Her Right-Hand Cowboy (Forever, Tx Series Book 21) Read online

  “Hey, that sure sounds like a fair bargain to me,” an older woman said, then cackled at the possible outcome of the confrontation.

  “Looks like you get to go in next, Mitch,” Debi told him, coming around toward him from behind her desk. “Just follow me.”

  “I’ll wait here,” Ena told him.

  She would have preferred going into the exam room with him, but she knew she couldn’t very well go in and hold his hand. He wouldn’t stand for it, and besides, she wasn’t related to him.

  She watched Debi lead Mitch in through the door that led to the exam rooms in the back of the clinic.

  With a sigh, she moved away from the reception desk and found a seat in the waiting room.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “Waiting is always the hardest part, honey.”

  The remark came from an older woman sitting in the waiting room. The woman was to Ena’s right and she leaned forward in her seat to give their exchange a semblance of privacy. Smiling, the woman patted Ena’s hand as if they had some sort of bond between them, even though Ena didn’t recognize her.

  Ena forced a smile to her lips. “I guess it is,” she replied politely.

  “Oh, I know it is because you’re stuck out here, letting your imagination run wild. If you were in there with him, asking questions and finding things out, it would be a lot easier for you, trust me,” the woman told her with confidence. Her face brightened. “But he’ll be out by and by.”

  Ena forced a smile to her lips and just nodded in response.

  The smile the woman flashed at Ena was genuine. “You don’t remember me, do you?”

  Ena had to admit that the woman’s voice sounded vaguely familiar, but her face wasn’t. Ena shook her head. “I’m sorry—”

  The matronly-looking woman laughed. “Oh, don’t be sorry, dear. The last time I saw you, I had brown hair instead of all this gray and you were this cute little senior going to high school along with my daughter, Sandra.”

  The name instantly triggered a memory. “Mrs. Baker?” Ena cried uncertainly, looking more closely at the woman in the waiting room.

  Shirley Baker laughed, delighted. “So, you do remember me.”

  “Of course I do,” Ena answered, genuine pleasure filling her voice. “How’s Sandra doing?” she asked, grateful to be able to actually carry on a conversation instead of doing what the woman had said, letting her mind come up with awful scenarios about Mitch’s possible condition.

  Mrs. Baker beamed. “Sandra’s doing just great. She’s married now. Gave me two beautiful grandbabies,” the woman said proudly. “They’re two and four. I watch them for her when she works at the hotel. I’m taking the day off today, getting my semiannual with the doctor,” she confided in a lower voice. And then she went on to say in a louder voice, “We’ve done a lot of growing here in Forever since you’ve been gone.”

  Ena nodded. “I noticed.”

  Shirley Baker’s expression turned sympathetic. “I was sorry to hear about your dad. He was a good man. A lot of people came to his funeral,” she said, obviously thinking Ena would take comfort in that. “Almost everyone in town paid their respects.”

  “So everyone keeps telling me.” Because this woman was someone she had once known, Ena knew the woman was undoubtedly wondering why she hadn’t attended her father’s funeral. “I didn’t know he was ill until he was gone,” she started to explain.

  Mrs. Baker reached over and squeezed Ena’s hand. “Nobody’s blaming you, dear. Family ties aren’t always the easiest to maintain,” she told Ena. “I just wanted you to know that when my Henry died, your dad was the first one at my door, managing things for me until I could get my head together and deal with things myself. I don’t know where I would have been without him.”

  “My father did that?” Ena asked incredulously.

  She couldn’t remember a single instance over the years when her father actually went out with friends or, for that matter, even mentioned having any. How had that solitary man transformed himself into the perennial good neighbor?

  Mrs. Baker nodded. “Your father.”

  “When I fell off my tractor and wound up breaking my leg, it was your dad who came over every day after he finished his own work to help out with mine. And when he couldn’t come over, he sent that foreman of his over. The one you brought in to see the doc,” Jeb Russell told her, adding his voice to Shirley Baker’s.

