Finn Read online

  Finn

  Hathaway House, Book 6

  Dale Mayer

  Books in This Series:

  Aaron, Book 1

  Brock, Book 2

  Cole, Book 3

  Denton, Book 4

  Elliot, Book 5

  Finn, Book 6

  Gregory, Book 7

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  About This Book

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Epilogue

  About Gregory

  Author’s Note

  Complimentary Download

  About the Author

  Copyright Page

  About This Book

  Welcome to Hathaway House, a heartwarming and sweet military romance series from USA TODAY best-selling author Dale Mayer. Here you’ll meet a whole new group of friends, along with a few favorite characters from Heroes for Hire. Instead of action, you’ll find emotion. Instead of suspense, you’ll find healing. Instead of romance, … oh, wait. … There is romance—of course!

  Welcome to Hathaway House. Rehab Center. Safe Haven. Second chance at life and love.

  Navy SEAL Finn MacGregor arrives at Hathaway House not only with half of one leg but with a stoma, one that necessitates the use of a colostomy bag. While it’s nice to once again see his old friend Dani Hathaway and her father, the Major, it’s tough to feel like the least sexy man on the face of the earth. Especially after he meets the pretty nurse in charge of his care …

  Fiona Smithers has seen practically everything when it comes to the human body, and Finn’s physical problems don’t faze her. Emotionally she’s wary though. Once before, one of her patients had confused the gratitude he felt for her as love. … That scenario left Fiona devastated to know her friendliness had been misunderstood. Whether deemed love or friendliness, those emotions directly effected that patient’s initial healing and then his setbacks of body as well as of heart and of mind, making her more determined not to run the same risks again.

  Yet, this time, she may not be able to help herself. She wants Finn in her life on a permanent basis, but, after seeing his obsession with her in his artwork, is that even possible?

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  Prologue

  Surely Hathaway House couldn’t be that good. Finn MacGregor couldn’t believe the emails he’d received from Elliot about the success of his healing therapies … and about Sicily.

  They had to be fiction. Elliot didn’t have a girlfriend already? And not just a girlfriend but like a wedding in the near future?

  How could that be?

  Finn knew that a lot of good women would take on a man less than whole, but Elliot sounded like a completely different person. Originally Finn had tossed off Elliot’s interest in Sicily as infatuation, but now, months down the road, apparently not. Finn had told Elliot about applying for a transfer, but Finn’s multiple surgeries had pushed that back.

  And rightly so, but, as Finn lay in bed, worn out and so done with doctors and this hospital, he realized that maybe now was the right time.

  He was at a crossroads. This was the end of his surgeries, and now it was all about making the best of who and what he was today.

  No need to transfer to another center to get that, but he wanted a change of faces, smells and scenery. And Hathaway House sounded divine. He’d been raised on a ranch in Texas. That alone made him want to go. Any chance to go home—particularly at this stage of his life—was good.

  A text came in. He lifted his phone and checked the message. It was from Elliot.

  Put in your request. They have beds opening up and a cancellation. No better time than right now.

  This was the right time for a lot of reasons. But instead of filling out the request form, he dialed a number he’d looked at many times.

  When a woman answered, he said, “Dani? It’s Finn. Any chance you’ve got a bed there?”

  “For you, I’ll find one. How soon can you come?”

  “As soon as you can make it happen,” he said, a silly grin on his face. It would be good to see her again. He’d met her years ago when he was with his friends Levi and Stone. They’d kept in touch, but only through Elliot had Finn realized who ran the center.

  Lord, it would be good to go home.

  Chapter 1

  Finn MacGregor, with the help of the aide behind him, slowly pushed his way up the ramp in his wheelchair. He could see that, over time, this ramp would be a lot easier, just like so many other ramps in his life. Being in a wheelchair sucked. He’d had high hopes of getting out of it at the beginning, and that hope had faded over time. But now that he was at Hathaway House, his friend Dani’s place, with Elliot, another friend, here to cheer him on, Finn had reinvested into that same hope again.

  He knew it was a bit foolish, but, when a man was down and out, hope was one of the biggest things that kept him going.

  The aide pushed a little harder behind Finn. When they reached the top of the gradual slope, Finn twisted and looked up at the big man behind him, smiled and said, “Thanks.”

  His voice cheerful, as if he’d done this many times before, the man replied, “No problem. Next time you can do it all on your own. You did pretty well getting here as it is.”

  The name tag on the man’s shirt read Malcolm. “Well, Malcolm, hopefully it won’t take too long to make that kind of progress.”

  “It won’t,” Malcolm said. “All kinds of miracles happen here.”

  Finn straightened up as the huge double doors opened, letting Malcolm push him into the front reception area. Finn stopped and stared at the massive open space and all the long hallways that conjoined right at the reception area. An office was off to the side, light music played and absolutely nothing was institutional about this place. More like the lounge of a bed-and-breakfast.

