by Janice Lynn
Chelsea stared at their entwined hands, loving the warmth and comfort of Jared’s touch, wondering if he realized he was holding her hand, wondering what his touch meant.
“The stress of surgery is so hard on a body, though,” she said. “She could easily miscarry.”
“It’s possible.”
“How far along do you think she is?”
“From the ultrasound I’d guess eleven or twelve weeks.”
“She’s not far enough along for a baby to survive if the surgery puts her into labor.”
“No, but we’ll think positive.”
“Who do you think the father is?”
“That’s none of my business.”
“I think it’s Will.”
He gave her a pointed look. “Neither is it any of your business.”
“You’re right, of course, but—”
“But nothing. Leslie’s business is Leslie’s business. Don’t harass her on who the father is.”
“I wouldn’t.”
He sighed. “I know. Sorry. It’s been a long day.”
Although afraid to remind him they were holding hands, she brushed her thumb over the back of his hand. “I’m glad you were there when Leslie passed out. I’d hate to have had to deal with that alone.”
“You’d have been fine.”
“It’s different when the person you’re taking care of is someone you care about.”
He nodded, glancing up when her brother stepped into the waiting area.
Their hands parted. Chelsea smoothed her slacks while Jared tucked his hand beneath his thigh. If Will noticed, he didn’t comment. Actually, she doubted he had.
“She’s already in surgery?” he asked, his gaze going to the closed doors. He looked tired, stressed. His dark hair was ruffled and his expression grim.
“Yes, just a few minutes ago.” Although reluctant to leave her spot next to Jared on the sofa, Chelsea went to her brother and touched his shoulder. “Jared and I followed the ambulance. I called you the moment we arrived.”
“I was at the nursing home, making rounds. I came as soon as I got your message.”
“Jared called ahead and had the operating room ready. Dr Marks was waiting. Everything happened pretty fast.”
“You’re sure it’s her appendix?” Will’s eyes went back and forth between them.
Jared nodded.
“I heard…” Will’s voice trailed off, and he met Chelsea’s gaze. If there had been any doubt in her mind about Leslie and her brother’s relationship, about who was Leslie’s baby’s father, the way her brother’s face paled to a ghostly white would have convinced her. “She’s really pregnant, isn’t she?”
“Yes. Jared did an ultrasound in the office.”
Jared cleared his throat from behind her, but Chelsea wasn’t going to keep secrets from her brother. With Leslie so well loved within the medical community, word of her urgent condition, complicated by a pregnancy, would spread like wildfire. Actually, it sounded as though the rumor mill had already spread word throughout the hospital as her brother knew.
“What did you hear?” she asked.
“Just what your message said. Leslie was brought in with appendicitis and was being rushed to surgery. But I bumped into one of the paramedics on my way in and he mentioned Leslie was pregnant.”
A big no-no as the man had had no right to deprive Leslie of her confidentiality, but Chelsea nodded. “She is.”
“What did Dr Marks say?”
“He didn’t. Unlike a paramedic who needs to be reprimanded, Dr Marks couldn’t discuss Leslie’s personal health with us. We’re not family,” Jared reminded pointedly. “We’ve called her sister, but she lives an hour away and hasn’t arrived yet.”
“Dr Marks wouldn’t tell you anything? What the…?” Will pulled free of Chelsea’s hand, heading toward the operating room.
“Will,” she warned her brother, worried at the determined look on his face. “You can’t go back there. We’re only allowed to wait outside the OR as a professional courtesy.”
“I’m going to find out what’s going on.”
“No.” Having jumped up from where he’d been sitting, Jared grabbed Will’s arm, stopping him just as he reached for the door. “I’m sure you’re worried about Leslie, but you can’t do any good by breaking Dr Marks’s concentration.”
Will glared at Jared, looking as if he wanted to slug him.
“Think about what you’re doing, Will. She’s in surgery. What’s going to happen if you go barging in there?”
