Wholehearted Read online

  By CATE ASHWOOD

  NOVELS

  Keeping Sweets

  HOPE COVE SERIES

  Brokenhearted

  Wholehearted

  Published by DREAMSPINNER PRESS

  http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com

  Copyright

  Published by

  Dreamspinner Press

  5032 Capital Circle SW

  Suite 2, PMB# 279

  Tallahassee, FL 32305-7886

  USA

  http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of author imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Wholehearted

  © 2013 Cate Ashwood.

  Cover Art

  © 2013 Aaron Anderson.

  [email protected]

  Cover content is for illustrative purposes only and any person depicted on the cover is a model.

  All rights reserved. This book is licensed to the original purchaser only. Duplication or distribution via any means is illegal and a violation of international copyright law, subject to criminal prosecution and upon conviction, fines, and/or imprisonment. Any eBook format cannot be legally loaned or given to others. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the Publisher, except where permitted by law. To request permission and all other inquiries, contact Dreamspinner Press, 5032 Capital Circle SW, Suite 2, PMB# 279, Tallahassee, FL 32305-7886, USA, or http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/.

  ISBN: 978-1-62798-238-2

  Digital ISBN: 978-1-62798-237-5

  Printed in the United States of America

  First Edition

  December 2013

  To my friend Skylar:

  my writing partner, confidante, and personal cheerleader.

  Acknowledgments

  Thank you to LJ for all the support and butt-kicking when I needed it, to Freddie for all the last-minute reading and pep-talking, to Shira Anthony for finding the answers to all my legal questions, to Sean Smith from The Hungry Southerner for the use of his delicious cinnamon roll recipe, and of course to the staff at Dreamspinner Press, who never fail to amaze me.

  Chapter 1

  DEPUTY DECLAN Grant rounded the corner onto Beech Street, scanning the tree-lined road as he drove. He was midpatrol in the town of Hope Cove, Maine, checking in and making sure everything was as it should be; not that anything was really ever out of place in the small coastal town.

  It was as close to paradise as Declan thought he could ever get. It might be small, but it was a tight-knit community where people actually cared about their neighbors. Some cops would be disappointed with the lack of action local law enforcement saw around the town, but to Declan, it was perfect.

  His job as deputy had been an easy one since he had arrived almost a year ago, and he wanted to make Hope Cove his home forever.

  Life hadn’t always been so easy for Declan. His position on the force in Austin had been a different lifetime for him. He’d come to Hope Cove to try to forget and move on from what had happened. So far, it was working. He was content. He liked his job and his friends. His house overlooked the water, which was something he had missed when he moved to Texas from California.

  He drove slowly up and down the streets, keeping an eye out, not expecting anything out of the ordinary, when his radio crackled to life and Lisa’s voice filled the squad car.

  “Declan, are you anywhere close to the pier?”

  There was no need for radio call signs or technical speak in a town where you could count the members of law enforcement on one hand. Declan chuckled. “Everywhere in Hope Cove is close to the pier.”

  “Don’t get smart with me, young man.”

  “Sorry about that, Lisa. Won’t happen again,” he said with a smile. Lisa was the most ancient woman he’d ever met, but she had sass. “I’m just driving past the high school, but I can be at the pier in five. What’s going on?”

  “Nancy Webber called about someone sleeping on the end of the dock. I’m sure it’s nothing, but you should probably check it out anyway.”

  Nancy and her husband owned the inn on the north end of town. The building overlooked the ocean, with the pier right in the middle of their view. It was great for tourists and good for Hope Cove PD, because teenagers in town often made a habit of drinking and making out at the end of the dock. If things looked like they were getting out of hand, Declan or one of the other deputies would show up to diffuse the group.

  “No problem,” Declan confirmed into his radio. “I’ll be there soon.”

  It was probably nothing, but Declan switched his lights on anyway. There weren’t very many opportunities for full lights and sirens—he had to take advantage when he could.

  He made the five-block drive from the school to the dock, parked his cruiser, and walked down the long pier. He was halfway down when he spotted the man. As he got closer, he realized the man wasn’t sleeping, and the situation was far worse than he’d originally been told. He broke into a run and used his radio to call it in.

  “Lisa, this guy isn’t sleeping. It looks like he’s barely alive. You need to send in the EMTs now!” he shouted.

  Panic rose in Declan’s throat. The ambulance was at least twenty minutes away, and that was if he was lucky. Hope Cove was too small to have its own ambulance station. It would be up to him to keep this guy alive until the paramedics showed up.

  He knelt down beside the man and took an inventory of his injuries. Declan had gone through a basic medical training course when he’d started with the force in Austin, and he tried to remember what he’d learned. He gently placed two fingers on the right side of the man’s throat, trying to find a pulse. There. He found the faint thrumming of blood through the man’s veins. ABC. Airway, breathing, circulation. Right. He leaned down and held his ear above the man’s head. He could hear faint sounds of gurgling when the man inhaled and exhaled. Not a great sign, but better than no breathing at all.

