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She brushed her palms down her shirt, smoothing wrinkles that had set in during the drive only for them to reappear once she lowered her hands.
“I’m not a damsel in distress,” she muttered, sounding less convincing than she’d hoped. “I can still do all the things I did before this.” She stuck her booted leg out, the heel kicking up dust in the slight breeze.
“An Achilles tear is often career-ending for a dancer,” the surgeon had said. “I’ve seen it in several other patients. You’ll walk just fine, and dancing for exercise or recreation? Sure. You can still do that. But the stress you’d put on the tendon—not to mention other muscles and joints that would try to compensate for the injury—if you tried to go back to dancing full-time would only exacerbate the situation. If you rupture it again—”
“You’re wrong,” Beth had interrupted. “I mean, you could be wrong. Not every patient is the same. You don’t know me or what I can do.”
“I didn’t say you couldn’t,” Eli responded, bringing her back to the present. He nodded toward her cast. “But you are injured. And when you’re hurt, you don’t have to bear it in silence or prove you’re still you. Just—I don’t know—be hurt and accept a helping hand if you need it. There’s no shame in that.”
She squared her shoulders and stood up straight. “Yeah, well, my sister—the one who’s supposed to have my back no matter what—obviously doesn’t believe I’m still me, or she wouldn’t have manipulated me into a trip I didn’t want to go on, a guesthouse I have no intention of staying in, and a job I’m certainly not going to take. So I’m sorry if you drove me all the way here for nothing, but I’ll just call a cab or a rideshare or something and head back to the airport.”
Beth pivoted back toward the truck, dumped her tote on the floor, and attempted to climb back into the cab to fish her suitcase out of the small back seat, but it was too cumbersome to lift it on her own. Not that she was about to admit that to Eli. No, she’d rather stay where she was, on her stomach halfway between the front and back of the cab, legs flailing out of the opened door as she continued to struggle…until her phone rang.
She reached into her tote, rummaging through its contents until she found the device.
She scowled when she saw her sister’s name on the screen.
“You tricked me,” Beth answered with no other greeting.
“Nolan is okay. Thanks for asking. Her fever came down, and Sam finally got her down for a nap,” Delaney responded, fighting one guilt trip with another.
“That’s not fair,” Beth countered. “For all I know, you made all that stuff up about Nolan being sick as part of your grand plan to—to what? Get me to move to Middle of Nowhere, California, and answer phones for the rest of my life?”
Delaney laughed. Laughed. “My grand plan? No. I guess my daughter spiking a fever was just a happy accident. Jeez, Bethy, will you just hear me out?”
What was Beth going to do? She was planking half inside and half outside a truck that wasn’t hers with her belongings stuck in the back seat and no clue whether there were any flights heading back to Vegas before the end of the day.
She groaned. “Fine. It’s not like I have anything better to do at the moment.”
Delaney sighed. “I’m sorry about what happened at the audition, Bethy. And I know the last month has sucked.”
“Understatement of the year,” Beth mumbled.
“I know,” Delaney said again, and Beth could hear the sincerity in her sister’s voice, which made it really hard to stay mad at her…until she remembered the whole manipulation scheme.
“You still tricked me,” Beth reminded her.
“You’re right.” Delaney didn’t even attempt to deny it. “But the doctor transitioned you to the walking cast a week ago, and you still hadn’t left the apartment.”
Beth’s mouth fell open, but before she could respond, her sister continued.
“Mom and Dad were worried, so I said I’d get you out of the house for a bit.”
Beth dropped her forehead against the leather seat, banging it softly a few times before propping herself back up on her elbows.
“A bit? You set me up in a guesthouse and got me a job. Even if you’re on the doctor’s side and believe my career is over, you’re supposed to lie to me and tell me it’s not. You’re supposed to make me believe that this isn’t the end of the road for me so that—I don’t know—maybe I’ll believe it too. But, Lanes? You’re not supposed to sign me up to answer the phone at a vet clinic.” Beth’s throat grew tight, and her eyes burned.
“Oh, Bethy.” Delaney paused. “I believe in you to the moon and back. Always. But I can’t make you believe in yourself. That’s all you. What I can do is give you a change of scenery and a change of pace while you heal, and I mean more than just the foot in the cast.”
Beth didn’t respond. She didn’t know what to say that wouldn’t either cause a rift between her and her sister or turn herself into a snotty, blubbering mess. In another month, she’d be out of the cast. And six months down the road, she’d likely have full use of her leg and ankle again. But that couldn’t be it.
“Look, if you hate the Murphy guesthouse, you are more than welcome to stay here. I just figured you’d appreciate sleeping through the night, but if you want to get up with Nolan at two and sometimes four in the morning, I won’t turn you down.”
Beth let out something between a whimper and laugh. “She’s still not sleeping?”
“Sam and I are crossing our fingers that by the time she turns two, we’ll be fully functioning humans again.”
“And the job?” she added.
