Five minutes later I sat gazing down at the plate of scrambled eggs that Dan had insisted on getting for me from the cafeteria line, as Alice Cahill began to explain about Damon. “Three days ago an evening commuter flight from New York to Newport crashed into Narragansett Bay…”
“The night of the big storm,” I interrupted, recalling the TV news story about a plane crash that I’d turned off on my second night back in Freedman’s Cove.
Alice nodded. “The commuter pilot reported he was experiencing heavy icing and severe turbulence just before he went into the bay,” she confirmed. “The Coast Guard began an immediate search and initially reported no survivors. All seventeen crew and passengers aboard the flight were presumed dead.”
A weary smile touched the corners of the doctor’s full lips. “But miracles sometimes do happen. And your friend upstairs in ICU,” she said, raising her gentle eyes toward the ceiling, “is one very tough customer. After floating around all night in a life jacket he was picked up by a fishing boat more than eleven hours after the crash. The Coast Guard flew him directly here by helicopter because Boston Med has the best facilities in the region for treating cases of advanced hypothermia.”
She paused to take a sip of orange juice and nibbled at her toast. “I was on duty when they first brought him in. He had the usual assortment of broken bones and internal injuries that we expect to see in plane-crash victims, and he was in the final stages of hypothermia. Actually, when he arrived here his core body temperature was down to around eighty degrees and his heart had stopped during the helicopter ride.”
Alice shook her head in wonderment. “That we were able to get his heart going again was nothing short of a miracle all by itself. Anyway,” she continued after a moment, “we immediately went to work warming him up—thankfully we have the latest equipment here, which allows us to actually remove and reheat the patient’s blood, otherwise he wouldn’t have survived. Fortunately, the procedure worked like a charm and his temperature stabilized. So next we took him into surgery and attended to the more serious internal injuries, primarily a ruptured spleen and a punctured lung. He’s also suffering from the effects of a severe concussion to the brain.”
“You also mentioned broken bones,” I said, “but he doesn’t seem to be wearing any casts or anything.”
The doctor paused and looked directly into my eyes. “His fractures are simply immobilized at the moment,” she said frankly. “We’ll do further surgery to permanently repair that damage…if he makes it through this present stage.”
“What are Damon’s chances of pulling through…this stage?” I persisted.
The soft-spoken surgeon exchanged a worried glance with Dan, who reached over and took my hand. “It’s really much too soon to say,” she answered. “Your friend is incredibly strong, but he’s been through an awful lot. Now it’s up to his body to heal the worst of the trauma. As often happens in such cases, especially after a severe concussion, he’s withdrawn into coma. Hopefully, he’ll come out of it within the next twenty-four hours.”
I could feel the all-too-familiar sting of tears welling up in the corners of my eyes. And I was struck by a sudden horrible thought. “The brain injury. If he lives, he won’t be…mentally impaired?”
I tried to push away a nightmare image of sweet, brilliant Damon propped up in a hospital bed somewhere gazing out a window, his sparkling brown eyes devoid of all comprehension and intelligence.
For the first time since we’d met, Alice Cahill actually smiled at me. “You mean will he have any permanent brain damage? No, I don’t think so,” she replied. “Hell, I’m sorry. I should have mentioned that right away. Your friend…Damon…actually regained consciousness for a short time after we reestablished his body temperature. He and I held a brief but coherent conversation.” The smile broadened. “He was naturally quite confused and it was a very strange conversation.” She laughed and said, “But basically coherent all the same.”
“Thank God for that,” I breathed. “What did he say?”
Alice grinned. “Well, after I told him where he was and explained that he’d be staying with us a while, he looked around the ICU and said if I expected him to stay I might add some drapes and a few throw pillows. He also suggested I get a more flattering haircut and consider wearing a little makeup.”
“That’s definitely the Damon I know and love.” I giggled, nearly giddy with relief.
