by Jean Stone
In less than five minutes, a man in a white lab coat with a stethoscope dangling around his neck pushed through the “personnel only” doors. He was followed by a young man with a clipboard. And Cynthia, who directed them to the group.
“Mrs. MacNeish?” the doctor asked.
Meghan stood up; the others did, too.
He introduced himself, then quickly continued. “The bullet has fractured your husband’s clavicle. No organs seem to have been damaged. But he needs surgery.” He spoke rapidly, as if the procedure was urgent. “The bullet didn’t exit, so we need to try and get it out of there pronto. We also have to remove a number of bone fragments before we’ll know the full extent of his prognosis, such as if there’s been any impairment to the neurovascular bundle or the subclavian artery. I’m sure you could tell he lost a lot of blood.”
They stood, silent. Annie would have bet that none of them—including her—had a clue as to what either the neurovascular bundle or subclavian artery were, but she didn’t think it was the right time to ask for details.
“Any questions?” he asked Meghan.
Annie wanted to ask for his name again, as he’d spoken so fast she had missed it. He did not look familiar.
Meghan shook her head. She was clearly overwhelmed.
“How long will surgery take?” Annie asked.
“Hard to know. Maybe several hours.”
The onlookers hung on his every word.
“Is he going to be okay?” Lucy asked, her voice small and scared.
The doctor turned to her. “We’re going to do our very best. I’m sorry I can’t be more specific. Not until after the surgery.”
Then the young man with the doctor thrust his clipboard at Meghan. “We need you to sign this as his next of kin. It’s consent for the operation.”
Meghan took his pen and the clipboard. She hesitated, and then asked, “Have you performed this type of operation before?”
The doctor smiled. “We don’t have many gunshot wounds on Martha’s Vineyard. A hunting accident now and then, but that’s about it. Working on an island, though, we’re trained to be versatile. And without the surgery, your husband’s chances are, at best, poor. We don’t recommend airlifting him to Boston. It would be too risky to lose the time.”
With a slow nod, Meghan raised the pen and sighed the form. “I’ll wait here,” she said. “I don’t care how long it takes.”
Perhaps, Annie thought, with all Meghan had been through, she was better equipped than the rest of them to navigate the hospital environment.
Then Annie realized something else: Meghan had signed the consent form as Kevin’s wife when, technically, they were divorced. She wondered what legal liability Meghan might incur, and if the fact that she hadn’t known would make a damn bit of difference.
* * *
Annie convinced Earl to take Claire and Lucy home. She promised to let them know as soon as Kevin was out of surgery. Lucy announced that she’d sleep at her grandparents, if they’d have her, which, of course, they would. So the trio set off. Like Annie and Meghan, they must have been afraid for Kevin, and now they also knew the truth about his wife. It was a lot, Earl said, to reckon with; Annie expected they would talk nonstop on the way back to Chappy.
Francine did not go with them. “How about if I run over to the food truck at ArtCliff and pick up a couple of sandwiches? It could be a long night.”
By then, Meghan had retreated to a seat that gave her a clear view of the door from which the doctor had emerged.
Annie hesitated, then remembered that her dinner—the sandwich from the shop by the Chappy Ferry—was still in her purse, along with her phone, back at the cottage. A tremor shivered through her when she thought of Kevin’s blood puddled on the floor. “I have no purse,” she said. “No money.”
“I’m buying,” Francine said. “And come out to my car for a second, okay? I have something to show you.”
Annie told Meghan she’d be right back, and then followed Francine out the big glass doors. When they were outside under the portico, Francine suddenly stopped.
“I have nothing to show you,” she said.
Not in the mood for guessing games, Annie asked, “So, what’s up? And who’s staying with Bella?”
“Jonas is on babysitting duties.”
Annie couldn’t help but smile.
With a carefree shrug, Francine said, “We all pitch in in an emergency, right?”
“Right,” Annie replied.
Then Francine’s dark eyes darted around, scanning the cars, shifting to the harbor, then moving back to the hospital where she stared at a pillar of the portico, looking anywhere but at Annie. It was obvious that she was holding something back.