“Will,” Chelsea said, afraid the two men she most cared about were going to come to blows.
Will visibly shook, his head slumping forward. “You’re right. She probably doesn’t want to see me right now anyway.”
“She’s under anesthesia. She won’t know you’re there even if you do go busting in. Let Dr Marks do his job.”
Chelsea frowned at Jared’s blunt tone. “I’m sure if Leslie was awake she’d want to see you.”
Will didn’t comment. Chelsea stayed at his side, talking with him, to pass the time while they waited. Jared had returned to the sofa and flipped through a magazine, but from the noisy, rapidly turned pages he couldn’t concentrate any more than she could.
Leslie was pregnant.
By her brother.
She was going to be an aunt. Her parents were going to be grandparents. Wow.
Chelsea hesitated before getting out of Jared’s car. She’d ridden to the hospital with him, and although she’d wanted to stay with Will, her brother had insisted she go home. Jared had reminded her that Will and Leslie needed time alone.
However, Chelsea didn’t want to be alone right now and she lingered in the parking lot.
Too much weighed on her mind. Leslie and the baby had come through surgery OK. So far there was no evidence of hemorrhaging to hint at a pending miscarriage. But the fear was still there. Not only that but her brother and Leslie did have a lot to work through.
Thank goodness Jared had been with her this evening. She’d enjoyed the closeness they’d shared tonight and if she was honest with herself, she would admit that being near Jared was probably the real cause of her hesitation to leave.
“I’ll follow you home.”
Nodding, she got into her car, but her restlessness wasn’t any better by the time she got to Will’s beach house.
Jared got out of his car, but rather than head toward the house he leaned against the door.
“Goodnight, Chelsea. Try to get some rest.”
She shot him a pleading look. “You could come in for a while, or we could go for a walk on the beach.”
He ran his hand over his face. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”
“But we’re friends, right?” She put him on the spot, knew she was putting him on the spot, and didn’t care. She didn’t want to be alone.
She wanted him.
“I’m trying, Chelsea.”
“Trying to be my friend?”
He hesitated, then surprised her with his blunt honesty. “Trying to just be your friend and not want more. Lots more.”
Telling him she wanted him to be more played on the tip of her tongue. The only thing staying her was the all-too-real fear of him going back to avoiding her. She couldn’t bear losing his friendship if she slipped up.
“What do you want?” she asked, fighting the longing to beg him not to leave her alone, that she’d been alone too long, and tonight she just wanted someone to hold her close.
“To go home, get some sleep, and hope tomorrow is a better day.”
Jared went home, but the next day wasn’t a better one. Neither was the following Monday. The office staff juggled the appointment schedule to cover for Leslie’s absence, and everyone’s workload was heavy.
He’d worked through lunch and so far his afternoon had consisted of three depression patients, a diabetic who was recovering from a recent toe amputation due to gangrene, a hemorroidectomy, numerous upper respiratory p
atients, and the heart-failure patient he’d just finished examining.
“Dr Jared, there’s a call for you on line four.” Kayla poked her head into Jared’s office. “It’s Dr Goodall’s nurse about Connie Black.”
Jared finished entering the information on the heart-failure patient and hit the save key. “Got it. Thanks, Kayla.”
He picked up the receiver. “Dr Floyd here.”
“Hold while I get the doctor, please,” the nurse immediately responded.
Jared pulled up Connie’s file. She was due to start her chemotherapy this morning. Had something gone wrong?
“Jared?” Dr Goodall’s voice came over the line. “I’ve got bad news.”
Connie hadn’t wanted to go through chemotherapy again. Had she changed her mind about proceeding with treatment? He’d call her, convince her to go, drive her to the appointment himself if that’s what he had to do to get her there.
“Connie started her chemotherapy this morning and did fine.”
Relief washed over him.
