Page 39 of Orphan Girl's Mountain Men

We finally reach the small county seat of Silverton—San Juan County's only municipality, and the only place in the entire county with a hospital. We park in the hospital parking lot and Lennon insists I get into a wheelchair, which he fetches from Reception.

He pushes me up the ramp, through the double doors, and over to the front desk, where he explains what happened to me in the stables. After a short wait, we're shown into an examination room, where a young and very smiley Japanese doctor in a white lab coat, a stethoscope around his neck, introduces himself as Doctor Nakamura.

The doctor asks for Lennon's help to get me up onto the examining couch, then Lennon steps away while a nurse draws a curtain around me. The nurse pops off my boots and gently pulls down my jeans so the doctor can examine my thigh.

"Ouch!" I cry out when he touches the exact spot where the blow landed.

"Hmm," says the doctor after some more poking and prodding, which has me squeezing my eyes shut and doing my best not to yelp again. "Okay." He makes a note on the file he's carrying.

"Well—is it broken?"

"Good news, Miss er…" he refers back to the file again "Miss Thompson. It looks like nothing's broken." I let out a sigh of relief. "But there's some bad bruising here…"

He prods me just where it hurts again, and I cannot help but let out another little cry "Ouch!"

"I'm going to prescribe you some stronger than normal painkillers, which you must only take one at a time and only when you need them. Leave at least three hours between each pill. Other than that, you will need to rest your leg for about three days."

Oh shit—how am I going to get any work done? Dean's going to kill me.

Lennon strolls back from the window at the far side of the room, where he's been standing, looking out onto the street below.

"What's the news?" he asks.

"Not too bad. Nothing broken. He's prescribed painkillers, and I need to get some anti-inflammatories. He told me to rest my leg for the next three days."

"Three days, huh? Well, that's not too bad. Could've been a lot worse than three days of rest. Could've lost a leg, for one thing."

"Well, aren't you a little bundle of joy today!"

He smiles at that, but even now there's still something in his eyes—sadness, or melancholy.

On the way back from Silverton General Hospital, Lennon takes a small detour to pick up his daughter from pre-school in Cedar Falls.

Grace must have been watching out for us, because as soon as we pull into the lot, she comes bounding out of the one-story building with sunflowers painted around the doorway.

"Daddy!"

"Precious." He rushes to her and sweeps her up in his arms, delivering a thousand kisses on her cheeks. My heart warms as I watch them.

"Oh! It's Princess Ice Cream." As she hugs her father, Grace finally notices me sitting in the front seat.

"Hi, Grace."

"I wanna sit with Princess Ice Cream. Can I, Daddy?"

He hesitates, then says gently, "You have to sit in your special seat, precious. It's the rules. Gotta keep you safe in case we have a bump."

Her lip quivers, and my heart twists a little. "That's okay," I say quickly. "I can ride in the back with her. That way she's still in her seat, but we're together."

Lennon gives a small nod of approval.

"Yay!" Grace scrambles into her seat, and as Lennon fumbles with the various straps and buckles, I climb out of the front and slide into the back.

As Lennon drives us back to the ranch, Grace chatters away about her day. All the usual stuff—a kid ate a crayon, someone wouldn't share her favorite swing at recess, so she had to use a different one, they sang round songs (which she enjoyed), and she made the biggest sandcastle in the class and earned a gold star to put on her chart.

I listen, making all the right appreciative noises, but mostly I'm marveling at how adorable she is—and how much she smells like sunshine.

I catch Lennon glancing at us several times in the rearview mirror. Something dark flickers across his expression, but he doesn't say anything.

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