The pediatric floor had its perks, in that the patients were unbelievably sweet most of the time. Plus, it was a lot easier to lift them from their beds when they needed moving. She’d been assigned to every floor in the hospital, and physically this was the cushiest job.
The door to Room 305 stood open.
“Hey, there. How’s my bestie?” Brooke entered the sunny yellow-painted room with her best smile, knowing that the color of the walls could only do so much to ease Presley’s situation. “You got any new cards for me?” Pokémon cards had made a resurgence.
Eleven-year-old Presley hoisted himself up on his elbows, scooting a little higher in the bed. “Hey, girlfriend. Where’s my kiss?” His voice wasn’t strong.
“We’re taking things slow, remember?”
“It’s been too long since you’ve been kissed, Nurse Brooke. You should be kissed, and often, and by someone who knows how.”
Nice Clark Gable impression. “You’ve been watching too much AMC movie channel.”
“There’s nothing else to do here.”
“You want me to bring you some Legos? Or I could fire up our Minecraft account. You haven’t been keeping the Creeper out of your Redstone mine. Bad move.”
He flopped back on his pillows. “I’m sick of Minecraft.” By this, Brooke knew the eleven-year-old was having one of his bad days. When she couldn’t tempt him with video games, she knew something was off. She looked at his chart. Yeah, it wasn’t looking good. Why did kids have to get sick? It seemed so unfair when most of the other patients in Maddox General had at least lived some. With Presley, he’d gotten sick five years ago and had spent over half his life in and out of hospitals. Raw deal.
“You want some juice?”
He curled up, looking smaller than usual. She noted circles under his eyes that were darker than had been there last time she was on this floor. Brooke knew the signs, had seen them before.
“How about a story?” That always seemed to get them, and Presley was no different. He brightened visibly. She tousled his hair and they did a round of rock-paper-scissors, which Presley won.
“Good! I get to choose the story.”
“Winners choose, but losers get to be in charge of the needle.”
“Last time the winner got to give the shots. Bait and switch.” Presley flopped back on his bed and exposed his arm for Brooke to draw the blood. It wasn’t actually administering a shot, but that was what Presley called it. They had to check his white blood cell count often enough that Brooke let him call it whatever he wanted. “Whatever. I want a good story.”
“I have a monster story and a baseball story today.” There were about twenty stories in her arsenal, but that was all she needed because most of the time a kid who stayed long enough in a hospital to hear all of them didn’t mind a repeat or two. She watched the vial fill and wondered how the lab results would turn out.
“What kind of monster?” Presley stared at the ceiling.
“Wolfman.”
“Baseball story.”
“Good choice.” Brooke liked this kid. It was impossible not to, the way he kept his sense of humor even on dark days like today.
Presley reminded her of a couple of other kids she’d been assigned to a while back, especially one special kid, Oscar Rutledge, also about eleven at the time. Oscar always chose the baseball story. She’d told it to him about ten times before the Rutledge family finally decided it was better to care for him at home in his last days.
She’d never forget Oscar. Good kid.
Brooke handed Presley a carton of apple juice and a straw from her pocket and then sat down in a chair across from him. Kids would rather have her at their level when they heard a story than have her standing beside them, so even though she wasn’t technically supposed to sit down on the job, the moment required it.
“Have you ever heard of the Bambino?”
“Babe Ruth? Everybody’s heard of the Babe.”
“Good. I’m glad to hear it. I knew you’d be a kid who would appreciate this story.” Then Brooke settled in and recounted the historic day when…
Babe Ruth, in the fifth inning of the third game of the 1932 series against the dreaded Chicago Cubs, got sick and tired of the Cubbies fans talking smack. He sauntered up to home plate, sent a menacing glare at Charlie Root on the pitcher’s mound. Charlie said a few choice words, which the Babe did not appreciate. The Bambino aimed his mighty bat at the grandstands over center field, as if to say, “There! That’s where this ball is a-going, boys.” Charlie Root hurled the ball through the strike zone. The Babe’s bat connected with the ball with a CRACK! The ball arced past the flagpole and out of the ballpark— exactly where Babe Ruth had told Charlie Root and the heckling dugout rats and the whole world it was going to fly. Yankees fans went wild as the Great Bambino rounded the bases. The Yankees took the game— and the series.
