“You’re beautiful,” he whispered then. “Did I ever tell you that?”
Then he bent down and kissed her on the forehead.
She smiled. “I wish I could see the lilacs blooming on your ranch. Just once.”
“I’ll bring you back in a couple of months and you can smell your fill of their fragrance.”
Cat closed her eyes. It wouldn’t hurt to take a little nap. Jake was here. He’d take care of anything that happened.
“Remember to come back in the morning,” she muttered.
“I’m not leaving,” he whispered as his fingers caressed her cheek again.
It was so nice to feel his hands on her face, she thought to herself.
“We need to get married,” Jake said.
Her whole body jumped.
“Keep breathing,” he said. “It doesn’t need to be scary. I just need to have some claim on Lara if— I mean, we both know the state well enough to know they won’t give custody of a little girl to a man who isn’t related to her.”
“Oh,” Cat said. Of course, he was right.
“Breathe,” Jake commanded and she did. Her heartbeat was settling down.
“I didn’t think of that. Maybe it could just be until—well, I mean, if I live, we wouldn’t need to stay that way.”
“You’re going to live,” he said, determination in his voice.
“Maybe you and she could do a paternity test instead,” she murmured and she could hear her voice fading. “Then you wouldn’t need to…”
Suddenly, she forgot what she meant to say. It was too much energy to speak anyway. She was so very tired and Jake was here. They’d talk tomorrow.
She turned her cheek toward him as his hand stroked her face and that was the last thing she did before sleep came.
Chapter Twelve
Jake woke with a start. A shaft of early-morning light was coming in through the gap in the curtains that hung high on the window. He’d fallen asleep with his head on Cat’s bed and he still sat on the metal folding chair next to it. A beeping was coming from somewhere and he saw a red light flashing.
He squinted. Between the faint light from outside and the red light from inside, he could barely make out Cat’s face. She looked pink. But when he reached out and touched her, she was cold. And she didn’t move.
Just as he realized something was wrong, the night nurse came rushing in, leaving the door open so light flooded in from the hall. Then he could see Cat’s skin wasn’t rosy at all. It was pale as white marble and had a blue hue to it.
“What’s going on?” he asked softly so he wouldn’t disturb Cat, but the nurse didn’t answer him.
Instead, she looked at the buttons on the machine next to the bed and pushed another one on the bed. Then there was a pulsing sound calling some kind of a code out in the hallway.
The woman looked at him as though she had just realized he was still there. “Move away from the bed.”
He stood up and stepped back, sliding the chair back with him so it was out of the way, as well.
The nurse was on the bed now, straddling Cat and pressing her hands against his friend’s chest to keep her heart beating. Seconds later another woman came in and then they were joined by the doctor Jake had seen last night walking around the emergency room.
“Clear the room of visitors,” the doctor commanded with a stern look at Jake. “Wait outside.”
“I can’t,” Jake whispered, but no one paid him any more attention. He gripped the rim of the chair without wondering why. He’d been holding it and he was paralyzed. Cat couldn’t die, could she?
He watched the medical team at work. Lord, he whispered without thinking, You can’t be that cruel. Not to me. Not to Lara. Please, not this.
He hadn’t wrestled with God like this since his mother was on trial. He had brought all his fury against Him to argue for his mother and he hadn’t been successful. He didn’t have that kind of rage in him now. Losing Cat would break him until there would be no room for anger. There would just be nothing. How did a man stand against something like this? Cat’s body was shutting down and he couldn’t make the blood flow for her. He was helpless.
Finally, the pounding and the rushing stopped. It was quiet finally. The lights on the monitors flickered, but there were no alarms going off.
The doctor stepped back. “Give her some room now.”
The nurses moved away from the bed, one of them stopping to smooth the sheet over Cat before she did.
“Is she okay?” Jake asked softly. His throat felt hoarse, as though he’d been holding his breath.
The doctor turned. “I thought you were supposed to leave last night.” Then he shrugged. “I guess it’s too late for that now. We’re not supposed to give any information out to nonfamily members, you know.”
“I’m her fiancée.” Jake offered up the only bargaining chip he had.
The doctor raised his eyebrow in skepticism. “That’s not the way I heard it when I talked to her earlier.”
“I asked her to marry me last night. And she agreed.”
It had not been an enthusiastic acceptance of his proposal. In fact, he wasn’t sure she hadn’t reversed her initial decision, but Jake figured the doctor did not need to know everything.
As it was, the man seemed to know enough. “I suppose she figured you’d be more likely to stay around for your daughter if she said yes.”
Jake was silent.
The doctor didn’t speak for a bit and then he gave Jake one long look. “Here’s the deal. It’s not good. Her heart stopped for a bit there. It’s not pumping blood like it should, even with the rest and the oxygen. If she was in Minneapolis, we’d be rushing her into the surgery room. But we’re a small hospital. More of a clinic than anything. We don’t have the staff or the equipment to take on that kind of heart surgery here.”
