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“No, I’m good. Get some for yourself if you want.”
Ethan shook his head. “How’s Nic? Mom made it sound like she was on her deathbed, but the nurses said that she’s going to be okay.”
Joel summed up Nic’s injuries, adding the same sentiment he had expressed to Heidi. “She was lucky.”
“Damned lucky,” Ethan agreed. “That could have been a tragedy—for a lot of people. It’s a wonder Nic was the only one who fell when the balcony collapsed.”
“No kidding. Nearly a dozen people had been standing in that corner only minutes before it buckled. I don’t know what caused the supports to collapse just as they rushed inside for breakfast—whether it was the movement or the shifting weight or what—but Heidi and Nic were the ones left behind and in the most danger of falling.”
“Is it true that Nic pushed Heidi away from the edge?”
“Yeah. She grabbed her and shoved her away just as the railing snapped. Her reflexes were amazing, Ethan. Before I’d even had time to realize what was happening, Nic had already grabbed Heidi and all but thrown her toward me. She never even thought about her own safety, she just jumped right toward the edge to help Heidi.”
“That’s what she’s trained to do, isn’t it? Put herself into danger to help other people.”
Heidi had said something similar in reference to Nic’s job. And while Joel had never really worried too much about Nic’s career before, figuring she was hardly keeping the peace in a dangerous urban setting, suddenly he found himself looking at it a little differently. It took a certain personality to be a police officer—bold, determined, maybe even a little reckless—and Nic fit that profile a little too well.
That was something he was going to have to think about later, in private.
The cheery opening tones of “Here Comes the Sun” caught his attention, making him look around with a frown. The sound was coming from Nic’s canvas tote bag, which he’d dropped on the empty chair beside him.
He debated whether he should try to dig out the phone and answer it. It could be one of her family members, in which case he would have to explain what had happened to her and pass along reassurances that she would recover fully. Yet for some reason he thought the caller might be Aislinn. And since she had already expressed concerns about Nic this weekend, he knew she would worry if no one answered the call.
He sighed and dug through the daunting assortment of junk in Nic’s bag to find the phone. The ringtone was still playing when he located it, then held it to his ear. “Hello?”
After a very brief pause he heard, “Oh. Joel. It’s Aislinn.”
So his hunch had been correct. He supposed he should be relieved that it wasn’t Nic’s mother. Nic would probably want to tell her family about the accident in her own way. But Aislinn still made him a little nervous. “Hi, Aislinn.”
“Is everything okay there?”
Aware of Ethan listening in, Joel said, “Nic’s been hurt, but she’s going to be okay.”
A longer pause followed his words this time. “She’ll be all right?”
There was no surprise at all in her voice that something had happened. Just a need for reassurance that her friend wasn’t badly injured. Joel shook his head a little even as he repeated, “She’ll be fine. She has a concussion and some bruises and she’s being kept in the hospital today for observation, but there’s no reason to think we won’t be able to come home tomorrow.”
“What happened?”
He gave her a quick summary of the accident, finishing with, “It could have been a hell of a lot worse.”
He could almost hear Aislinn shudder. “Yes. I wish I’d had a better sense of what was going to happen. All I knew is that Nic was in some sort of danger. I wasn’t any help to her at all.”
“Aislinn, how could you have known that balcony was going to collapse? You would ha
ve had to have been…well, you know.”
“I know.” She sighed heavily. “What good are better-than-average intuitions if they don’t actually keep your friends from being injured anyway?”
Because that seemed to be a rhetorical question—and one he couldn’t have answered if it wasn’t—Joel said simply, “I’ll have Nic call you as soon as she’s rested a bit, okay? You’ll feel a lot better once you’ve talked to her and convinced yourself she’s all right.”
“Thank you, Joel. Is there anything I can do? Should I come there to help?”
“No. My brother’s here with me now, and my parents are available if we need them for anything. But thank you for offering.”
“Take care of Nic, Joel.”
“I will,” he promised.
