“Izadora? What’s happened? Someone said you were hurt?”
Izzie jerked around at the questions from an unfamiliar voice behind her, moments after she’d left her uncle and headed back toward the ER. Wanda had waved her toward an exam bay and told her she’d be there shortly.
Izzie was to wait. Well, she never had waited well. She got started cleaning the wounds while she waited.
It took her a moment to put it together who the man behind her was. Seventeen years had dulled most of her memories of him.
Now was the worst time for this.
It was those writers of her life again—or fate, screwing with just about everything. Izzie was about ready to demand better edits, or something.
Her father stood next to the curtain, a look of concern on his face when he looked at her. This was the man she’d judged every male physician against from the moment she’d hired on at the hospital.
How stupid she’d been. This man…he was nothing at all like Allen, or Rafe, or Caine, or Virat, or Cage—he wasn’t like any of the men she worked with that she liked and respected.
He hadn’t changed much since she was eight. He still looked almost exactly the same. He’d aged well. Time had been good to him, at least.
“It’s not my blood. Mostly. It’s Shelby’s, Allen Jacobson’s sister.” She wanted to get out of there as fast as she possibly could. The last thing she felt like dealing with right now was the man who’d fathered her. She was too shaken over what had happened. “I’m fine. I need to clean up and get in there with Allen. He’ll need me.”
Allen couldn’t treat Shelby. Izzie doubted if she could at this point, since she’d been injured as well. Rafe was a stickler on that now. Allen was going to need her. This was going to rattle him.
He took protecting Shelby so seriously.
And her.
She understood—she and his sister were Allen’s entire world.
He hadn’t exactly hidden that from her since South Padre Island.
She finished rinsing the last of the cuts she’d gotten from the flying glass. The counter had protected her from most of it.
Her father stepped closer. He had a paper towel ready. Before she could stop him, he was blotting at the remaining water. He frowned. “You’ll need this sutured.”
She nodded. She’d suspected as much. “I’ll get it taken care of. Thanks.”
By any other surgeon on the planet.
His hand rose and wrapped around her shoulder. He stared into her eyes. Izzie fought not pulling away. The connection was there; she couldn’t deny that she felt it, but she didn’t know this man. She wasn’t certain she even wanted to. Not anymore.
“Keep pressure on it. I’ll take care of it, if you want me to.”
She shook her head. “Rafe’s tightened the regulations against treating...family. Not that we’re…family or anything. But on paper…” She understood the reasoning, from a liability standpoint. Now, she was glad for the practical aspect of it. She didn’t want her father taking care of her at all. It was better if they all stayed in their own lane. “I’ll get Nikkie Jean or Lacy to take care of it when they’re free.”
“At least...let me wrap it. No sense in you bleeding all over the place.”
“I got it. You...don’t you have patients?” She wanted him to get away from her. She couldn’t handle her father right now. Not now.
A look of frustration passed over his face. Izzie took an immediate step back from the threat.
She did not know this man. What she did remember about him was arguing. Yelling. Hiding in her bedroom under her blankets until it stopped.
Until the day her mother had stumbled into her room, drunk, and told Izzie she’d accomplished it. Izzie had driven him away to another kid. One who wasn’t as defective as she was.
Her mother had only been verbally abusive when she’d been drunk. In the six years that had followed her father leaving, her mother had been drunk more times than not.
Courtesy of the child support check, there was always plenty of alcohol in the cabinet. Never enough food, but plenty for her mother to drink.
She had always had Jake. “Thanks for your concern...Jeoffrey.” She couldn’t call him Dr. Stockton. She wasn’t about to call him dad.
“I know I don’t deserve it, but I’d like it if you called me Dad. At least…eventually.”
Well, apparently he didn’t have any problem making his wishes known. Even when it was never going to happen. It was probably best for her to just get it out there between them now. “I don’t have a dad. I have my uncle. He’s the closest thing to a father I’ve ever had. I won’t...cheapen what he is to me by calling another man Dad. Not when Jake was the one there for me every day that he could be after you left me.”
She’d teased her uncle countless times by calling him exactly that. There had been one particularly obnoxious girlfriend who had not wanted Jake to have a fourteen-year-old girl around. Izzie had confided to her that she was really his daughter. That he’d fathered her when he’d been thirteen. Izzie had been very convincing with a complex backstory and everything.
Jake hadn’t been too happy when he’d found out. She’d been grounded for two weeks. But that woman had left them alone. Apparently, she hadn’t wanted the joy of having a teenager around, after all.
“I’m glad you had him. Had I known that your mother had died I never would’ve left you alone. I would have come for you. But I didn’t know.”
He’d taken off without a backward glance. Izzie wasn’t stupid. For whatever reason his conscience had caught up with him now. Maybe he’d had a midlife crisis or something? She had been born when he was around twenty-two years old. He had to be forty-seven or forty-eight now. She thought. She wasn’t exactly certain. She’d not exactly gotten an opportunity to know.
“I was alone with her for six years after you decided you were finished being my father, and I survived. Barely, but I survived her. Once Jake was there, I did fine. Thank you for your concern.” She was so going to have to talk to Nikkie Jean about their suddenly returned absentee-fathers and what the two men expected. But for now… “I need to get in there. Allen...needs me now.”