Alice’s expression turned serious again. “He was also asking for you,” she said. “I assume you know he was on his way to see you when his plane crashed.”
I stared at her in amazement. Because, in my agitated state, until that very moment I hadn’t given any serious thought to the reason Damon had been on a commuter flight bound for Newport, Rhode Island, especially since he detested flying.
“Did Damon say why he was coming to see me?” I asked, remembering with chagrin our last agitated telephone conversation and the way I had screamed at him over the cell phone. Though I had been almost certain then that he had not heard my final stupid accusation about his having always hated Bobby, I must have been wrong.
The doctor shook her head. “He didn’t give any reason,” she answered. “He just kept repeating that it was extremely important that he see you right away. Then he lost consciousness again before I could get any information on next of kin. So I listed you on the admission forms as the person to be contacted.”
I felt my tears returning. The only explanation I could think of was that Damon must have decided he had to come and personally put things right between us, face-to-face. “We had argued,” I whispered. “If it hadn’t been for the terrible things I said to him, he would never have gotten on that airplane.”
Dan’s hand was squeezing my shoulder. “Sue, you don’t really know why he was on that plane,” he said. “You can’t blame yourself for what happened.”
“Take a look around you,” Alice interjected. She made a broad gesture, indicating the dozens of somber visitors and staff members sitting at tables scattered around the huge hospital cafeteria. “You can see a thousand tragedies a day in this or any other big-city trauma center. That’s just life, Susan.” She smiled. “It’s a risky business, living.”
Chapter 19
“What would you like to do now?” Dan gave me along questioning look. We were sitting in the Mercedes and a fine freezing drizzle had started to fall. I noticed that the moisture was forming glaring halos around the orange security lights that were coming on around the hospital parking lot.
Dan had waited for most of the day while I had gone in to be with Damon for the allowed ICU visiting periods of five minutes out of every hour. I had spent those brief intervals holding Damon’s hand and talking to him, willing him to wake up. But nothing had changed.
Around noon I suddenly remembered that our Manhattan office had been unattended since Damon had left New York on his fateful flight, so I called in to check voice mail. After jotting down a dozen calls to be returned, I changed the outgoing message, explaining that there had been a medical emergency and that I would get back to everyone as soon as possible.
Then I returned my attention to Damon. In between my brief ICU visits, Dan had brought me coffee and listened quietly while I talked, mostly about my best friend and the unique relationship that he and I shared.
We stayed on at the hospital until Alice Cahill came back on duty at six and threw us out. “There is absolutely nothing you can do here except make yourself sick,” she warned me. “If your friend pulls through this ordeal he’s going to need you. So go back home and get some rest. That’s an order. I promise I’ll phone you the minute there’s any change whatsoever in his condition.”
“Sue?” Dan was patiently waiting for me to answer his question. I had been gazing transfixed through the misted windshield at the floodlit façade of the medical center, praying for a miracle. “I really don’t want to go back to Freedman’s Cove. At least not right now,” I said at last. “It’s much too far away…i
n case something changes.”
“Can I make a practical suggestion, then?”
I turned and looked at him, reading the weariness in his eyes. “I’m sorry,” I said, taking his hand, “you must be positively exhausted and I’ve taken up your whole day.” I scanned the darkness beyond the security lights, looking for a lighted Holiday Inn sign. “There’s supposed to be a motel around here somewhere,” I said. “Maybe we should try to find it. Then you can drop me off and get back home to your work.”
“My work wasn’t exactly what I was thinking about.” Dan gave my hand a reassuring squeeze. “I think you need some support right now, and my schedule is whatever I make it. I’m here for as long as you want me.”
“Thanks.” I leaned over and kissed his cheek.
“Anyway,” he continued, “Running Freedan Studios involves a lot of travel for our executives and we also entertain visiting buyers here in Boston. So the company maintains a couple of rooms at the Hyatt Regency out near Logan Airport. It’s only fifteen minutes from the medical center. I seldom use the place myself, but we can go out there and stay, if you’d like.”
