Read Online Navy SEAL Rescuer by Shirlee McCoy - Free Book Online

“If you
don’t need anything else, Osborne, I’m going to take off.”
    “No problem. You want to wait here, Logan? I’ll go with
Catherine.” He didn’t give Randal a choice, just followed Catherine down the
narrow hall and into the guest room.
    Catherine shuffled forward to avoid tripping over anything in
the dark room. She could hear Eileen’s labored breathing, and it hurt her heart.
It wouldn’t be long before Eileen needed oxygen to get through the night. The
doctors had warned that she was heading in that direction, and Catherine knew
they were closer to it than either she or her grandmother wanted to admit.
    Closer to the end than either of them wanted to admit.
    It hurt to think about, hurt to acknowledge, and Catherine
would have liked to pretend that the signs weren’t there. Her nurse’s training
refused to let her. She might have spent four years in prison, but she hadn’t
forgotten what she’d learned in school or what she’d learned in the five years
she’d worked at Good Samaritan Convalescent Center—three as a nursing assistant
and two as a registered nurse. She’d seen death in patients’ eyes, heard it in
their breathing and in their voices. She knew which patients were nearing the
end of their lives, which were accepting that and which ones were fighting
it.
    Eileen was fighting, but there would be a time when she
couldn’t.
    “Eileen?” she whispered, feeling the cool, lined skin of her
grandmother’s forehead. Eileen didn’t respond, and Catherine touched the pulse
point in her neck as she peered through the darkness and into Eileen’s pale
face.
    Please, God.
    She tried to pray, but the words felt old and rusty, her faith
used up during those days when she’d begged and begged for God to step in and
keep her from going to prison.
    He hadn’t answered then.
    Would He now?
    Please.
    “Go away. I’m tryin’ to rest,” Eileen mumbled, her words
slurred but strong.
    “I just wanted to make sure you were okay,” she said, relief
flooding through her, making her weak-kneed and tired. This wasn’t supposed to
be how things worked out. She wanted a redo, a rewind. Wanted a chance to go
back four years and try to change things.
    “Right as rain. Love you, girl,” Eileen said, without opening
her eyes, and Catherine kissed her cheek, the leathery coolness making her eyes
fill with tears.
    One day soon, Eileen would be gone. Memories would be all
Catherine had left. She wanted to make good ones. Had been trying to make good
ones since the day she’d left prison.
    It seemed like all she was making was more of a mess.
    “I’m so sorry about all this, Eileen,” she whispered, feeling
Darius behind her, his presence as compelling as warm fire on a cold day.
    “Not your fault. Now, go away and let me sleep.”
    She didn’t want to go. She wanted to stand where she was,
watching over Eileen for the rest of the night, the rest of the next day, the
rest of the time they had left together.
    “Come on. She needs some rest, and Logan is waiting. She’ll be
okay alone for a little bit.” Darius touched her back, his palm burning through
her tank top, heat flooding through her.
    She wanted to turn into him, bury her head against his chest,
tell him the truth. That she was scared to death of leaving the room and coming
back to find Eileen gone.
    The weakness surprised her.
    She hadn’t leaned on anyone since the first days of her trial
when she’d poured her heart out to Peter. Her fiancé, her best friend, the man
she’d thought she’d build a future with.
    She shifted away from Darius’s hand and walked out of the room,
following the scent of coffee into a cozy kitchen. Stainless-steel appliances
and granite countertops gleamed in the warm overhead light. The walls had been
painted light sand, and a bright white chair rail edged matching wainscoting.
She wanted the kitchen to be cold and impersonal, but it had warmth and
personality, the antique breadbox and huge 1940s stove