Chapter 10

CHAPTER 10

" I want him written up!" the social worker demanded again.

Eric ignored her as Bill tried to calm her down. He didn't give a rat's ass what they did to him. The only thing he cared about at the moment was behind those double gray doors.

He rubbed a shaky hand over his face. She'd really scared the hell out of him tonight. Over the years, they'd been in more fucked-up situations than he could count, but nothing like tonight's.

When that little bastard went after Tyler's gun, he swore his heart stopped. The only thing he could think about was getting Joe out of there before he pulled the trigger. Any other woman would have made a run for it, but not Joe.

Not only had she stayed when he told her to run, but she just had to risk her fucking life with that asinine move. That damn gun could have easily gone off when she'd decided to use her body to force it out of Adam's hands.

Slowly exhaling, Eric dropped his head in his hands. He didn't want to think about how close he came to losing her. What the hell had she been thinking? It was fucking selfish that's what it was. She could have gotten herself killed tonight and left him. Did she even think about what her dying would do to him?

No.

It was so fucking important to her to be one of the guys that she never once stopped to think about how it would affect him if something happened to her. If something happened to her, he would-

"The three of them attacked him! He was forced to defend himself," the social worker yelled, drawing the attention of everyone in the crowded waiting room.

"Ma'am, you don't know the full story," Bill said, keeping his tone polite, but Eric knew the man was pissed. Not even an hour ago, he'd been in the nurses' break room when Bill stormed into the room after seeing Joe and slammed the door shut. Then, for good measure, he'd kicked a few chairs across the room.

After a loud shouting match between the two of them and two nurses running away from the room in a panic, they'd calmed down enough for him to tell Bill what went down. Hearing what happened only seemed to enrage the man more and set off another bout of chair kicking.

Eric would have joined him if the doctor hadn't shown up at that moment to ask about Joe's closest relative, nearly taking twenty years off his life. After explaining that they needed permission to treat her because she was still unconscious, he'd reluctantly explained that she didn't have any relatives.

He definitely didn't count her mother since no one had seen or heard from her in almost fifteen years. When the doctor refused to explain what was wrong with Joe, he'd lied and told him that he was Joe's medical proxy. Technically, it wasn't a lie since they'd filled out the paperwork. They just hadn't gotten around to have it notarized yet.

It took a few minutes of arguing and Bill flat-out lying to back him up to convince the doctor to listen to him, but he'd finally relented. They'd already ruled out a spinal injury as well as a skull fracture, but he was positive that she had a concussion and they required permission to treat the deep gash along her temple. Eric quickly gave it and had obediently followed a nurse to the waiting area to fill out paperwork.

The paperwork hadn't provided the distraction that he needed. In less than five minutes, he had it filled out and returned to the triage station. He'd hoped it would take longer so he didn't have to think about Joe being in there all alone.

"I know that three so-called professionals took it upon themselves to gang up on a helpless man," she said with an indignant sniff. "Thanks to their brutal tactics, that poor man is in there getting his broken arm fixed."

Yeah, he broke the little bastard's arm. Did he care? Not one fucking bit. He knew without a doubt that if the little bastard had gotten his hand on the gun that he would have shot them and everyone in that house. Throw in the fact that he'd attacked Joe when she was bleeding and down and would have probably killed her with his bare hands if Eric hadn't grabbed him, then he would say the guy was lucky.

"If they'd done their jobs, my client would not be-"

"And if you had done your job," Eric snapped as he got to his feet, sick of her bullshit, "then you would have known that facility wasn't providing him with proper care and that he needed a medical intervention. If you had done your fucking job, we wouldn't be here right now, and my partner and an officer would not be stuck in this hospital getting patched up thanks to your fucking incompetence."

Tyler had suffered dozens of bites, scratches, and punches requiring god only knows how many stitches and shots. By the time backup arrived, he'd looked like he'd gone ten rounds with a tiger.