  He knew he shouldn’t move the man until the EMTs arrived in case he had a spinal cord injury. This guy looked pretty messed up. It seemed like whoever had done this to him meant to kill him.

  His lip was split, and there was blood pouring out of his nose, his mouth, and a cut below his eye. His left eye was almost swollen completely shut. There was what looked to be a stab wound in his abdomen. Declan tore off toward his car to grab his first aid kit. When he returned to the guy, he found the gauze and ripped open as many packages as he had before pressing the white fabric against the wound. He watched as the blood soaked through, turning the pure white a dark red. He held the gauze in place, applying as much pressure as he dared with his right hand. With his left, he opened the man’s jacket and tried to feel around for a wallet or some other kind of identification.

  Finally, he felt the heavy weight of leather in the pocket closest to the man’s shoulder. He pulled out the wallet and emptied it beside him on the dock. Lucas Hale. Twenty-three years old from Illinois. God, Declan could barely match the man in the picture to the man splayed out before him. Lucas was so badly beaten it would take him weeks to recover if he pulled through at all.

  Declan tried to remain calm, using all his energy to keep the rising panic at bay. His heart was racing, and his breath was coming in quick huffs. He could feel the adrenaline surging through his veins, and all he wanted was to pull this man into his lap and drive him to the hospital. What the fuck was taking the medics so long? It felt like he’d been kneeling here
for hours already and there was no one to help.

  It was then he noticed the letters, a bright-red scrawl across the wooden slats of the dock. FAG, they spelled, written in the victim’s blood. Declan’s stomach turned, as he remembered Texas and felt very much like he was going to be sick to his stomach. He couldn’t understand why some people were filled with vicious hatred. The anger and spite boiled inside him, filling him with rage.

  He looked down at the man again, light-brown hair turned almost black from the blood. He looked young, but then twenty-three was young. He had tunnel vision for the man in front of him. In the distance, he thought that he might have heard sirens, but he couldn’t be sure. Everything felt like he was seeing it through a fog. The EMTs would be here soon. There would be someone to help Lucas. He was going to be okay. He had to be.

  He heard the shouts of the medics, but they sounded like they were yelling from the other side of the cove. He felt himself being pulled away from Lucas, and he struggled against the forceful hands. He couldn’t let go. He had to staunch the bleeding.

  He finally realized the hands belonged to his boss, Sheriff Macklin, and he relinquished his grip. The gauze was completely soaked through, and he couldn’t tear his eyes away from Lucas. The EMTs began to work on him, cutting away his clothing to survey the damage. It was worse than Declan had thought. He was going to throw up.

  “Declan!” Mack shouted, shaking him. “Declan, look at me.”

  He couldn’t; he felt as though if he tore his eyes away from Lucas, even for a minute, he might lose him. He needed to see what happened to him—needed to know he was okay.

  “Declan,” the sheriff said, more gently this time. He placed his hands on either side of Declan’s face and forced his gaze away from Lucas. “Declan, he’s going to be okay. Are you?”

  Declan nodded, feeling numb.

  “Are you sure? I’ve never seen you so shaken up. Is this the first time you’ve attended a call like this?”

  Declan gave himself a moment for his eyes to refocus before answering Mack. “No, I’ve done calls like this before. This isn’t as bad as some of the stuff I’ve seen, but I don’t know, Mack. I just need to make sure he’s okay.” He looked back at the man. The EMTs had securely strapped him to the spine board and were loading him into the ambulance. “He’s going to be okay, right?” he asked weakly.

  “You wanna go with them to make sure?” Mack asked.

  “Yeah,” Declan said, flooded with relief that he could keep watch over Lucas.

  “All right. We will take care of things on this end. I’ll have Scott come and bring your car back to the office. You go and I’ll follow behind in my car, okay?”

  “Yeah,” Declan said, grateful that Mack seemed to understand.

  He didn’t know why he was so affected. He’d seen beatings before. Hell, he’d seen beatings much worse than this, but he just couldn’t get Lucas’s face out of his head. He felt responsible, like it was his duty to make sure the guy was going to be fine. How fucked up was that? He’d never felt like this before.

  He marched over to the ambulance and climbed in the back. The attending EMT didn’t question it, just moved over to make room on the bench for Declan.

  “Can you give me the rundown on his injuries, please?” Declan asked, taking out the notepad from his utility belt and making notes. He needed the information for the file, but more than that, he needed to know for himself exactly what this man was going to have to overcome to be healthy again.

  “As far as we can tell, he’s got a broken arm, possibly a broken shoulder, a couple of broken ribs, and absent breath sounds on his left, so likely a punctured lung.”

  “Is that from the stab wound?” Declan asked as calmly as possible, but inside he was so angry he wanted to punch the wall of the ambulance.

  “No, the stab wound seems to be pretty superficial. I don’t think there’s any internal bleeding, but they’ll run some tests at the hospital to make sure. There’s only so much we can determine in the field. When we get him to Coast Memorial they’ll go over him head to toe.”

  “Is he going to need surgery?”

  “We won’t know until we get a proper assessment, but my gut says yes. Punctured lungs aren’t good, and although we don’t think the stab wound hit any organs, he may need to be stitched up internally depending on how clean the cut is.”