“We need to get her to Minneapolis then,” Jake reasoned. “Right away.”
The doctor paused and whispered, “She’d never make it.”
At first, Jake thought he hadn’t heard the man right.
The last of the two nurses left the room then, and Jake was still standing there, trying to convince himself the doctor hadn’t given up.
“She’ll just have to get better right here, then, until she’s well enough to make the trip to Minneapolis?” Jake finally said.
The doctor didn’t meet his eyes.
“Well, we can’t just let her die!”
“We’re doing all we can.”
“That’s not good enough,” Jake said, determination building inside him as he spoke. “There has to be a way to do this. We can get one of those medevac helicopters you hear about to fly her over.”
“That’s what I was thinking of when I said she might not make it,” the doctor answered slowly and then looked Jake squarely in the eyes. “It’s risky to take her up with her heart in the condition it’s in. I tried to convince her doctor to fly here and do the surgery, but he has commitments in Minneapolis.”
“What kind of commitments?” Jake asked, his voice indignant. This couldn’t be happening.
He glanced back at Cat and saw that the color in her face looked better. What could be more important in any doctor’s schedule than saving a life?
“He’s a speaker tonight at some kind of fundraiser for the hospital. They’re trying to raise money for kids without insurance who need surgeries. He feels passionate about it. Knows some of the kids it would help. He says they need the money now or it will be too late for a couple of them.”
The man’s voice trailed off. “He wouldn’t be able to get a flight into Billings today, anyway. The early-morning one already left Minneapolis and the ones with stops won’t get in until this evening.”
Jake felt resolve grow out of the despair inside him. He wasn’t going to just shake his fist at the heavens over this. He was going to win this battle, with or without God’s help.
“What is his fundraising goal?” Jake’s voice was strong and calm now that he knew what to do. He’d had good fortune at the poker tables, but he’d made sound investments with his winnings, too.
The sun was shining into the room better now. A new day was beginning.
“I think he mentioned a half million dollars. I know it’s not much in medical terms, but he waives his fees so it’s only the hospital bill that’s left. I think he said there are five kids, illegal aliens all of them, who will live because of the money he raises tonight. Some kind of government aid might be possible, but it’s not certain at this point.”
“Call and tell him I’ll send him his half million dollars and add another hundred thousand to the pot if he gets on a plane and does the surgery here. The folks at the fundraiser can entertain themselves or, if he wants, I can fly in one of the best comedians in Las Vegas to keep them happy.”
The doctor lifted his eyebrow again. “That’s right, you’re the gambler. Mary at the reception desk told me. Said she’s been afraid to run your credit card so it’s still just sitting on her desk. The poor woman has a soft heart.”
“Tell her it’s good.” Jake glared at the doctor. “I don’t lie. And, after Mary runs that card, tell your doctor friend that the odds don’t get any better than this. He wins no matter what. And I know someone who’ll help me arrange for a private plane to fly him here.”
“Gamblers bluff,” the doctor said with a shrug to his shoulders. His eyes looked as if he wanted to believe, but he just shook his head.
“I’ll let you talk to my banker.” Jake pulled out his cell phone.
“There’s no coverage here,” the doctor replied, the hope that had flickered briefly in his eyes died. “But you probably knew that.”
“Try me,” Jake demanded. “There has to be a landline around here that I can use.”
Jake looked over at Cat. She seemed to be breathing regularly again. “The nurses will look in on her while we go use a phone, won’t they?”
The doctor nodded. “I need to go back to my office now, anyway. You can use the phone there.”
“And Cat?”
“I’ll have someone come and sit with her.”
Jake looked at the man. “Let’s go then. But if she wakes up, I want the nurse to tell her I’m coming right back.”
The doctor smiled slightly. “I think they can manage that.”
When they stepped out of the room, Jake almost stopped. He didn’t remember the hallways being this short. The building was three stories tall, but it really wasn’t much more than a clinic. “You do have operating rooms here?”
The other man nodded. “The doctor from Minneapolis might need to fly in some equipment, but we should have enough of most things to do the surgery. It’s not ideal, of course. But he goes all over the world. Surgeons operate in war zones and African countries with less than we have here.”
“War zones?” That did halt Jake.
The fluorescent light in the hallway, above him, was flickering. He hadn’t seen those kinds of lights used in decades. He looked around. The paint was chipped in places. A couple of worn wheelchairs were gathered at the end of the hall. This place was not prosperous. He wondered just how close to a war zone it came.
“Tell the doctor to bring what he needs with him. I’ll get another plane if there’s not enough room in the one plane for all of it.”
A few minutes later, they were standing at the counter in front of Mary. She didn’t smile at Jake and he figured that was not an encouraging sign. He wondered briefly how she could have been working last night and still be on duty this morning. Then he realized it hadn’t been that many hours ago since he and Cat walked through the hospital doors for the first time. It probably wasn’t even six o’clock in the morning now. He tried to remember if he had heard the rattle of breakfast trays going down the hall to the rooms, but he couldn’t.
