uh, that’s providing you elect to hire me. I didn’t mean to be pushy. Dr. Layton called Lola Vickers, but she’s not available.”

  “Do I need to decide right now? I’ve been tossed off horses before, and even been kicked in the head. After those docs patched me up I recuperated on my own at the ranch. Anyway, the Lonesome Road, my ranch, is well named. It’s two hundred acres in the middle of nowhere.” He gestured with his hand and once again the IV lines rattled. “Someone like you would get bored there before a day passed.”

  She began backing toward the door. Seeing the shape he was in she probably shouldn’t take personally his reluctance to hire her. After she’d taken over from Lola as the only private duty nurse in the ranch community around Abilene, her jobs were mostly caring for ranchers or their wives following simple surgeries. There was Tom Parker, who’d been gored by a bull and gangrene had set in. Besides nursing she’d done their cooking so Tom’s wife could get their cattle to market. She could handle McNabb’s job.

  To be honest she felt rattled over the possibility of working for the fancied McNabb brother. Someone who had matured and had definitely gotten more muscular. Even amid all his casts and bandages, and with the scruff of a five o’clock shadow, Rio McNabb was still handsome as sin. Had he become better looking than Ryder? The deeper question—was he nicer?

  Quickly contemplating what it’d be like to share his home if it was as remote as he indicated, all while handling his most intimate needs, left her thinking this was probably a bad idea.

  She was almost out the door when Rio called, “Hey. In high school, did you date my brother?”

  The pain caused by that query even so many years later sent Binney spiraling in anger. But, loath to admit that his brother had stood her up, she stepped fully into the room again. “Are you kidding? I never garnered Ryder’s attention, although it wasn’t for the lack of my hoping to.”

  Rio might have responded, but Nurse Murphy came into the room and stopped to greet Binney. “Hey, hello. How’s Raenell Foster? I heard you were taking care of her after her heart attack. What a shock. She’s my age, you know. And she was never an ounce overweight. Nothing like me,” the woman said, patting her ample girth.

  “I completed my stint at the Fosters’.” Binney glanced at her watch. “In fact I’m filling a few shifts in ER until another outside job comes up. I’m working three to eleven tonight. Guess I’d better go grab the elevator to keep from clocking in late.” She dredged up a smile for Rio then peeled off the sterile gloves and gown she’d donned to enter ICU.

  Gertrude Murphy shot a furtive glance between her patient and Binney. “Oh, so you two are friends.” She broke into a wide smile. “Or more than friends? I forget you younger nurses have lives outside of the hospital. If you two are dating, feel free to stop back anytime.”

  Binney choked. “We’re not friends. Dr. Layton thought Mr. McNabb might have need of home nursing once he’s dismissed from here.” She wadded up her used gown. “He doesn’t think he’ll require home care.”

  “Of course he will.” Gertrude made a face. “Wait’ll the morphine wears off and we try to get him up to see if he can manage crutches. The tougher these cowboys are, the harder they go down. You’d better keep in touch.”

  “I’m not deaf,” Rio exclaimed, gray eyes thunderous. “And I don’t think I said for sure I wouldn’t need help, only that I didn’t want it. Dr. Layton or the resident said they’d be back to check me this evening. Earlier I wasn’t thinking straight. Now I have some definite questions for the doctor as to my prognosis. So, Binney...er, Nurse Taylor, keep in touch, okay?”

  She felt a childish urge to stick her tongue out at him. Instead she inclined her head, and murmured to Gertrude, “The hospital has my phone number and ER schedule.” With that, she spun away, dumping everything in the trash receptacle situated right outside his room.

  “It doesn’t sound as if you made a very good impression,” Gertrude chided, marching to Rio’s bedside.

  He scowled all the way through her taking and logging in his vital signs. He practically growled when she pulled a syringe from the deep pocket of her uniform. “No more shots for pain.”

  “Dr. Layton ordered a shot every three hours through tomorrow. Then he’ll reevaluate.”

  “The stuff you give me knocks me out cold.”

  She grinned. “That’s the point. Sleep facilitates healing. Come on. Don’t make me call in an orderly to hold you down.”

  Rio noticed pain had begun to seep back. “Is there a reason I need to sleep sitting up?”

  “You had a collapsed lung. You don’t
want it deflating. I expect if all sounds good later, your surgeon will give us leeway to adjust the head of your bed. Between a tightly taped clavicle, a neck brace and recovering from a pneumothorax, sleeping reclined for the time being is preferable. Has anyone suggested you order a hospital bed to use at home?”

  “Yes.” His scowl deepened.

  “So is that what you and Binney were fussing at each other about?”

  “Were we fussing?” Rio didn’t care to tell a friend of Nurse Taylor’s that his irritation at the younger nurse centered on the fact she’d all but admitted to lusting after Ryder. Not that he wasn’t used to women flocking around his more flamboyant twin, like bees buzzing over a flowerpot. He wondered when it had started bothering him so much. Possibly when he heard admiration for his twin falling from the kissable lips of the attractive blonde nurse with the striking green eyes. Those eyes were memorable, and yet he couldn’t place her. Damn!

  Since his head had cleared a little, he searched his memory bank back to high school. It annoyed Rio that he continued to draw a blank when it came to Binney Taylor. He could phone Ryder on the PBR circuit and run her name by him. Given their last falling out, he quashed that thought. JJ was a bit older, but he might remember Binney Taylor. Or his fiancée, Rhonda, who’d also attended their high school.

  Why did any of this matter? Why waste time worrying about the past when he didn’t even want to hire a private duty nurse?

  In spite of telling himself that, Rio was beset by a longing to see her again. As he tried to sort through why that was, Nurse Murphy popped him with the needle she brandished, and in seconds Rio slipped out of the real world again.