I shook my head in wonder. “You are full of surprises,” I said.
“Of course,” Dan hurried to assure me, “if you’d feel more comfortable by yourself I can put the place at your disposal and arrange for a car and driver to ferry you back and forth to the hospital—”
I reached out and placed my fingers over his lips. “Please, don’t say another word,” I whispered. “Just start the engine and drive.”
He obeyed, twisting the ignition key, slipping the car into gear and pulling out of the lot.
“What I really want more than anything right now is a long, hot bath,” I mused when we were on the road. “I feel like all my joints are creaking and I’m chilled to the bone from the air-conditioning in that ICU. It’s a wonder everyone in there doesn’t have hypothermia. I hope they have really hot water at the Hyatt.”
He laughed. “Scalding,” he said.
“Then maybe we can get some actual food, too,” I said, feeling my stomach rumble. “Preferably something that hasn’t been petrifying on a cafeteria steam table for the past twelve hours.”
“I recommend calling room service in your bathrobe,” Dan advised. “And maybe we’ll get a basin of hot water to soak your feet in, so you won’t get chilled again.”
“Sounds heavenly,” I sighed.
There was a long silence as Dan guided the car onto the beltway leading to the airport.
“Alice talked to you while I was in with Damon the first time,” I said in a small voice. “Tell me the truth, Dan, do you really think she believes he’ll come out of this?”
Dan thought about my question for several seconds. “I believe if anyone can pull Damon through, Alice is the one,” he finally answered. He smiled and reached over to touch my hand. “She told me she felt Damon had been sent to her in order to see if she was really as good as she thought she was.”
I nodded approvingly. “I like that,” I said. “I like that a lot.”
Freedan Studios’ “couple of rooms” at the Hyatt turned out to be one of four VIP suites in the penthouse. The Freedan suite consisted of two very large bedrooms, each with its own bath, separated by a vast living room that came complete with a conference table, fax, computer with broadband Internet, wet bar and too many other amenities to mention. The entire suite was furnished in good late-18th-century English antiques in the Japanese style, and the exquisite silk-and rice-paper-covered walls were hung with Dan’s original paintings.
He had called ahead from the car, so we were met and escorted upstairs by no less a personage than the Hyatt’s manager, who had informed us that the chef in the four-star restaurant was awaiting our room service dinner order.
“Okay,” I said when the manager, who’d seemed not at all surprised by my handsome friend’s arrival with a bedraggled me in tow, had departed, “I’m impressed.”
“Good,” Dan replied slyly. “I was wondering what it would take to affect a jaded New York sophisticate like you.”
Despite the grim circumstances of our being together I felt better than I had all day. By now I was totally at ease with Dan. And it felt perfectly natural to flop onto his richly brocaded sofa and wearily kick off my shoes. “No wonder poor Debbie Carver—excuse me, Olson—looks so wistful when she talks about the thing she used to have for you,” I teased, looking around the palatial suite.
Dan went to the bar and rummaged in the refrigerator for a beer. He popped the top and took a long swallow straight from the can. “You never told me you’d been talking to Debbie,” he accused. “Would you like something to drink?”
I asked for white wine. “Oh, yes, Debbie and I had a fascinating chat the other day,” I allowed as he found a small bottle of Fumé and poured a glassful.
He brought me the wine and dropped into a soft chair facing me. “Interesting,” he said seriously. “Did she tell you that I offered her a job with my company a few years ago?”
I looked up in surprise, for I really had just been joking with him. “And she turned you down?” I asked.
He took another sip of his beer. “Debbie said that if she went to work for me everyone in town would figure we were having an affair. And, of course, they would have done exactly that. But, considering what the town had already thought about both of us in the past, I asked her what difference it would make. Know what her answer was?”
I shook my head.
