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Yet now she was going home to an empty, cavernous house, with only a demented cat and the whispers of old ghosts to keep her company.
“Quite an exciting life you lead,” she muttered to herself as she pulled out of the back parking lot, waited for several cars to pass, then turned north on Main.
The deep tire ruts in the snow grabbed at her tires as she drove slowly enough to keep ample distance between her and the car ahead.
The single stoplight in town turned yellow at her approach and, despite her best intentions, she glanced at the Edwards Law Office on the opposite corner.
She drew in a sharp breath.
Dressed in khaki slacks, a blazer and a shirt open at the throat, Grant was at the open door, talking to a woman who stood with her back to the street.
The woman rested her hand on his forearm for a moment, then stood on her toes to kiss his cheek. She turned and hurried down the steps to an all-too-familiar red, vintage Cobra parked in front.
At the car, she turned back and waved at him, her long, too-bright auburn hair whipping in the wind.
Jill’s heart gave an extra, hard thud. Natalie.
The old hurt welled up inside her and she sat frozen through the green light until the car behind her honked.
She hadn’t wanted to believe the rumors last fall. Even now, perhaps this wasn’t what it seemed. But Natalie’s advances a moment ago certainly hadn’t been rebuffed.
Since Grant had come back to town, he and Jill had carefully tried to avoid each other, but small towns didn’t allow for a lot of space. Seeing him again had made her feel a little…wistful. Made her start reviewing the past. Made her second-guess all that had gone wrong.
But those regrets were a waste of time.
Grant could do whatever he liked, with whomever he liked, and it didn’t matter one bit. He was a free man.
And seeing the woman who’d destroyed the last hope for their marriage drove that fact home with blinding clarity.
CHAPTER FOUR
JILL PAUSED AT the door of Patsy’s hospital room to study the rainbow of crayon drawings taped to the wall, the untidy bouquet of flowers on the bedside table.
Zoe’s work, Jill thought sadly. The four-year-old loved to handle the flower arrangements delivered to the room, beaming as she plucked one bloom after another and presented them to her mother.
What was it like, seeing your mommy lying so still in this hospital bed, with the steady snick of an IV pump marking off the seconds?
Patsy’s head turned on the pillow, her weary eyes lighting with recognition. Her hand dropped to the white cotton blanket, and a small tape recorder fell from her grasp.
Jill caught it just before it hit the floor.
“Thanks,” Patsy whispered. “I’m…trying. So hard. I need…time.”
The effort to speak clearly exhausted her, and Jill felt renewed anger at the doctor who’d originally misdiagnosed this poor woman. The HMO system that had refused to cover the tests that might have caught her cancer earlier. And especially, at the callous husband who’d walked out on her right after her diagnosis.
No one deserved to die young.
And no one deserved life more than this young mother of three who, until recently, had operated a day-care program in town and had selflessly reached out to others in need.
Jill fingered the stack of audio cassettes on the bedside table. “Your children will treasure these.”
Patsy’s gaze veered to the tapes, then back to Jill. “The kids will have my memories…of them when they were small. I want them to know…how much I love them. That I’ll love them forever.”
“They’ll never have any doubt.”
“Zoe won’t even remember me, really.” Patsy winced and fell silent for a moment. “She’s so young.”
“But she’ll have these tapes, with your voice. She’ll have photos. Do you have home movies?”
“Some.” A faint smile flickered at the corners of her mouth. “I’m always on the other side of the camera, though.”
“How about getting some film of you and the kids here—maybe down in the lounge? You could be reading to Zoe, or telling some old stories from when you were young. I’ll bet we can get one of the nurses to run the camera.”
“K-Kurt got it.”
In a divorce that had been far from equitable, if the rumors were true. “Then I’ll bring in mine,” Jill said briskly. “How about that? I’ll bring it in tomorrow, and leave it at the nurse’s station with a few extra blank cassettes.”
“Not sure I’m ready for prime time,” the younger woman said, touching the wisps of her thin hair. But the grateful expression in her eyes spoke volumes.
“There are people who will never be beautiful, no matter how perfect their hair. But you? Your kids will treasure every moment. And once the tapes are transferred onto DVDs, the copies will last forever. Or so I was told,” Jill added with a smile, “by the young guy at the electronics store who sold me a DVD/VHS dubbing machine.”
“Thank you.”
She was so clearly exhausted that Jill glanced at the clock on the wall. “I need to let you get some rest, so you’ll be ready when the kids arrive.” She picked up the chart at the end of the bed and studied the nurse’s notes and lab reports. “You know that you can still request hospice if you change your mind?”
