door slamming shut and paused, waiting for Rose to join him.
“Don’t wait for me,” his wife said, waving him toward the ER entrance. “Just go!”
Nodding, Andrew made his way to the rear ER doors quickly. How many times had he been here over the course of his career and then some? Far too many to count, he thought. Once, years back, he’d even been brought here himself.
It never got any easier, he decided.
It took Rose two beats to catch up and be at his side.
“You move fast for an old man,” she told him, trying to tease Andrew and lighten the huge weight that she knew had to be weighing down on him.
“Not that old,” Andrew replied.
Just then the young woman behind the registration desk turned toward them. A look of mild recognition crossed her face.
The next moment the pieces of the puzzle were falling into place. “You’re here about Seamus Cavanaugh, aren’t you?”
Under ordinary circumstances, Andrew might have said something light in response, but these were not ordinary circumstances. They were scarier than he could ever remember them being. His father had been beaten, possibly shot. Add to that the man had age working against him. Despite trying to keep a positive attitude, this was not the best of scenarios.
Andrew got down to business immediately. “Yes, we are. How is he?”
“Grandpa’s a hearty warhorse, Dad. You know that,” his oldest daughter, Callie, said as she hurried up to join him.
She was not alone. Behind her was her husband, Benton Montgomery, as well as her two brothers, Shaw and Clay, and her sisters, Teri and Rayn, along with each of their spouses.
Hugging her father, she said, “When Mom called to tell me what happened, I got the word out. Most of the family’s either already here or on their way.”
Rose smiled at her husband when he turned toward her. “I thought it wouldn’t hurt to have a first floor full of Cavanaughs praying for Seamus’s recovery. God can’t ignore this many like-minded people all asking for the same favor.”
Though he tried to mask it, the breath he released was shaky. “Well, that would explain the crowded parking lot. Let’s hope you’re right,” Andrew said to his wife. It was obvious to Rose that he was afraid to be too confident about the outcome.
“I’m always right,” Rose informed him with a confidence she really didn’t feel. She looked around the immediate area. “Anyone know where your granddad’s doctor is?” she asked the ever-growing sea of people.
Dax Cavanaugh spoke up first. “He was here a minute ago,” he told his aunt.
Brian Cavanaugh, Aurora’s chief of detectives, came up behind his son and put his hand on Dax’s shoulder as he addressed his sister-in-law. “I’ll have him paged, Rose.” Turning, Brian spotted an official-looking nurse and headed straight for her. When he saw that she was about to turn away, he called out to get her attention. “Ms.? Excuse me, Ms.!” Brian sped up his pace.
Marsha Williams, whose newly bestowed official title was head nurse of the ER, stopped in her tracks and slowly turned around. The pasted-on friendly smile quickly turned into a wary expression. Before she could stop herself, she murmured, “Oh, lord, they warned me about this.”
Brian cocked his silvery head. “Who warned you about what?” he asked in an amicable voice.
“The last head nurse. Rachel Rubin. She told me that sooner or later—most likely sooner—there would be a flood of you people in here because one of your own was hurt in the line of duty and that you wouldn’t leave until you were absolutely sure that the law-enforcement person was going to pull through.” She had a tablet with her and scrolled through it now, checking on new admissions and recent patients who had been brought into the ER. “But no one like that was brought in.”
“Try again, dear,” Brian’s wife, Lila, instructed the head nurse. There was no mistaking the authority beneath the friendly voice. For the woman’s benefit, the recently retired detective began to fill her in. “Seamus Cavanaugh was brought in unconscious less than—”
Recognition entered the head nurse’s eyes as they came to rest on a recent entry.
“Oh, here he is,” the woman declared. Marsha raised her head. “Dr. Iverson is overseeing his case,” she reported.
“And what’s the name of the doctor who’s actually doing something for my grandfather?” Detective Troy Cavanaugh asked, a note of impatience in his voice.
Marsha Williams’s somewhat high-handed attitude receded. “I’ll go get the doctor,” she replied, moving away.
Having quietly slipped into the circle gathered around the woman, Andrew smiled at the head nurse. “Thank you,” he said in a subdued, civil-sounding voice.
The former chief of police turned toward the rest of his family as the nurse hurried away to find the missing physician.
“Anyone have any more information on what happened than what we already know?” Andrew asked the various members of the family around him.
“Sounds like a mugging gone bad,” his younger brother Sean answered. Several other heads nodded. “Not much to go on yet,” Sean concluded.
“Who found him?” Brian asked, throwing out the question to anyone who could answer it.
“A guy walking his dog,” his daughter, Riley, volunteered. “He called a patrolman.”
“Who was the detective who was first on the scene?” Andrew asked.
“That would be me,” Detective Finley Cavanaugh said, raising his hand as he stepped forward to the front of what was quickly becoming a very large crowd. “I caught the case and I was hoping to have a few words with your father, Uncle Andrew.”
“So are we, Finn,” Andrew replied with feeling. “So are we.” He looked around, hoping to see the ER doctor cutting through the growing gathering of his relatives.
Rose tugged on her husband’s arm. When he looked quizzically in her direction, she pointed toward a rather young-looking man in hospital scrubs quickly walking toward them.
“Looks like maybe the doctor’s finally going to tell us what’s happening,” she said.
Dr. Joshua Logan had recently transferred to Aurora from a hospital located on the opposite coast. He was still getting acclimated to the mild weather. His easygoing manner belied that he was a top-notch emergency-room physician.
Dr. Logan quickly assessed the crowd, then introduced himself. “The good news,” he continued after shaking the hands of the people nearest him, “is that there doesn’t seem to be any internal bleeding or a skull fracture.”
“And the bad news?” Andrew asked since the doctor’s tone clearly indicated that there was a downside as well.
“I’m afraid that your father’s pride was badly wounded.”
“Wait,” Andrew responded suddenly as the doctor’s words registered. “Does that mean that my father’s conscious now?” There was no missing the eager hope resonating in his voice.
“He was for a few minutes,” Dr. Logan qualified. “But when I told your father that I wanted to keep him here overnight for observation, he started to become very agitated. I thought that it was best if I gave him a sedative.”
Brian wanted the ER doctor to realize that their father wasn’t just being difficult. “The problem is our father doesn’t really like being in a hospital,” he explained.
Dr.