Chapter Twenty-Two

"Nana, you have to lay back and relax. It won't do you any good to fight us." Drew gazed down at his grandmother with affectionate exasperation. Now that she was no longer in any danger, he had no problem exerting his authority as a doctor rather than a worried grandson. "You aren't going to leave here a moment before Dr. Porter says so." He allowed himself a brief glance out of the window to catch a glimpse of Ash but didn't see him. Dr. Porter came in with a bevy of young interns and residents following him.

"Well, Mrs. Klein, you gave your family quite a scare." He flashed a broad smile at her.

One thing his grandmother loved was a nice-looking man, no matter the age. Tall, with dark hair and piercing light-blue eyes, Rob Porter was one of the hospital heartthrobs, and Drew noticed with amusement how she turned her charm on the doctor. Esther might be close to ninety, but she was still a flirt.

"Why, I didn't mean to, of course." Her brow furrowed as the smile dimmed from her face. "These two young men came to my door and said such awful things." The pink color drained from her face, leaving her pale. Alarmed, Drew grabbed her hand while Rachel brushed back the hair from her face.

"Mrs. Klein, try not to get upset. I'm sure your family will see to it that you are given the best of care and that something like this never happens again." Rob beckoned Drew over to the door.

Anxious to hear what Rob had to say, Drew jumped up from the chair, first stopping by his grandmother's bed to give her a kiss. "I'll be back in a few minutes." When he joined Rob, the doctor was frowning.

"Drew, she's fine. I'm going to keep her here one more day for observation but I recommend you have someone stay with her once she returns home. She shouldn't live on her own."

That's what Drew was afraid of. His grandmother never wanted to be one of those people who had to rely on external help. He and Rachel would have to tread carefully to preserve her independence. "Don't you worry, Rob. She's going to have to listen to us now."

"Good."

After making some notations on the chart, Rob said good-bye and left, the group of doctors trailing in his wake. Drew returned to Rachel and his grandmother. "Nana. You're going to have to have someone with you from now on. No argument."

Rachel got up from the bedside. "I spoke with Mrs. Delaney. Now that her husband is gone, she told me she was thinking of selling the house, since she can't afford the taxes and the upkeep. She'd love to move into your spare bedroom, Nana. It would be the perfect solution. You like and trust her, and she could keep you company, as well as help out."

"That's a wonderful idea, Rach. A win-win in my book, right, Nana?" Drew said.

He had to give her credit. She didn't fight back, merely glared at them and said nothing. Knowing her, she was coming up with some convoluted plan in her mind to counteract their plans.

Before he could say anything else, someone knocked on the door. Spotting Keith's blond head in the window, Drew motioned for his friend to come inside. Keith was in his official capacity as an NYPD detective, as he wore a shirt and tie and Drew spotted his detective's shield clipped to his belt.

"Hey, thanks for coming so fast." They hugged briefly before Keith went over to his grandmother.

"Well, Esther, what do you have to say for yourself?" Keith's bright blue eyes twinkled.

"My, you boys all look so handsome in your suits and ties. It was almost worth getting sick to get to be surrounded by you all." She laughed.

"Nana, really." Rachel's exasperated groan sent him and Keith laughing and shaking their heads.

"Okay, Esther. Drew said you had some visitors. Can you remember and tell me what happened?" Keith pulled out a little notebook and pen, then sat in a chair next to her bed.

Drew glanced at the heart monitor attached to his grandmother and setting off steady beeps. At the first sign of any change, he'd make sure to cut off the questions. Rachel stood by her bedside, like a protective sentry, holding her hand.

"Well, it was funny. Remember I said two young men had come by and cut my grass and trimmed the bushes for me the other day?" They all nodded, and she continued. "They came back, which I thought was strange, since I obviously didn't have any work left for them to do."

"Did you tell them that, Esther?" Keith had stopped writing in his notebook.

She nodded. "I did, and they laughed at me and said some strange things."

"Like what, Nana?" Rachel dropped her hand and sat on the edge of the bed.

His grandmother looked at him. "They mentioned you, Drew. Not by name, but said, ‘Tell your grandson and his friends to keep out of our business.'" She dropped her voice and fingered the edge of the sheet. "They started cursing and saying horrible things about you, darling, and Asher and Jordan."

Keith's eyes turned into chips of blue ice. "Did they threaten you, Esther, or touch you?"