  That started the ball rolling. Within minutes, other people in the waiting room were speaking up, telling Ena about things that her father had selflessly done for them when they found themselves suddenly in need of a good neighbor.

  Ena felt both stunned and overwhelmed. It was hard for her to reconcile this version of her father with the one she had grown up with and had always known. She felt cheated because he had never been this way with her and he had never allowed her to witness what was obviously a new, improved version of Bruce O’Rourke.

  After she had left home, the man had reinvented himself.

  Why this new, improved version never attempted to get in touch with her—especially after he had had her tracked down—was still very much a mystery to her. Yes, Mitch had given her a reason, but it was a relatively poor one and it didn’t really begin to provide her with any answers to her questions.

  When the door leading to the examination rooms in the rear of the medical clinic opened and Mitch came out, Ena was busy talking to another one of the patients. She didn’t see him at first. When she did, she immediately shot up to her feet and quickly crossed over to the reception desk.

  She saw a tall kind-looking man in a white lab coat talking to Mitch. He had to be the doctor, she decided. Why was he still talking to Mitch?

  Was something else wrong?

  Apprehension immediately returned to her in spades as she came closer.

  “How is he?” she asked the man in the lab coat without any preamble.

  Dr. Daniel Davenport turned his head in her direction. “You must be Ena O’Rourke,” he said, putting out his hand to her.

  Ena shook his hand without really taking note of what she was doing. She was completely focused on Mitch. “I am. How is he?” she repeated.

  “You’re right,” Dan said to Mitch, who was standing right next to him. “She really is as direct as her father was.”

  Ena immediately wanted to deny the similarity, but doing so would take her down another path and she didn’t want to distract the doctor. She wanted her question answered.

  Now.

  Rephrasing her question, she asked, “Does he have a concussion?”

  “I did a CAT scan. He does have a concussion, but it is only a very mild one,” Dan told her.

  Mitch appeared vindicated. “See, I told you I didn’t have to come in,” he said to her.

  Dan continued talking as if Mitch hadn’t said a word. “But you were right to bring him in,” he said to Ena. “It’s better to check these things out than to experience regrets later on.” He glanced toward Mitch, then told Ena, “I’d definitely recommend a couple of days of rest for him.”

  “Rest. Got it,” Ena said as if she was making the doctor a promise. “Anything else?” She wasn’t about to rely on Mitch to tell her the doctor’s instructions once they left here.

  “He should be all right after that,” Dan responded. “But if he experiences any complications—dizziness, nausea, trouble sleeping, that sort of thing,” he elaborated, “I want you to call the clinic immediately and bring him back here.”

  “We won’t have to make that call,” Mitch told the doctor.

  “Unless we do,” Ena said, overruling Mitch.

  Dan laughed quietly as he watched the couple leave his waiting room.

  “I’d say that he’s met his match. What do you think?” he asked the nurse.

  “I think that you’re right, Doctor,”
Debi told him, then handed Dan the medical file for the next patient waiting to see him.

  * * *

  “See, I told you that there was nothing to worry about,” Mitch said as they walked back to his truck in the parking lot.

  “That is not what I heard the doctor say,” Ena responded.

  “Maybe you should have had your ears checked while we were there,” Mitch suggested.

  Reaching his truck, he was about to open the driver’s-side door. Ena managed to block his hand with her own, keeping him from opening the door.

  “What are you doing?” Mitch asked, looking at her in confusion.

  “I’ll drive,” she informed him.

  Mitch was far from pleased. “The doc said I was okay.”

  “No, he said you had a mild concussion and to watch you for a couple of days,” Ena corrected. “The man said nothing about watching you drive,” she stressed. “Now, get into the truck on the passenger side—unless you want to stand here for the better part of the day and argue about it.”

  Mitch sighed and shook his head, then stopped abruptly, the color suddenly completely draining from his face.

