“What’s that?” she asked, leaning over. “Oh, a Mother’s Day card. I have a box of them that Lindsey’s made for me.”
“It was the last one I made for my mother,” he said then set it aside. She didn’t need to know how angry his father had become when William had insisted on taking the card to his mother. It was the same day his father had rasped through gritted teeth that his mother would never be able to read the card. Would never be able to come home again.
Hannah reached into the box and brought out a signed baseball. “Astros?”
“Rangers. My father’s company sponsored a family fun night when I was eleven,” William said.
He let her examine the strange collection that had come from his childhood. An old picture of Elle Campbell from the eighth-grade dance. A rock from a riverbed he’d collected on the trip he had taken with his grandparents to the mountains of Tennessee.
Hannah held up an empty perfume bottle. It had been his mother’s, one of the few things he had taken from the boxed items the staff had put it the attic. Over the years, the fragrance had evaporated until only the empty bottle remained. Just as his hope that his mother would return for him had dried up as the weeks and months had stretched into years.
“I had forgotten about these things until you mentioned gathering things for Avery,” he said, gently taking the bottle from her and holding it to the light of the bulb hanging above them. “You were right, Hannah. There are things of her mother’s that Avery will treasure when she gets older. You always seem to know the right thing to do.”
“Me? I wish,” she said and then hesitated.
He waited and watched as she bit down on her lower lip. A warm heat spread through him, part desire and part something else...something he refused to acknowledge.
“I’ve made a lot of mistakes,” she finally said. “Done the wrong thing. Said the wrong thing. They’ve taught me some hard lessons.”
“Was one of those mistakes Lindsey’s father?” he asked, his curiosity getting the better of him.
“Best mistake I ever made,” Hannah breathed. “It gave me Lindsey. She’s a blessing, not a mistake. It was her father who was the mistake.”
“I didn’t mean Lindsey,” he said. The funny girl who kept him on his toes was delightful.
“I know you didn’t. But yes, in other ways, my relationship with Lindsey’s father was a mistake.”
“I take it he’s not involved with Lindsey?” he asked. Did the man know what he was missing? Any man would be proud to be the girl’s father.
“No. He had plans for his life that didn’t include me or a baby. By the time I figured out that I was just a rebound relationship for him, he’d gotten back with his high school sweetheart.”
“It’s his loss, you know,” William said as he put his cherished items back inside the box. “And I’m not just talking about Lindsey.”
“Thank you,” Hannah said. “I know it would have been easier if I’d had help, but it wasn’t meant to be. Me and Lindsey—we were meant to be.”
“Your parents couldn’t help?” he asked. He knew from conversations he’d overheard between Hannah and her daughter that things were very tense between Hannah and her parents.
“That’s a story for another time... It’s going to be a long car ride back to Houston tomorrow. We’d both better get some sleep.”
Putting the lid back on the box, he stood, stashed it under one arm, and reached out a hand to help Hannah up from the bench.
For a mere second, they stood together, hands linked, bodies all but touching, breaths mingling.
William felt more aroused then he had ever felt in his life but he took a step back. This couldn’t happen. Not here in this house. Not now. Because as much as he had tried to warn Hannah against him, deep inside he knew that no matter the risk, someday soon he would not be able to walk away from the hunger in her eyes.
“I’m not the man you think I am, Hannah.” He tensed when she stepped closer to him, fought his body’s arousal.
Resting her hands against his chest, she lifted her lips to his in a soft caress.
“You’re not the man you think you are, either,” she said before turning away, leaving him wondering what was it that she saw in him given all the baggage he carried with him.
CHAPTER NINE
LEAVING THE OPERATING ROOM, Hannah all but danced. She had passed the test required by the hospital to allow her to assist William in the OR and she couldn’t wait to get back to the office to tell him. Her phone vibrated in the back pocket of her scrub pants and she pulled it out to see a text from William asking how it was going.
Done and passed! she typed. Her phone rang immediately.
“Meet me in the emergency room,” William said, his words clipped, cold. She knew the tone only too well now. There was a critical patient who was not doing well.
“I’ll head there now,” she said as a bit of the adrenaline from her excitement drained from her.
While she understood why William internalized his feelings during surgery and when dealing with a patient that needed emergency care, she wondered how healthy it was for him to hold it all inside. It seemed that underneath all that control lay the root of whatever it was that made him think he needed to go through his life alone.
She’d only recently realized that even all of his hobbies were solitary. Had he spent so much time alone in the house his father had built that he didn’t know how to live life any other way? Of course, his life was changing now with Avery. Whether within his comfort zone or not, he would be joining the rest of the world.
She spotted William’s tall frame and brown hair above a group standing outside one of the trauma rooms and joined them. She also spotted a couple of officers, which sent shivers through her. Their presence meant that the patient was likely either a crime victim or a suspect.
“Excuse me,” she said as she pushed past an X-ray technician leaving the crowded space.