After a little hesitation, she nodded. "They pushed me against the wall and said to tell Dr. Drew that things would get worse if he continued helping those kids." She glanced up at Keith. "They used a slur, and I'm not about to say it, even for you, dear. I don't use that kind of language."

Keith's normally smiling face vanished, replaced by a stone-like mask. He patted Nana's hand. "Don't worry about it. I know what you mean." He wrote for a few minutes in his notebook. "Is that all?"

Nana thought for a moment. "Yes. They left, laughing as if it were a big joke, but not before pushing me around a little." Her voice rose with indignation. "What kind of world are we living in with such a lack of respect for women and someone of my age? Who's raising these hoodlums?"

The machines kept up their steady beeping with no change, Drew noted. He turned his attention back to Keith, who continued to ask questions.

"Esther, what did they look like, and did you hear them call each other by any names?" Keith watched her with an expectant look on his face.

Her face scrunched up in thought for a moment. "They were both young—teenagers, I'd guess. One was tall and nice looking. He had very short hair and brown eyes, but his lips were thin. I tell you I've never trusted a man with thin lips. The other was shorter with that crazy hair all over his face, like they like to wear nowadays." She shrugged. "I don't know why they think it's attractive."

Drew looked over at Keith and caught his lips twitching as if to hold back his laughter. He turned back to her. "Any names, Nana?"

She shrugged. "No. I'm sorry. But I would definitely recognize them again if I saw them." Her eyes brightened. "Maybe you could bring me down to the police station, and I could look through pictures."

Keith laughed. "Esther, I have a feeling you think this is like an episode of Law and Order ."

"Well, I do love that show," she grumbled. "And that's what their witnesses to crimes always do."

Keith stood and went over to the bed to give her a kiss. "I'll take you myself in a squad car with the lights on the top and let you look through pictures, but only after your doctor clears it." He stuck out his hand. "Deal?"

She took his hand and shook it as everyone in the room laughed. "Deal."

The nurse came in and shooed them out. "Mrs. Klein needs her rest. Everyone out now please, including you, Dr. Klein. No special treatment for you because you're a doctor." Mrs. Albright winked at him. The two of them went way back, to when he was a resident here and she was the toughest nurse, always giving the new doctors the hardest time.

"Yes, ma'am." They filed out of the room into the waiting area. Drew was surprised to see only Jordan and Mike. Where was Ash?

When he posed the question to Jordan, his friend merely shrugged. "He left a long time ago. Got in the elevator and went. Forget about him, Drew. I told you a long time ago he's a player and a bastard. He's no friend to you."

Drew couldn't believe Ash would simply up and disappear. Not after last night and the truths they'd bared to each other this morning. Without being told, he knew Ash had never revealed to anyone else the brutality and degradation he'd suffered before he reinvented himself. The scars that left, both physical and emotional were not to be taken lightly, nor were they something to slough off and bury away, as he feared Ash did to survive.

Remembering how gentle and caring Ash had been with him the night before, Drew wasn't about to let him withdraw back into that cold, lonely shell. Now that he'd seen the best of the man, he was ready to help him through his worst.

"Jordan, did you say anything to him to make him leave?" Everyone turned to him, Jordan's face a picture of astonishment.

"Are you implying that I drove the man away? I did nothing of the sort. He walked away of his own free will." Keith put a hand on Jordan's shoulder, but he shook him off and advanced upon Drew. "Why do you care if he's here, anyway? What happened to Shelly? Where's your girlfriend?"

Everyone now stared at Drew. Damn, the back and forth was like a tennis match. "We broke up."

Rachel's mouth fell open. "Oh, Drew. I'm sorry."

He shrugged. "It was for the best. She was way too serious about the relationship. Much more into it than I was."

Jordan made a sound of disgust. "I'm sure your buddy Ash was happy about the breakup."

This was getting ridiculous. "What the hell is your problem? You've had a stick up your ass about Ash since we first met him. So what if he made a pass at you years ago? Shit, man, let it go."

Jordan persisted. "But don't you see—"

"What I see is you bad-mouthing someone who's never said a bad word about you. There's no reason for you to hate him so much."

"He's a user, and you're too nice a guy to see it. He screws people and then dumps them. That's his MO."

