Joan Hohl - Wolfe Wanting

Just get it over with.

The cry rang inside Megan's head, its echo creating an ache to fill the void of its passing. Suddenly, she needed to weep, she needed to sleep, she needed to be left alone. Distracted, agitated, she lifted a hand to rub her temple.

“Pain?”

Megan wasn't quite sure which startled her more, the sharp concern in his voice, or the sudden sound of his ID folder snapping shut. Before she could gather her senses enough to answer, he was moving to the door.

“I'll get a nurse.”

“No!” She flung out her hand—as if she could reach him, all the way near the door, from her bed. “I'm all right. It's just a dull headache.”

He turned back to run an encompassing look over her pale face, his startling blue eyes probing the depths of her equally blue, though now lackluster, eyes.

“You sure?” One toasty eyebrow climbed up and under the silky lock of hair that had fallen onto his forehead.

“Positive.” Megan sighed, and nodded. “Please, have a seat.” She indicated the chair placed to one side of the bed. “I'd like to get this over with.”

“Well...” He brushed at the errant lock of hair as he slowly returned to her bedside. “If you're sure you don't need anything for pain?” The brow inched upward again.

“I'm sure,” she answered, suppressing yet another sigh. “It'll pass.”

“All things do.”

Strangely convinced that his murmured reply was not merely the voicing of conventional comfort, but a genuine and heartfelt belief, Megan watched him lower his considerable length into the average-size chair.

He should have appeared funny, folded into the small seat, and yet he didn't. He looked... comfortable.

“In your own words, Miss Delaney,” he said, offering her a gentle smile. “And in your own time.” He glanced at his watch. “I'm in no hurry.”

Megan felt inordinately grateful for his compassion and understanding. She dreaded the coming purge, the dredging up of details, the accompanying resurgence of fear.

“I...I...”

“Start at the very beginning,” he inserted, his voice soft with encouragement.

“Thank you, Sergeant, I—” She broke off when he raised a hand in the familiar “halt” gesture.

“Let's make this as easy as possible. Considering the circumstances, I think we can dispense with the sergeant and sir stuff. Okay?” Both toasty brows peaked.

“Yes, but what should I call you?”

“My name's Royce,” he said. “Royce Wolfe.”

Royce Wolfe. Megan tested the name silently, deciding at once that she liked it. “Okay, Royce,” she agreed, “but on one condition. And that is that you call me Megan.”

“Deal.” His teeth flashed in a disarming smile. Withdrawing a notebook and pen from his jacket pocket, he settled into the chair. “Whenever you're ready...Megan.”

“I have one question.”

“Shoot.”

“Well, you said I should start at the beginning,” she said, frowning. “Where? Of the evening, of the atta—” The very word stuck in her throat.

Megan drew a breath before trying another attempt; Royce was faster.

“You can start from the day of your birth,” he suggested, quite seriously. “If that's easier for you.”

“My birth?” Megan frowned again. “Why, I was born right here, in Conifer. I grew up here, lived here until I went away to college.” The frown line smoothed at the realization that starting from the very beginning was easier.

“That was probably before I was assigned to duty here,” Royce reasoned aloud. “What college did you attend?”

“Kutztown State, now University.” She smiled. “It offered a great fine-arts program.”

“You're an artist?” He sounded impressed.

“No.” Oddly, Megan hated having to disillusion him. “It didn't take long to discover that I wasn't good enough for that. I'm an illustrator.”

Royce was quick to correct her. “Illustrators are artists. Norman Rockwell was an illustrator, and so was the first of the painting Wyeths....”

“Well, yes, of course, but...” Megan broke off to frown at him. How had they strayed from the point, and what difference did it make, anyway? “Does it matter?”

“Not really.” Royce grinned at her. “But you are a lot less nervous than when I came in.”

Megan smiled. She couldn't help smiling. “Yes, I am. Thank you.”

“You're welcome.” His voice was low, honeyed, encouraging. “Ready to continue?”

“Yes. Where was I?”

“You didn't return to Conifer after college,” he said, prompting her.

“Oh, right.” Megan shrugged. “I had decided that to succeed, I would have to go where the action was—that being New York City, naturally.”

“Naturally,” he concurred in a drawl.

“I was right, you know.”

“I don't doubt it.” Royce appeared extremely relaxed in the small chair. “I personally wouldn't like to live there,” he added. “But I don't doubt that you were right.”

Megan sighed—damned if he hadn't hit the nail directly on the head.

“After all this time, I finally discovered that I personally don't like living there, either,” she confessed. “That's why I jumped at the excuse to come home for a while.”

“You've lost me,” Royce said, in obvious confusion. “Jumped at what excuse?”

“To house-sit for my parents while they're away.” She smiled, and explained, “My parents left three weeks ago on a world cruise. They'll be gone a year.”

“A whole year!”

“Yes. Wild, huh?”

“It sounds great.” Royce chuckled. “I wish I could talk my mother into something like that.”

“Your mother's alone?” Megan asked, interested, but still conscious of playing for time, keeping the moment of truth at bay for a little longer.

“Yeah.” Royce exhaled. “We lost my dad almost two years ago.” He looked pensive for a moment, and then he mused aloud, “Maybe I'll talk to my brothers about all of us chipping in on a cruise vacation for Mom, if only for a week or two.”

“I always wanted a brother.” Megan's voice held a note of wistful yearning. “How many do you have?”

“Three,” he said, laughing. “And we were a handful for my mother. Still are, at times.”

“Sounds like fun.” Megan sighed in soft, unconscious longing. “If I had a brother, he would...” Her voice faded, and she stared into space through eyes tight and hot, yearning for a brother, her father, someone to be there for her, hold her, protect her, tell her she was safe.

There was a moment of stillness. Then a blur of movement on the bed near her hip caught her eye. Blinking, Megan lowered her gaze and focused on the broad male hand resting, palm up, on the mattress. Without thought or consideration, she slid her palm onto his. His fingers flexed and closed around hers, swallowing her hand within the comforting protection of his.

A sense of sheer masculine strength enveloped Megan. Not a threatening, intimidating strength, but an unstated, soothing I'm-here-for-you strength, the strength she needed now, when her own had been so thoroughly, horribly decimated.

Megan blinked again, touched, and grateful for the gentle offering from this gentle giant. Unaware of her own flicker of power, she gripped his hand, hard, hanging on for sanity's sake to the solid anchor, seeking a measure of stability in her suddenly unstable world.

“It may be easier to get it over with.”

Royce's soft advice echoed, joined forces with her own earlier silent demand.

“Yes.” Megan's voice was little more than a breathless whisper. “I have friends who own a getaway place in the mountains,” she began, steadily enough. “They called me up yesterday, said they had come in for the weekend, and invited me to meet them for dinner at the French Chalet. You know where that is?” She met his eyes; they were fixed on her face.