“But Connie’s neighbor just called. Apparently after they got home Connie suffered a severe reaction to the medication. I’ve called for an ambulance and am heading to the hospital to meet them, but I knew you’d want to know.”
Tension gripped the muscles in Jared’s neck, clawing into his very being. He pulled his car out of the designated doctors’ parking lot and onto the highway to head home.
What a hellish day.
Mere moments after the ambulance, he’d arrived at the house Connie had shared for forty years with her husband. They’d all been too late. The paramedics hadn’t even attempted resuscitation. Not that a dozen attempts would have mattered.
Connie’s face had already turned blue and with such a rapid onset of discoloration Jared suspected she’d had a clot that had gone to her brain, cutting off vital blood flow.
He rubbed his fingers over his face, trying to ease the gritty feel of his raw eyes. When he pulled back, moisture dampened his skin.
Oh, hell.
No. He wouldn’t. Hadn’t ever. Not even when his life had fallen apart after Laura had died.
He wouldn’t start now. Not today. Sure, he had guilt, but didn’t he always?
A horn honked and he realized the light had changed, but he hadn’t moved. He let off the brake, hit the accelerator. Just a few more minutes and he’d be home.
Fatigue swept over him. He’d go to the house he’d bought the year after arriving in Madison to signify the permanence of his life there, take a hot shower, and go to bed. Tomorrow, when he’d rested, he’d sort through his reaction to Connie’s death, sort through his guilt.
Yet another woman he’d cared about that he’d let down.
Only when he pulled into a driveway, it wasn’t the long, winding one to the refurbished house where he lived.
The drive belonged to Will Majors’s beach house.
Will, who planned to stay the night at Leslie’s place to take care of anything she might need. Will, who’d waited for him while he’d told Rose the news about her mother. Will, who’d stood by him through all the stuff with Laura, encouraged him to come to Madison and buy into the practice. Will, who was his good friend and partner.
Will, who wasn’t at home.
But his little sister was.
So what the hell was he doing here?
And why couldn’t he bring himself to shift his car into reverse because all the reasons he hadn’t been willing to much more than leave his car last week still applied and then some?
Chelsea cradled the cordless phone between her shoulder and right ear while she pulled a deli pizza from the oven. She inhaled deeply and sighed with pleasure. Not the healthiest choice but, as far as taste went, she considered pizza to be manna from heaven.
“Hey, Will, how’s Leslie?” she asked, sliding the pan onto a heat pad.
Will called to check on her every night he worked in the emergency room and, although he wasn’t working tonight and was likely at Leslie’s house, he apparently still thought he should do so. Sometimes she wondered how he thought she’d managed while in college when they’d occasionally gone weeks without talking.
“She’s doing great and goes for her first OB appointment in the morning.”
“You’re still planning to go with her?”
“Yes.” She could hear the hesitation in his voice and became uneasy. Surely, he wasn’t having second thoughts about his role in Leslie’s and the baby’s lives? Although he hadn’t told her many details yet, he had admitted to having feelings for Leslie.
“Will, you’re sure Leslie’s OK?” Her friend had looked OK, better than OK really, when she’d visited her earlier in the day.
“Chels, Connie Black died today.”
All thoughts of her brother and Leslie came to a screeching halt. Connie Black. The sweet little lady with the striking eyes she’d met at the office. The lady who’d asked her point-blank if she loved Jared. The lady who’d told her she should go after what she wanted because life was too short to sit around, waiting for love to happen.
Even now the feisty woman’s words rang hauntingly in her ears.
“I’m sorry,” she said. She’d wondered why Jared had hightailed it out of the office so quickly. Kayla had said he’d gotten a call just as he’d finished his last appointment, and he’d taken off. The call must have been about Connie. “She was to start her chemotherapy today.”
“She had a reaction to her chemotherapy, threw a clot, and died instantly.”
Chelsea cringed at the thoughts that must have been in Jared’s head when he’d gotten the call, at the overwhelming frustration and loss he must feel at Connie’s death.