  “Okay, any other injuries you can tell me about now?”

  “He’s likely going to have a concussion, and he lost a lot of blood, so he’s going to need at least two or three units.”

  “So do you think he’s going to walk away from this?”

  “I’m not really qualified to say….”

  “Oh come on,” Declan prodded, “I know you guys know more than you’re allowed to tell. I just wanna know if he’s going to be all right.”

  “I’d say that it looks a lot worse than it is when they’re all covered in blood like this. He’ll need a cast, and about a week in the hospital, but barring any bad news once the doctor gets a good look at him, I would say that he should be able to go home after that and make a full recovery. You can’t quote me on that, though. I’m not a doctor and I am not supposed to be making assumptions like this. That’s just my best guess.”

  “Thanks. It helps. Is he in pain?” Declan asked.

  “Not right now. He was unconscious when we arrived, but we sedated him anyway to put the airway in. They’ll give him some good stuff at the hospital too, so the worst of the pain should be over for him.”

  Declan scooted to the edge of the bench.

  The medic gave him a little smile. “Most of the damage is on his right side. You can touch him if you want to. It won’t hurt him.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Sure, if you want to.”

  Declan wanted to. He wasn’t sure why he felt so strongly drawn to this man, but the feeling swamped him. He reached out and gently took Lucas’s hand, rubbing slow circles across the top with his thumb. As he held it, the coldness in Lucas’s skin melted away, until it was warm and solid beneath his. That reassured him, and made him feel more secure in the knowledge that Lucas was going to be okay.

  “Do you know him?” the EMT asked.

  “No. All I have at this point is a name. Hope Cove is small enough that everyone knows everyone else. Whoever he is, he’s not from here.”

  The EMT looked at him, but Declan didn’t find any judgment in his eyes. He wondered how many broken patients and distraught family and friends this guy had dealt with during his career. He guessed quite a few.

  The ambulance sped down the highway, lights flashing and sirens blaring, until they reached the trauma bay at the hospital in Ellsworth.

  The driver hopped out and walked around to the back, then flung open the doors. From that moment, it was a hectic scene of the medics, doctors, and nurses all working on getting Lucas cleaned and prepped for whatever tests and exams he needed. All Declan could do was sit and wait in triage.

  Mack arrived a few minutes later with two paper cups of coffee. He sat next to Declan, who had preoccupied himself with counting the spots in the linoleum tiles on the floor. Three hundred and eighty-two spots before Mack put the coffee into his hand.

  “You all right, Declan?” Mack asked.

  “Yeah, this call just shook me. I don’t know why.”

  Mack shrugged. “It just happens like that sometimes. Some people affect us more than others do. There isn’t anything you could have done differently. You did good. We have the whole department working on this, trying to figure out who is behind it. He’s going to be okay, and it’s because of you.”

  “That’s not true, Mack. I panicked,” Declan said, leaning forward, elbows resting on his knees, coffee cup clutched in both hands. “I tried to remember what they’d taught us in first aid, but my mind just went blank.”

  “No, really, you did the best you could. I’m sure he’s going to be fine. Do you want to give me your report now?”

  Declan tur
ned his head to look at Mack. “Can it wait a little bit? Everything still feels a bit fuzzy.”

  “Sure. You’ll have to give it to me sooner rather than later, though. I don’t want you forgetting something down the road and letting the asshole that did this get away with it.”

  Declan saw red. He’d been so preoccupied with worry over how Lucas was doing, he hadn’t stopped to think about who had done this to him. His blood heated, and he had the urge to hunt down and kill whoever had hurt him.

  “It’s suddenly feeling so much clearer. Let’s get it done now.”

  “You sure?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Chapter 2

  THREE HOURS later, Declan and Mack were on their fourth cup of coffee, sitting in the waiting room trying not to stare at the clock. Declan fidgeted in his seat, becoming more impatient with each passing sweep of the second hand. He stood, walked in measured steps to the nurses’s desk, and asked as politely as he could if there was any new information.

  “Let me check for you,” the nurse said, her voice syrupy sweet and lacking the bitter edge that more seasoned nurses possessed. She picked up the phone and talked to someone on the surgical floor.

  “He’s just come out of surgery, but he’s still unconscious. You’ll have to wait until he’s awake to get your report, officer.”

  “Can I see him now?”

  The nurse looked confused, but buzzed him through to the back hallway anyway. “He’s on the second floor, room 215.”

  “Thanks,” Declan said. He turned to Mack. “You coming?”

  “No, go ahead. I’ll wait for you here.”

  “Okay.”

  The elevator ride up to the next floor seemed to stretch out infinitely. The antiseptic smell of the hospital swirled around him, potent once again as the doors slid open to the second floor. He walked right past the nurses’s station and down the hall, and into room 215. Lucas was there, hooked up to machines that created a symphony of beeps and clicks in the background. He looked smaller than he had lying lifelessly on the dock. He had more color, though, and it brightened Declan’s spirits to see him with a bit more life to him.