“No. I want home…to be happy for them. Not a place where they watched me…die.”
“Hospice can get you back here before that point, if you still want to,” Jill said gently. “They’ll help you be comfortable, and they’ll help your children deal with all of this.”
Yesterday Patsy had refused to even discuss it. Now, she blinked away the moisture in her eyes. “For them, then…if it will help.”
“I don’t think you’ll regret it.”
“I could go home and stay for a little while? With this?” She lifted a fragile hand toward the IV pole. “And I…could come here when…when…”
“Everything, just as you wish.” Jill put the chart on the window ledge and sat beside Patsy on the bed. She took one of her hands. “The nurses tell me you’ve been refusing your morphine.”
“Makes me too…fuzzy. I need to visit with my kids.” She managed another faint grin. “Alison says it makes me sound drunk.”
Her nine-year-old daughter probably knew about that kind of behavior all too well, given who her father was. The thought of that jerk—an arrogant, self-righteous dentist who’d had an affair with his hygienist, then abruptly moved to Green Bay and filed for divorce—set Jill’s teeth on edge. “But what about your pain control?”
“Okay.” Patsy sank deeper into the pillow. Her eyes fluttered shut and her breathing deepened.
Her heart heavy, Jill watched her for a moment, then she picked up the chart and headed for the door.
Even after two years in family medicine, she still found it impossible to accept that a stroke of terrible luck could strike anyone, anytime.
Patsy’s husband hadn’t asked for shared custody. He hadn’t arranged a single visit since he’d walked out.
And soon three young children were going to be left in his care, because their loving mother was going to die.
“HEY, ROSS. GREAT NEWS!” his mom gushed into the phone. She giggled, breaking away from the call to tell Tony to leave her alone, and Ross could just imagine what the guy was doing. Pawing her, probably. Playing vampire at her neck.
Tony’s smarmy possessiveness over his mom had made Ross’s stomach churn from day one, and he’d so wanted to land a fist right in the creep’s smug face. The guy was way older than she was, for one thing. And there was something about him that made Ross’s skin crawl.
He started to hang up when she came back on the line breathless and laughing. “Sweetie, you’ll never guess! Tony and I are going to Reno—we’re getting married!”
He froze, unable to speak.
“We’re leaving tomorrow on an early flight. It will be so cool! We’ll take in some of the shows, and I hear the food is great. Tony knows of a little chapel where they have real flowers and everything…. Are you still there? Did you hear me?”
Ross mumbled something unintelligible into the receiver.
“Look, I know you’re gonna be real disappointed, but it’s just me and him going. He got a great deal on tickets and a hotel for two. And,” she added after another burst of laughter and the sound of Tony’s voice in the background, “it is our honeymoon.”
“Y-you planned this all along.” Ross swallowed hard. “You took me up here so you could go to Reno?”
“Of course not, sweetie. It…it just sorta came up. Just last night, in fact. Isn’t it exciting?”
Just sort of came up? The week after she’d dumped him in Grace’s lap? The false cheerfulness in her voice told him she was lying, which just made it worse. “Yeah, right. Exciting.”
“It’s still a good thing you’re up there with Grace,” she added quickly. “Tony’s real busy with the bar and all, and…well, you know.”
“Yeah.”
“I’d think you could at least be happy for me.” Her voice took on a petulant edge. “You know how we’ve struggled.”
She’d never noticed that Tony was a real jerk toward Ross. She’d been defensive and even angry when he tried to tell her, because she didn’t want to hear it.
In return, Ross had never tried to hide his own disgust. Especially not after he’d seen the bastard coming out of a late-night movie with another woman, though Mom had refused to hear a single word against her latest lover.
A chill settled over Ross as he dropped the receiver into its cradle; a feeling of emptiness so huge that if he’d been a few years younger, he might have just sat and bawled.
Grace had tactfully left the kitchen when Ross answered the phone, and from out in the living room he’d heard the sound of her bustling around. Now, she appeared at the kitchen door. “About ready for school? I’ll give you a ride.”
“Nah.” He grabbed his jacket from the back closet and shouldered on his backpack. She’d offered every day of his first week here, and every day he’d refused. With no school bus service for the town kids he could be dropped off like a grade-schooler or he could get there on his own. No contest, there—even if it meant eight blocks of snow-packed streets through the bitter cold.
“Are you sure?” Biting her lip, she glanced outside. “It’s five below and windy this morning. The streets aren’t that good, either. People don’t even try to ride bikes here this time of year, and I really don’t mind—”
“No.” Before she could push any further or worse, ask him about the phone call, he jerked open the back door, unchained his mountain bike and hoisted it down the steps.
