by Patti Berg
Hope FOR
Tomorrow
Hope FOR
Tomorrow
PATTI BERG
Stories from Hope Haven is a registered trademark of Guideposts.
Copyright © 2010 by Guideposts. All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher. Inquiries should be addressed to Guideposts, ATTN: Rights & Permissions Department, 16 E. 34th St., New York, NY 10016.
The characters, events and medical situations in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual persons or occurrences is coincidental.
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Cover design and illustration by Lookout Design, Inc.
Interior design by Lorie Pagnozzi
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Printed and bound in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
For my dearest Aunt Lola, who will live in my heart forever.
Thanks for many things, especially bologna, white bread, mayonnaise and love.
And, as always, for Bob.
The Best Medicine by Anne Marie Rodgers
Chasing the Wind by Patricia H. Rushford
Hope for Tomorrow by Patti Berg
Strength in Numbers by Charlotte Carter
A Simple Act of Kindness by Pam Hanson & Barbara Andrews
The Heart of the Matter by Leslie Gould
Well Wishes by Anne Marie Rodgers
Measure of Faith by Patricia H. Rushford
Cherished Memories by Patti Berg
Christmas Miracles by Charlotte Carter
The Healing Touch by Pam Hanson & Barbara Andrews
Lean on Me by Leslie Gould
Special Blessings by Anne Marie Rodgers
With Open Arms by Patricia H. Rushford
In This Together by Patti Berg
New Beginnings by Charlotte Carter
Chapter One
MONDAY MORNING’S DEEP PURPLE CLOUDS were skittering away by the time six o’clock rolled around, leaving behind a sky tinged with pink and orange as the first hint of sunlight peeked over the top of Hope Haven Hospital.
What a glorious October morning.
In spite of the chill, Elena Rodriguez leaned against her forest green Jeep Liberty and—as she did at the beginning of almost every workday—inhaled the clean autumn air of Deerford, Illinois, population 7,821, give or take a few, depending on how many babies had been born during the night.
She refused to think about the birth’s antithesis. One event was blessed; the other a given, and she saw far, far too much of the other. That, unfortunately, was one of the drawbacks of caring for patients in the hospital’s Intensive Care Unit.
Of course, there were also some pretty amazing benefits to being a registered nurse. Except for a few cranky souls and those who were perilously weak, most patients and their loved ones laughed and talked and even shared an awe-inspiring story or two with Elena as she comforted them and tried to ease their pain.
“Father, be with me as I care for my patients today,” she whispered. A wisp of wind fluttered across her face and for one moment wrapped her in its oddly warm embrace before scurrying back to the maples, where it began to shake amber and crimson leaves from their branches.
Smiling, Elena offered a quick but heartfelt amen and hitched up the tote bag carrying the lunch and snacks her husband Cesar had packed for her, along with a notebook full of ideas, contracts, proposals and cost estimates for the Bread of Life Harvest Festival—a charity event she was coordinating for her church and two others. Instead of heading for the staff entrance, she meandered through the hospital grounds toward the front of the hospital. It was too beautiful a morning to shut out the outside world just yet.
The floribunda roses lining the walkway no longer bloomed with yellow, pink and scarlet blossoms, but after sixteen years at Hope Haven, where she’d started working at the age of thirty, their sweet scent was fixed in her mind. The green grass was rapidly turning the color of wheat, storing all its energy to survive winter and the snow that would come all too soon—but hopefully after the Harvest Festival to be held the Saturday before Thanksgiving.
On the day after Thanksgiving, members of the hospital staff would hang twinkling lights in the trees and decorate the reception area with glittering trees and wreaths and a menorah or two. Elena was more than ready. The holiday season was her favorite time of year.
The dried leaves crunching under Elena’s baby blue clogs reminded her that she needed to head to Cavendish House one day soon to gather the biggest and best leaves for harvest decorations.
Cesar would laugh, of course. “I’ve been raking leaves around the house for weeks now. Couldn’t you have picked some of ours?” Elena would explain once again that they had to be somewhere close to perfection—the right size, the right shape and color—and those could only be found on the grounds of the 1850s Greek Revival mansion that was owned by the Deerford Historical Society, which rented it out for weddings and other special occasions.
The maple and beech trees the Cavendish family had planted a hundred and fifty-some-odd years ago were the absolute best for fall color—just right for decorating.
As she neared the front of the hospital, she was mentally compiling a few things to add to her to-do list besides gathering leaves—recruit two people willing to decorate kids’ faces for free, design a maze to be built out of hay, finagle free hay from Jim Ireland—when she heard raised, angry voices coming from near the hospital’s main entrance.
She heard Albert Varner’s familiar baritone drifting toward her, and she stopped dead in her tracks to listen.
She’d recognize his voice anywhere. The chief executive officer of Hope Haven had a friendly smile and encouraging words for everyone on the staff. He also sang in the choir at Elena’s church. She’d never heard or seen him annoyed, let alone furious, until this moment; nor had she ever seen him storm across the hospital grounds, looking like he would punch a fist through the glass doors; but they slid open just in time, and he disappeared inside the hospital.
