He suddenly jerked up the window and leaned out, shouting, "All right, Jeff! Cut it out! The raisins are for your snowman's eyes, not Mark's ears!"
Downstairs in the pine-scented living room, Mrs. Mallory was sipping a cup of coffee, listening with half an ear to her daughter's chatter.
"He is different, Mama, surely you've noticed! Why last night, Papa even beat him in chess, and you know that's unheard of!" She paused a moment, then drew a surprised breath. "My God," she said, smiling widely, "I bet it's a woman. My dear brother is in love!"
Mrs. Mallory regarded her garrulous daughter above the rim of her coffee cup. Lindy was a dear, but such a gossip. "My dear," she said at last, her voice as calm as a placid lake, "Elliot's divorce was over seven years ago. He's had ample time to find himself another wife. He hasn't shown the least bit of interest."
"Then how do you explain his..." Lindy hesitated a moment, searching for the right word. "His lapses? Oh, he says all the right things, and puts up with the children's pranks like he always does, but his mind wanders. And he has a new watch," she added, as if clinching the matter. "When I commented on it and asked if I could see it, Elliot looked uncomfortable."
"And refused? How odd, I asked him, too."
"Speak of the devil!" Lindy said brightly as Elliot walked into the room.
"Mother looks thoughtful," he said, cocking a black eyebrow at his sister. "So I presume you've been telling tales again, Lindy."
"About you, brother!"
"Would you like some coffee, Elliot?"
"No, Mother, not just now. I thought I'd go out and save Mark from Jeff's sense of humor."
"Would you like to leave me your watch, Elliot?" Lindy asked. "You don't want to damage it in the snow."
"Lindy," he said, "sometimes I wish you were five years old again and I could toss you in the garbage can."
At least, Elliot thought later, dutifully admiring the snowman with his nephews, Lindy was easy to sidetrack. He had left her recounting several occasions in their childhood when he had mistreated her.
He didn't see George until the second week in January. After her England assignment, she had stopped in Michigan to visit with her parents. "You're lonely as hell, you stupid bastard," he finally admitted to himself, and felt immediately better.
But only until he realized it would be time to speak to her when she returned to San Francisco. He would insist that she start going out with other men, men her own age. How long would it take then? A month? Two? Theoretically he accepted it, but his guts churned at the thought of another man even kissing her. Then she came home, and all thought of it fled from his mind.
Elliot didn't know what woke him. One minute he was dreaming about racing a red Lamborghini in Italy, and the next he was sitting up in bed, fully awake. George wasn't beside him. He looked blankly at the clock: 3:00 a.m. He pushed off the covers and walked to the bathroom. She wasn't there. He switched on the bedroom light, looking for his robe. It wasn't there, either.
"George?" he called. There was only silence.
He felt a frisson of alarm run through him. He trotted downstairs, turning on lights as he went.
He stilled a moment in the dining room. Was that a moan he had heard? He quickly walked into the kitchen and turned on the light. At first all he saw was the glare from the appliances. His breath caught in his throat when he saw George. She was lying on the floor, pressed against the refrigerator, her body curled in the fetal position. Her hair tangled and loose, hiding her face.
"George?"
She raised her face, white and tearstained. Suddenly, her features twisted in pain and she drew her legs up against her chest, twisting away from him, pressing close to the refrigerator.
"What is it, George?" He dropped to his knees beside her and tried to gather her in his arms. He could feel her pain rippling through her, communicating itself to him. "For God's sake, what's wrong?" He pulled his robe aside, his first thought that she had appendicitis. She was wearing only a pair of panties, and he slipped his hand beneath them to feel her belly. She sat up in pain, panting, trying to push him away.
"Where is the pain?" He caught her face between his hands. "Where do you hurt?'
George couldn't speak for a moment, with the pain jabbing at her. She was trying not to scream. "It won't go away,'' she gasped. "It's always gone away before. It's worse this time."