Worried, pissed off, and tired, Drew had enough. "I'm not that nice, and I can take care of myself. And as for Ash, you've never given him any slack, no matter how hard he's worked at the clinic or tried to protect Stevie. You think you have the right to judge everyone and everything, and we should let you run our lives. Who the hell are you to treat me like some fucking child who doesn't know any better? I decide who I take to my bed, not you, Jordan." He stopped for a moment to catch his breath. "And for the record, Ash didn't have to try too hard to screw me, 'cause I wanted him as much as he wanted me."

Keith had come over to Jordan's side but for the first time it seemed he wouldn't be able to calm his lover down as Jordan continued to bad-mouth and rant about Ash.

For some reason, Jordan thought he had the right to decide who Drew dated, screwed, and fell in love with. Drew always knew the man had an ego a mile wide, but this was ridiculous. "You know what, Jordan? I'm done. I thought as a friend you'd trust me to make the right decisions and stand by me." They'd known each other since he was four years old, and this was the first test to their friendship. "I always thought I could count on you. Has that changed?"

Jordan couldn't hold his gaze. "I trust you. It's him I don't trust."

Drew came right up into his friend's face. Jordan could be stubborn, arrogant, and high-handed but never deliberately mean.

"If you trust me, then you have to understand I know exactly what I'm doing here."

Jordan's mouth tightened. "It's different. Snakes never let you know when they're coming toward you. They slither around you, and before you know it, they've swallowed you whole. That's what Ash Davis is. A snake. I've seen him in the courtroom. He's got a way with words that'll make you think black is white and up is down. Never mind silver-tongued, the man has a forked tongue."

Remembering where Ash's tongue had been on him last night, heat rose in Drew's face. Irritated with himself for getting distracted, Drew folded his arms across his chest and glared at Jordan. "It's not the same, and you know it. You're bordering on the irrational the way you feel about him."

He turned on his heel to walk away; if he didn't leave now, he'd do or say something he'd regret. Something that might irreparably damage their lifelong friendship, and Drew wasn't ready for that to happen. He knew everything Jordan said to him was out of love and concern, but for so many years, people had managed his life and he'd acquiesced, out of disinterest and boredom. His one act of rebellion, marrying Jackie, turned out disastrous, and that was all the fodder they needed to show him he wasn't strong or smart enough to pick the right person for himself.

No one understood him. Pathetic as it might be, Drew still felt like that scared and lonely child when his parents left for work and he'd stay home with Nana. He'd constantly needed reassurance that they'd be coming back home and hadn't disappeared forever. Was it so wrong to want someone to hold, someone to love? He'd always been that little boy lost.

After his parents died, he'd gone slightly crazy and thrown himself into the wildness of the college party scene. Anything to not be alone. Many a morning found him in a strange girl's bed, with no idea how he'd gotten there. Nor did he remember the threesomes, occasionally waking up sandwiched in between two girls, or even once or twice tangled up with another girl and guy. He'd always been so drunk he couldn't remember the sex at all. Total oblivion was what he'd been after, to wash the pain away.

That hadn't lasted long, as fear for his health as well as his studies overcame his irrational behavior, and he'd settled down to being the studious bookworm he'd always been. He may have opened his mind to his studies, but he'd walled off his heart to life.

Now Ash had up and left him at a time when he needed someone to lean on the most he had in years. They might have been lovers—he'd let Ash inside his body—yet Drew still didn't fully understand Ash.

After last night, though, he assumed he'd have a chance to try.

Perhaps Jordan was right, and Ash had used him. It wouldn't surprise him as he'd had to live his whole life by his wits and quick mind. But even as those thoughts tumbled around in his muddled brain, he remembered the quiet strength of Ash's voice as he revealed his childhood to him. The self-loathing and pain etched on his face, the halting way he disclosed his story of debasement and cruelty, scoring a path of not only pity across Drew's heart but something fresh, unexposed to light before, as if he'd come out of the darkness from a long trip. Feelings he'd never experienced and wasn't yet ready to face.

When he glanced around the small room, everyone he cared about was there. They all looked at him with varying degrees of surprise, dismay, and pity to some extent. He knew they loved him, but only as a brother and a friend. Right now he needed more than that. He needed to find out if the man he'd shared his secrets with and let possess his body was merely a figment of his imagination.

"I gotta go find out where Ash went. I'll come back after lunch and check on Nana." Drew kissed Rachel good-bye. "We'll talk later, about everything."

"You better mean everything, you know," she called after him as the elevator doors closed on him, and he traveled downward to the first floor. That promised to be an interesting conversation, for sure.