Diana Palmer Christmas Collection: The Rancher / Christmas Cowboy / A Man of Means / True Blue / Carrera's Bride / Will of Steel / Winter Roses

“Oh, my poor little girl,” Sadie said miserably. “She’ll give up, if she knows she might not be able to walk again. She won’t fight!”

“She will. Because we’ll make her,” Odalie said quietly.

Sadie looked at her with new eyes. Her gaze fell to Odalie’s dress. “Oh, your dress,” she exclaimed.

Odalie just smiled. “I can get another dress. It’s Maddie I’m worried about.” It sounded like a glib reply, but it wasn’t. In the past few hours, Odalie’s outlook had totally shifted from herself to someone who needed her. She knew that her life would never be the same again.

A sheriff’s deputy came into the waiting room, spotted Odalie and Cort and approached them, shaking his head.

“I know,” Odalie said. “It’s my fault. I was driving his car—” she indicated Cort “—and not looking where I was going. Maddie ran out into the road after her stupid rooster, trying to save him. She’s like that.”

The deputy smiled. “We know all that from the recreation of the scene that we did,” he said. “It’s very scientific,” he added. “How is she?”

“Bad,” Odalie said heavily. “They think she may lose the use of her legs. But we’ve called in a world-famous surgeon. If anything can be done, it will be. We’re going to take care of her.”

The deputy looked at the beautiful woman, at her bloodstained, dirty, expensive dress, with kind eyes. “I know some women who would be much more concerned with the state of their clothing than the state of the victim. Your parents must be very proud of you, young lady. If you were my daughter, I would be.”

Odalie flushed and smiled. “I feel pretty guilty right now. So thanks for making me feel better.”

“You going to charge her?” Cort asked.

The deputy shook his head. “Probably not, as long as she survives. In the law, everything is intent. You didn’t mean to do it, and the young lady ran into the road by her own admission.” He didn’t add that having to watch the results of the accident day after day would probably be a worse punishment than anything the law could prescribe. But he was thinking it.

“That doesn’t preclude the young lady pressing charges, however,” the deputy added.

Odalie smiled wanly. “I wouldn’t blame her if she did.”

He smiled back. “I hope she does well.”

“So do we,” Odalie agreed. “Thanks.”

He nodded and went back out again.

“Tell me what the doctor said about her legs,” Sadie said sadly, leaning toward them.

Odalie took a long breath. She was very tired and she had no plans to go home that night. She’d have to call her family and tell them what was happening here. She hadn’t had time to do that yet, nor had Cort.

“He said that there’s a great deal of bruising, with inflammation and swelling. That can cause partial paralysis, apparently. He’s started her on anti-inflammatories and when she’s able, he’ll have her in rehab to help get her moving,” she added gently.

“But she was in so much pain…surely they won’t make her get up!” Sadie was astonished.

“The longer she stays there, the stronger the possibility that she won’t ever get up, Sadie,” Odalie said gently. She patted the other woman’s hands, which were resting clenched in her lap. “He’s a very good doctor.”

“Yes,” Sadie said absently. “He treated my nephew when he had cancer. Sent him to some of the best oncologists in Texas.” She looked up. “So maybe it isn’t going to be permanent?”

“A good chance. So you stop worrying. We all have to be strong so that we can make her look ahead instead of behind, so that we can keep her from brooding.” She bit her lower lip. “It’s going to be very depressing for her, and it’s going to be a long haul, even if it has a good result.”

“I don’t care. I’m just so happy she’s still alive,” the older woman cried.

“Oh, so am I,” Odalie said heavily. “I can’t remember ever feeling quite so bad in all my life. I took my eyes off the road, just for a minute.” Her eyes closed and she shuddered. “I’ll be able to hear that horrible sound when I’m an old lady…”

Cort put his arm around her. “Stop that. I shouldn’t have let you drive the car until you were familiar with it. My fault, too. I feel as bad as you do. But we’re going to get Maddie back on her feet.”

“Yes,” Odalie agreed, forcing a smile. “Yes, we are.”

Sadie wiped her eyes and looked from one young determined face to the other. Funny how things worked out, she was thinking. Here was Odalie, Maddie’s worst enemy, being protective of her, and Cort just as determined to make her walk again when he’d been yelling at her only a week or so earlier. What odd companions they were going to be for her young great-niece. But what a blessing.

She considered how it could have worked out, if Maddie had chased that stupid red rooster out into the road and been hit by someone else, maybe someone who ran and left her there to die. It did happen. The newspapers were full of such cases.

“What are you thinking so hard about?” Cort asked with a faint smile.

Sadie laughed self-consciously. “That if she had to get run over, it was by such nice people who stopped and rendered aid.”

“I know what you mean,” Cort replied. “A man was killed just a couple of weeks ago by a hit-and-run driver who was drunk and took off. The pedestrian died. I wondered at the time if his life might have been spared, if the man had just stopped to call an ambulance before he ran.” He shook his head. “So many cases like that.”

“Well, you didn’t run, either of you.” Sadie smiled. “Thanks, for saving my baby.”

Odalie hugged her again, impulsively. “For the foreseeable future, she’s my baby, too,” she said with a laugh. “Now, how about some coffee? I don’t know about you, but I’m about to go to sleep out here and I have no intention of leaving the hospital.”

“Nor do I,” Cort agreed. He stood up. “Let’s go down to the cafeteria and see what we can find to eat, too. I just realized I’m starving.”

The women smiled, as they were meant to.

Maddie came around a long time later, or so it seemed. A dignified man with black wavy hair was standing over her with a nurse. He was wearing a white lab coat with a stethoscope draped around his neck.

“Miss Lane?” the nurse asked gently. She smiled. “This is Dr. Parker from the Mayo Clinic. He’s an orthopedic specialist, and we’d like him to have a look at your back. If you don’t mind.”

Maddie cleared her throat. She didn’t seem to be in pain, which was odd. She felt very drowsy. “Of course,” she said, puzzled as to why they would have such a famous man at such a small rural hospital.

“Just a few questions first,” he said in a deep, pleasant tone, “and then I’ll examine you.” He smiled down at her.

“Okay.”

The pain came back as the examination progressed, but he said it was a good sign. Especially the pain she felt in one leg. He pressed and poked and asked questions while he did it. After a few minutes she was allowed to lie down in the bed, which she did with a grimace of pure relief.

“There’s a great deal of edema—swelling,” he translated quietly. “Bruising of the spinal column, inflammation, all to be expected from the trauma you experienced.”

“I can’t feel my legs. I can’t move them,” Maddie said with anguish in her wan face.

He dropped down elegantly into the chair by her bed, crossed his legs and picked up her chart. “Yes, I know. But you mustn’t give up hope. I have every confidence that you’ll start to regain feeling in a couple of weeks, three at the outside. You have to believe that as well.” He made notations and read what her attending physician had written in the forms on the clipboard, very intent on every word. “He’s started you on anti-inflammatories,” he murmured. “Good, good, just what I would have advised. Getting fluids into you intravenously, antibiotics…” He stopped and made another notation. “And then, physical therapy.”

“Physical therapy.” She laughed and almost cried. “I can’t stand up!”

“It’s much more than just exercise,” he said and smiled gently. “Heat, massage, gentle movements, you’ll see. You’ve never had physical therapy I see.”

She shook her head. “I’ve never really had an injury that required it.”

“You’re very lucky, then,” he said.