He slung a leg over the bike and sped down the long hill toward Main Street without a backward glance. He didn’t have to look back to know that Aunt Grace was watching him from the porch, her arms folded across her chest and her brow furrowed with worry.
Her house was small, and she’d probably heard some of the conversation.
The roughly plowed street caught his front tire. He wobbled wildly for a split second, then righted himself and eased into the track of a car. Great—I might as well break my neck and be done with it.
As cold as it was in this godforsaken place, he was already so numb he probably wouldn’t even feel a thing. The phone call this morning almost made him wish he had the courage to let it happen.
For now, he had a place with Grace. But what about later?
Moving back with Mom would no longer be an option. Though Tony had a creepy way of being nice to his mom while getting her to wait on him, his whole personality changed when she wasn’t home. He swore a lot, slammed things around and got his kicks out of trying to be intimidating.
It didn’t take any imagination to guess how much he’d dislike having a teenage kid around.
A gust of wind kicked up a blinding cloud of snow at the intersection of Oak and Lake. A dark shape suddenly materialized at his left. Coming too fast…
Ross slammed on his brakes and jerked the bike to the right. Skidded sideways. From far away he heard a heavy thud and someone screaming.
For one dizzying moment he felt as if he were weightless, spinning, disoriented. And then the ground rushed up to meet him.
THE HOSPITAL’S ONLY male nurse, Carl Miller, met Grace at the door of the E.R. “He’s in Room 3. Dr. Reynolds is with him right now.” He tipped his head toward the waiting room. “The girl who hit him is here, too, and her father is on the way. She’s pretty upset.”
Grace nodded and hurried down the hall, her damp shoes squeaking on the highly polished floor.
A heartbeat after she’d received the call, she’d grabbed her purse and coat without a thought for snow boots, gloves or scarf. Now, with snow melting inside her shoes and her hands tingling, she wrapped her arms around herself and tried to stop shaking. I never should have let him leave home like that. I should have made him sit down and talk.
But she knew just how far she would’ve gotten. She’d had him for over a week now, and still hadn’t made it past his sullen anger. He’d been less talkative with each passing day.
At the door of the room she said a silent prayer, then hid her worries behind a bright smile and stepped inside.
A bag of saline hung from the IV pole at the other side of the bed. No ventilator, though. Thank God. No frantic rushing to get the boy to surgery. And of the four doctors who had privileges at this hospital and could be on call today, Connor Reynolds and Jill Edwards were the very best.
Dr. Reynolds was bent over the bed with his stethoscope on Ross’s bare chest. He straightened at the sound of Grace’s squeaky shoes, a reassuring smile on his lean, handsome face. “Ross had a mishap, but he’s going to be fine.”
“Oh, my Lord,” she whispered. She hurried to the other side of the bed and ran her hands gently over Ross’s face, then his arms and chest.
The abraded, reddened areas over one cheekbone and his left arm would be deep purple by tomorrow. The sheet, drawn up to his waist, might hide more serious injuries, but so far, she could see no bandaging, no evidence of lacerations. “Are you okay, honey? What happened?”
Ross darted a wary look at her, his cheeks reddening. He closed his eyes and turned away. “Nothing.”
Did he expect her to be angry? She wanted nothing more than to gather him up in her arms and comfort him.
An impossibility, given the situation and his teenage pride.
Swallowing back her emotions, she gripped the side rail on the gurney. “He says this is nothing?” She looked up at Dr. Reynolds. “Tell me.”
“We’ve got a young man here who’s been rethinking his idea about biking in the winter. He was very lucky. Deputy Krumvald says the accident happened at an unmarked intersection, and it isn’t clear who was there first. The car hit his back tire and sent him about fifteen feet into heavy snow banked up along the street.”
“Thank God.”
“Still, that snow wasn’t exactly a feather pillow—those banks are hard-packed and crusted. He’s got some scrapes and bruises, and a light sprain in his left wrist.”
“X-rays?”
“He just came back. We took X-rays of the wrist, ran an MRI and some lab work. No sign of internal damage or a concussion, though I suspect he’ll be sore for a while. I recommend bandaging the wrist, a cold pack and elevation for a day. After that, just wrap it until it feels comfortable.” The doctor smiled. “I think the worst part of this for him was starting that IV.”
It had been placed immediately, Grace knew, in case there’d been a fast decompensation of Ross’s status. A rush to surgery. Something she dealt with frequently, even in this small hospital.