“I have to tell you something,” she finally said. “And I didn’t want Meghan to hear me.”
Then, a bolt of lightning—or a message from Murphy—struck from high up in the starlit sky, leaving Annie with an ominous feeling that this was important. Her belly churned and nausea loomed as she waited for Francine to speak.
“Taylor came back with Kevin.”
Murphy must have stepped in and stopped Annie from screaming. She muttered a word she did not even use in her mysteries, no matter how gritty they became.
“I was at Jonas’s when she came in,” Francine went on. “The first thing I thought about was Meghan. I didn’t say anything, though. I promised you I wouldn’t. Taylor said she was exhausted and was going to bed. Which was also strange because that’s where Jonas and I have been sleeping. Anyway. . .” she seemed to lose her train of thought for a moment, “she went to bed. Jonas and I went outside, while I tried to decide what to do about where I should stay. I was going to call Earl and ask if Bella and I could bunk in there until Simon and his sidekick are gone and we can have our room back. That was when you called and told me about Kevin.”
“Did you tell Taylor that Kevin had been shot?” Annie’s question sounded harsher than she’d intended. After all, Francine was an innocent party.
She hung her head. “No. I didn’t tell Jonas, either. I was going to ask him to come to the Inn with me and hang out there so someone would be on the premises. Then I realized if he found out about Kevin, he might insist on telling his mother. So I decided not to tell him. Because I didn’t think you’d want Taylor to show up at the hospital and come face-to-face with Meghan.”
“So Jonas doesn’t know, either.”
“No.” She raised those big eyes again. They were troubled, sad. “I told him that Earl and Claire had cancelled our dinner plans, so I might as well go back to the Inn until you got back.” She bit a fingernail. “I can’t believe I lied to him. And I told him to stay at the house with his mother. And to please keep Bella there because I’d already put her to bed.” She fidgeted with her small earrings, a gift from Jonas for, as she’d told Annie, no special reason. “Oh, Annie, I hope Kevin’s going to be all right. And I hope I did the right thing.”
Annie reached out and hugged her. “You absolutely did. You are positively the best. I love you.”
“And I love you. Every one of you. And I don’t want anyone to be hurt.”
“It’ll be fine. But I expect that after Taylor wakes up, it won’t be long before she knows. Which gives me between now and then to figure something out.”
Annie let Francine go, watching as she walked to her car to go get the sandwiches, grateful, so very grateful, that she was in her life. Then, before going back into the hospital, Annie leaned against one of the portico’s tall white pillars and looked up at the sky. “We need a lot of help down here,” she said. “In case any of you are listening. Murphy? Donna? Mom? Dad?” She paused then whispered, “Brian?”
* * *
Conversation between Annie and Meghan was minimal while they sat, nearly holding their breaths, waiting for the message that Kevin was out of surgery. That it had gone well. That he was doing great.
“I’m sorry,” Meghan said at one point.
“Sorry for
what? This isn’t your fault.”
“I didn’t hear the gun go off. My headache pill knocked me out. I was asleep. I never heard the shot.”
“It doesn’t matter. Simon called 911 right away; there’s nothing you could have done.”
“But Kevin wouldn’t have come back if you hadn’t called him because of me . . .”
“Stop. Don’t blame yourself, okay? You have enough to worry about right now.” It was easy for Annie to say.
Later, Annie coaxed her into splitting one of the sandwiches Francine had bought, though they each only had a bite or two. The rest of the time Annie sipped water and flicked her gaze from the “personnel only” door back down to the floor. She couldn’t shed the shame that this was her fault. And hers alone. True, she didn’t know that Simon would be a jerk or that Kevin would blast into the scene with his stupid gun. Hell, she didn’t even know he was on the East Coast. But if she hadn’t gone into the cottage in the first place . . .
The guilt, the remorse would not abate.
Not long after midnight, the outside doors whooshed open again; Annie barely noticed. It was, after all, still August, so they’d whooshed often that night.