Then she saw her.
Her arm still wrapped in the Velcro splint she’d been wearing the last time Hannah had seen her, there was now an ugly scar above her eye, the greenish hue of old bruises standing out against her pale face.
Jeannine Jones had been intubated and a respiratory tech was quickly setting up the ventilator. Grabbing a pair of gloves from the dispenser, Hannah made it to the side of Jeannine’s bed. She carefully pushed the woman’s hair back from the side of her face to assess her swollen, bloody eye.
“Orbital fracture?” she asked as William joined her.
“No, thank God. The blow knocked her back and she hit her head against a fireplace hearth. CT shows a cranial fracture with a subdural hematoma that I’ll have to fix in the OR once she’s stabilized.”
He showed no emotion to the outside world, but Hannah knew him now and he didn’t have to raise his voice for her to see how angry he was that they hadn’t been able to save this woman. Did he look at her lying so lifelessly and see the body of his mother? she wondered.
“Where’s her husband?” Hannah asked the officer taking information from the emergency doctor.
“He’s in custody. The neighbor called us when she heard him shouting at her. We found Mrs. Jones on the floor, him passed out drunk beside her,” the officer said.
The monitor beeped as Jeannine’s heart rate climbed.
“Are you going to be okay assisting?” William asked Hannah. There was no censure in his words, no judgment if she refused. Hadn’t that been just what she had been doing to him earlier? Judging him by his emotional reactions?
There was emotion in the man. He wasn’t the Ice Prince everyone saw in the OR. She’d seen him laughing as he’d played on the floor with his sister just last night. It was easy to see the love he felt for Avery. And he was working hard to be the parent he needed to be for her.
Hannah looked down at Jeannine, whom she had o
nly met once but had worried about often, imagining her being mistreated by her husband. This was what she’d always dreamed of doing. Though her part was only to follow William’s directions, it was still close enough to make her heart race. She wiped her gloved palms against her pants. She had to take this step now to prove herself. Not just to William, but to herself.
“If you take her to surgery, I’m going with you.” she said. “Was there anything else we could have done to help her?”
“I don’t know. I spoke to the neuro social worker who met with her the last time she was here. Staff had tried to talk Jeannine out of leaving with Calvin, but she wouldn’t listen. In the end, our hands were tied. Not that it makes me feel any better,” William said as he left the room. “I’ll have you paged if we’re going to the OR.”
While Hannah waited to hear if they would be taking Jeannine to the OR, she made a trip to the cafeteria. The last thing she needed was to be weak in the OR and embarrass herself.
“Hannah?” a soft voice inquired.
She turned to find a beautiful, dark-haired woman standing behind her—with a baby bump she couldn’t mistake. “Sarah, you’re pregnant!”
“I know. And thank you for not adding again.”
“You look beautiful. I can’t believe I didn’t know,” Hannah said—and meant it.
With Lindsey carpooling to her riding lessons, Hannah hadn’t seen Sarah in weeks. She made a mental note to herself that once her studying was done, she would take some time to see her friends. She’d missed Sarah. The nurse practitioner who had played such a big part in Lindsey and Hannah’s lives by advocating for the transplant was beautiful both inside and out. Even after Lindsey’s surgery, she had been there to advise Hannah throughout nursing school.
“Lindsey tells me you’ve almost finished with your practitioner classes,” Sarah said, following Hannah to the cashier. They each took their turn swiping their payment and found a table where they could catch up.
“I’m so close right now. I’ve got my preceptor hours with Dr. Cooper and I’ve learned so much,” Hannah said.
“According to Lindsey, there’s more than learning going on between you and William Cooper. I hear you’ve moved in together.”
Oh, no. What had Lindsey been telling people?
“It’s not like it sounds. I mean...yes, Lindsey and I are living with him. But it’s only a temporary arrangement. He just needed some...help and it works out better if we live together.” Hannah tried to clarify, saying, “It’s more like an exchange of information.”
“Maybe you need to start from the beginning,” Sarah said as she sat her coffee cup down, “because somehow I have a feeling this is going to get complicated.”
Hannah did as she asked, telling Sarah how William had come to have custody of his baby sister and had needed some guidance on the day-to-day care of a soon-to-be toddler. She explained that she had been given a chance to work with the neurosurgeon and also get her educational hours in while having evenings off with Avery and Lindsey.
“I have to say I’m a little disappointed,” Sarah said as she pushed her tray away.
“I don’t understand,” Hannah replied. She thought a lot of the woman who had made such a difference in her daughter’s life. Without Sarah’s advocating so hard for Lindsey’s transplant, it might not ever have happened. Sarah’s example had been what had helped Hannah make the decision to go to nursing school. She would never want to disappoint her.
“I was hoping that maybe you’d finally taken some time for yourself. Some time for romance, Hannah. And I can’t imagine anyone being more perfect for you than William.”