  Finn frowned. “Are you sure this is the right place?” he joked.

  Malcolm, a big yet quiet smile on his face, nodded and said, “Not only is it the right place but that person has been waiting for you.” He pointed to a woman walking quickly toward Finn.

  He stared at her and felt a shock of recognition. “Dani?”

  She let out a peal of laughter, opened her arms wide, bent down and gave him a big hug.

  He wrapped his arms around her as best he could. Just feeling her arms tighten around him made his eyes leak a bit. “Damn,” he said, “I should have tried to get here earlier.”

  “I told you to,” she said, “but I must wait until people are ready. Ready to make that kind of move. It’s not easy to do, and I’m really proud of you for having made it.”

  Again he felt that light prick of pride inside. He had to remind himself that pride went before the fall, and he’d already had enough falls in his life. He glanced around and said, “Honestly, I thought Elliot was off his rocker with everything he’s been telling me about your place here, and I’m so proud of you for having done what you’ve done. This place is huge.”

  “It is, indeed,” she said, “and getting bigger every day. We are adding a wing up and down. Here for the humans and downstairs for the animals’ vet.”

  Finn nodded. Elliot had filled him in on how this rehab center catered to both injured animals and humans. They had a massive veterans clinic and rehab center here, where veterans came home with more than a few health issues, had gone through surgeries, and now needed specialized care to get them back on their feet. This wasn’t a long
-term facility for people who had no improvements to be made. This was a place where people came to get their strength back and to learn how to become mobile with whatever body parts they had replaced—or, in some cases, didn’t have replaced.

  Finn stared at his missing lower leg and frowned.

  “Not to worry about your leg,” Dani said, her gaze following his. “You’re just one of many here.”

  He winced at that. “Somehow that’s not reassuring.”

  “It will be,” she said. She walked behind the reception area, picked up a file and then said, “Come on. Let’s get you to your room. The sooner we get you settled, the sooner we can start having fun.”

  As they headed down the hall, he asked her, “How long have you guys been open now?”

  “Seven years,” she replied. “But, of course, getting the word out is a whole different story. This last year has been incredible though,” she admitted.

  “Sounds like it’s well-deserved with the kind of success Elliot has been spouting off about. If it’s even one-tenth as good as what he’s been telling me,” he said, “it’s got to be fantastic.”

  “We’ve had a lot of really good successes,” Dani said with a bright smile. “But with all that comes one case which just gives you no end of trouble. And we’ve had a couple people who have come here and then decided it was not for them and left.”

  “I think that goes for everything in life,” Finn said. “We are not all geared for the same things.”

  She turned to Malcolm and said, “We’re heading for 212.”

  Malcolm nodded. They took the next corner, went down a short hall and turned Finn’s wheelchair to face the door with big black numbers proclaiming 212.

  Dani opened the door, and Malcolm pushed Finn through the extra-wide doorway. The room was large. Had his own private bathroom. There was a dresser and a large double bed with all the equipment that went with his disabilities. He stared at all the hooks and chains and winced. “I sure hope I don’t ever need those,” he said, motioning at the apparatus above the bed.

  She walked over, and, with the push of a button, the apparatus retracted against the wall. “I’d be happy to never have to touch that again for you,” she said cheerfully. “But it’s there if you need it. Physiotherapy specialists and doctors will decide how much of that you might need.”

  He nodded, staring up at it. “Very high-tech,” he murmured.

  “We try,” she said. “Do you want to get into bed right now?”

  He hesitated.

  “Otherwise, we can go over the paperwork. I’ll give you your iPad and then I can take you for a tour, and we can sit out on the deck with a cup of coffee.”

  He brightened at that. “That sounds much more informal and more my style.”

  She grinned. “Here’s your iPad with your schedule and more information, if you’re curious. I want you to flick through it all. Your team has been assigned to you, and they are all available for messaging on that tablet, custom designed for us. You’ll see all the names of everybody who will be working with you. I’ll leave this paperwork here. You can take a look at it when we get back and you’re on your own. Obviously, you have some personal effects coming.”

  Malcolm stood by the doorway and said, “I’ll grab his stuff at reception.”

  Dani smiled up at him. “Thanks, Malcolm.”

  She turned toward Finn. “When we get back after coffee, you can put your stuff away, so that it feels more like home. Let’s head down, and I’ll show you around.”

  As they wheeled out with her pushing him, he said, “I can wheel myself, you know?”

  “Good,” she said, “but sometimes it’s nice to be wheeled around. You’re tired and stressed with your travels, and I need to make sure that your stress levels are minimized. So how about letting your old friend push you around?”

  He sagged into the wheelchair, his back easing because, of course, it did hurt his back to do the wheeling. It was one of the things that his prior doctors had not been happy about. He was missing a big swath of muscle along one side, not to mention the kidney on the right side, and of course, the shrapnel had eaten away part of the muscles around it. After the act of removing that shrapnel, they had put as much of Finn back together as possible. Multiple surgeries later, he was as good as he would get, but he was weak on one side. That was his job to fix now.

