Chapter 21

Dolly tooka moment to do inventory before she answered his question. "Everything hurts. What happened to me? How did I get here?"

"Anything hurt worse than the rest of your body?"

"Yeah, my butt. And maybe my head," Dolly said, lifting a hand to touch where the pain in her head seemed centered. "Right here."

She frowned when she felt something warm and wet on her head. Pulling her hand back, she found her fingertips were covered with red.

"Uh, Quincy, I'm bleeding. Why am I bleeding?"

"What's the last thing you remember?" Quincy answered her question with another one of his own.

Thinking made the pain in Dolly's head grow, but she kept at it. "I remember one of the sadists grabbing my arm and telling me he would come after me with a bullwhip if I wrote about him. I decided to go back to the room and hide and… and… That's all I remember."

"Apparently you were going up the stairs, tripped and ended up falling back down the stairs. I'm sorry, but this is going to hurt," Quincy said as he clicked on a small flashlight and shined it in her eyes.

"Ouchie," she whined.

"All right, you don't seem to have a concussion, but because you were unconscious for several minutes, I want to keep a close eye on you. Let's get you cleaned up and then we'll go back to our room. You can rest for the next couple of days and hopefully be ready to travel home by the weekend."

When Quincy helped her sit up, her stomach rolled and her ass complained about sitting, but the pains seemed to settle after a few seconds. He quickly cleaned and bandaged the cut on her head and brushed a kiss on her forehead when he finished.

"All right. Give me a few minutes to write some notes and talk to Derek about my bill, and we'll go back to the room."

"I can go by myself," Dolly said, wondering if her clumsiness would ever end.

"You can, but you're going to be a good subbie and wait right here."

She sighed and slowly nodded. "Yes, Sir."

Dolly carefully laid down again and rolled to lay on her side. The change in position eased the pain in her ass, making her more aware that the rest of her was banged up. Closing her eyes, she allowed herself to drift while she waited for Quincy to finish.

It seemed like only a few minutes before she felt someone pick her up. Opening her eyes, she looked up at Quincy's beard-covered chin. "I can walk."

"Or you can just relax and let me carry you," he said without stopping.

"You've been carrying me a lot."

"I like carrying you."

She had no argument for that so she relaxed. "Okay, you can carry me."

"Thank you very much."

Quincy watched her sleep, afraid that if he took his eyes off her for a second she would somehow get in trouble. She really was clumsy, but he did not think he wanted her any other way. He would happily spend the rest of his life with her by his side so he could keep her out of trouble.

After a while, he pulled out his phone and went book shopping for the entire collection by Dee Carter. He then settled in to read and found himself learning more about Dolly through her writing than he expected. From what he had learned from spending these past days with her, he could see that she put a lot of herself in her characters.

At dawn, he started a pot of coffee then called room service and ordered a breakfast that would be easy for her to eat and digest. While she probably should go to the hospital and get checked out, he knew if he suggested it, she would decline, saying she was fine. Besides, he was a doctor and would be keeping a close eye on her. If she showed signs of a more serious head injury, he could always take her to the hospital, but for now, he was satisfied that she would be fine with rest and quiet time here in their room.

"What are you doing?" Dolly whispered, drawing his attention to the bed.

Quincy stood and crossed to sit on the edge of the mattress by her hip. "Watching you sleep. How do you feel?"

"Tired. Sore. Stupid."

"Be careful or you'll find yourself over my lap getting your ass rewarmed for calling yourself names," Quincy said, gently brushing her hair back from her face.

"You look tired," Dolly said after studying him for a few seconds.

Since there was no question, he decided to ignore the statement, even though it was true. He was getting too old to go more than twenty-four hours without sleep.

A knock at the door gave him a welcomed reprieve. After taking the tray of food from the man, he set it on the foot of the bed. "Breakfast and then you're going back to sleep," he said.

"Are you going to sleep with me?"

"We'll see," he said, though he wasn't sure he would be able to sleep. Not with the vision of her being carried into the infirmary on a stretcher haunting him every time he closed his eyes.

"I think you should," Dolly said. "I would promise to make it worth your while, but my head and butt still hurt so I don't think I'd be very good at seduction this morning. Raincheck, okay?"

Quincy could not help the chuckle that escaped at her disappointed tone. "I'll accept a raincheck, yes. For now, how about we eat breakfast and then take a nap."