“Go ahead and run this guy’s credit card,” the doctor instructed the clerk while looking over at Jake. “Let’s see what he’s made of.”
“How much should I…” Mary stopped to bite her lower lip in confusion.
“Might as well run it for the full fifty thousand limit the card takes for one transaction,” Jake said. “We’ll be paying that before the day is over if things go my way.”
The doctor nodded.
The woman looked hesitant, but she picked up the card and punched some numbers into a machine. Then she positioned the card, ready to swipe it. Then she closed her eyes and ran the card through with one fluid motion of her hand.
A receipt started printing.
“Did it work?” the doctor asked.
Mary ripped off the receipt and peered closely at the numbers. Then she nodded without speaking and handed the receipt to Jake. “You’ll need to sign on the line.”
“Thank the Lord,” the doctor said, a grin splitting his face as he turned to Jake and extended his hand. “I confess I didn’t believe you were telling us the truth, but it appears you might be.”
“I am,” Jake replied, shaking the hand. “But I wouldn’t be thanking God too much just yet.”
The doctor looked at him, his face a question.
“Money’s nothing,” Jake said. “If God is going to give us a blessing, I want it to be on that operating table.”
The other man nodded. “Next stop is my office. You can use the phone in there to call whoever you need. I wouldn’t even know who to call to arrange some of the stuff we’ll need.”
Jake grinned for the first time. “The good thing about playing poker with high rollers is that they tend to be the movers and the shakers. There’s not much we could need that I wouldn’t know someone to ask how to get it.” He stopped and then from somewhere inside him came the words. “Except for prayer, maybe. Not many religious people at the big-stake tables in Las Vegas.”
“Oh,” the receptionist said and turned pink when Jake turned to look at her.
“I just called Mrs. Hargrove a few minutes ago,” she said. “My shift is ending soon and I wanted to be sure they put your friend on the prayer chain in the Dry Creek Church. I didn’t mention any names or anything, not even what was wrong, but…” Her voice trailed off.
“Thank you,” Jake whispered. “You mean well.”
That wasn’t much of a ringing endorsement and he could see by the expression in her eyes that she realized that, too. But he didn’t have time to explain that he hadn’t given any thought to the words he’d spoken about needing God’s help. He was sleep deprived and not himself. The truth was, he didn’t expect any help to be coming no matter what anyone prayed. Jake and the doctors were on their own.
The doctor was already walking down the hall and Jake needed to follow him.
Suddenly, the doctor stopped and turned around.
Mary looked up at him.
“Call the lab and have them set up a place for people to donate blood. I don’t know how much we’ll need for the Barker surgery, but we don’t want to be low.”
Then the doctor glanced at Jake as he started walking again. “I’m assuming you’ll give blood. We’re going to need type O positive, but the Red Cross will credit us with donations and switch out some of what we have for what the Barker woman will need.”
Jake nodded as he started to roll up the sleeve on his shirt. “I’ll be ready to go after we make our phone calls.”
They walked silently.
“Will they let me give twice?” Jake asked.
The doctor stopped walking and looked at Jake. “She’s got you scared, does she?”
Jake nodded.
“Good,” the doctor said, and called back down the hall to Mary, “Get in some cookies and juice for the blood donors. It’s going to be a long day.”
“I’m assuming you’ll bring in the friends and family,” the doctor added to Jake as he opened the door to a small room.
“Me?” Jake stopped in astonishment. He’d give Cat every drop of blood he had in him, but he didn’t know how to ask many others. Wade would probably give. And his mother might, although he didn’t know if she was eligible. Maybe Amy would do it, too. “Would three donors be enough?”
“Not even close,” the doctor said as he walked into the room and pointed at the black telephone on the desk. “But let’s worry about the doctor first. Go ahead and sit. You have some phoning to do.”
Jake nodded. One step at a time. That’s how he would make this happen. If he could just keep breathing.
Cat dragged the air into her lungs. She wasn’t doing well and she knew it. Each in and out of her breath felt as if it was too much work. The sun was starting to come inside the hospital room. She had seen the same nurse sitting beside her bed, reading something, each time she floated up to consciousness. Cat realized she could die. Then she decided, if this was to be her last day, she didn’t want to spend it in darkness.
“Curtains,” she whispered and the nurse set down her journal and leaned closer.
“Please open,” Cat added.
The nurse stood up and nodded. Then she walked over and pulled the curtains apart so the room was filled with sunshine.
“Better,” Cat murmured.
The effort of it all had made her tired. She told herself that’s why she didn’t ask where Jake had gone. She was out of energy. She knew that wasn’t the real reason, though. She couldn’t bear to face the fact that he had left. She tried not to blame him. No one liked to stay in hospitals. She was grateful he’d waited to leave until she’d gone to sleep last night.
And then she looked up and he was standing in the doorway. His hair was rumpled and his shirtsleeves rolled up. There were circles around his eyes she hadn’t noticed before, but when he saw her looking up at him, he smiled.
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