  Ena was instantly alert. “Did you just get dizzy?”

  He expected her to gloat or utter those awful words: I told you so. When she didn’t and exhibited concern instead, Mitch decided that maybe he should stop giving her a hard time. He acted grateful instead.

  “Maybe I will sit in the passenger seat for now,” he told her.

  “Good choice,” she agreed. She waited for Mitch to climb into the truck on the other side, fighting the urge to offer her help. She already felt she knew how he would react to that. “Ready?” she asked once he’d closed his door and buckled up.

  “For your driving?” he quipped, covering up the fact that, just for a second, he’d felt dizzy again. “Not really.”

  Ena got in on the driver’s side. “I’ll have you know that I’m a very good driver.”

  “You forget, I’ve already had a sample of your driving. I was with you when you drove to the clinic,” he reminded her. “Dallas must have different driving standards than we do.”

  “Dallas,” she informed him coolly, “has decent roads.”

  “Does that mean that you don’t speed there?” he asked, feigning surprise.

  “I didn’t speed to the clinic,” she told him. “I was just trying to get you to the doctor before you could come up with a reason to bail on me,” she informed him stiffly.

  “Does that mean that you’re going to be taking your time driving back to the ranch?” he questioned.

  “Now that we know all you really need is some bed rest,” she said, easing back on the accelerator, “yes, I’m going to be taking my time getting back to the Double E.”

  Mitch frowned when she mentioned bed rest.

  “If you’re expecting me to just lie around for the next two days—” he began.

  Ena cut him off. “Yes, that’s exactly what I’m expecting.”

  “Then I suggest you prepare yourself to be disappointed. I’ve got far too much to do to lie around like a lump for two days.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “I can have you tied to your bed.”

  For a second, he allowed himself to build on that image, but then, shaking it off, he said, “As tempting as that sounds, no, I’ll have to pass on that.”

  “Did I give you the impression that this was up for a vote?” she asked. “If I did, then I’m sorry because it’s not. You have no say in this. It’s just me and the doctor.” And then she relented. “We can compromise, and you can be on my dad’s old recliner instead of a bed.”

  She had noticed the old chair the other day. It was shoved over in a corner of the living room. She could clean it up so that Mitch could use it.

  “It’s only a compromise if you put that recliner out in the middle of the corral so I can do the work I signed on for,” he informed her.

  “If you’re going to give me a hard time,” she fired back in a steely tone, “I wasn’t kidding about having you tied up.”

  He laughed shortly at her threat. “Sorry, I don’t mean to insult you but you’re not strong enough to do that.”

  She was not the weakling he took her to be, Ena thought. “You’d be surprised,” she told him. Then she went on to say, “But who says I was going to be the one to tie you up?” When she saw the perplexed expression on his face, she told him, “I’ll get Wade, Billy and Felicity to hold you down and tie you up—and if they’re not enough, I can always call in Miss Joan. If anyone can make you rest, it’s Miss Joan.”

  He sighed. “Okay, Uncle,” he cried, surrendering. “You win.”

  Ena laughed. “I figured threatening you with Miss Joan would tip the scales in my favor. This is for your own good,” she told Mitch.

  He was cornered and he knew it. There was no use in fighting the matter. Even so, Mitch blew out a frustrated breath.

  “You really are a lot like your father,” he told Ena. He saw her stiffen. “That’s not a bad thing, you know.”

  “So I’ve been hearing,” she said with a touch of exasperation in her voice. She still hadn’t made her peace with the fact that her father had made this transformation after she had left town. “Those people in the waiting room, they all told me about what a good man my father was, how helpful he was, volunteering to help his neighbors when they needed him.”

  “He was and he did,” Mitch affirmed.

  “Where was this version of him when I was growing up?” she asked.

  “I really can’t answer that for you,” Mitch admitted. “He was being busy, I guess. Maybe being overwhelmed by all the things he was trying to do. What matters, in the end, was the man that he became.” He hoped she could take some comfort in that.