“He did it. The Great Bambino called his shot.” She ended the story with as much dramatic flair as she could muster, which may be what had made this her patients’ favorite story of all time, and one she told kids at least once a week.
Presley closed his eyes, his head against his pillow. “I like the Red Sox, though.”
Brooke boxed his feet. “A Red Sox fan, huh? I guess we can still be friends.”
“Even if I hate Babe Ruth, that’s my favorite story from you, Nurse Brooke.” Presley looked more relaxed than earlier, and his juice was all gone. “You’re my favorite nurse. Am I really your boyfriend?” According to his chart, his meds were up to date, and she pulled the covers up around him. The room was a little cool.
“Let’s just say I haven’t got any boyfriend more serious than you.”
If protocol had allowed it, she would have leaned over and planted a kiss on Presley’s hairline before leaving him to sleep. Good kid.
Her shift ended, and she went home to Aunt Ruth’s— to start her real work.
__________
“You have the final designs drawn up for the marquee?” Brooke called as she let her purse and keys slide onto the table at the back of what would soon be Left Field: Maddox Baseball Museum, assuming the final funding fell into place. Assuming Trae Earnshaw could be convinced Grandpa Thunder’s collection was worth the investment.
“They’re right here, my little chickadee. Tell me what you think.” Aunt Ruth handed them over, and Brooke checked them out.
“I like the blue pinstripes. Very Yankees.” The back of the museum also served as Aunt Ruth’s apartment, and Brooke took the upstairs level, which sadly had no air conditioning and faulty plumbing.
“Naturally.” Aunt Ruth sat back down at her project table, with the perpetual bowl of salted peanuts in the middle to shell. “I’m nothing if not loyal.”
Brooke grabbed a frozen dinner from the fridge. There wasn’t time to cook anything real. At least this one had vegetables. Trying to launch Left Field ate up all Brooke’s free time, all her spare emotional reservoirs, not to mention the entire chunk of life insurance money she’d received last summer, money that had come too late to use for tuition, so school had had to wait.
Too bad it hadn’t been enough to foot the whole bill of their joint dream, but opening a museum took a lot more capital than she or Aunt Ruth initially dreamed.
It wasn’t like either one of them was J.B. Rivershire, billionaire electricity magnate. Instead, they’d have to depend on a guy like Trae Earnshaw, whose pockets were deep but whose heart was hard.
It was weird, being so close to achieving the big goal they’d been bantering about ever since Brooke came to live with her. Almost within reach.
Come on, Trae Earnshaw. Come through with the funding. Aunt Ruth needed this.
“Should we put Grandpa’s name on it?” Brooke asked. “It is his collection.”
They’d gone over this. But Aunt Ruth insisted Grandpa Thunder would never want it. Sure, it was his collection, but he’d want it to stand for something more, something purely baseball.
“
Having the park named for him was bad enough, he would say.”
Fine. This was about Aunt Ruth, anyway.
“Check out the mail, sis.” She waved a handful of envelopes at Brooke. They all looked official and stressful, as usual.
Brooke brought her black plastic dinner tray over and set it down, peeling back the film and watching the steam curl out before she grabbed the stack of mail.
“Who’s Fawn Zimmerman?” Brooke tore at the cream linen envelope.
“Sounds like one of those beauty pageant names.” Aunt Ruth scowled. She hadn’t liked the Miss Chesapeake thing. Or the Miss Virginia thing. But there’d been no other way to foot the bill for nursing school. Too girly, she’d said. “I’ll just bet they want you to contribute to the pageant scholarship before you’ve even finished school yourself.”
“I’ve got my LPN.”
“Yeah, but your RN—”
“Will happen after Left Field is up and running. Which is going to be soon. I have a meeting with Trae Earnshaw next week.” The Earnshaw meeting was the biggest news of the day.
Until now. Brooke’s voice trailed off as she scanned the contents of the letter.