“Are you serious about Jacobson, then? There are rumors that you’re involved with him. Strong rumors.”
She honestly didn’t give a damn about rumors now—they were so…trivial. She’d faced more important things in her life in the last handful of weeks. Things that truly mattered. A pang went through her.
She needed to be with Allen right now. That’s what mattered. Everything else…superficial. “Why is that any of your business?”
“He’s changed since he was in my classes at FCU. The young man I used to know...I’m not sure Dr. Jacobson is the kind of man I want for one of my daughters. He has a reputation.”
One of his daughters. Well, apparently she had at least one sister out there. That was nice to know.
“Seriously? You question him? Allen...Allen has never let me down. Not even once. He’s been there during the worst moments of my adult life. I’d be dead if it wasn’t for him. Multiple times. Every single time I have ever needed him, he has been there. He is the one man I can count on to be there every single time I need him.” Even Jake. His job took him away so many times, but Allen…Allen had always been there when she’d most needed him.
She trusted him in that way. He always would be.
“That makes you feel indebted to him?”
“Hell, no. This isn’t your business at all. Allen is my business and has nothing to do with you. You forfeited your right to even care long ago.” She’d trust Allen with every part of her being. She’d depend on him in an instant. Had trusted he would always be there when she needed him. “I need to go. Allen needs me. His sister is all the family he has.”
Izzie cleaned herself up at the nearest sink, trying to compartmentalize her father where he belonged. It wasn’t easy.
Why had he had to come back to her world now?
The last three months had been the most chaotic, unsettled, most terrifying days of her life. Through almost all of it, Allen had been there. Even Jake had been more absent than present, lately.
But Allen had always been there.
She was going to do the same for him. Starting right now.
Izzie stepped out of the exam bay and searched out someone who could set a few stitches. Her arm was starting to sting like the devil. She found Nikkie Jean near the rear of the ER.
It took her only a few moments to describe the weird encounter with her father. Nikkie Jean just tended to her arm, bandaged it, and patted Izzie on the head. Apparently, they were all starting to get used to the bullets flying around them. Izzie didn’t know what to think about all that. “You have got to stop playing so rough on the playground, Iz. You’re starting to look like Frankenstein’s Bride. That’s what you should go as for Halloween. All you need is green face paint. Speaking of...I need green face paint, orange fabric—eighty-six yards of it, and pink paint. And gray.”
“Which kid is going as what?”
“That’s for me.” Nikkie Jean snickered, but there was still fear and worry on her face. “Well, the gray and green are for Caine. I’m determined to make him a dragon. Now, as for me, I’m going as the traditional pumpkin. He wouldn’t let me go as an egg. I wanted to draw a crack on it and sew on a doll hand and foot. He nixed it. Said it was a little too creepy.”
“Do it. I dare you.” Izzie laughed, appreciating her friend’s way of diffusing tension.
Nikkie Jean turned serious. “I don’t know, kid. In my head, I know my father is just a person. One who is entitled to make mistakes like the rest of us. The instant he gets close to me, my throat closes, my heart races, and I have to fight crying. Now, a part of that is probably the hormones—” She paused, then shot Izzie a pointed look. “You’re sure you’re not pregnant? No striped or polka-dotted prophylactics, right? Just the regular old boring—and effective—kind?”
“Not pregnant. We are careful. Unlike a certain pair of physicians we know, we know how to use protection...properly.” Although, if they were ever to have a baby…that would be fine with her.
In fact, she rather liked that idea a lot.
Someday. When the timing was right. Maybe even three or four, so they could have the noise and laughter that went on at Nikkie Jean’s or Annie’s every day. Allen would probably like that, too.
“I love the way he looks at you like you’re cotton candy and he’s jonesing for a sugar fix.” Nikkie Jean leaned closer. “You’re beautiful together. He’s all broody and gentle, yet looks like a male model. You look like a pixie, and so graceful and feminine. When you are together in the room, you can feel the heat. Of course, you always could. Since the storm. So...what are you going to do next?”
“Now? I’m going to go check on him. His sister.”
“She’s been taken upstairs. Cage is taking care of her; there was glass embedded pretty deeply. She’s far shyer than I realized. Even worse than Annie.”
“Annie has confidence in herself, she just doesn’t like public attention. But Allen’s sister...she’s hurting,” Izzie said. “Like the rest of us were. Are.”
“Well, we’ll have to make certain she knows we can help her find her safe place. Now, go stand by your man. I think that’s exactly what Allen needs more than anything. A woman who’s proud to be at his side. I think he’s doubted himself long enough.” Nikkie Jean hugged her quickly. “Take care of him, Iz. I think he needs you more than he’ll ever admit. He’s accustomed to being the protector, the caregiver, the one in charge.”
“The hero.”
“That’s exactly it. I think he needs someone to take care of him for a while.”
Well, Izzie thought she could do that.
Allen was nothing like her father—he was ten times the man her father would ever possibly be. He would not ever hurt her.
He wouldn’t abandon her—she wasn’t about to do the same to him.