Free The Harder They Fall by Doreen Owens Malek Page B

she’d asked.
    It seemed a very long time before he returned.
    “Doc says you can go back there now,” he said gruffly.
    “I’ll wait here,” Maria said, stepping back.
    Helene followed the man’s broad back to the rear of the vast circus tent, which had been cordoned off to create a makeshift dressing area. She pushed aside a curtain and found herself standing ten feet away from Chris, who was sitting on the edge of a portable examination table, white surgical tape bisecting his brown midsection. He was sipping a beer as Ginny Porter applied an ice pack to the back of his neck.
    “What are you doing here?” he greeted her.
    “I was in the stands and saw you fall,” she replied.
    “I didn’t know you were coming here today.”
    “Maria brought me.”
    “Well, you can go home,” he said.
    “Where’s the doctor?” Helene inquired, looking around for him anxiously.
    “He taped me up and left, said I was fine,” Chris answered, not looking at her.
    “Did he say you could drink that?” she inquired, nodding at the beer can.
    “I don’t need a mother,” he said shortly.
    “What about X rays? Didn’t you hit your head? You were unconscious, weren’t you?”
    “You’re a doctor too, now?” he said disgustedly.
    “I’m taking him by the emergency room for some pictures on the way home,” Ginny said. “He’s not supposed to drive.”
    “That means you could have a concussion and you shouldn’t be drinking liquor,” Helene said.
    “Go preach in church,” he said darkly and took another big slug of his brew.
    Suddenly out of patience with him, Helene rushed forward and knocked the can from his hand. He and Ginny stared at her in astonishment as the beer splattered all three of them.
    “You are the most childish, immature individual it has ever been my misfortune to meet,” Helene said flatly. “You should thank God that someone is concerned about you, instead of behaving like a spoiled four-year-old with a serious case of bad manners. I will go home, thank you very much, and if you start seeing double or throwing up or developing a headache I hope your little friend here has the good sense to admit you to the hospital once you get there. Goodbye.”
    She whirled on her heel and stalked out of the dressing room, signaling to Maria when she passed her.
    “What on earth happened to you?” Maria asked, hurrying to fall into step beside Helene. “You smell like the brew that made Milwaukee famous.”
    “We had another fight—what do you think happened? I found him back there with his floozy, chugging beer and claiming that he was first in line for the President’s physical fitness award.”
    “So what upset you more, the beer or the floozy?” Maria inquired mildly.
    “Oh, shut up,” Helene muttered, much too annoyed to rise meekly to the bait.
    “Did you pour the beer on his head?”
    “Almost.”
    “What does that mean?”
    “I knocked the can out of his hand and the contents sort of... splashed.”
    “You?”
    “All three of us.”
    “You, Chris and the floozy?”
    “Right.” They had reached Maria’s car and Helene yanked on the door handle impatiently as Maria unlocked her side.
    “Which floozy was it?”
    “Ginny Porter,” Helene responded, flinging her purse into the back of the car with such force that it bounced wildly off the rear seat and onto the floor.
    “She’s been around a lot lately,” Maria observed.
    “I’d think she hadn’t heard he was married, but I was there myself when she received the news,” Helene said sarcastically, sliding onto the front seat next to Maria.
    “It doesn’t seem to have made much of an impression.”
    “Apparently not.”
    “Maybe he explained the situation to her,” Maria said.
    “I wish he would explain it to me,” Helene muttered, and then added in an undertone, “Oh, I could kill him.”
    “Twenty minutes ago you were terrified that he was dead,” Maria reminded her, starting the car.
    “That was twenty minutes