Think. Think. "I"m not feeling dizzy," she admitted, but h.e.l.l if it wasn"t her only win. "My legs are still . . . hurting."
Hunter didn"t even blink. "Like yesterday?"
"About the same," Emerson said, although it bordered on being untrue. She"d done all the research, studied everything on paper. But she"d never had a relapse this bad before, and never once had she thought the pain or the fatigue would be so crushing.
She"d thought she"d be able to handle it. She needed to be able to handle it.
"Scale of one to ten." Hunter"s tone softened, his fingers brushing her cheek just enough to ground her, and dammit, why did he have to remember everything from his PT?
She whispered, "Eight."
"Okay. I"m getting the doc."
"No!" Fear claimed her gut, clutching tight. The frown hooking at the corners of Hunter"s mouth told her in no unequivocal terms that he wasn"t letting her off on her own recognizance, but still, there had to be something else.
"I"ll go home to rest," she said, the words wavering past the tight knot of her throat, and Hunter stepped in, his warm fingers wrapping around her traitorous, trembling hand.
"You"ve been resting. If you"re in that much pain"-he paused, his throat working over a swallow, his eyes turning more gray than blue as he continued-"and you haven"t been able to keep any food down because of the meds, you"re probably dehydrated. I don"t have to tell you how dangerous that can get. You"re a smart woman. So I can get Doc Sanders or I can take you to the hospital. Those are your choices."
Emerson dropped her chin to her chest. G.o.d, she hated it, she hated it, but he was right. "Okay. We can go to the hospital."
The drive to Lockridge wasn"t a cakewalk, but at least no one there would know her. Plus, she could lie down in the truck like she had when Hunter had taken her to her last appointment. Maybe that would give her some relief from this stupid pain.
Hunter squeezed her hand. "Okay. I"ll go tell Doc Sanders you"re still not feeling well and then we can go."
A thought hit her, sending a swirl of dread through her belly. "You have to promise to let me walk to your truck, though. If the doc sees you carrying me, or G.o.d, if Amber sees, everyone in town will talk."
"You"re in pain," he argued, but she shook her head. She couldn"t cave. Not on this.
"I"ll make it."
A few minutes and some highly creative maneuvering later, they were in Hunter"s truck, headed out of Millhaven. Her legs burned and throbbed from the short walk she"d forced them to make. Even though he drove with care, Emerson"s stomach pitched and twisted just from the forward motion, and she closed her eyes to ward off both the nausea and the pain.
"Can I do anything for you?" Hunter asked, and she anch.o.r.ed onto his voice, letting the cadence soothe her.
"Mmm mmm," she managed as a wave of pain slid down her legs. Tears formed behind her closed eyelids, but when she inhaled, the scent of leather and cedar and Hunter himself countered them.
"I"ve got you, Em. It"s going to be okay."
That voice, the rise and fall, the honesty in it. G.o.d, she wanted to believe him, but her body hurt.
The tears did fall then, tracking over her face past her still-closed eyes. Hunter thumbed them away one by one, murmuring quietly that she was going to be okay, and somehow, unbelievably, despite the fire tearing through her, Emerson actually believed him.
She trusted Hunter to help her. With him, she would be okay.
Breathing in and out, she focused on keeping her stomach in check, losing herself in the darkness of her closed eyes. She drifted along with the sound of his words, the heady, comforting scent of him right next to her, until a change in momentum jerked her back to her senses.
Wait . . . "Why are we slowing down?"
"We"re here," Hunter said, but that couldn"t be right. They hadn"t been on the road long enough.
And then the sign in front of her registered, the bright-red block print pumping dread through her veins.
"CAMDEN VALLEY HOSPITAL, EMERGENCY DEPARTMENT."
"This isn"t the right hospital," Emerson blurted, but he pulled up to the circular entryway to the ED, anyway.
"It was closest, and you"re in pain. I"m not arguing with you." To prove it, he put the truck in park, jumping down to round the pa.s.senger side to open her door.
Every defense Emerson had wailed in warning. "I can"t," she said, darting a glance at the brick-and-gla.s.s building.
Hunter didn"t even stop moving. "You can."
Her legs tingled as if to agree, and she gave in with a heavy exhale. She"d been here for the better part of the day on Friday while Mr. Cross had been treated, and hadn"t seen so much as a hint of her parents. Being here was far from ideal, but it was what she had.
No matter how much she hated it.
Bracing his hands around her waist, Hunter helped her out of the truck and through the sliding gla.s.s doors. Each step sent aches from her swollen feet to her furious lower back, but she took each one. When they got to the triage desk, Hunter made sure Emerson had the nurse"s full attention before he slipped back outside to park his truck.
"Can I help you?" the woman asked, but all it took was one good look for her to spring from her seat and round the business end of the desk with a wheelchair.
Great. She even looked weak to strangers. "Yes, I"m . . . not feeling well," Emerson said, unable to force herself to say the real words.
If she said them out loud, they"d be real. Irreversible.
Too true to ignore.
