“Oh, God, Trask…are you all right?” Her fingers were exploring the lump on the back of his head and tears gathered in her large eyes. “I was afraid something like this might happen, but I just couldn’t believe…”
He opened his eyes and tried to focus. It was dark, but the woman’s face was definitely that of his sister-in-law. Propping himself on one elbow, he tried to push his body upright to stand, but the jarring pain in his ribs and abdomen made him suck in his breath and remain on the hard ground.
“What happened?” Neva demanded, looking at the beaten man with pitying eyes.
As if she could have prevented what happened, Trask thought dizzily and then discarded his annoying thought. Neva’s head moved quickly from side to side, her eyes darting from one shadowed tree to another as if she half expected to discover the man who had attacked him lurking in the still night.
“Someone jumped me—” Trask began to explain.
“I knew it!” Her attention swung back to the injured man. “I knew that something like this would happen!” She let out a breath of despair and her shoulders slumped in resignation. As if finding an answer to an inner struggle, Neva clenched her fist in determination. “I’m going to call the police and then I’ll get an ambulance for you.”
“Hold on a minute,” Trask ground out, again leveling himself up on one elbow. Sweat had broken out on his forehead and chest and several buttons were missing from his shirt. “I don’t need an ambulance or the police…”
“You’ve been beaten, for God’s sake!” she shrieked.
“Neva, get hold of yourself,” he insisted as his groggy mind began to clear. Tory! If anything had happened to her…
With one hand he reached forward and held on to Neva’s arm. “I’ve got to get into the house—to a phone,” he stated. Disjointed but brutally clear images of Tory and what might have happened to her began to haunt him.
“You need a doctor.”
“You’re a nurse. Can’t you just fix me up?”
She eyed him severely. “No. You need X-rays. And an examination by a doctor. You might have a concussion, maybe cracked ribs and God only knows what else.” Gingerly she touched the deep cut along his jaw where his chin had crashed into the ground.
“I’ll be fine,” Trask said angrily, mentally cursing himself for not being more careful with Tory’s safety. “Just help me up and get me into the house. Whoever did this to me may have gone after Tory.”
“Tory?” Neva repeated, freezing.
“I don’t have time to talk, damn it!” A dozen hideous scenarios with Tory as the unwitting victim filled his mind.
“Yes, sir,” Neva snapped back at him, offering her body as support as he rose unsteadily. With her arm around his torso to brace him, Neva forced Trask to lean on her as they walked up the steps to the front door. “Before you do anything else, I expect you to tell me exactly what happened.”
“Later.”
Once inside the house, she examined his head and offered him an ice pack. “Lucky for you you’ve got a thick skull,” she murmured tenderly. “Now, what else?”
He motioned to his side. She took off his shirt and frowned at the purple bruise already discoloring his ribs. “Someone doesn’t like you poking around,” she decided.
“No one likes me poking around,” he said with what was an attempt at a smile. “Not even you.”
“Maybe you should take this warning seriously,” she suggested.
“Can’t do it, Neva.”
“Oh, Trask, why not?”
“
I’ll explain once I make a few calls—”
“Mom?” Nicholas was standing on the landing of the stairs to the loft. His blue eyes rounded at the disheveled and battered sight of Trask sprawled over the couch in the living room.
“Nick, I thought you were asleep.” Neva’s eyes flickered with fear before darting from Trask to her son and back again. Her gaze silently implored Trask to keep the truth from Nicholas.
The young boy ignored his mother and his eyes clouded with worry. “What happened, Uncle Trask?”
“Would you believe a barroom brawl?” Trask asked, forcing a painful grin.