"Like h.e.l.l. Everyone around here knows you're Mr. Sensitive."

Sean laughed. "Tell that to Deanna."

"Why waste my breath? I've seen the way the woman looks at you. She already knows it."

"Actually, at the moment she thinks I'm an interfering, pushy man, and I'm not too sure which part of that she considers to be the worst crime."

"Then by all means let's get over to Joey's so you can reinforce her opinion," Hank said wryly.

"You think I should stay away, give her some s.p.a.ce?"

"If that's what she says she wants, yes," Hank told him.

Sean considered Hank's advice. It wasn't as if he was doing anything more than satisfying his own overprotective instincts by sitting at Joey's watching Dee work.

"Maybe we should eat here at the station tonight," he said, just as a call came in for an ambulance. Though he wasn't involved in the call, he instinctively listened to the dispatcher.

He and Hank recognized the address at the precise same moment. It was Joey's.

Panic swept through Sean, even as he ran for his gear. He frowned at Hank. "You coming or not?"

"It's not our call. Let the paramedics take it."

"Are you crazy?" Sean demanded. "Get the rest of the guys. We're going over there. It could be Deanna. Or Ruby, for that matter."

"More than likely, it's one of the seniors who eat there every night," Hank said reasonably, then shrugged when Sean refused to back down. "I'll get the guys."

"I'm riding with the EMTs. I'll meet you there," Sean told him, shoving his way into the back of the departing ambulance. His scowl kept the paramedics from arguing with him.

The instant they reached the restaurant, he was bolting for the door, scanning the cl.u.s.ter of people gathered over someone stretched out on the floor for some sign of Deanna.

"Please, let her be in the kitchen," he muttered as he raced across the room. But something in his gut told him he wasn't going to find her in the kitchen. When Kevin wiggled through the crowd, his eyes filled with tears, Sean knew even before the boy charged at him.

He scooped Kevin into his arms. "What happened?"

"Mommy fell down," Kevin sobbed, clinging to his neck. "She won't wake up."

Sean held him tightly and rubbed his back as sobs shuddered through him. He would have given anything to put Kevin down and rush to Deanna himself, but he understood that the EMTs knew what they were doing. "It's okay. The paramedics are going to take real good care of her," he promised, saying the words aloud as much for his own benefit as for Kevin's.

When the customers recognized him, they parted, making a path so that Sean could get closer. Ruby caught his eye.

"I think she just fainted," she said, her voice tremulous, her cheeks pale. "We wouldn't have called nine-one-one except she didn't come to right away."

"Can you take Kevin for a second, so I can check on her?" Sean asked, surprised to hear the husky sound of his voice.

"Of course." She reached for Kevin. "Come here, buddy. Let Sean help your mom."

Sean sucked in a breath when he saw how pale Deanna was. Add to that the bruise already blossoming on her forehead from slamming into the floor facefirst and she looked pretty awful. He managed to find a spot next to her that wouldn't interfere with the EMTs and took her hand in his. Hers was icy cold.

"Hey, darlin', wake up," he murmured. "Let me see those pretty brown eyes of yours."

Her eyelids fluttered and a sigh seemed to wash over her.

"Come on, Deanna, you can do it," he coaxed. "Wake up."

She stirred restlessly. "No."

The word was barely a whisper, but it had him grinning. "Why not? You enjoying this Sleeping Beauty routine?"

"Not that," she said, her eyes still clamped shut.

"What then?"

"Don't want to listen to you saying you told me so."

The EMTs regarded him with a grin.

"I think she's back with us," one said. "Or at least she will be if you don't terrorize her into sinking back into oblivion."

"Her vitals are strong," another confirmed.

"You taking her to the hospital?" Sean asked.

Her eyes did snap open at that. "No," she said very firmly. "No hospital. I just fainted, for goodness sakes."

"A trip to the E.R. wouldn't hurt," Sean said, still holding her hand. "Get you checked out. Have someone take a look at that b.u.mp on your head."

Her gaze clung to his. "No hospital, please. I'm fine. See?" She started to sit up, then clutched her head and sank back.

"Whoa, darlin', how about staying real still till your head stops spinning?"

"Where's Kevin?" she asked.

"He's right here. Ruby has him."

"I need to see him. He must be scared."

Sean heard the anxiety in her voice and knew she was worried about more than Kevin's state of mind. She was worried that Sean was going to view this incident as one more example of her not being a good parent. Good parents didn't fall on their faces in front of their kids.

"Kevin's a little worried about you, but he's doing just fine. No harm done," Sean rea.s.sured her, hoping that she understood the underlying message. "Hey, Ruby, bring Kevin over here. Somebody's asking for him."

Once again Deanna struggled to sit up, this time making it with Sean's arm to prop her up. When Kevin raced toward her, she enveloped him in a hug that Sean found himself envying.

"Mom, are you okay?"

"I am now," she a.s.sured him.

Sean watched the two of them clinging to each other, and for the first time in years, he felt like an outsider again. What had ever made him think that he could fit into their tight little family circle? They had each other and that was all that seemed to matter to either of them.

The loneliness that crept through him now was even worse, somehow, than it had been years ago. He'd gotten used to it then, but lately he'd started to let himself dream. He was an idiot, no question about it.