“I met her once, in the office,” she mused. “She seemed like a wonderful lady.”
“She was.”
Chelsea went to close the oven door.
“Look, Chels…” Stress deepened Will’s voice. “Jared’s taking her death pretty hard. I’m worried about him.”
“Ouch.” Chelsea jerked her hand away from the hot metal, dropping the phone in the process. Sucking on the burned finger, she picked up the phone before her brother had the rescue department on the way.
“Chels? What happened?”
“No biggie.” She situated the phone back between her shoulder and ear. “I made pizza and burned my finger on the oven door.”
Walking to the sink, she turned on the tap and let cold water cool the skin, inspecting the pink area. She saw only a surface burn but unfortunately that didn’t ease the pain.
“You OK?”
“I’m fine.” The cool water helped. “Now, why did you call to tell me about one of Jared’s patients?”
“Like I said, I’m worried about him.” He hesitated. “I’ve never seen him so upset over a patient. He feels responsible for Connie’s death and, just like with Laura’s accident, he’s blaming himself.” Another hesitation. Very unlike her brother. “I thought you might go to his place and check on him.”
Chelsea’s heart squeezed. “You’re kidding?”
“Why?”
“Because you’ve done everything you can to keep me away from Jared since I got here. I can’t believe you’d intentionally have me go anywhere near him.”
“Have I?” He considered her accusation as if the thought had never occurred to him, which she knew it had. The fink. “If I’d wanted to keep you away from him, I’d never have agreed to you coming to work at the clinic.”
“Huh?”
Will gave a big sigh. “I know something happened between you two that spring break.”
“I had a crush on him, that’s all.”
“He was so wrapped up in Laura during that time, but you got to him. Still do.”
Will was asking her to go and check on Jared, telling her Jared was interested in her.
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because I care about you both and any fool can see he still gets to you, too.”
Chelsea had no more
than hung up the phone when a knock sounded at her door. Not a very loud one and she could almost convince herself she’d imagined the noise.
Except she knew she hadn’t.
“Who’s there?” she asked, before releasing the safety chain. Although she was afraid to get her hopes up, she had a pretty good idea of who stood on the other side.
“Jared.”
Her heart beat a rapid tattoo in her chest, making breathing difficult. Jared had come to her. Of his own free will. Maybe her brother was right. Maybe she did get to Jared. With shaky fingers she released the catch and opened the door.
Any joy she felt that he’d come to her faded the moment she saw him. He looked awful.
She stepped back, allowing him entrance, wanting to convey her sorrow at his loss, to let him know she understood and was there for him.
Only he stood on the stoop, staring at her with hollow eyes. “I’m not sure why I’m here.”
“Jared.” She sought the right words and didn’t find them. “Come in.”
Which couldn’t have been the wrong words because with only a moment of hesitation he came inside.
“Sit down,” she suggested, feeling self-conscious about the gym shorts and T-shirt she’d changed into after arriving home.
His gaze touched on the sofa but he didn’t move, just stood a few feet from her with his hands shoved in his pants’ pockets. He looked like a lost little boy.
She couldn’t stand the ache in his eyes, the aloneness that permeated him. Whatever his reasons, he’d come to her. She cared too much to ever turn him away, not when he needed her. Whether he acknowledged that need or not.
She reached out, touched his hand, and gave it a gentle squeeze. “Will called me.”
His face tight, he nodded, surprising her by not withdrawing his hand. Still, she wouldn’t get her hopes up that him coming there meant anything other than his sense of loss at Connie’s death and him wanting to be with a friend. Will was at Leslie’s so maybe that was the only reason he’d turned to her instead of her brother.
“I can’t believe she’s gone.” Jared’s gaze dropped to their hands, and his eyes glistened. “I shouldn’t have insisted she have the chemotherapy. She didn’t want to. What right did I have to tell her she had to fight?”