Twenty-Seven

"ENRIQUE? Enrique? My god...!" She tapped his cheek. "Enrique? Are you hurt? Don't faint. Enrique?"
He opened his eyes, then he tried to grin, so she thought he really was hurt.
In the head.
Like gone mad.
"The horse... stupid... horse..." he mumbled in a rough voice.
"It got scared of our fight... I'm sorry it's my fault."
He still looked confused as he tried to sit up. "That's the first time I ever fell from a horse..." he said groggily.
She cringed. He folded his legs as if he was going to get up but she held him down tighter. "No... wait. Let me see first..." she told him. "Where are you hurting? Let me see your back."
"Sure..." He was still smiling. Her hand froze from reaching for the back of his head.
"Enrique?"
He winced. And then the ‘royal highness’ tone again. "Enrique's really a mouthful. I told you, Eric or Ric. Choose for the last time."
“I forgot, okay?” He’s injured and he still had the time to nag?
"Say it."
"What?"
"My name.”
She stared at him stupidly. Really?
“Or you can't check my injuries."
*For goodness' sake!* "Okay! Eric! Let me see!" God, this man was so infuriating!
He was grinning now, his eyes alert. Shameless! He had recovered enough to play with her again. But he winced at her angry touch and she went back to being worried.
"Where does it hurt?"
"I just got stunned by that fall but I'm alright. I can stand up. Wait."
"Are you sure?" she asked, but helped him when he turned here and there, shaking the dirt off his clothes.
"I'm sure... I’m just a little shaken. Stupid horse. Will you help me up?" He looked at her again. "Please...?"
"Here," she said as she held his big hand in her smaller one, then seized his other arm with her other hand.
So she helped him up, trying not to fall on him when he got a little off-balanced because he was heavy. He swayed a little and her arms went around his back to steady him.
"Careful."
"I'm fine... really." He sighed, rotated his shoulder, and stretched his back.
He paused for a moment as she anxiously watched him. Then he rolled his eyes and turned towards the direction they were going in before the fall.
"So, I guess we'll have to walk."
She gasped as she saw the trickle of blood at the back of his neck. Now that he was upright, it flowed down.
"Señorito, what is that?" Her hand had reached the back of his head and the part of his hair that was wet, and her fingers came away with more blood. "You've a wound in your head!"
"I think I did hit my head somewhere hard," he repeated, dazed again.
"Let me see."
"It's just—"
"Stay still and let me see," she instructed in a harder voice, and he froze.
She pulled at his shoulder as he was taller, and he obediently bent so she could see the spot under the strands that were wet with blood.
She winced. There was a cut between the parted hair. It was on top of a small lump and blood was still oozing out, but she could see it beginning to congeal.
"You have a gash here, Eric," she said.
"Hmm, that's better," she heard him mumble.
"Huh? Injured is better?" She really couldn’t understand him.
"You calling me Eric now without being told."
She blinked and the automatic response of feeling weird at the unfamiliar took her again. "I didn't mean to." She really felt calling him by his real name was inappropriate. Why couldn’t he stay señorito?
"As I've said," he said as he straightened up. "Don't mind it. I'm sure it's just a scratch."
"It's not just a scratch!" she protested. "You need to be seen by a doctor. Señ—"
"Don't you dare," he threatened.
She rolled her eyes, incensed. "It's a cut that's still bleeding. We have to stop it from bleeding, at least, before we even start to walk." She was looking for what to use. Cloth. There was nothing else but...
"Whoa. What are you doing?" he asked as she started to pull at the hem of the shirt she was wearing.
"I need something to put on the wound to stop the bleeding," she repeated very patiently.
"You're not going to get naked-"
"I'm not!" she exclaimed, shocked he was thinking that way. "I just need to tear this shirt so... why is this so damn hard to tear? It looks easy in the movies."
He snickered. "Stop. Use this." And he started to strip his shirt.
"What are you doing?" she asked, suspiciously.
"Use this. It's got blood in my back already, so it doesn’t matter. I have a lot and I can walk shirtless. You can't."
She knew she had seen all of him. She had even rubbed herself skin-to-naked skin against him. She'd done the most intimate act a man and a woman could share with him.
But she was, suddenly, having difficulty looking at his exposed chest.
It was because of Enrique—Señorito... Eric had a beautiful body. He had a powerful chest and his tummy wasn't flat—it's got buns. He also had the kind of shape that was too hard to resist watching so she tried hard to act normal as she took the shirt from him and turned him around so she could—
"I'll hold it," he said in a gentle voice. "It's okay. I'll hold it." He took the shirt she had folded fast from her. "I'm too tall and you'll be uncomfortable to hold it for me."
"Let me at least put it in place before you hold it," she replied in a winded voice as she started doing that. His hand replaced hers after she told him it was done. "We'll get to the house first and I'll use the bike to get you back home."
"I'll call to have someone get me," he said as he took a small phone out of a pocket, then frowned when he looked at it. "The screen's busted."
"You... we fell on it, oh no. I'm sure it's expensive."
"It's the horse's fault."
"You're going to make it pay?"
He looked at her a bit too intently. "Well, it was your angry voice that got it spooked so… hey, I was only joking!"
She hadn't hit him yet. But her hands had gone into fists.
"If my brother's already home as you've said, you can use his phone. He's got a small keypad phone."
"Want to get rid of me so quickly?" he teased.
She gave him the devil's stare, and he laughed, then winced because it moved his head and rubbed the shirt on it.
"Serves you right. Can you walk?"
"Pfft. It's just a small wound. Of course."
She looked in the direction of the house. It wasn't very far. "I hope Tommy's really home." Then she put two fingers in her mouth and let out a shrill whistle.
"Whoa…" Eric said. When she turned to him, he looked shocked.
"I hope Tommy is home so he can hear me."
And she whistled again as he stood there dumbfounded.
After a while, they heard something.
Then the tri-bike turned the corner not far away with Tommy on board. And of course, as worried as she was about Eric, she started to worry about something else.
She hadn't seen the expression on her brother's face because he lowered his head as he pumped the bike more forcefully, but she saw how stunned he looked when he saw them together.
He finally reached their side, but she was surprised to see how well he controlled his features so that she couldn't read what he felt.
"Ate, what happened?" he asked in a polite voice.
"Señorito here... his horse bolted and... he fell." Eric snorted, but she continued. "And he got a cut and a lump on his head and it's bleeding."
"Is that why he didn't have a shirt on?" Tommy asked innocently.
Again, she looked at him, but her brother was staring back at her... for a little bit longer… before he turned his eyes to Eric.
She could swear the older man seemed to shrink.
"I have to use my shirt to put on my wound because she was going to take hers off—"
"No, I wasn't! I was just going to—"
"Ruin a perfectly whole shirt to stop my wound from bleeding."
She clamped her teeth together instead of arguing with him again. He needed a doctor. "Will you just sit on the bike so we can get home and you can call your people so they can bring you to the hospital?" she blurted out irritably.
It was quiet for a moment. Even though she wasn't looking at Tommy, she could feel how shocked her brother was now. Her jaw fell, though, when Eric quietly walked towards the tri-bike and got in.
Tommy had schooled his features back to normal again except for his eyes. They were full of a thousand questions. She shook her head a little at him and went in herself to sit beside Eric.
No one said anything anymore and Tommy kicked on the pedals, and they were soon on their way to their small house.