“You know that’s not what I want. My biggest responsibility is to Lindsey right now. The last thing I need is a man in my life,” Hannah scoffed.
“You have noticed that William’s a man, haven’t you? And he is in your life, right? From what Lindsey says, y’all are getting along great,” Sarah said.
Hannah hated to admit that Sarah was right. There was no doubt that William was a man—she was more aware of that than she should be. And Lindsey was right, too. Somehow the four of them living together worked.
It surprised her, now that she thought about it, but they had both been two single people living alone—except for Lindsey, of course—and they’d been happy with their lifestyles. If someone had asked if she would be agreeable to living with someone else, Hannah would have said no. She was too used to living independently to deal with someone else in her space and she was pretty sure William felt the same way.
But the two of them had worked through all those awkward problems that came with sharing a home. And, for the most part, things were working well. They had each made concessions and were happy with the current arrangement.
No, she admitted, she was more than happy with what the two of them shared now. But what about William? Was she just a means to an end for him? He’d made it more than plain that he’d liked his life before Avery had come to live with him. But he had made so many changes since then. He was really working hard to be the best substitute parent for Avery that he could be. But it wasn’t all about Avery.
The hours they spent together at night after the kids had gone to bed had become one of her favorite times of the day. They shared experiences with each other, talking not only about the job and the kids, but about themselves. He told her about things he had seen that he thought would be of interest to her. She told him about something she had read that might interest him. Things had begun to change between the two of them. They’d become friends...and maybe even more.
“Hannah?” Sarah asked.
Hannah realized her friend was staring at her as if she had lost her mind. She also realized there was a good possibility that she had lost not only her mind but also her heart.
“So, I was right. There is more than you’re telling me,” Sarah said, briefly covering Hannah’s left hand with hers. “Look, I’ve known William for a while now, and he’s a good man.”
“You have?” Hannah asked. For someone who said he wanted to be left on his own, he did seem to know a lot of people.
“I have. He’s a big donor for our therapy program at the ranch. He covers the cost of all the safety equipment we use, including all the helmets we give each student,” Sarah told her. “I’ve also heard he donates a lot of money to the children’s oncology department. And everyone knows what a good surgeon he is and how good he is with his patients.
“It’s not something he wants attention for,” Sarah attested. “That’s not why he does it. He cares about people. I just don’t think he’s had that many people in his life who have cared about him. Which brings us back to you...” Sarah paused. “Hannah, I know you pretty well, too. You can’t help but get involved with people—your patients, your classmates—you care for everyone. Sometimes that can put you at a disadvantage. I don’t want to see you get hurt.”
“I know I’m out of my league with William,” Hannah said, giving up on getting the soup down and pushing her tray aside.
“No. From what you’ve told me, I’d say he’s out of your league. I’ve seen the women he dates. They all look like the dolls we use to play with as kids—beautiful to look at but only fluff cotton inside. Not one of them would have done what you’ve done for him. You have to be scaring the life out of him, and I think that’s a good thing. Emotions are messy and sometimes uncontrollable, which is not something William’s had a lot of experience with.”
Sarah was seeing romance, Hannah thought to herself, when, in reality, what William and Hannah had was a good friendship. And that was all it could ever be.
Her phone pinged with a message from William. They were going to the OR. With a hug and a thank you to Sarah, she headed off to get ready, pushing thoughts of what Sarah had said out of her mind.
* * *
William’s hand was steady as he made the first cut, his mind fig
hting the doubts he still had about Jeannine Jones’s outcome. Still, if she was going to have a chance at any quality of life, he knew he had to do whatever he could.
He took the procedure one precise step at a time, Hannah beside him, anticipating his needs for irrigation and suction. By the time he’d elevated the cranial bone and noted the blood flow increase, they had fallen into a natural complementary rhythm.
“Her blood pressure is dropping and her heart rate is up,” the anesthesiologist announced. “Do we have any more trauma blood?”
“Cautery,” William said to the OR tech, his hand out for the instrument. “Hannah, can you adjust the light?” He took care of the bleeders, concentrating on each detail as he ignored the others working around him.
“How’s she doing?” he asked the anesthesiologist.
“Hypotensive, but starting to level off,” she answered.
He evacuated a large clot and cauterized another section before preparing to close, repairing tears as he went. It was slow and tedious work but it had to be done.
“Heart rate one-fifty. Blood pressure beginning to drop again,” the anesthesiologist informed him.
“Almost finished,” William said as he began the work of reconstructing bone fragments. “I just need a few more minutes.”
“Hang on, Jeannine,” he heard Hannah say when the anesthesiologist called out for more blood. “Just hang on.”
CHAPTER TEN
WILLIAM STARED BLANKLY at the computer screen in front of him. He’d made the excuse of wanting to catch up on some charting when he had sent Hannah home earlier. That had been hours ago. Since then, he’d haunted the recovery room to check on Jeannine Jones’s blood pressure and consulted with a couple of new patients.
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