Maybe this wasn’t going to be such a glorious morning after all.
A moment later, Hope Haven’s wealthiest, surliest board member, Frederick Innisk—whom Elena had nicknamed Scrooge—stepped into view, his face red with rage as he fiddled with the knot in his tie and smoothed his hands through his thick silver hair. He looked around the grounds as if searching for busybodies who might have overheard his argument with Mr. Varner. When his gaze settled on Elena, she wanted to run.
He marched toward her, the rage on his face hardening into animosity. Scrooge had loathed the Wall of Hope fund-raiser idea she’d dreamed up several months back as a way to raise money to help keep the hospital open. He’d fought her tooth and nail, and he and Elena even had a somewhat heated discussion about it in front of hospital staff, which had only raised his ire.
Adding fuel to the fire was the fact that the rest of the board would not abandon the idea, not after Elena had contacted each board member to state her case for the Wall of Hope. In the end, Elena won, and Frederick Innisk had seemed to be out to get her ever since.
He’s probably gunning for me right this moment, she thought when he stopped in front of her. She didn’t need to get on his bad side, not when she already had one big strike against her.
A gust of wind whipped Elena’s long, dark brown hair into her face, covering the smile she offered him. Unfortunately, she could easily see his downright churlish glare.
Be nice, she thought.
“Good morning, Mr. Innisk. It’s a beautiful day, isn’t it?”
“Too windy for my liking.” He looked at his watch and frowned. “Shouldn’t you be at work by now? As far as I know, we don’t pay you to lollygag or to stand outside listening to private conversations.”
Elena hadn’t been late a day in her life, and if Varner hadn’t been yelling, she wouldn’t have stopped. She wasn’t one to argue, but the mere fact that he was one of the hospital’s board members didn’t give him the right to be an uncivilized boor.
“Actually, Mr. Innisk, my shift doesn’t start for another hour. Now, if you’ll excuse me,” she said, skirting around him, “I have a meeting to get to.”
Elena pulled her scarf up close to her face to fight off the wind and Scrooge’s scowl. She rushed off, feeling the heat of Mr. Innisk’s glare on her back until she disappeared through the hospital’s sliding doors.
“Dear Lord,” she whispered, “please let that be the last encounter I have with Frederick Innisk for a good long time. Amen.”
Elena walked past the gift shop, which was dark inside and locked up tight. It wouldn’t open until seven o’clock, when the hospital came to life. At this early hour, there were only two people walking through the reception area, probably on their way to day surgery. Hap Winston, one of the hospital’s custodians, was busy vacuuming the carpeted area.
Hap was skinny and scrawny and had a ruffle of white hair at the sides and back of his head, which was bald and shiny on top. A fixture at Hope Haven for at least forty years, he had been named “Employee of the Month” more times than anyone could remember.
Elena waved hello, but Hap was too deep in his work to notice. She hung a right into the administrative area, just in time to see Mr. Varner shove through his office door and slam it behind him.
What on earth was going on?
It seemed odd that the chief executive officer and one of the board members would be at the hospital at the crack of dawn, arguing and slamming doors. Unless…
Elena frowned. The hospital had suffered through financial woes a few months ago. Was it in dire straits again?
Elena had too much on her plate to worry about what was going on behind the hospital’s closed doors, but she had to think about her job, her future.
All the upheaval would gnaw at her nerves until she learned the truth.
She hoped she could get to the bottom of it during her meeting with Quintessa Smith. Quintessa was serving as the festival’s financial coordinator, and—most importantly—worked as the executive assistant to Chief Financial Officer Zane McGarry. She was privy to just about everything that went on behind the hospital’s closed doors. Quintessa was the height of decorum and confidentiality, but if Elena could work the argument between Innisk and Varner into their conversation about donations and sponsors, Quintessa might let something slip.
Walking into Quintessa’s office was like stepping into a calm oasis of comforting colors—dove gray, mauve and pale jade—dotted with lush green plants that flourished in the artificial light and the soft music Quintessa played on a hidden stereo. The music reminded Elena of the Sarah McLachlan and Cranberries CDs Quintessa often had playing in her car.
Quintessa was like a calm oasis too. Tall and svelte, her skin was the color of warm cocoa, and her eyes were dark brown, big and expressive, reflecting her intelligence as well as her warmth. She and Elena had become good friends when they worked together on last year’s hospital Christmas decorating committee. Elena had been in charge, but Quintessa was an idea person, too, and they’d made a terrific team. Naturally, Quintessa was the first to step up to bat when Elena said she needed help with the festival.
She was on the phone, seated behind an antique mahogany desk, the top neat as a pin. One corner of the desk, plus the credenza behind her, was devoted to photographs of her family—her twin brother, Dillan, a technician in Hope Haven’s lab, her mom and dad, plus a host of nieces and nephews.
The desk itself was one Quintessa had rescued from a storage room in the hospital’s basement. She’d found it hidden behind an assortment of old chairs and file cabinets, and while restoring it to its former glory, learned that it had once belonged to Hope Haven’s founder, Winthrop Jeffries, a minister and doctor who had established the hospital in 1907 because he longed for his patients and those of other doctors in the area to receive care, not only for their bodies, but for their spirits as well.