He forced himself to calm. "Where, George?" He slipped his hand back to her belly and gently probed. "Here?"
"No, over there. Always there."
He eased her back on the kitchen floor and drew down her panties. "Show me," he instructed her in his professional voice.
Her fingers, as if frightened to touch her own body, hovered a moment, then flitted down. He probed lightly, and abruptly let go. Probably ovarian, he thought rapidly. "This has happened before? When?"
"The last two months," she panted, trying to pull her legs up to ease the pain. "It wasn't so bad, and it went away within hours."
"The same time of the month? Close to your period?"
George felt dulled with pain. Questions! Why was he asking her questions when all she wanted to do was die! "Yes."
He thought rapidly. She had finished her period only yesterday. He quickly pulled her panties back up and jerked his robe tightly around her.
"Don't move," he said. "I'll be back in just a minute and we'll go to the hospital."
Five minutes later, Elliot was galloping back into the kitchen, dressed in blue jeans and a pullover. He had never been so afraid in his life. He drew his robe about her and lifted her in his arms.
"It won't be long, sweetheart," he murmured to her as he carried her to the car.
There was no traffic, and he made it to the hospital in twelve minutes flat. He kept talking to her as he drove. "Just a few more minutes, sweetheart. Hang on. Just a few more minutes."
He screeched into the emergency parking lot. When he lifted her out of the car, she moaned, squirming against him to ease the pain. The night duty nurse looked at him and took in the situation quickly. She looked him in the eye, waiting.
"I'm Dr. Mallory. I need a nurse in an examining room quickly."
"Yes, doctor," she said, blinking.
The nurse met him at the entrance of one of the gy-necology rooms. "We'll start with an IV, normal saline through a sixteen-gauge angiocath, draw routine preop bloods and an HLG. Tell the radiology resident to bring down an ultrasound unit. Leave me your stethoscope." He paused a moment, and added, "And bring in ten milligrams of morphine sulfate."
He cradled George in his arms, unwilling as yet to lower her onto the table. "Just a few more minutes," he said. "Then there'll be no more pain, George." He knew he shouldn't give her anything, not until he was certain what was wrong with her, but he couldn't stand her pain anymore.
He had her in an examining robe and had taken her blood pressure when the nurse raced back into the small room. "Hold still just a second, George. You're going to feel a needle in your arm." He quickly swabbed her arm and plunged the large needle into a vein. She didn't even feel it, he thought.
He nodded to the nurse. "Send this blood off, please. I'll call you in a minute."
He uncovered George again and started to press down on her belly, but she moaned in pain. He pulled his hand away and gave her a large dose of morphine, enough to make her groggy. He cradled her in his arms and rocked her back and forth. "In just a little while, George, there'll be no more pain." He waited perhaps another minute, then said, "Try to take deeper breaths, George. Is the pain lessening?" He could feel her beginning to relax. He felt her nod against his chest. "Deep breaths. That's it." He wanted to ask her why the hell she hadn't awakened him. And this was the third month of the pain. He felt her head loll against his arm.
"Is the pain gone?"
"Yes. I know it's there, but it feels like it's at a distance somehow, and I feel so sleepy."
Her eyes closed and she murmured, "I'm sorry, Elliot. Such a bother for you. I
'm sorry."
"Don't be ridiculous," he gritted at her in a hoarse voice, but she seemed to be sleeping. He looked down at her peaceful face and smoothed the tangled hair behind her ears. He kissed her gently on her mouth, and called for the nurse. He wrote the emergency-room note himself and told the nurse that he didn't need an intern. While the radiology resident was setting up the ultrasound, he called David. It occurred to him only after the phone began ringing that Maggie was her gynecologist.
On the fourth ring, he heard Doris's sleepy voice. "Hello?"
"Doris, Elliot. I'm sorry to wake you, but I've got to speak to David. It's an emergency."
David sounded alert. "What the hell is the matter, Elliot?"
