Page 4 of Heal Me
Chapter Two
“I’m fine, Emily! Stop bugging me,” Ric snapped at his sister, Emily Jeffries.
She narrowed her hazel eyes at him. “I’m just trying to make sure you have everything you need before I take Hayley to school.”
Ric sighed and rubbed his eyes. “I know and I appreciate it, but I won’t be alone that long and I have my crutches. I’ll be fine. I promise.”
“All right.”
Ric’s niece, Hayley, ran into the living room and hopped up on the couch beside him. She wrapped her arms around his neck and gave him a noisy kiss on the cheek while Coco jumped onto the couch and tried to squirm in between them.
“You have a good day,” she said, her blue eyes smiling.
Ric kissed her nose. “I will. Go learn lots, okay?”
“Okay.” She wiggled down off the couch and Coco yipped and ran after her.
Ric looked back up at Emily. “Go take your girl to school. Me and the dog will be fine.”
“Well, after what happened the other day, I’ve decided to take Coco along when I take Hayley to school,” Emily said. “I won’t be long.”
“Go!”
“Okay, okay!”
Ric blew out a sigh of relief when she left the room. He ran a hand through his hair and tried to let his frustration go. He picked up the remote and turned on the TV as he heard Emily and Hayley leave.
He flipped through several channels and then looked at his left ankle in dismay. He’d come to Cooper’s Creek for Hayley’s eighth birthday party a week and a half ago and he’d slipped on black ice when he’d been getting out of his rental car at the grocery store in town. Although they were heading into spring, the nights were cold.
He’d gone down heavily and his foot had gotten caught in the door somehow, fracturing two of the bones in his ankle. Emily had been up his ass ever since he’d come home from the ER. While he was grateful to her and her husband, Tyler, for letting him stay with them while he recovered, he could see that Emily was going to test his patience with her constant mothering.
After clicking through a bunch of shows and infomercials that didn’t hold his interest, he turned on Sports Center. Nothing on there, either. Of course, it was only seven-thirty a.m., so there wasn’t going to be much on TV at that time of day. Normally, he’d already be at work. He ran the New York division of Horizon Enterprises, a highly successful investment firm.
Tyler, who was one of his best friends, now ran the Denver office, and their other best friend, Chase McIntyre, ran their L.A. office. With a smile as he thought about Chase, Ric picked up his phone and hit the Skype icon. It would only be 5:30 a.m. there and rousting Chase’s annoying ass from bed would be fun.
Chase answered but he wasn’t in the frame anywhere.
“Hang on!” Ric heard him say, followed by heavy breathing. “Oh, God. Can’t stop. Gotta keep going!”
“Jesus, Chase! Why do you answer when you’re in the middle of sex?” Ric asked, about to hang up.
“I’m not! I’m running, but I’m almost done. Hang on!”
Ric leaned his head back against the couch while he waited.
“Okay.”
Ric saw a very sweaty Chase smiling at him. “Why are you up so early?”
“I ain’t been to bed yet. Couldn’t sleep, so I decided to take a run on the beach while the sun came up. Look at that.” Chase turned the phone around so that Ric could see the beautiful sunrise over the beach. “Isn’t that gorgeous?”
“Yeah, it is. How come you couldn’t sleep?”
“Too jazzed up from a late-night Creative session.”
“Are you sure that’s all it was?” Ric’s brotherly-like concern rose.
“Positive. It was a great session, too. I sent you and Ty the preliminary stuff we came up with, but you’re supposed to be relaxing. And you shouldn’t look at business stuff if you’re on pain killers. You’ll screw something up. How are you feeling?”