Then Annie heard Meghan say, “Hello.”
“Any word?”
It was John.
“Not yet,” Meghan said.
Annie raised her eyes; John stood in front of her. He set down a suitcase and a large canvas bag.
“Francine updated me about Kevin being in surgery. I figured you’d want to be here all night, so I asked her to pull some stuff together. She put it on the last ferry; Captain Fred dropped it off at the station for me.” He turned to Meghan. “This suitcase is yours, right, Meghan? That’s your name, right?”
“Yes,” she said weakly. “To both questions.”
“Nice to meet you. My dad explained your situation. I think I can speak for my whole family when I say I’m really glad that you’re here.”
She smiled tentatively.
“Francine said the suitcase was in your room, that it looked packed, and that it saved her from having to go through your things to pick out . . . whatever.”
Annie did not want to consider that Meghan’s suitcase had, in fact, already been packed. That she had planned to leave in the morning. For real.
“Annie, the canvas one’s for you.”
Off duty, out of his uniform, dressed in ordinary shorts and a T-shirt, he didn’t look as menacing. He looked like John again, her John, though he no longer was. “Thank you,” she said.
Now that he’d delivered the goods, he seemed unsure what to do or say. He folded his hands in front of him and asked, “Do you mind if I sit down?”
“No,” Annie said. “Do you need to interrogate both of us?”
He sat next to Annie, on the far side of Meghan. As earlier, he kept an empty seat between them. “I’m here as . . . I’m here to give you some support, Annie. I care about Kevin, too, you know.”
She nodded. “I know.” She rested her hands on her knees and took a long breath.
“Annie . . .” he began.
But she shook her head. “Please don’t, John. I’m trying to hold myself together. I can’t do a long discussion.” She fully expected that he’d get up then, say good night, and leave. Instead he reached across the empty chair and took her hand in his. As tired as she was—and as dazed as she’d thought she was—she was unprepared for more tears to splash out of her eyes.
John moved to the chair next to hers, put an arm around her, and pulled her toward him. Her head tipped down and rested on his shoulder.
“It’s my fault,” she whispered. “If I hadn’t been . . .”
He shushed her, then kissed the top of her head. “Kevin shouldn’t have had the gun. Simon shouldn’t have wrestled him for it. And, yeah, you shouldn’t have been in there. But it was an accident, Annie. Open-and-shut.”
She wanted to say, “Tell my heart that.”
“I asked Simon not to leave the island until we’ve spoken to Kevin.”
If you’re able to speak to Kevin, Annie thought, but did not say.
Then a man in blue scrubs came through the “personnel only” door. The surgeon. Annie and Meghan simultaneously leaped to their feet.
“Doctor?” she asked, aware that John was right behind her, perhaps ready to catch her if she . . . fainted?
“He’s out of surgery,” the doctor said. “It was trickier than we’d hoped, but so far so good. We’ll going to keep him under sedation for at least twenty-four hours, maybe longer. We removed the bullet without much of a problem, but there were a number of bone fragments—one of them had nicked the subclavian, which is where all the blood came from. We were able to fix it, but we need to keep him immobile for a while to be sure.”
Annie and Meghan remained quiet, as if they didn’t realize that the doctor had finished speaking.
“Thanks, Mike,” John said. “I’m glad you were on duty.”
The doctor reached around Annie and shook John’s hand. “I’m happy it went well. We never know with these kinds of injuries.”
Annie moved away from John then and wrapped her arms around Meghan. Stalwart, strong Meghan, who started to cry.
“It’s okay,” Annie said. “He’ll be okay.”
“He’ll be in ICU,” the doctor—Mike—continued. “Whenever we decide to wake him up, we’ll let you know ahead of time, so you can be here if you want.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” Meghan said.
“Then I won’t, either,” Annie added.
“He’s in recovery now; you won’t be able to see him until the morning . . .”
Then John interrupted. “Mike, is there somewhere near ICU where the ladies can stay tonight?”
