Cooper. Keith. The men who had shot at them. The unexplained magical powers of the men who had shot at them.
There was a knock at the door, and then Keith’s nurse entered to give them another update on Keith’s progress.
The nurse was a big, burly guy who looked like he could have played in the NFL and bent Gretchen’s gun into a pretzel with his bare hands, but even he hung back against the wall like he was afraid to come too close to them.
Prisoners had that effect on people. She’d noticed that before, of course, but she’d never felt it like this.
Now it was impossible for her to miss the way Cooper stiffened when the people around him suddenly started cutting him a wide berth. He didn’t like people being afraid of him, and, she realized, he did everything he could to avoid it. The second the nurse had come in, Cooper had slumped his shoulders, as if he could make himself smaller and less threatening, and he had turned his attention to the speckled linoleum of the floor.
Gretchen thought about how completely exhausting it must be to live every day knowing people were afraid of you.
And what it must be like to know those fears were unjustified—and that you could never explain that. That no one would ever believe you.
During Cooper’s trial, whatever expression he wore had been scrutinized and analyzed within an inch of its life. If he smiled, it was because he had no sympathy for the victims. If he looked sad, he was either marinating himself in self-pity or putting on an act that everyone resented. If he looked angry, he was a monster. If he looked serious or just plain blank, he was hiding something, and his lawyers had probably coached him.
From the moment of his arrest, he’d never been able to relax.
“—hold for further observation,” the nurse was saying.
She owed Keith’s status her full attention, dammit. With a surge of guilt, she refocused herself.
“I’m sorry. I’m still a little shaken up.” That was true, even if it wasn’t exactly accurate in terms of why she’d been distracted just then. “Would you mind repeating that?”
The nurse nodded. He had a warm, reassuring smile, even if he aimed it solely at her and was still avoiding any eye contact with Cooper. “Sure. Deputy Marshal Ridley has a
severe concussion. We have him on a drip right now for the nausea and the pain, and he’s resting. He should be fine with a little time to heal, but even after he’s stabilized, we’d like to hold him for a while to make sure he’s not developing post-concussion syndrome. Do you know what that is?”
She did. “That’s where the headaches and the confusion hang around for a few weeks, right?”
“That’s the one. It’s not typical, but it happens about twenty percent of the time, and with a head injury like his, we like to keep an eye out for it. Unless...” He glanced surreptitiously at Cooper. “Unless there’s some urgent reason for Mr. Ridley to get back on the road as soon as possible?”
“No,” Gretchen said firmly. Even if she’d been traveling with a prisoner who did ring the alarm bells in her head, she still wouldn’t have used that fear to justify endangering Keith’s health. She felt bad enough about him getting hurt in the first place. “My chief is on his way here, and we’ll work out what to do next. If you don’t mind us staying camped out here a little while longer...”
The answer to that came with a little bit of hemming and hawing, but the gist of it seemed to be that the hospital didn’t care what they did, as long as they, to quote Gretchen’s Nana Miller, didn’t do it in the streets and frighten the horses. Or in the halls and frighten the patients. The nurse zipped off then to attend to other matters.
Like clockwork, Cooper straightened up again, some of the tension easing out of his face.
He must spend so much time on guard against other people’s perceptions of him—and so much time twisting himself into knots to try to put them at ease.
She was glad he didn’t do that with her. But he didn’t have to. She had never been afraid of him, and she never would be afraid of him.
Because he’s innocent. I know it.
She couldn’t explain that belief yet, not even to herself. And she had no clue what to do about it.
Well, that made this problem fit in with all the other problems she’d had today, at least.
“This is all my fault,” she said.
Cooper gave her a crooked, charming half-smile. “Huh. You managed to drive that car and ours at the same time? You rear-ended us and then started shooting?”
That drew a soft laugh out of her. “Okay, maybe it’s not all my fault. But some of it is.”
He was just looking at her then, waiting to hear what she meant; his cool, clear eyes completely attentive.
Almost transfixed. Captured.
Gretchen had been loved her whole life, by her family and her friends, but she didn’t know that anyone had ever looked at her like that before, like she wasn’t just the center of their attention but the center of their whole world.