“What are you thinking right now?” he asked.
With her one working shoulder, she shrugged beneath his touch.
He took his free hand and tipped her chin up so she was looking at him once more. “Talk to me, Callie. I won’t let you go through this alone, even though you want to.”
Blinking back tears, she sighed. “I just don’t know how you can look at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like…like you care for me.”
His head tipped to the side as he smiled. “Callie, I do care for you or you wouldn’t be here. You’re hurt and it’s my fault.”
Confused, Callie stepped to the side, away from his touch. “What do you mean, your fault?”
“If I hadn’t asked you to model, you wouldn’t have been on that freeway and you wouldn’t have been in the accident.”
She hadn’t thought it possible to hurt more, but pain sliced through every fiber of her being. His declaration just proved she was at his house, under his care, because he felt pity. And not just pity, but obligation and guilt, and not because they’d begun something in the car the other day.
She closed her eyes, forcing the tears back until she was alone. “Just show me to my room. I’m tired.”
He looked as if he wanted to say more, but after hesitating a brief moment, he nodded and moved farther down the wide hallway. Callie prayed her collarbone would recover fast so she could go home.
For so long she’d been such a fighter. But right now, she wasn’t so sure she had any fight left in her.
She wanted to have something to push toward, to look forward to
after her healing was over. But she knew the odds of living out her dream had more than likely died the second her car slammed into that semi. And Callie would replay that hellacious moment in her head over and over until she died. Of that she was dead sure.
She headed to bed, praying somehow things would look better in the morning.
Five
Noah put the towels away in his master suite and glanced at the small picture of Malinda and him during one of their earlier, carefree times that sat on a shelf beside the window. This was the only picture in the house he hadn’t stored in a box on a shelf in the back of his closet. One last reminder of the happiest moments of his life.
He still had a closet full of clothing from Malinda’s job as a personal shopper; most of them still had tags. But for some reason he still couldn’t let go.
Some reason? No, he knew the reason. How could he let go? If he let go of the past, he’d be finalizing the fact that he had failed the one person he’d loved more than life itself. If he severed all ties with that portion of his life, the finality of the truth would settle in deeper, and quite possibly cripple him.
He just couldn’t bear to face the truth. Not only was Malinda gone, he hadn’t been able to do anything to stop her swift spiral down to the depths of her drug overdose.
And Callie thought he knew nothing of hell on earth? He lived it every single day. The reminder of the life he thought he’d have with Malinda was always in the forefront of his mind. Between the picture he just couldn’t take down and tending to Thelma’s needs, the past just wouldn’t let him go. He was caught in the vise of this damn nightmare and he had no way of getting out and moving on. And he feared he’d always be on this roller-coaster ride of emotions.
As he moved into his bedroom, he sighed. He was getting frustrated with Callie and he didn’t want to go all alpha male on her and take over, but he would if he saw she wasn’t taking care of herself. Stubbornness had no place in the healing process.
Since they’d arrived, she hadn’t come out of her room. He’d asked her about eating and she’d claimed she wasn’t hungry and just wanted to rest. Well, that was nearly five hours ago.
Now it was time for her medicine, so she was going to have to open the door and let him in. She had to eat something because she couldn’t take these heavy pain meds on an empty stomach or she’d feel a whole lot worse. He’d also apply more ointment to her face, though that was really just an excuse to get close to her.
Callie’s self-esteem and bubbling energy seemed to have been a casualty in the accident, and he intended to make them come back to life. More than likely that would take time, but Noah couldn’t watch another woman destroy herself whether it be via drugs or depression.
As a doctor, he’d vowed to protect and heal people. But as a man, he just couldn’t sit by and see Callie beat herself up and let her anger and frustrations fester. If she didn’t open up, she might end up worse than she was now.
And yeah, the irony of him thinking someone needed to open up was not lost on him. Looked as if the pot and the kettle would be spending a lot of time butting heads over the next few weeks.
Noah kept Callie’s medicine in his room so he could have easy access, but also so it wouldn’t be with her. The risk of her becoming addicted was too great. He would let her have the prescription painkillers for the next two days, but after that it would be over-the-counter meds. He needed to wean her off the narcotics.
Just the thought of Callie hooked on painkillers sickened him. But the fact they were back in his house only made him have flash upon flash of another woman, another drug.