“She said she wouldn’t mind the talk if it was true,” Dan said. “But since it wasn’t, she’d never have any love life at all if she took the job. ‘So, thanks, old pal, but no thanks.’”
I smiled. “I’m beginning to understand why you liked Debbie so much,” I said, sipping my wine.
“Like,” he corrected. “I still do and I always will. She’s a wonderful person.”
“So what about your current love life?” I probed curiously. “After all, you’re rich, famous and good-looking. Where’s the jealous girlfriend who should be calling up here about now to find out who the strange lady is in your hotel room?”
Dan shrugged. “Don’t have one, jealous or otherwise.” He grinned. “At least not at the present time.” He cast me a meaningful look.
Ignoring the look, I took another sip of wine and got unsteadily to my feet, suddenly aware that I was treading on dangerous ground. Thankfully, though, I still had enough sense to realize that the small amount of alcohol I had consumed on an empty stomach was going straight to my head…and out my mouth.
“I think I’d better go take that bath before I get myself in trouble.” I looked questioningly at the two bedroom doors on opposite sides of the big room.
Dan stood and pointed with a gallant flourish to the nearest door. “Milady’s boudoir is right through there,” he said. “Sing out if you need anything. While you’re soaking, I’ll call downstairs and order our dinner. What would you like?”
“You’re doing just fine so far,” I replied with a smile. “Why don’t you order for both of us?”
“Done,” he said.
I hesitated in the doorway, all the fatigue and anguish of the past twelve hours suddenly seeming to come back heavily to rest on my shoulders. “Dan,” I said softly, “thank you again, for everything.”
He winked at me and leaned over to plant a brotherly kiss on my forehead. “My pleasure,” he said. “And I really do hope that Damon pulls through this crisis.” He smiled. “From what you’ve told me about him, he seems like a person I’d really like to know.”
I went into the bedroom and closed the door.
The bathroom light was on and I stepped inside to discover that it was just as large and luxurious as the rest of the suite, with azure marble flooring, a huge, comfortable tub and a vanity stocked with expensive shampoos, conditioners and bath oils. Arrayed on the countertop beside the built-in hair dryer was a complete set of toilet articles, including a new toothbrush, comb, shower cap and the lik
e.
I started the water running and snatched a thick terry robe embroidered with the hotel logo from a hook by the door, then returned to the bedroom. Peeling off my rumpled clothes, I opened a closet in search of hangers.
Inside were a half dozen articles of feminine apparel, all bearing exclusive designer labels. “Whoops!” I muttered aloud. “Who’s been sleeping in my bed?”
I frowned and lifted a delicate black cocktail dress from the rack, wondering cattily who it belonged to. She had great taste and was a size six, whoever she was. A Freedan Studios executive? Heather, the mysterious New York art agent to whom Dan credited his amazing success? It was impossible to tell, for he had said earlier that any number of his people used the suite.
Deciding that it was really none of my business, I carefully replaced the exquisite garment on the rack and hung my own clothes at the opposite end of the closet. But as I walked back to the bathroom I felt just the slightest tinge of annoyance at having to share the space with a stranger’s clothing.
“Now you’re being ridiculous!” I told my haggard reflection in the bathroom mirror. “Anyway, this is certainly neither the time nor the place to start having possessive thoughts about Dan Freedman.”
“I’m not so sure about that,” the little voice in my head that is my romantic self replied. “Surely you’ve noticed that Dan’s interest in you transcends his being the nicest, most considerate guy you have ever met in your life.”
“Don’t give me that crap!” I snorted, lowering myself by slow degrees into the scalding water. “Bobby was by far the nicest guy I ever met.”
I closed my eyes and let the heat envelop me. “Besides,” I murmured, “I’m not ready for anything like love yet. In fact, I don’t know if I’ll ever be ready for it again…Love hurts too much.”
The little voices inside wisely remained silent.
“Anyway, I’ve got to think about Damon now,” I added in a louder voice, just in case she was still listening.
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