What in the— ? Brooke’s eyes watered, and she had to blink.
“What’s that say?” Aunt Ruth came and leaned over Brooke’s shoulder. “Whoa.”
Whoa was exactly right.
Ms. Brooke Chadwick.
Your presence is requested at the reading of the last will and testament of Harvey Jarman.
A time and location in Naughton was listed.
It is recommended that named heirs bring their own legal counsel. Please arrive promptly. Heirs must be present to take possession of bequests. Unclaimed bequests will be donated to charity.
“Harvey Jarman.” Aunt Ruth plopped back down in her chair and grabbed a pile of peanuts from the bowl to shell. “Who in tarnation is Harvey Jarman?”
“No idea.” Brooke was already tapping his name into her phone. “It’s not a family name that I know of.”
“What about a patient?”
“Why would a patient leave me something in a will? Besides, that’s a memorable name. I never had a patient called Harvey.”
“Or boyfriend.”
Ugh. Not the boyfriend nudge again. Aunt Ruth should know by now— “Looks like he was from Naughton. Not much of an online presence. Just an obituary.” Brooke scanned it. “Yankees fan.”
“I would have liked him.” Aunt Ruth tossed a handful of peanut shells into the trash. Good, because sometimes she sucked the salt off them. “What kind of stuff is in his will? Is there Yankees stuff? That’d be great for Left Field.”
No kidding. Brooke let forth a little sigh as she got up to toss out her half-eaten dinner. “Probably just some kitsch. Or fifty dollars or whatever.” She downplayed it just to keep her own balloon of hope from floating into the stratosphere. Named in a stranger’s will? Weird. Right now, Brooke suspected Trae Earnshaw’s hesitations— not that he’d been explicit about them— were probably because Left Field’s collection wasn’t quite stellar enough.
One big ticket item, and they’d be set.
“What’s kitsch, a German dessert?” Aunt Ruth got suspicious of all things foreign, apparently words with foreign roots, even.
“Like knickknacks. Porcelain Hummel figurines, Norman Rockwell collector plates, that kind of thing.”
“Oh, good. Because I doubt you’d want German dessert that’s been hanging around a dead guy’s house until a will-reading. Unless it’s fruitcake …” She babbled on a bit, and then she asked a scary question. “Who’s going to be your lawyer?”
“My lawyer?”
“It says to bring counsel.”
What would a small-town nurse need a usual lawyer for? Brooke didn’t have one, at least not one she’d trust.
Bring Dane, something inside her whispered. You trust him. But she swept that temptation out of her mind. The last thing she needed was to reignite a flame that shouldn’t have been kindled in the first place, and she knew herself well enough to know in Dane’s case, she was not asbestos.
No. She’d go without a lawyer, if she went at all.
__________
“You’re staying late again tonight, Mr. Rockwell?” Vonda asked. She pressed her glasses back up on her nose. They slipped this time of day. Er, night. “Because you could just blow it off and go out with my niece. She won’t care that you have a police record, so long as you also have your bar card.”
Her niece liked lawyers. The Lawyer Hunter, everyone in the office secretly called her. But Dane wasn’t interested in being prey. Eventually Brooke would break radio silence, and when she did…if she did…
“Too much work to do on Ballard v. Insura-Care. Those class-action suits aren’t going to sue themselves.” He sounded stupid, possibly because he’d already been here for fourteen hours. “You go on, though. Have a nice Friday night.”
The stack of files on his desk mocked him, with the to-be-read side at least five times as tall as the already-read side. He might as well stay clocked in here at Tweed Law for the duration. Was there enough caffeine for him to slide through until Monday quitting time? Because that’s what this caseload looked like.
“I’m serious, Mr. Rockwell. You may look young and handsome and invincible, and you might be raking in the fees for Mr. Tweed, but I’ve seen burnout. I know the signs.” Vonda picked up her jacket. This spring wasn’t nearly as warm as last year’s. “What I’m saying is be gentle with yourself. Get an outside interest. It’ll prolong your lifespan here.”
She tugged a protein bar from her purse and left it on his desk as she shuffled out.
