LITMIR.BIZ

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concern for his stowaway. Most of the time, Dale was hard-edged and irascible, cranky to everyone. Maybe Rosa reminded him of his three granddaughters or something.

      “Thanks,” he answered. “That’s real decent of you.”

      “Least I can do.”

      “There’s Deputy Hendricks,” Daniel said as another department SUV approached. “She’ll take a statement from you with the particulars of your sister’s address and all, and then she can drive you home when you’re finished.”

      “What the hell for? I can drive myself home.”

      “I’m sorry, Dale, but we’re going to have to take your truck to the garage down at the station to see if we can find any evidence in the back. It’s standard procedure in cases like this.”

      The rancher didn’t look too thrilled with that piece of information. “Don’t I have any kind of choice here?”

      “You want us to do everything we can to find out who hurt that girl, don’t you?”

      “I suppose…”

      “You’ll have it back by morning, I promise.”

      That didn’t seem to ease Dale’s sour look, but the rancher seemed to accept the inevitable.

      “You heading to the hospital now?” he asked.

      At Daniel’s nod, he pointed a gnarled finger at him. “You make sure R.J.’s daughter treats that girl right.”

      Though he knew it was a foolish reflex, Daniel couldn’t help but stiffen at the renewed animosity in the rancher’s voice. How did Lauren deal with it, day after day? he wondered. Dale wasn’t the only old-timer around here who carried a grudge as wide and strong as the Weber River. She must face this kind of thing on a daily basis.

      It pissed him off and made him want to shake the other man. Instead, he pasted on a calm smile. “Dale, if you weren’t so stubborn, you would admit Lauren is a fine doctor. She’ll take care of the girl. You can bet your ranch on it.”

      The other man made a harrumphing kind of sound but didn’t comment as Teresa Hendricks approached. Daniel turned his attention from defending Lauren—something she would probably neither appreciate nor understand—and focused on the business at hand.

      “Thanks for coming in on your first night off in a week,” he said to his deputy. “Sorry to do this to you.”

      “Not a problem. Sounds like you had some excitement.”

      He spent five minutes briefing her on the case, then suggested she drive the rancher home and take his statement there, where they both could be warm and dry.

      “I’m going to follow the ambulance to the hospital and try to interview the vic,” he said. “If anything breaks here, you know how to reach me.”

      The snow seemed to fall heavier and faster as he drove through Parley’s Canyon to the Salt Lake Valley. It was more crowded than he would have expected at eleven at night, until he remembered the film festival. This whole part of the state was insane when all the celebs were in town.

      By the time he reached the University of Utah Medical Center, his shoulders ached with tension and he was definitely in need of a beer.

      At the hospital, he went immediately to the emergency room and was directed down a hallway, where he quickly spotted Lauren talking to a man Daniel assumed was another doctor, at least judging by the stethoscope around his neck.

      The guy was leaning down, and appeared to be hanging on every word Lauren said. He was blond and lean and as chiseled as those movie stars in their two-thousand-dollar ski jackets up the canyon, trying to see and be seen around town.

      Daniel immediately hated him.

      He took a step down the hallway and knew immediately when Lauren caught sight of him. She straightened abruptly and something flashed in her blue eyes, something murky and confusing. She quickly veiled her expression and it became a mask of stiff politeness.

      Just once, he would love the chance to talk to her without the prickly shell she always seemed to whip out from somewhere and put on whenever he was near.

      “Sheriff Galvez,” she greeted him, her delicate features solemn. “Have you met Kendall Fox? He’s the E.R. attending tonight. Kendall, this is Daniel Galvez.”

      The doctor stuck out his hand and Daniel shook it, though he couldn’t escape the impression they were both circling around each other, sizing up the enemy like a couple of hound dogs sniffing after the same bone.

      He didn’t miss the dismissal in the doctor’s eyes and for the second time that night, he had to fight the urge to kick somebody’s ass. He wouldn’t waste his energy, he thought. Lauren was too smart to go for the type of smooth player who couldn’t remember the name of the woman he was with unless she had it tattooed somewhere on a conveniently accessible portion of her anatomy.

      “How’s our victim?” he asked.

      “She’s gone to Radiology for some X-rays,” Lauren spoke up. “The tech should be bringing her back in a moment. Kendall…Dr. Fox…and I were just discussing the best course of action. We think—”

      Dr. Jerk cut her off. “She has a little frostbite on a couple of her toes, an apparent broken wrist and some cracked ribs.”

      “How’s the baby?” Daniel pointedly directed his question back to Lauren, ignoring the other man.

      She frowned, looking worried. “She’s started having some mild contractions right now. We’ve given her medication to stop them, but she’s definitely going to need to be closely observed for the next few days.”

      “She give any indication who put her here?”

      Lauren shook her head. She had discarded her parka somewhere, he observed with his keen detective eye, and had put surgical scrubs on over the pale blue turtleneck she had worn when she treated his shoulder. Her hair was slipping from its braid and he had to fight a ridiculous urge to tuck it back.

      “She clams up every time we ask.”

      “I was afraid of that. She’s got to be frightened. It would sure make my job easier if she could just give me the name, age and last-known address of the son of a bitch who put her here. Of course we have to do this the hard way. Can I talk to her?”

      “You cops. Can’t you even wait until the girl gets out of X-ray?” Fox asked.

      Daniel slid his fists into his pockets and pasted on that same damn calm smile that sometimes felt about as genuine as fool’s gold.

      He really hated being made to feel like a big, dumb Mexican.

      “I didn’t mean this instant,” he murmured. “But I would like to talk to her as soon as possible, while the details are still fresh in her mind.”

      The doctor looked like he wanted to get in a pissing match right there in the hallway, but before he could unzip, a nurse in pink scrubs stuck her head out of one of the examination rooms.

      She didn’t look pleased to find the E.R. doctor still standing close to Lauren, a sentiment with which Daniel heartily concurred. Her reaction made him wonder if the good doctor was the sort who left a swath of broken hearts through the staff.

      “Dr. Fox, can you come in here for a minute?” the nurse asked. “I’ve got a question on your orders.”

      The doctor’s handsome features twisted with annoyance but he hid it well. “Be right there.”

      After he walked down the hall, a tight, awkward silence stretched between Daniel and Lauren. He found it both sad and frustrating, and wondered how he could ever bridge the chasm between them.

      He wasn’t exactly sure how much Lauren knew about the events that led up to her father’s exposure and subsequent fall from grace. If she knew all of it, she must blame him for what

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