Protection Detail. Julie Miller

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СКАЧАТЬ and unconscious; still and pale in a hospital bed after surgery; unable to speak or use his legs and right arm; fighting to stand and pick up his feet and relearn how to hold a fork; working his lips and teeth and tongue so hard to form a coherent word that a lesser man would have given up months ago. It felt wrong to be wishing for even one moment that the old man couldn’t talk.

      “I’m not doing da tupid eckertise again.” Seamus’s slurred words were articulate enough to make his frustration and fatigue clear.

      Jane sat her hip on the edge of the table, facing Seamus. “Yesterday in our therapy session at home, you handled the tongue rolls and language exercises just fine.”

      “I’m too tlow. Tink faster dan I talk. Make mi-takes.”

      Although her words were a little less peppered than Seamus’s tirade had been, Jane’s tone seemed as reprimanding as his father had been with the intern. “Speed doesn’t matter. How many times have I told you that getting back to the man you were before the shooting isn’t going to happen overnight? You’re giving up.”

      Whoa. That was going a step too far. “He’s tired. He’s been testing for two hours.”

      Jane tilted her chin toward Thomas, her hazel eyes glittering with angry specks of gold that he shouldn’t have noticed, either. “Don’t you defend him. He was rude and he knows it.” She looked back to Seamus. “You have worked your butt off all month to improve your performance on this evaluation. Now, are you being lazy, or do you just enjoy making women cry?”

      “Jane...” Rising to her feet, she put a hand on the middle of Thomas’s chest and stiff-armed him away from intervening between her and Seamus. Not that he couldn’t have easily overpowered her claim of authority over his own family if he wanted to seize her wrist or push against her hand. But the moment of ire quickly gave way to an ill-timed rush of awareness that heated the spot where she touched him, and Thomas retreated a step from the contact.

      Nope. Definitely not dead.

      “Seamus?” Jane pressed his father for a reply with the stern tone of a mother dealing with a child. “I know you can do this.”

      After a few silent moments, Seamus nodded. “I chould ’pologize.”

      “Yes, you should.” Although it burned in his gullet to let someone else take charge of his father, to take charge of the entire room, Thomas retreated another step as Jane turned to the silver-haired woman still clutching her hands and keeping her distance on the opposite side of the table. “Millie, would you see if you can get Stephanie to come back? Tell her Seamus is feeling more cooperative now.”

      The older woman seemed relieved to have a task to perform. “Of course.”

      Once the office door at the end of the room had closed behind the Watsons’ longtime housekeeper, Jane moved behind Seamus’s chair, squaring it in front of the table. She squeezed his shoulder before moving around him to straighten the therapy items on the table. “You should apologize to Millie, too, for using language like that. And your son. And me. I thought you were this infamous Irish charmer who had a way with the ladies. Did you think you were working the streets again? That Stephanie was some perp avoiding arrest you had to yell at?” Thomas propped his hands at his waist, letting his fingers settle near the gun and badge he’d worn on the belt of his jeans every day since his family had been attacked at Olivia’s wedding, even on days like this when he wasn’t teaching a seminar at the police academy or assisting with an investigation at precinct headquarters. He shook his head as Jane worked her magic on his father. She was tough, almost abrasive at times. But he had to give the woman props for earning his dad’s—and his—respect. She understood the way a family of law enforcement professionals worked, the sense of duty that ran through their veins, and often used Seamus’s career with KCPD as a motivator. “I’m not happy to have all my hard work be for nothing when we come to see Dr. Koelus.” She softened her tone as she slipped into the chair on the opposite side of the table. “I bet you’re not happy, either.”

      “I walked,” Seamus reminded her. “Koelus ted I could get rid of de walker and use my cane. I did de finger eckertises. I’m better.”

      “Yes, you are. And those are wonderful accomplishments you should be proud of. But if you want that peach cobbler at the restaurant for dessert, then you’re either going to have to do another half mile on the treadmill with me when we get home, or you’re going to have to apologize to Stephanie and repeat the vocal exercises one more time.”

      Seamus pointed a bony finger at her. “Dat’s bwackmail.”

      “Yes, it is.” Jane waited a couple of beats before smiling. “Is it working?”

      The undamaged corner of Seamus’s mouth crooked up in an answering smile.

      Thomas hid his own grin. That woman had his father’s number. She might challenge his own authority and rub him the wrong way at times, but she certainly knew the right mix of tough love, teasing and unflinching faith in her patient that Seamus had been responding to for months now.

      A moment later, Millie returned with the speech therapist. The young woman’s eyes and nose were red from crying, but she smiled to the woman who was old enough to be her grandmother. “Thank you.”

      Millie had probably given her a pep talk. The older woman’s smile faded when she chided Seamus. “Now you be nice to her.”

      Millie tried to back away from the table, but Seamus snagged her hand. “I’m torry, my ol’ friend. It been long time tince you heard lang-ege like dat.” He struggled to spit the words out, even growling with frustration, just as he had a moment before losing his temper. With a glance at Jane, as if seeking her approval, he folded his weaker hand around Millie’s fingers, too. “I raise my boy and grand-tons to be gentlemen. I chould be, too.”

      Twin dots of pink colored Millie’s cheeks and her smile reappeared. “It’s all right, Seamus. They weren’t any words I hadn’t heard before.”

      “I chouldn’t have taid to you. You lady.” He released her hand and tapped his chest. “Better man dan dat.”

      “I know you are.” To Thomas’s surprise, Millie leaned down and kissed his cheek. Seamus’s face was as rosy as hers as Millie picked up her purse from a nearby chair and bustled off to the hallway. “I’m going to find the ladies’ room. Excuse me.”

      The hallway door was swinging shut before the blush left Seamus’s cheeks. He turned to the intern, raising a snowy white eyebrow in a shrug of apology. “Tefanie? Forgive a fwustwated ol’ man. I have college degree and worked long time with public. Front dek at KT...KCPD. But I tound like baby now. Embarashes me.” Jane winked encouragement as she gave up the chair and moved toward Thomas. “I twy again.”

      Stephanie sat and picked up flash cards again. “Thank you for saying that. You were so sweet with me last time—I guess it surprised me when you got so upset. I will say that you articulated each and every one of those cuss words very clearly.” Seamus grinned at her teasing and shook his head. “I’m sorry I ran out on you. I can’t be anywhere near as tired as you must be. We’ll skip the tongue exercises this time and just do the reading so I have a score to report to Dr. Koelus.”

      Thomas heard the buzz of the cell phone vibrating in Jane’s pocket. Again? That was the fourth text she’d gotten since they’d arrived at the hospital, and she’d ducked out of the evaluation sessions with Dr. Koelus and the physical therapists marking the monthly progress in Seamus’s recovery each СКАЧАТЬ