Chuh. An outside interest. Check how well that worked out for him a year ago, speaking of springtime weather.
An hour later and only three files down the stack, Dane’s phone calendar alarm sounded. Saturday, First Pitch, noon. Maddox Little League coach/team selection. Contact info even followed.
How did that even get on his phone? He didn’t remember adding it. Maybe it was left from last year as a repeating event.
Not that he had any interest in repeating events of last year. Except, naturally, the serious kiss with Brooke Chadwick in that church. He’d like a repeat of that every single day, and twice on Sunday.
If she’d ever lift her ban on him. Not that it was necessarily stopping him— he’d been under stifling pressure at work ever since starting at Tweed Law— but out of respect, he’d been keeping his distance. Maybe she hadn’t even noticed, except when he’d skipped Quirt’s wedding. Of course, he’d had an excuse for that— it had fallen smack dab in the middle of a huge insurance trial. Winning that case hadn’t felt like much of a victory compared to sacrificing the chance to see Brooke.
Saturday, First Pitch, Noon. It sounded a second time. Big Brother had infiltrated his life via his phone.
He tugged at the next manila folder, Discovery: Insurance Clauses. It was far too late at night for insurance clauses. His head pounded. The little flame in him that usually burned in a bright pattern of “fees for the bosses” and “make partner by next year” flickered and dimmed.
Maybe Vonda was right. Maybe he did need to get some balance back into his life.
Exercise didn’t count. He was already doing that, and it wasn’t enough. Maybe he could wedge church into his life again. That’d be a start. But he didn’t know any good churches around here. Besides, in a way that was doing more stuff for himself. Spiritual health, all that.
He asked himself his fallback question: What would Matthew Chadwick do?
Duh, Matthew Chadwick would find some poor, potentially delinquent kid on his little league team and keep him from falling into the error of his parents’ ways, that’s what.
Yeah, Dane wasn’t exactly in a position to mentor. He barely had his own legs under him. How could he steady some kid? And hello, he didn’t even know any kids. Kids didn’t sue their insurance companies and come to talk to lawyers.
; My, how small his sphere had shrunk.
Yeah, Dane couldn’t imagine Matthew Chadwick would’ve approved of that, either.
He dissected sixteen pages of clauses, and then his phone chimed midnight.
He checked it: Today’s tasks. First Pitch, noon. Maddox Little League coach/team selection. Criminy. He’d shut that off…
But as he lifted his phone to delete it, a voice in his head whispered, Matthew Chadwick would coach little league.
Just like his daughter is doing.
Brooke. Brooke coached.
The idea sat in his head, like a seed, a popcorn kernel.
Two file folders later, the kernel popped.
He checked the contact information and sent a message.
Happy to be an assistant coach if you still need one.
“Especially if you need one for Brooke Chadwick’s team,” he muttered but didn’t type into the message. Sure, she hadn’t officially given him notice that he could come around again— hadn’t told him otherwise, so it was risky. But this was community service. Running into Brooke wasn’t guaranteed— but if it happened organically, what could she say?
The answer shot back almost immediately, and he could smell the panic coming off the coach assignment organizer’s midnight message:
Thank you! We just had three coaches quit tonight, for sudden employment relocation. Your message was a godsend. You’ll have your own team. Come at three, please.
His own team. So…
Practice every afternoon.
Games every Saturday.
Commuting to Maddox from Naughton. Not that far. Fifteen minutes on a good day. More on a bad.
Late nights in Tweed Law to make up for lost time, but yeah. Talk about a sudden dose of balance.
And a possible dose of Brooke Chadwick.
Chapter Seven
Official Notice
Brooke took a bite of Saturday lunch and let the family conversation swirl around her.
Quirt’s wife Olivia brought out some fresh lemonade. Brooke recognized this whole meal for exactly what it was: a distraction for Brooke from First Pitch and all its associated memories. Fresh lemonade, roast beef, cooked carrots, onion gravy— all Brooke’s favorites. She’d put good money on a coconut cream pie being chilled in Mom’s old refrigerator.
Wills & Trust (Legally in Love Collection Book 3) Page 6