"It's George. Right lower quadrant pain, but I don't think it's appendicitis. This is the third month in a row she's had it, without telling me. I think it may be an endometrioma. I shouldn't have done it, but she was in such pain, I gave her some intravenous morphine." He finished telling David the tests he had ordered.
"I'll be there in thirty minutes," David said and hung up.
Elliot was looking at George's ultrasound films in the examining room when David hurried in.
Elliot quickly gave him a rundown of the test results and showed him the films. "You're probably right," David said, and walked to the washboard to scrub his hands. "I'll examine her and then we'll see. Relax, Elliot. She's going to be all right. You've done all the right things."
Elliot hadn't realized he was so tense, and he smiled tightly. "It scared the hell out of me."
"No wonder," David said.
They positioned her legs in the stirrups, and David quickly slipped on sterile gloves. He began his examination probing into her gently, while his other hand pressed her side.
"Well?" Elliot asked impatiently. He was standing beside the table, holding George's limp hand.
"For God's sake, Elliot, give me at least a minute!"
Suddenly both men froze. George was muttering something, her fingers weakly clutching Elliot's hand.
"Shh, sweetheart," Elliot said softly, stroking his hand over her face. "It's all right. Go back to sleep."
George felt light-headed, and so drowsy that she had to concentrate on keeping her eyes open. But it was important, she thought wildly, important to say it.
"Elliot," she whispered. "Please, it wasn't like that at all"
"I know, sweetheart," he said, soothing her.
"Please, you mustn't believe that I picked you to be the first just because of.. .unimportant things."
David looked sharply at Elliot, his eyes widening, but Elliot ignored him.
"I know," he said again, feeling like a dumb parrot.
"I started loving you when I served the volleyball in your stomach. I loved the way you laughed at yourself." She stared up at him, seeing him through a blurred veil. She felt his lips touch her forehead and tried to raise her face so he would kiss her. He did, very softly.
"It's all right, George," he said, lightly feathering her mouth with his lips. "I understand. Sleep now, sweetheart."
She smiled and drifted away.
* * *
George heard voices, blurred and faraway at first, then drawing closer. She blinked and slowly opened her eyes. For a moment, she had no idea where she was; then her memory cleared, and she drew in her breath, waiting for the pain. There was none. She saw Elliot and David Thornton standing at the foot of her bed, talking quietly.
"Hello," she said.
Elliot turned around quickly, the frown on his forehead instantly smoothing out.
"Hello yourself, George." He moved swiftly to her side and grasped her hand in his. "How do you feel?"
"You didn't lie to me. There is no more pain."
"There shouldn't be," David said, coming forward. "The dose Elliot gave you would make an elephant groggy." He saw that George was puzzled and quickly added, "I'll call Margaret, George. Elliot forgot she was your doctor in all the excitement."
"What's wrong with me?"
David heard the tremor in her voice. "Nothing that can't be fixed," he assured her. "Let me explain." He pulled a pen from his shirt pocket and picked up a piece of paper from her side table. "I'm much better with pictures. There's a cyst on your ovary, George." He sat beside her on the bed and proceeded to draw the female anatomy. "That's why you had the pain three months running at the same time. As the cyst got larger, the pain got worse. All we need to do is remove it, leaving your other ovary intact."
"David knows a surgeon in Los Angeles. We were just discussing when we could get him up here."
"It's not malignant or anything?" George said.
"No," Elliot said, squeezing her hand. "But the cyst could rupture, and that could be dangerous. It has to be removed well before your next period."
"It's not very major surgery, George," David said. "But delicate. That's why I want Norman Greenberg to do it. He's the best there is."
"Maggie can't do it, or you, David?"
"Norman is a perfect ten, George, in this kind of operation."
Elliot added with a grin, "Your body is far too valuable to entrust it to an imperfect nine. David and I decided to give Norman a couple more hours sleep before calling him. Likely he can be here tomorrow night and the operation on Monday morning."
George looked thoughtful. "You said, David, that the operation must be done before next month?''