  But it was obvious that she didn’t. “I wouldn’t know about that.”

  “I can tell you about him,” Mitch volunteered. “So can some of the others on the ranch.”

  “When we get to the ranch, you’re going to be resting, remember?” Ena reminded him.

  “The doctor didn’t say anything about resting my jaw muscle,” he said.

  “I’ll place a call to the doctor when we get home,” she said with such a straight face, he didn’t know if she was being serious. “Maybe he just forgot to mention that little thing.”

  There was silence for a few minutes as Ena continued to drive, and then Mitch spoke. “I’m probably going to regret this...” he began, then stopped for a beat.

  “Regret what?” she asked when he didn’t continue.

  “Saying this,” he told her.

  “Saying what?” she asked impatiently. The man could draw out a single syllable.

  He took a deep breath, as if he needed the extra air to push the word out of his mouth. And then he finally told her, “Thanks.”

  “You’re thanking me? For dragging your stubborn hide into town and to the doctor?” she guessed.

  “No,” he admitted, “for caring enough to see that something was off.”

  “Then you are dizzy,” she said triumphantly because he’d finally admitted it.

  “Was,” Mitch corrected. “And I’ll admit that it might not have been the worst idea to have me checked out. The doc told me that he’d seen a few of these cases go sideways.”

  Ena smiled. “So, let me get this straight. You agree that I did a good thing, overruling you and bringing you in to get checked out, is that it?” she asked him. He could hear the smile in her voice.

  “Don’t let it go to your head,” he warned.

  Her smile widened, her eyes crinkling as she spared him a look. “Too late.”

  Mitch sighed, feigning aggravation. “I knew I was going to regret this.”

  “Not as much as if we hadn’t gone in and you suddenly started experiencing all the complications that go along with a
head injury,” she said seriously.

  “This seems to be a personal crusade of yours,” he commented.

  “In a way, I guess it is.” She paused for a moment, debating whether or not to share something with Mitch. To be honest, she was surprised he didn’t already know, seeing how close he’d gotten to her father. “My uncle—my dad’s younger brother—got thrown from a horse when I was a kid. He wasn’t even trying to tame it. The horse was spooked by a rattler, reared, and my uncle just fell off. Hit his head, thought nothing of it and shook it off. A week later, he was dead,” she said flatly, holding thoughts of the incident at bay. After all these years, the memory still hurt just as sharply as it had that day. “The doc at the hospital said the injury had caused a blood vessel to break and he bled out.” She paused for a long moment before she could continue. Glancing at Mitch, she told him, “I just wanted to be sure that didn’t happen to you.”

  “Oh. Well, thanks for that,” he mumbled.

  “Yeah, just remember that when I tell you to rest,” she said.

  This time he kept the words that rose to his lips in response to himself. He figured he owed it to her.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “This isn’t necessary, you know,” Mitch insisted as he watched Ena making up the sofa in the spare bedroom.

  She didn’t even bother stopping what she was doing to look in his direction. Instead, she focused on turning the sagging sofa into something that she would be able to sleep on.

  His late boss’s daughter had to be the most stubborn woman he had ever encountered, Mitch thought. He tried dissuading her one more time, although he had a feeling it was futile.

  “I’m perfectly capable of spending the night in my bunk at the bunkhouse,” he told her. “Or, if you don’t trust me, I can sack out on the recliner.”

  When they had returned from the medical clinic, Ena had covered the faded leather chair with a sheet, as well as a comforter. Mitch had grudgingly spent the rest of the day there.

  However, he had to admit that he had enjoyed having Ena make him dinner. She’d insisted that he eat that in the recliner, as well. Because Felicity had the afternoon off, Ena had made the meal—boiled chicken along with a bowl of homemade chicken soup. Mitch felt as if he were five years old again, but it was nice to be fussed over, although he would have never admitted it out loud.