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“Get away from me!” Dr. Spencer shouted.
Maddie snapped her penlight off her keychain and made her way down the hall. Maybe not such a good idea. She should wait for help to arrive. Surely it wouldn’t take security more than a few minutes to—
Another crash, then “Stop!”
She dropped to her knees and crawled toward the imaging area. The desperate tone of the doc’s voice drove her forward. As she edged closer, she took slow breaths to calm her racing pulse.
She turned the corner and aimed her penlight into the office.
The technician, Kurt, lay motionless on the floor. She scrambled to his side and felt for a pulse. Strong and steady. He was alive, but completely out. She pried open his eyes. Pupils were dilated. Had he been drugged?
“What do you want?” Dr. Spencer shouted.
A low mumble responded to the question. She glanced at the tech, then at the window into the MRI area. If the attacker was bold enough to drug Kurt, he might do much worse to Dr. Spencer.
She scanned the office for something to use as a weapon. Unfortunately hospitals were not rife with defensive tools. Fine, she’d rely on her self-defense training.
“Let go of me!” Another crash was followed by a slam against the window.
Adrenaline shot through Maddie’s body. She shouldered the door open and realized that by doing so, she’d made herself as vulnerable as the doc. She arced the beam of her flashlight across the room.
Suddenly someone shoved her face-first against the wall. She kicked the top of his foot, hard. He released her and took off down the hall, the squeak of his shoes echoing as he ran.
“Yeah, run, you jerk!” The outburst escaped her lips.
“Hey, you! Stop!” a voice called outside from the office.
Security must have arrived. Good, she could focus on the doctor. She took a few deep breaths and turned.
“Dr. Spencer?” she said.
No response.
She aimed her flashlight and spotted him on the floor in the corner.
“No, no, no,” she muttered, rushing across the room to him.
When she touched his shoulder, he jerked away as if he’d been stung. “I said don’t touch me!”
A shudder ran down her spine. This kind of raw fear looked all wrong on the doc.
“Dr. Spencer, it’s me. It’s Maddie.” She aimed the flashlight at her own face and offered a bright smile. Then she redirected the beam at the doctor. He was curled up, looking away from her.
“It’s okay,” she said. “You’re okay now.”
She reached out again and tentatively placed her hand on his shoulder. “Remember me? Maddie McBride?”
The emergency lights clicked on, bathing them in a soft glow.
“Doc?” she prompted.
He slowly turned to look at her. “Maddie? Of course I remember you. How could I ever forget you?”
Whoa, not exactly the response she expected. His eyes looked glassy, and not totally focused.
“Did that man hurt you?” she said.
His eyes widened with fear.
“Don’t worry, he’s gone.” She smiled. “Are you hurt?”
He shook his head that he wasn’t, looking at her like he adored her. This wasn’t right. The amount of medication he’d been given for the MRI shouldn’t have made him this loopy.
“What did he say to you?” she asked.
“Maddie!” a male voice called.
“In here!” She glanced over her shoulder.
Security guard Ted Graves stepped into the room. “Is he okay?”
“Seems to be. Someone needs to examine Kurt. I think he’s been drugged.”
Ted called it into his radio.
Dr. Spencer squeezed Maddie’s hand, still resting on his shoulder. She looked at him.
“You saved me...again,” he said. He brought her hand to his lips and kissed it.
Oh yeah, he’d been overmedicated all right. Which meant someone breached the hospital’s drug protocol and gave him a higher dose than intended so that he couldn’t defend himself.
A man cleared his throat in the doorway. She glanced up at Chief Nate Walsh.
“Everything okay?” he said.
“He doesn’t seem to be physically hurt, but I suspect Dr. Spencer was given higher dose of the sedative than was ordered for the MRI. Did you catch the attacker?”
“No, he escaped,” Chief Walsh said. “Did you get a good look at him?”
“Lights didn’t come on until after he’d left,” Maddie said. “We need to get Dr. Spencer back to his room.”
“No.” Dr. Spencer squeezed Maddie’s hand. “I can’t stay here. He’ll find me.”
Maddie glanced at Nate. “What should we do?”
“I’ll assign an officer to him 24/7.”
Maddie looked at the doctor. “Does that work?”
He nodded, but didn’t look so sure.
“If you want, I can stay, too, okay?” she said.
With a sigh, he nodded and closed his eyes.
* * *
To say Spence was disappointed when he awoke the next morning just as Maddie was leaving his room was an understatement. He reminded himself that he shouldn’t depend on her so much, especially to feel safe. The brain trauma must be causing anxiety, that’s all. It’s not like he specifically needed Maddie’s caring nature to feel grounded. It could be anyone kind enough to offer comforting words.
If that was true, why hadn’t he felt grounded when Nurse Bethany came to check on him, or Nurse Tanya?
He felt smothered by the staff and utterly frustrated on so many levels. Dr. Danner seemed to enjoy holding Spence hostage, yet every minute spent at the hospital as a patient made him feel more broken, and more anxious because someone got to him here last night.
He appreciated both Maddie’s presence, and the police protection. Without them he wouldn’t have slept at all.
Ruth gave him the good news that the intruder hadn’t interrupted the MRI, and his scan indicated a mild concussion.
The discharge couldn’t come fast enough. Whatever trouble he’d stumbled into out in the mountains seemed to have followed him back to town. What else could explain the attack in the MRI department last night? He didn’t want to put staff members in danger by staying in the hospital another minute longer than necessary.
Chief Nate Walsh offered to give Spence a ride. Nate was a good friend and Spence didn’t feel he had to watch his words around him, or keep up the charming pretense.
“We’re doing everything we can to find the guy,” Nate said eyeing Spence in the rearview mirror of his cruiser. “You don’t remember anything he said, do you?”
“Not really, no.”
Spence racked his brain trying to remember something from the encounter last night. Between the head injury and the overmedication, it was all still foggy.
“Do you remember anything from last night?” Nate asked.
“Like