The desk was the find of the century.
“I’ll be another few minutes,” Quintessa whispered to Elena, her hand over the phone’s mouthpiece.
“No hurry,” Elena whispered back, wondering if she’d hear more slamming doors or more raised voices coming from Mr. Varner’s next-door office while she waited.
Elena dropped her coat, scarf and tote on one of the guest chairs, taking a load off…and listened, but it was only Quintessa’s voice she heard.
“Let me put it this way, Mr. Welsh,” Quintessa said, speaking succinctly into the phone. “If you look closely at the proposal, it’s up to you to come up with a viable way to…”
The conversation was all Greek to Elena. Money was not her thing, and her mind wandered to her ever-growing to-do list: taking her granddaughter Isabel out for a girls’ lunch and then to the zoo or the art center, and what she planned to fix for dinner that night.
“Wait a minute. We discussed—”
Elena stiffened when she heard the angry voice reverberate through the wall, nearly drowning out Quintessa’s conversation. There was definitely a battle going on in Mr. Varner’s office.
Elena leaned against the wall, hoping she could pick out a few phrases from the conversation, but it was all rather garbled and all she could do was guess at what they were saying.
Had the directors finally decided to vote Mr. Innisk off the board?
Was Varner being fired?
Could there be a huge malpractice suit on the horizon?
If only she could hear more.
“It can’t be helped. You know that better than anyone.” Board President Bernard Telford’s familiar voice filtered through the wall.
What can’t be helped? Elena frantically wondered.
The door slammed. She heard coughing and throat-clearing and then recognized Frederick Innisk’s voice. “I don’t see the need for any further discussion on this matter.”
“You might not see the need, Frederick, but you haven’t been around here 24/7. You—” Mr. Varner’s beyond-exasperated voice was cut off by Zane McGarry’s, but his words were muffled, impossible to understand.
And then, unfortunately, Quintessa hung up the phone. “Sorry to keep you waiting so long.”
If only she’d been a little longer, Elena might have heard more from next door. Even though she knew Quintessa wouldn’t divulge any secrets, she couldn’t help but ask, “What on earth is going on? What’s with all the door slamming?”
Quintessa’s pretty brown eyes darted to a packet of papers on her desk that she suddenly seemed interested in. “I haven’t heard even one slamming door.” Quintessa was being much too coy.
And then another door slammed.
Elena’s eyes widened. “Don’t tell me you didn’t hear that?”
Quintessa laughed lightly as if it were no big deal. “If you spent eight hours a day here, five days a week, you’d hear that a lot. It comes with the territory.”
Elena wanted to dig deeper, to see if Quintessa would divulge anything, but all this crazy intrigue was pulling her away from her number one priority right now. She was the queen of multitaskers, but she already had enough on her plate without getting completely caught up in the Hope Haven hornet’s nest.
Not right this moment, anyway.
Elena pulled a file folder from her bag. “Here’s the list of local businesses and those in the surrounding area that I came up with to contact about possible donations.” Elena handed a copy of the list to Quintessa, plus a CD containing an electronic copy of the form.
Quintessa scanned the list quickly. “I know two women who are great at sales and love talking on the phone. I think we can crank out these calls before the end of the week.”
“That would be wonderful,” Elena said, tucking a wayward strand of her windblown hair behind her ear. “I have a meeting with the pastors from Holy Trinity, Good Shepherd and Riverview Chapel in a couple of days. They might feel a little more reassured that the festival’s going to go off without a hitch once I tell them you’re handling the donations.”
Suddenly, Albert Varner’s shouting once again reverberated through the wall. “I’m out of here. Find someone else to do your dirty work.”
Elena tensed, her breath catching in her throat, as the door slammed in Varner’s office.
Quintessa turned her head away from Elena, picked up a stack of papers, like she had something important to get to, but Elena had seen the tears beading up in her eyes. No doubt about it, Quintessa knew exactly what was going on and hated every minute of it.
Elena put a hand on her friend’s arm. “I can’t possibly ignore that, Quin. You might say it’s nothing, but something bad’s going on. If it has to do with the hospital’s finances, if there’s more talk about our closing down, of my losing a job I love, I need to know.”
Elena placed her file folder on Quintessa’s desk and headed for the door.
“Don’t go out there, Elena,” Quintessa called after her. “There might be heads rolling.”
“Then they might be in need of a good nurse.”
Unfortunately, all Elena saw when she threw open Quintessa’s office door and stepped into the hallway was Albert Varner’s back as he disappeared into the hospital’s main reception area; when she turned to see if anyone was going after him, she saw the tear-stained face of Mr. Varner’s executive assistant, Penny Risser. She was known as the Dragon Lady, the CEO’s faithful, fearless and brusque guardian. Tears were something one never saw on Penny’s face, confirming that something dreadful had happened.
“Is there anything I can do?” Elena asked.
Penny’s slender shoulders drew back. Her long neck stiffened, and Elena was sure that if Penny could breathe fire, she’d do so right this very minute.