Satisfied that Deanna was going to be fine, he stood up, took one last look at them, turned on his heel and walked away. Some people just weren't meant to have their dreams come true. It looked as if he was one of them.

Chapter Nine.

Deanna was home, tucked beneath the sheets in Ruby's bed with a tray of scrambled eggs, toast, raspberry jam and tea in front of her, by six-thirty. No one had listened to her protests that she was perfectly capable of finishing out her shift. She grinned ruefully. Maybe it had something to do with Joey's liability insurance. He probably wasn't covered for waitresses fainting into people's dinners.

Ruby and Kevin sat beside the bed watching her intently, as if they weren't so sure she wasn't going to pa.s.s out again.

"Eat," Ruby finally ordered, when Deanna had yet to pick up her fork.

"I'm not hungry."

"Yeah, right. That's why you fainted, because you were so overstuffed from chowing down all day."

"Very funny," Deanna said, pushing the eggs around on the plate. She lifted the fork to her mouth, then put it down again.

"Nice try, but you have to actually put the food in your mouth for it to do any good," Ruby commented. She studied Deanna worriedly, then glanced at Kevin. "Kiddo, I knew we forgot something. How about going into the kitchen and getting your mom a gla.s.s of juice?"

Deanna started to protest, then caught the forbidding look in Ruby's eyes and clamped her mouth shut.

As soon as Kevin was out of the room, Ruby frowned at her. "Okay, you want to tell me what's going on?"

"Nothing. I'm fine. Really."

"And I'm first lady of the United States," Ruby retorted in a tone heavily laced with sarcasm.

"Okay, it's Sean," Deanna admitted reluctantly. "He just took off. One minute he was there watching me with that worried frown on his face. The next he was gone." She noticed that Ruby didn't even try to deny that there was anything odd about Sean's behavior. Evidently she'd noticed it, too. "Did you see him go? Was he upset?"

"A woman he cares about keeled over while serving spaghetti, what do you think? Of course he was upset," Ruby retorted impatiently. "When he walked into Joey's and spotted you on the floor, I thought he was going to pa.s.s out right beside you."

Deanna recalled the gentle, coaxing tone in his voice as he'd tried to draw her back to consciousness. She also recalled something else, the quick glimpse of a totally bleak expression on his face when she was holding Kevin. Then she'd been concentrating on rea.s.suring her son, and by the time she looked Sean's way again, he'd gone.

She was still puzzling over that memory when the doorbell rang.

"Eat your dinner while I get the door," Ruby said. "Unless it's a tall, handsome man, I'm sending whoever it is away." She regarded Deanna with a stern expression and added, "As for you, drink the juice when Kevin brings it."

"Yes, ma'am," Deanna said with a salute that mocked her drill sergeant manner.

After Ruby had gone, she toyed with the now totally unappetizing eggs, then sighed. She couldn't seem to shake the feeling that something just wasn't right about the way Sean had disappeared.

"That's no way to get back on your feet," a disapproving voice chided her.

Deanna's gaze shot to the doorway, where Sean stood regarding her uneasily.

"I'm not hungry."

"Isn't that how you landed in bed in the first place?" He crossed the room, took a look at the plate of cold, congealed eggs and dry toast, and made a face. "Give it to me."

She held tight to the tray. "Why?"

He rolled his eyes. "Do you have to argue about everything?"

"Pretty much. Otherwise, people tend to steamroll right over me."

"This could be one instance when you should let them," he said, gently disengaging her fingers and taking the tray. "I'll be right back."

She stared after him, more confused than ever. He didn't seem angry or even upset, just a little sad.

It was twenty minutes before he returned, carrying the same tray with a plate of steaming French toast with a dusting of sugar and cinnamon. He set the tray across her knees, then stood scowling down at her.

"Now, there are two ways we can do this," he said. "You can eat that like the intelligent woman we both know you are."

Deanna had to fight to hide a smile. "Or?"

He grinned, looking surprisingly eager for her to test him. "Or I feed it to you."

"I'd like to see you try," she muttered, but she picked up the fork and began to eat. After a couple of bites she stared at him in surprise. "This is really good. You made it?"

"With my own two hands," he acknowledged. "When you live on your own, you learn a thing or two about cooking or you live on frozen dinners. And at the station, we all have to take a turn at kitchen duty. Believe me, none of us are slackers. Hungry men take no prisoners."

She grinned at the image. "What else can you cook?"

"Give me a cookbook, and I'll try anything."

"You're going to make some lucky woman a wonderful husband." She'd expected the teasing remark to draw a smile, but instead, that bleak expression darkened his eyes again before he turned away to stare out the window.

"Sean?"

"Yeah?" He turned back slowly.

"Thanks for coming to Joey's tonight. I know it wasn't your call."

"No big deal."

"It was a big deal to me," she insisted. "I heard you."

He turned to face her. "What?"

"When I was still pretty much out of it, I heard your voice. I think it pulled me back to reality."

He shrugged, looking uncomfortable. "You said something like that at the time." A smile tugged at his lips. "You said that was why you wouldn't open your eyes, 'cause you didn't want to have to face me when I said I told you so."