"Eric," Bill said tightly, "I'll handle this."

"How dare you?" the social worker hissed. "It's not my fault that my client was attacked. He has several neurological problems and you were well aware of that fact. You knew that he has bipolar and schizophrenia! Knowing that, you should have-"

"I'll be sure to tell his family that you took the time to announce his private medical information to a roomful of strangers. I'm sure they'll appreciate that," Eric drawled, cutting her off. He ignored her outraged sputtering and headed for the double doors of the emergency room. He was tired of waiting.

The double doors abruptly opened just as a nurse called out. "You can't leave!"

Eric watched Joe stumble into the waiting room with her light blue uniformed shirt untucked and bloodstained, her boots untied, and a large, white gauze pad taped to her forehead, barely covering the large bruise peeking out to complete the ensemble. He'd like to say that he was surprised that she was trying to haul ass against medical advice this early in the game, but sadly, he wasn't.

Nothing pissed Joe off more than being told what to do, which, of course, meant that he was going to have to resort to lying and manipulation to make sure that her beautiful ass never touched the tech bench in the back of an ambulance ever again.

Joe leveled a glare on him when she spotted him. That was followed by pointing a damning finger in his direction, barely righting herself as she stumbled to the right as she said, "Don't think for one minute that you're getting out of buying me a steak dinner tonight, you cheap bastard!"

"I. Hate. You," Joe bit out evenly as she watched Eric savor another bite of the steak that should rightfully be hers.

"Mmmm, this was a really good idea tonight," Eric said, taking a sip of her beer.

"You're dead to me," Joe groaned as another wave of nausea took over. Slapping a hand over her mouth, she quickly crawled off her bed and made a mad dash to the bathroom. She just barely made it to the toilet when the ginger ale Eric forced her to drink made another appearance.

"Let's get you into bed before you slam your head and I end up having to bring you back to the hospital for more stitches," Eric said in a soothing voice as he gently picked her up and carried her back to her bed.

She couldn't help but glare at the takeout container that held the remains of her juicy steak. "You could have waited until tomorrow night," Joe mumbled pathetically.

"I believe you requested your steak dinner tonight," Eric reminded her with a smug grin.

"You know I get sick from anesthesia! You could have waited, you evil bastard!" Joe snapped, causing the pain behind her eyes to explode.

She sucked in a breath as she buried her face in her pillow, hoping that it would go away. When it didn't, she focused on not crying. No matter what, she would never allow herself to cry. From somewhere above her, she heard Eric's soft curse followed by his footsteps as he walked away. She forced herself to focus on relaxing her breathing until the pounding at the back of her skull had somewhat dulled, allowing her to curl up onto her side, facing away from the television and the small lamp near her desk.

A minute later, Eric was kneeling down next to the bed with what looked like another glass of ginger ale and the bottle of generic aspirin she kept in the kitchen. "Open up," he said softly. When she grudgingly did as he'd asked, he dropped two pills in her mouth. "Swallow," he said, holding the glass against her lips.

Eric watched her as he gently ran his fingers through her hair and pushed it out of her face. "You need the pain medication they prescribed to you."

She started to shake her head only to remember that wasn't such a good idea right now. "I can't take that while I'm working," Joe pointed out only to cringe when a new onslaught of pain tore through her head.

"Since you're not going to work for a few days, I don't see the problem," Eric happily announced, cutting off any protests she was about to make by forcing her to drink more ginger ale. So, she settled for glaring at him.

When he decided that she drank enough, Eric removed the cup and placed it on the nightstand by her bed before he stood up and pulled the covers over her. "I really don't like the idea of leaving you alone to go pick up the pills."

"Then don't. I don't need them," Joe lied, feeling like someone slammed a sledgehammer into the top of her skull head.

He continued as if she hadn't spoken. "So, I called-"

"If you tell me that you called Mom," Joe said, ignoring the excruciating pain tearing through her head so that she could cut him off, "I will kick your ass."