"Yes."
"There's no particular rash, then?"
"George," Elliot said firmly, "let's get it done immediately. You scared the hell out of me last night. I doubt I'll sleep soundly until it's taken care of."
"I can't. I'm flying to Mexico City tomorrow, Elliot. Don't you remember?"
"To hell with Mexico City!"
George smiled. "There's something else you've forgotten," she said. "I'll be back next Friday afternoon. Then, Dr. Mallory, we're flying to Aspen for a week."
Elliot cursed softly.
"It's only two weeks, Elliot, and it is important." She saw that he would continue to argue and quickly turned to David. "How long will I be out of commission?"
"You'll be back on the volleyball court within three weeks. But you will have to rest for close to a week."
"This Norman Greenberg. Can you arrange for him to be here in two weeks, David?"
David shot a quick look at Elliot, and nodded. "When he hears who his patient is, he'd probably be here at a moment's notice."
"Can I go home now, David?"
David scratched the growth of new beard on his chin. "I'd rather you stay in the hospital today, but since you're with Elliot, I suppose it would be okay. Lord knows Elliot looks half dead. And it's already six a.m. and a Saturday. I'll call Maggie and let her know what's going on. Not to worry, all right?"
"Okay," George said. "Now, David, repeat that to Elliot!"
Chapter 10
George knew Elliot wasn't happy about her decision, but she saw no hope for it. It it were truly an emergency, she would have called Ben immediately and canceled the trip with the Braden-Tyrol people, but it wasn't. She sat up on the edge of the hospital bed, waiting for Elliot to finish her release papers, and yawned. It's like a bloody prison, she thought, and I'm on parole for two weeks.
"Hey, kid," Elliot said from the doorway in his best Humphrey Bogart voice, "you ready to split this dump?"
She turned quickly on the bed, and he saw a smile replace her somber expression. She looks like a teenager, he thought, with her legs dangling over the side of the bed, bare to the thighs, her hair tangled about her face.
"Yeah, big boy," she said in a ludicrous attempt at Mae West. "Ya got anything ya'd like me to wear?"
He walked around the end of the bed and came to a halt in front of her. "Only my bathrobe, George. And your panties."
"No peacock feathers?"
Teasing words formed in his mind, but he left them unspoken. He clasped her shoulders and drew her to him. "Jesus, George, you scared me."
"I scared myself," she murmu
red, pressing her cheek against his chest. "Thank you, Elliot."
She raised her face, and he leaned down to kiss her. "Let's go home, sweetheart."
"Okay."
"I bought you a pair of knee socks. I was saving them for a special occasion."
"Will a traumatic occasion do just as well?"
"Yes. They're lavender with pink panthers on them."
She burst into merry laughter. "Oh glory! And I thought you were tired!"
"I'd have to be dead to be that tired," he said. He unfastened the ties on the back of her gown and started to pull it off her. He looked up to see a nurse standing in the doorway. "Yes?" he said in a far different tone of voice.
"I came to help Miss Hathaway, doctor."
He felt George start to shake. "If you laugh," he growled softly, "I'll beat you, and no knee socks. Yes, nurse, thank you. I'll be back in a few minutes, George."
"At least it's early and few people are about," the nurse said as she helped George into Elliot's bathrobe. She looked down at George's bare feet. "Well, you're going out in a wheelchair, so it won't matter."
"And here I thought hospital floors were kept spanking clean."
"Rules," the nurse said, "You're the model, aren't you?" she asked casually.
"Yes," George said, tying the belt to the bathrobe more tightly. "If anyone saw me now, I'd likely be fired."
"Oh no," the nurse said seriously. "Have you known Dr. Mallory long?"
"Her father and I are good friends," came a bland voice from the doorway. "Thank you, nurse. George, let's go."
" Is it to be the wheelchair?''
"Yes. I'll be your beast of burden." He whisked her into his arms, and set her carefully in the wheelchair.
Aftershocks Page 10