“Man, it’s August. We’re okay right now, but I’m not sure we have enough beds for whatever else might happen the rest of the weekend.”
“What about the extra portable beds you brought in during the pandemic? Are they still in storage?”
“Not my department, but probably.”
John smiled. “I’ll check it out. I’m sure the ladies won’t mind sleeping in a closet if they have to.”
Chapter 26
While John was pulling whatever strings he had to pull, Annie texted Francine and Lucy about the surgery results and asked them to let Claire and Earl know. Then, because John was Annie’s hero, he once again saved the day with beds and linens and a supply closet that he set up as if it were a bedroom. He even procured a vase of fragrant pink roses that he’d coerced out of one of the nurses. According to John, they’d come from the nurse’s back yard, but she was happy to donate them to Annie and Meghan. He was Annie’s hero, indeed. But though Jane Austen might have been proud, Annie found the idea a little worrisome, not knowing what it meant, if anything, about their future.
Before one o’clock in the morning, she and Meghan were nestled in the closet, each in a twin bed that was remarkably comfortable. They set the roses on a wire rack that held boxes of latex gloves and surgical masks and agreed that they added a nice touch. Yes, Annie mulled, John had done a good deed.
So had Francine; she’d put a change of clothes and a few toiletries in Annie’s canvas bag and had thought to include Annie’s laptop and charger. The girl knew well what would be most important if Annie was sequestered for a day or two.
After saying good night to Meghan, Annie closed her eyes and willed sleep to come. It did not. Instead, her mind started spinning again, that time with thoughts of Simon. She wondered if he was sleeping in the cottage. If she were him, she’d be holed up in the other twin bed in Bill’s room. Or somewhere remote up in Aquinnah.
Then she remembered the explosion: the sound—as if the world had blown up. The gunshot: the reverberation—as if an earthquake had shaken the cottage. And Kevin’s blood: the stain—the floor of her beautiful bedroom now marred forever by this awful night. She sucked in her cheeks, clenched them between her teeth, and tried not to cry out.
; “Annie?” Meghan whispered into the darkness. “Are you asleep?”
“Are you kidding? I can’t stop thinking.” She didn’t want to tell her that she couldn’t erase the images from her mind. Or how she had become paralyzed with fear as Kevin had lay . . . bleeding.
“Do you think he’ll be okay?”
“I do. Your husband is a strong, healthy guy.” She knew she shouldn’t have referred to Kevin as Meghan’s husband, not in light of the divorce. Which Annie wondered if she should warn her about now. It was one more thing to worry about. One more slice of torment.
“Thank you for everything you’ve done, Annie. Thank you for being so nice to me.”
“How could I not? I liked you before I knew who you were. I did think it was a little strange that you were reading children’s books about turtles, though.”
Meghan let out a short, little laugh. “I’m not very good at trying to be someone I’m not.”
“Neither am I.” Annie’s knew that her years with her second husband had proved that.
In the darkness of the supply closet, they fell silent as the scents of cardboard boxes mingled with the roses in the air.
Then Meghan said, “Annie? What will he think when he sees me?”
Annie had no answer. So she was honest. “I’ve been wondering the same thing. Have you thought about how you want to do this? Or what you should say first?”
“No. But I guess I should.”
“It’s going to be a shock for him when he sees you.”
“And that I know who he is. And that I’m okay.”
Annie prayed that the confusion wouldn’t be too much for him.
“I think I’ll try and sleep now,” Meghan said. “I don’t want to be exhausted in the morning. And at least I know he’s peaceful now.”
There was no need to mention they did not know that for sure. Tomorrow, Annie thought, could not come soon enough.
* * *
She awoke at dawn, not to sunlight, as there were no windows in the supply closet, but to the sounds of a hospital beginning a new day: footsteps pattering in quick precision, muffled wheels of carts, the low chatter of take-charge voices. Annie found it comforting, a gentle cloak of life resuming. She wondered if Kevin had slept uneventfully through the night. The fact that they hadn’t been alerted otherwise must mean that, so far, he was stable.