Eric picked up an ice pack and gently placed it against her forehead. "It would serve you right if I did," he murmured softly, ignoring her glare. "But no, I realized calling Mom would only set off that stubborn streak of yours and piss me off when she started barking orders."

Relieved, Joe laid back and allowed him to place her hand over the ice pack to keep it in place. The last thing she needed was for Alice to come here and fuss over her. As much as she loved the woman, and she did, she tended to turn into a mother hen when any of them was sick.

Then, there was her tendency to act like a drill sergeant to everyone around them who wasn't sick. She still cringed when she thought about the time Nathan caught mono. Alice fussed over him, making sure every one of his needs was met whether he wanted them met or not. She probably would have found the whole thing funny if she hadn't been regulated to what Alice liked to call "Disinfectant Duty."

For the first day, they'd been forced to clean anything and everything Nathan might have come into contact with. It hadn't mattered that mono couldn't be spread by touching the bricks in the fireplace. They were scrubbed within an inch of their lives, along with everything else in the house. The second day, and every day after that until Nathan was better, were spent cleaning every inch of his room, the bathroom and making sure that he had absolutely no reason to leave his room. The only thing that had saved Nathan from getting his ass kicked when they had to wash his dirty underwear was that they knew that he had it worse than them.

She really didn't want to deal with Alice on top of everything else right now. Not that she would admit it to Eric, but she was still pretty shaken up by what happened tonight. They'd had a lot of close calls over the years, but what happened tonight easily surpassed every single one of them. On more than one call, she'd wondered if they were going to get hurt, but she'd never actually thought one of them could get killed.

"Hey," Eric said softly as he knelt back down again. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," Joe mumbled, forcing a weak smile. "I was just thinking about what Mom would do if she found out that I left the hospital." Which was a lie because there was no question that Alice would drag her sorry ass back to the hospital, kicking and screaming.

"Don't worry, I called Nathan and he should be here soon," Eric said, running his fingers gently along the bruise marring her forehead. "I could kill that little bastard."

"Nathan?" she asked, trying to lighten the mood. Thankfully, it worked. Eric rolled his eyes. "No, not Nathan."

"It's over, Eric," Joe said, hoping he'd let it go. She didn't want to think about what happened tonight or just how differently things could have gone if he'd managed to get his hands on that gun.

Eric stood up and busied himself with cleaning his dinner mess instead of responding to her. "When Nathan gets here, you're taking your pills."

She snorted, then winced when a fresh wave of pain shot through her temple. "Pain medication doesn't work for me," Joe reminded him as she pressed her fingertips against her temples in hopes that the pressure would help.

It didn't.

"They'll help you sleep," Eric pointed out, positioning the television so that it once again faced the bed. Joe didn't bother telling him that the glare from the television was hurting her eyes. That would just make him more determined to force the painkillers down her throat and she wasn't taking them. Besides, if she took them, then she wouldn't be allowed to return to work tomorrow. Not that she thought anything would happen, but if anything did, she could get in trouble for having narcotics in her system.

"I'm not taking them," Joe said as she carefully turned over onto her side to face away from the television. She could have kissed Eric when he shut the bedroom light off a few seconds later.

When she felt him climb onto the bed and settle next to her, Joe closed her eyes, more than willing to spend the next three or four hours struggling to fall asleep as long as she knew that Eric was safe.

He placed his hand on her blanket-clad hip and gave it a gentle squeeze. "Yes, you are."

"No, I'm not," she muttered sleepily.

"We'll see."

"No, we won't," Joe promised him as she snuggled back against his body.

"I just left in the middle of a date," Nathan suddenly announced, "so you better believe you're taking the damn pills even if we have to hold you down and shove a tube down your throat!"

Narrowing her eyes, Joe rolled over so that she could glare at Nathan and watched him yank his tie loose as he matched her glare. "You wouldn't dare."