Diana Palmer - Protector

“Awhile? How long a while?” Hayes asked.

“Micah Steele—remember him?—is our orthopedic surgeon. I called him in on your case. We removed the bone fragments and repaired the muscle damage...”

“What about the bullet?” Hayes interrupted. “Did you get that?”

“No,” Coltrain said. “Removing a bullet is up to the discretion of the surgeon, and I considered it too dangerous to take it out...”

“It’s evidence,” Hayes said as strongly as the weakness would allow. “You have to extract it so that I can use it to prosecute the...” He held his breath. “Guy who shot me!”

“Surgeon’s discretion,” Coltrain repeated. “I won’t risk a patient’s life trying to dig out a bullet that’s basically disinfected itself on the way into the body. I’d do more damage trying to get it out than I would leaving it in.” He held up a hand when Hayes opened his mouth. “I conferred with two other surgeons, one in San Antonio, and they’ll back me up. It was too risky.”

Hayes wanted to argue some more, but he was too tired. It was an old argument, anyway, trying to make a surgeon remove potential evidence from a victim’s body, and it occasionally ended up in a legal battle. Most of the time, the surgeon won. “All right.”

“Back to what I was saying,” he continued, “there was some collateral damage to your left shoulder. You’ll have to have an extended course of physical therapy to keep the muscles from atrophying.”

“Extended?” Hayes asked slowly.

“Probably several months. It depends on how quickly you heal and how fast your recovery is,” Coltrain said. “It’s still going to be a rough ride. You need to know that from the start.”

Hayes looked up at the ceiling. “Crackers and milk!” he muttered.

“You’ll be all right,” Coltrain assured him. “But for the next couple of weeks, you need to keep that arm immobilized and not lift anything heavier than a tissue. I’ll have my receptionist get you an appointment with Dr. Steele and also with the physiotherapist here in the hospital.”

“When can I go home?”

Coltrain stared at him. “Not for several more days. And even then, you can’t go home and stay by yourself. You’ll need someone with you for at least a couple of weeks, to make sure you don’t overdo and have a relapse.”

“A nursemaid? Me?” Hayes frowned. “I was out of the hospital in three or four days the last two times...”

“You had a flesh wound the last time, and the one before that you were only about twenty-seven years old. You’re thirty-four now, Hayes. It takes longer to recover, the older you get.”

Hayes felt worse than ever. “I can’t go home right away.”

“That’s right. You’re going to be extremely limited in what you can do for the next few weeks. You won’t be able to lift much while the damage heals and you’ll find even ordinary movement will aggravate the wound and cause pain. You’re going to need physical therapy three times a week...”

“No!”

“Yes, unless you want to be a one-armed man!” Coltrain said shortly. “Do you want to lose the use of your left arm?”

Hayes glared at him.

Coltrain glared right back.

Hayes backed down. He sank back onto the pillow. His blond-streaked brown hair was disheveled and needed washing. He felt dingy. His dark eyes were bloodshot and had dark circles around them. His lean face was drawn from pain.

“I could get somebody to stay with me,” he said after a minute.

“Name somebody.”

“Mrs. Mallard. She comes to take care of the house three days a week anyway.”

“Mrs. Mallard’s sister had a heart attack. She’s gone to Dallas. I’ll bet she phoned to tell you, but you never check your telephone messages at home,” Coltrain said with some amusement.

Hayes was disconcerted. “She’s a good woman. I hope her sister does well.” He pursed his lips. “Well, there’s Miss Bailey,” he began, naming a local woman who made her living from staying with recuperating patients. She was a retired practical nurse.

“Miss Bailey is terrified of reptiles,” he pointed out.

“Blanche Mallory,” he suggested, naming another elderly lady who sat with patients.

“Terrified of reptiles.”

“Damn!”

“I even asked old Mrs. Brewer for you,” Coltrain said heavily. “She said she wasn’t staying in any house with a dinosaur.”

“Andy’s an iguana. He’s a vegetarian. He doesn’t eat people!”

“There’s a young lady you dated once who might dispute that,” Coltrain said with a smile and twinkling eyes.

“It was self-defense. She tried to hit him with a lamp,” Hayes muttered.

“I recall treating her for a sprained ankle, at your expense,” the other man returned.

Hayes sighed. “Okay. Maybe one of my deputies could be persuaded,” he relented.

“Nope. I asked them, too.”

He glowered at Coltrain. “They like me.”

“Yes, they do,” he agreed. “But they’re all married with young families. Well, Zack Tallman isn’t, but he’s not staying with you, either. He says he needs to be able to concentrate while he’s working on your case. He doesn’t like cartoon movies,” he added, tongue-in-cheek.

“Animation bigot,” Hayes muttered.

“Of course, there’s MacCreedy...”

“No. Never! Don’t even speak his name, he might turn up here!” Hayes said with real feeling.

“He’s your cousin and he likes you.”

“Very distant cousin, and we’re not talking about him.”

“Okay. Suit yourself.”

“So I’m going to be stuck here until I get well?” Hayes asked miserably.

“Afraid we don’t have space to keep you,” Coltrain replied. “Not to mention the size of the hospital bill you’d be facing, and the county isn’t likely to want to pick it up.”

Hayes scowled. “I could pick it up myself,” Hayes said curtly. “I may not look like it, but I’m fairly well-to-do. I work in law enforcement because I want to, not because I have to.” He paused. “What’s going on with finding out who shot me?” he asked suddenly. “Have they come up with anything?”

“Your chief deputy is on the case, along with Yancy, your investigator. They found a shell casing.”

“Nice work,” Hayes commented.

“It was. Yancy used a laser pointer, extrapolated from where you were sitting and the angle of the wound, and traced it to the edge of the pasture, under a mesquite tree. He found footprints, a full metal jacketed shell from an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle and a cigarette butt.”

“I’ll promote him.”

Coltrain chuckled.

“I’ll call Cash Grier. Nobody knows more about sniping than the police chief. He used to do it for a living.”

“Good idea,” Coltrain added.

“Look, I can’t stay here and I can’t go home, so what am I going to do?” Hayes asked miserably.

“You won’t like the only solution I could come up with.”

“If it gets me out of the hospital, I’ll love it. Tell me,” Hayes promised.

Coltrain stood and backed up a step. “Minette Raynor says you can stay with them until you’re healed.”

“Never!” Hayes burst out. “I’d live in a hollow log with a rattler, sooner than do that! Why would she even volunteer in the first place? She knows I hate her guts!”

“She felt sorry for you when Lou mentioned we couldn’t find anybody who was willing to stay in your house,” Coltrain replied. Lou was short for Louise, his wife, who was also a doctor.

“Sorry for me. Huh!” he scoffed.

“Her little brother and sister like you.”

He shifted. “I like them, too. They’re nice kids. We have candy to give away at the sheriff’s office on Halloween. She always brings them by.”