The nurse slid an arm around Emerson"s shoulder, guiding her into the wheelchair, and Emerson was too tired, too dizzy, to protest. "Let"s see if I can help you with that. My name is Jackie. I"m going to take you to a curtain area to take your vitals. What"s your name?"
"Emerson." The relief at surrendering her body weight, even to a wheelchair, was enough to make her sigh.
"Okay, Emerson. Did you want me to have someone bring your boyfriend back to sit with you once we"re done with your a.s.sessment?"
She didn"t think. Just nodded. "Yes, please." If Hunter was with her, she could do this. He"d promised she"d be okay.
And she believed him.
Jackie guided her past the automatic doors leading into the emergency department, pulling back a curtain anch.o.r.ed in the ceiling tiles by a shiny silver track. The area was quiet but sterile, white sheet stretched thin over the pancake-flat hospital mattress, blue gown folded into a neat square at the foot of the bed, antiseptic smell of alcohol filling her nose, and Emerson"s heart thudded with the knowledge of what came next.
Jackie asked softly, "So what brings you in to the ED today?"
"I . . ." Again, the words wedged in Emerson"s throat, but then her mind tumbled back, Hunter"s voice right there in her ears.
I"ve got you. It"s going to be okay.
"I have multiple sclerosis," Emerson said.
And then she started to cry.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE.
Never in his thirty years had Hunter had to fight so hard to stay calm. But Emerson needed him, and even though she was in enough pain to scare him f.u.c.king senseless, he was going to stay strong.
What if . . . what if . . .
Hunter"s feet moved swiftly over the pavement, the question beating a foreboding pattern in his brain. His father"s near miss last week had brought the grim flip side of "what if" into sharp focus. Yes, his old man was fine now, but one twist of fate, one cruel shift in another direction, and he wouldn"t have been.
What if Emerson hadn"t been there for his father?
And what if Hunter hadn"t been there today for her?
His mouth went as dry as the asphalt beneath his boots. Multiple sclerosis was far more grave than he"d realized or she was willing to admit, and he was literally her only lifeline. She refused to tell anyone else she had the disease, refused to believe that the side effects of the meds she was on and the pain of her symptoms were anything other than normal. If he hadn"t stopped by the PT center when he did, she"d have collapsed on that floor alone.
What if . . .
Hunter reached the sliding gla.s.s doors, his arms p.r.i.c.kling at the whoosh of air conditioning on his sun-warmed skin. He needed to focus, to find a way to fix this. Once Emerson felt a little better, they could come up with a plan. Maybe she could at least tell Doc Sanders and a few other trusted people that she was sick. Lord knew she couldn"t keep hiding from it like this.
The pain might end them both.
Shaking off the thought, Hunter scanned the waiting room. Both Emerson and the nurse were gone-not a bad sign, as far as he was concerned-and he turned toward the triage desk to try to finagle his way back to the curtain area to see her.
And found himself face to startled face with Emerson"s father.
"Hunter." Dr. Montgomery"s brows creased over a stare caught somewhere between chill and confusion. "Quite a surprise to see you out this way."
"Uh," he stuttered, and s.h.i.t. s.h.i.t. Compared with this moment, the spot between a rock and a hard place was a luxury destination. "Yes . . . sir. That is, I wasn"t planning to be here."
"One usually doesn"t. Hence the "emergency" in the name."
The corners of his mouth twitched just slightly, smoothing back into seriousness before the gesture fully registered, and in that odd, stop-time second, Hunter realized that the response hadn"t been meant disrespectfully.
Had Emerson"s father been making an awkward attempt to be sociable?
"At any rate." Dr. Montgomery smoothed a hand over the front of his white coat, his gaze appearing genuinely concerned. "Are you unwell? I came down for a consult, but if you need a.s.sistance, perhaps I can point you in the right direction."
Hunter"s mouth opened, a fabricated answer locked and loaded on his tongue. Emerson had made him promise not to say anything-to her parents above all else-but dammit, her illness was bigger than she"d admit, and she needed help. Her parents had been trying to reach out to her all week. Wasn"t it possible that despite their overbearing way of showing it, they actually had good intentions? There was no way they didn"t love Emerson. She was their only child, for Chrissake! Dr. Montgomery was a physician, not to mention her father, her flesh and blood. Not agreeing with her career choice was a far cry from not helping her through being sick.
Screw the status quo. She was sick, and Hunter would rock all the boats he had to in order to ease her pain.
"Actually, I"m here with Emerson. I think the two of you need to talk."
Emerson had been around enough doctors in her life to know when things were mission critical. The look on Dr. Ortiz"s face right now?
Told her in no uncertain terms she wasn"t going to like what he had to say.
"Okay, Ms. Montgomery. You can relax now," he said, guiding the paper-thin bedsheet back over her two-sizes-too-swollen legs to preserve the tiny shred of her dignity that remained. "I"ve got a couple of concerns, and unfortunately they"re going to keep you here at least for a little while. The biggest is that you"re pretty dehydrated."