  She whispered, “Good way to start.”

  He chuckled. “We go way back, kiddo. I can’t believe we’re at this stage of our lives.”

  “Not sure about you,” she said, “but I’m engaged to be married. Remember Dad? He’s here too.”

  “The major?” Finn asked with a laugh. “Man, back then I wasn’t so sure he would make it.”

  “Neither was I,” Dani said, all her laughter falling away. “He started this center, I think, more as a project to help himself and to help his buddies, but since then he’s a completely different person. We’d have been lost without this center all these years.”

  Finn watched as they headed down the short hallway and into the main hallway, and almost immediately she turned a corner, and there it opened up a huge section, the entrance to a large eating area. He stared to see tables and chairs and couches, more like little community sitting areas.

  “We redid part of this area so that it was a more of a sitting room,” she said. “Pretty happy with the way it worked out.” She carried on, pushing him forward into what opened up to a massive cafeteria.

  He stared in surprise. “Wow. I was expecting little trays on hospital trolleys.”

  “That can be arranged too,” she said. “If you need a meal in your room, then don’t hesitate to ask. When you’ve had enough of the people or the physical work, or you’re just too damn tired, or you’re just too depressed, and you don’t want to make the effort to come in for a meal, we’d all appreciate it if you would at least call for a meal so that somebody can come and check up on you and bring you something hot to eat.”

  “I’ll remember that,” he said in surprise.

  “We’re much more of a family here,” she said. “You’ll get to know the characters around the place fairly quickly.”

  “Looks like it.” He watched several people at the cafeteria counter pushing trays in front of them, some with legs, some on crutches, some in wheelchairs.

  She pushed him into the line, pulled a tray down and placed it beside him as they moved along. “Are you hungry?” she asked.

  He flushed and shook his head. “No. Just coffee will be fine.”

  “Right,” she said. “I forgot, but I have to add a couple notes on that for your PT to consider.”

  “What notes?” he asked gruffly.

  “Notes about your system,” she said. “Not that you have allergies but you have a lot of food sensitivities.”

  He shrugged. What he was sensitive to was the way his food had to travel. Who knew that he would lose most of his bowels and need a colostomy bag? How embarrassing was that? He’d heard lots of other people say it made no bloody difference, but Finn had yet to come to that point. Who liked to poop out of their side? That was just gross. And every time he ate food, it reminded him that it had to go in one way and come out another.

  Almost as if she understood what he was thinking about, she bent and said, “I guess you don’t want a bran muffin with too much fiber then, do you?”

  He glared at her. She smiled, a secretive smile, as if she knew something he didn’t.

  She pushed him up to the coffee station. There, she poured two cups and said, “If you don’t want anything to eat, I’ll grab a muffin.” She placed it on the tray with butter and a knife and then looked around and said, “Where would you like to sit? Inside or out?” She pointed to a whole wall that opened up to an outdoor section of the cafeteria.

  “Outdoors,” he said instantly.

  She placed the tray in his lap and said, “You get to look after that.”

  She wheeled him past several other groups of men out in
the sunshine. As Finn studied the inside area, he thought he caught a glimpse of a dog. Maybe a therapy dog? As they shifted into the hot sun, he tilted his head back and smiled. There was something absolutely glorious about having the sun on his face.

  She removed the tray to place it on the table before pushing him up close and taking a seat across from him. He didn’t even want to face her; he was enjoying the morning sunshine so much.

  “There’s something just so wrong about being in an institution for so long,” she murmured. “Getting out in the sun and feeling it deep in your soul is so very healing.” Just then she called out, “Elliot!”

  Instantly Finn’s eyes opened. He twisted to see her pointing at somebody. He twisted around a little more, almost crying out, barely stifling the gasp of pain as he took the motion too far and settled back, gasping at first, then trying to breathe deeply to ease the pain. She waited calmly at his side. When he could, he said, “Sorry, that was foolish of me.”

  “Limitations of the body are not something any of us ever like to admit,” she said calmly.

  “I guess you’re used to it, aren’t you?”

  “Nobody ever gets used to somebody’s pain,” she said with the gentlest of smiles that he remembered so well.

  She had always been all heart, this girl.

  “And living in a place where every person lives with pain helps me to realize how grateful I am to be pain-free.”

  “Good point,” he said. He shifted in the wheelchair to ease the pain in his back when he felt a hand clap on his shoulder. He looked up to see Elliot Carver, an old friend, standing above him. Finn reached up to shake his hand, but Elliot bent and hugged him hard.

  “Damn, I’m glad to see you finally here,” he said with a big smile. He looked at Dani and back over at Finn. “Do you mind if I grab a chair and sit down?”

  “Hell no,” he said. “Please, join us.”

  Elliot grabbed a chair and dropped into it at Finn’s side.