  Chapter Two

  A bright light blinding Rio in one eye ejected him from a dark stupor. He tried to move his head to get away from the light, but was hamstrung by an immovable plastic collar he vaguely remembered someone clamping around his neck. His opposite wrist and ankle hurt like the devil when he moved either one, so he lay still until he could get his bearings.

  “You are still alive,” Dr. Layton said, shutting off the penlight as he continued to loom above Rio.

  Devoid of words, Rio simply blinked. Ever so slowly his thoughts coalesced with his body. “Barely alive,” he finally got out.

  “Did you insult one of our nurses?” Layton pulled up a stool and sat next to Rio’s upper torso. He unhooked his stethoscope and plugged in one ear tip, all the while checking Rio’s pulse.

  “If I did it’s probably because you’re doping me up like some street junkie,” Rio managed to feebly say. “I don’t recall insulting Nurse Murphy. But I didn’t mince words objecting to that last pain shot. I can’t remember what happens after one of those.”

  “So I’ve heard from a few staff members. Including from one who claimed she couldn’t wake you to eat the soup I ordered for your supper.” The doctor clamped in his other ear tip and slid the metal chest piece over Rio’s lungs and diaphragm. After he finished listening, he sat back and slung it around his neck. “Both lungs are getting good air. Any chest pain now will be from the vertebrae and clavicle. You’re lucky you have strong ribs. A broken rib on top of everything else would’ve added months to your recovery.”

  “Lucky. Yeah, that’s me.” Rio wrinkled his nose and tried to scoot up in bed, but couldn’t get any traction between his hand being in a cast and his opposite ankle in an inflatable one that extended below his heel.

  “We need to try and get you up. I’ll have our orthopedic man on staff drop by and see if the swelling in your ankle is down enough to exchange the temporary cast for an Ace wrap. That should give you some better mobility. How’s the rest of your pain?”

  “Manageable, I think. I guess I don’t really know since I’m zoned out more than I’m awake. Out of curiosity, who did I insult? If I swore at one of the nurses, I’m sorry.”

  “Nothing that bad. You apparently have issues with Nurse Taylor. Whatever transpired between you two gave her second thoughts about working for you. Since Lola Vickers opted out, you’d best get used to the idea of spending a few weeks at Baxter Rehab.” After typing on Rio’s chart, the doctor then clicked off the system and rose.

  Rio’s main issue with Binney Taylor was that she looked like a model, and in her own words once, and maybe still, harbored a desire for his brother. But were either of those things reasons for him to dismiss her services? Hell’s sake, he didn’t want to spend weeks away from his ranch.

  “To tell you the truth, Doc, my conversation with Nurse Taylor isn’t totally clear. Could you apologize for me and ask her to come back to talk again?”

  “I can do that.” Layton glanced at his watch. “In fact, she’s due to clock out of ER in a few minutes. I want someone to get you up to see if you can stand with crutches, and with help walk a few steps. The night duty nurse will check your vital signs, but if Binney’s available, let’s see if she can assist you out of bed. We’ll be more inclined to release you to go home if the two of you manage walking. Provided she’ll take you on as a private patient.”

  The doctor talked so fast Rio had difficulty processing everything. Enough registered for him to know he needed to be on his best behavior with Nurse Taylor. Really he just needed to satisfy Dr. Layton. Once he got home what would hold him to keeping a private duty nurse? Couldn’t he tell her he no longer required her help? What was most important was for him to go home, where, even if he was housebound, he’d be there to confer with JJ and do the ranch bookkeeping and such.

  A nurse Rio didn’t remember meeting bustled in to remove the inflatable cast and rebandage his ankle. Her badge said her name was Janet Valenzuela. In the course of their short conversation she revealed that she knew JJ and Rhonda. “I watched you ride in last year’s Abilene rodeo,” she said as she attached the clips to hold Rio’s Ace bandage in place. “My son and a friend do team roping.”

  “Would that be Carlos? If so, I know him. He and his partner are moving up in PRCA standings. Even before the accident this was going to be my last circuit ride. I did think I’d sometimes enter ranch rodeos.” He tried to move his newly taped ankle. Pain shot up his leg and made him catch his breath. “Plainly that won’t be for a while,” he said through compressed lips.

  About that time Dr. Layton walked back into the room accompanied by Binney Taylor. They both heard his last exchange.

  “Working here the last fifteen years I’ve met a lot of you stubborn rancher and rodeo types,” the doctor said. “I’ve seen a few who don’t take my professional medical advice end up in the obit column of the local paper. You can be one of them, Rio, or you can follow my orders and be content raising and selling horses. Barring being caught in a tornado, you could live happily into old age.”

  Rio caught Binney and Janet both wincing at the doctor’s blunt statement. Because his previously addled brain was beginning to connect to the truth of his situation, Rio thought he could accept Dr. Layton’s advice. “Some rodeo jocks don’t have options. I’m lucky to have the ranch as a fallback.” Rio mustered a smile. “Earlier I may have sounded like a blockhead. I understand my life has drastically changed. Truly I’m not like some guys who see rodeo as their whole life. I have a twin like that,” he added, his gaze boring into Binney as he spoke.

  “You act as if that’s significant to me,” she replied. “Until today I hadn’t seen you or Ryder since the night of your high school graduation, when, as a junior, I helped set out snacks. You both went on the all-night party. I worked two jobs all through high school. That’s how I paid for nursing school. Which reminds me,” she said, handing him a manila folder, “as I’m the only private duty nurse currently in the area, here’s a copy of my nursing diploma and recommendations from nursing professors. The hospital HR had them on file. If you’d like I can get references from my private duty jobs over the past two years.”