Danger Signals

Epilogue

Wade dialed the phone from his hospital bed. He closed his eyes as he counted the rings, but it didn't help to shut out the image of his brother the way he'd last seen him, making his way slowly and awkwardly through his apartment in his wheelchair.

It never did.

The rings stopped after only two, surprising the hell out of him. Always before when he'd called, it had taken at least six rings for Matt to get to the phone.

"Man," he said, "that was fast."

"Cell phone," his brother said. "Who's this?"

"It's me-Wade. How are you, buddy?"

"Hey…Wade. Wow-been a while."

"Yeah." He gritted his teeth against a double whammy of pain waves, one from his leg, suspended in a sling and swathed in surgical dressings, the other in his heart. Pure guilt. "Listen, about that-"

"Forget it, bro. It's cool. I understand. So…how you been? Bad guys keepin' you busy?"

Wade laughed-tried to do it without moving anything that might hurt. "Yeah. well… I guess I've been better. But, hey-that's not why I called. I've got somebody here wants to talk to you." He paused. "You sitting down?"

"Oh, yeah, funny. Very funny. So who is it? Hey-don't tell me. You got married?"

Wade looked up at Tierney. reached for her hand and squeezed it tightly. "Not quite," he said in a voice gone raspy with emotions. "Not yet. Soon though. We want you to be there. And I promise you, man, you're gonna love her. No-this is…" He paused, looked up at the faces bending over him and muttered half to himself, "Jeez, I didn't think this was going to be so hard… Uh, Mattie? Remember those nightmares I used to have? I told you about it, remember? There was this voice-you said it was-"

"An angel. Sure, I remember. I was a kid, what can I say? So? What about it?"

Wade took a deep breath and grinned up at Cory, who was standing poised, his face a mask of suspense that didn't come close to hiding his emotions. Tierney, unable to hold hers in any longer, lowered her tear-drenched face to his chest, and he let his fingers come to rest in her soft, soft curls and found the strength he needed to continue.

"Well, little brother…guess what? He's real. And here he is. In person." His voice broke and he barely got the rest of it out. "Mattie-say hello to our angel… the brother you didn't know you had."