She blew out a breath, hating the news even though it didn"t surprise her. "I figured." Poor Jackie had needed three tries to get Emerson"s IV into place. Considering the digestive rebellion her stomach had declared over the last two days, she"d have been shocked to her toes if she weren"t dehydrated. "I"ve been trying to at least keep fluids down, but the MS meds have been making that difficult."
"Let"s tackle it this way. I"d like to give you an anti-emetic for the nausea, that way we can work on getting something in your stomach once it settles. In the meantime, we"ll get more IV fluids on board so your dehydration doesn"t get any more dangerous."
Her shoulders sank against the mattress, but she gave up a tiny nod. "Okay."
"Good." Dr. Ortiz looped his stethoscope back around his neck, his expression telling her his laundry list of concerns had just begun. "Your pain is also obviously an issue, as is the edema in your feet and lower legs. We should be able to get both under control with rest and medication, but . . . are your MS relapses normally this severe?"
"No. I mean, I was only diagnosed about three months ago, but . . . yes. This is the worst one by far." She bit her lip at the admission, but to her surprise, the doctor didn"t crank up the aw-poor-weak-you sympathy.
"It"s not entirely unusual for the first few episodes after a diagnosis to be all over the place, especially if a patient is trying different treatments to manage them." He held up her electronic chart, which contained the health history she"d given Jackie as well as the mile-long list of meds her neurologist had prescribed. "Clearly, your current regimen isn"t a good fit if it"s going to make you nauseous enough to become dehydrated. But let"s not try to drive beyond the headlights, okay? Before we do anything else, we"ve got to manage this relapse. Then you can work out a new medication plan with your neurologist."
Emerson dropped her chin to the chest of her hospital gown. The thought of starting fresh with new meds was enough to make her stomach pool with dread, but still, it paled in comparison with an extended hospital stay.
"Okay. Do you think I"ll be able to go home today?" she asked, mentally tacking please please please to the end of the question. She knew she needed to rest, but the thought of doing it in a hospital, especially this hospital, gave her the shakes.
Dr. Ortiz pulled his cell phone, which had started buzzing like crazy, out of the pocket of his doctor"s coat. "What I think is that you need to rest and rehydrate, and let us manage your pain. Then we"ll see where we are. Ah." His black brows lifted toward his just-ruffled-enough hairline, and he looked at her in what seemed like surprise. "Seems there"s someone who"s rather impatient to see you."
For the first time in days, a smile pulled at the corners of her mouth. "Yes. It"s okay with me if he comes back."
"Okay. Get some rest, and I"ll have Jackie come in with a painkiller and some meds for your nausea and swelling. I"ll also send your visitor back." Dr. Ortiz nodded, tucking her electronic chart under his arm as he slipped from the room. Okay, so the road in front of her was longer and studded with more land mines than she"d thought, but she could do this. She was going to be okay.
Hunter had promised. He"d said he had her back, and she believed him. Even though it went against everything she thought she"d wanted when she"d returned to Millhaven, Emerson trusted him to see all of her, to stay right there with her no matter how bad the disease got.
But when the curtain slid back a minute later, the man on the other side wasn"t Hunter.
This couldn"t be right.
"Dad?" The heart rate monitor beside her bed went ballistic, the numbers flashing wildly along with the rhythm in her chest. But no way-no way was her father, the one person she"d been desperate to hide her sickness from the most, standing there in front of her while she was having her worst relapse to date.
"Emerson," he said, and her stomach dropped with the cold realization that he was in fact very much in front of her, taking in her imperfections by the minute. His brows creased in obvious confusion. "Would you like to tell me exactly what"s going on here?"
"No," she said, partly because it was true and partly because it was the only word she could get past the terror in her throat. How was this happening? She"d been in triage for all of fifteen seconds, for G.o.d"s sake!
Of course, her father took her refusal as an invitation to argue. "Clearly, you"re having a medical issue. I understand you"re . . ." He paused, and for the briefest of seconds, an emotion Emerson couldn"t identify flickered through his gaze. But then he tucked his shoulder blades around his spine, his shoulders straightening beneath his impeccably pressed doctor"s coat, and the emotion disappeared. "Upset with me regarding our dinner conversation the other night. But you don"t honestly mean to not ask for my help right now."
Emerson arranged her expression to show nothing but intent, despite the pain starting to radiate through her legs with every slam of her pulse. But no way was she telling him anything, even if he had managed to somehow stumble over her in the ED. "As a matter of fact, that is exactly what I mean to do."
The step back he took betrayed his surprise. "Don"t be ridiculous. I"m the head of surgery at this hospital."
Right. As if she"d forget. But the fact that her father had seen her here was bad enough. If he knew the real reason, if he knew the truth- "Em, your father wants to help you. Talk to him. Please."
Time extended for a heartbeat, one single thump-thump of time during which Emerson"s brain processed. Gathered. Processed again.
And then all the air in the room vanished as Hunter"s voice-G.o.d, his presence next to her father, of all people-smashed into her like a wrecking ball.