LITMIR.BIZ

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join his son in the video game challenge.

      All he could do for now was to wait and see. Hopefully, Dr. Adams would find the key to unlock Danny’s voice.

      That afternoon was bright and sunny, perfect weather for sledding, and Quinn found himself standing awkwardly next to several other parents at the Cedar Bluff sledding hill. Since he was still relatively new to the area, and worked odd hours, he didn’t know most of them, not even by sight, especially because Delores was the one who picked up Danny from school. The only familiar face belonged to Seth Taylor, one of the emergency department attending physicians.

      Quinn tended to avoid small talk, hating having to answer all the questions that invariably followed the moment people realized Danny was mute. He generally used his bluntness to keep people away, not wanting his personal life to become the source of small-town gossip.

      Instead, he kept his eye on his son. Danny was having a great time, sledding down the hill in his new plastic bright blue sled. Quinn noticed that two of the boys, Ben Germaine, who was Seth’s fiancée’s son, and Charlie Atkins, another boy in their class, acted very friendly toward Danny, as if they didn’t care about his lack of speech.

      “Come on, Danny. Let’s ride together!” Charlie said excitedly.

      Danny eagerly nodded and climbed onto his blue sled, moving up to the front and indicating with gestures for Charlie to climb on the back. The sound of Charlie’s young, carefree laughter rang through the air as they started down the hill.

      A slight smile tugged at the corners of Quinn’s mouth as he gazed after the boys. It was times like this that he was glad he’d made the move to Cedar Bluff. He was grateful that Danny had already found some friends. Maybe Cedar Bluff didn’t have the same lure for adults as Boston, but as far as he was concerned Danny’s wellbeing was all that mattered.

      He frowned, though, when Danny’s blue sled veered off course, turning sharply to the right, heading directly toward a line of trees.

      “Danny!” he shouted, through cupped hands, taking several steps forward. “Watch where you’re going!”

      He couldn’t tell what happened. It seemed as if the boys were somehow tangled up on the sled and not steering at all because the lightweight plastic sled gathered speed as it shot down the slippery slope toward a large oak tree.

      “Danny!” Quinn shouted again, running down the hill toward his son, feeling helpless when he realized he wasn’t going to make it in time. “Danny!”

      Too late. The sled hit the tree with enough force to knock both boys sprawling into the snow.

      Leila finished her lunch in the ED staff break room and leaned back against the sofa cushions, momentarily closing her eyes. Only another twenty-four hours and her long weekend call rotation would be over. At least today should be relatively quiet—it wasn’t exactly a party night of the week, compared to Friday and Saturday. The holiday weekend couldn’t end soon enough. She was exhausted, the steady stream of patients had been unusual considering it was Christmas.

      She sighed, thinking she would just rest for a few more minutes. What seemed like a nanosecond later, a hand on her shoulder caused her to jerk upright, and she realized Jadon Reichert, the ED attending physician on duty, was trying to wake her up.

      “What?” she asked groggily, trying to shake off her lethargy. Disoriented, she blinked away her blurred vision to focus on the large wall clock, noting with shock that she’d slept for more than an hour and a half.

      “Leila? Sorry to bother you but we have two peds traumas on the way in,” Jadon said, his expression apologetic for needing to rouse her.

      “Sorry, didn’t mean to fall asleep,” she muttered, pushing herself upright.

      “Hey, no problem,” Jadon said with a wry grin. “I’d cover the rest of your shift for you, but I think hospital administration might frown on me for performing surgery without the proper credentials.”

      She had to chuckle as she rose to her feet. “Yes, they probably would. Okay, I’m really awake now. What’s coming in? Did I hear you say we have two peds traumas?”

      Jadon’s smile faded, his gaze turning serious. “Two young boys hit a tree while sledding at Cedar Bluff Park.”

      Leila frowned, her stomach clenching in warning. This was one of the reasons she was glad she’d decided not to have kids. “Please tell me one of them isn’t Ben Germaine.”

      “No, not this time,” Jadon assured her. “Although it sounds as if Seth Taylor was on the scene, along with Quinn.”

      Quinn? How odd. But she didn’t give the coincidence more than a passing thought.

      “Thank heavens Ben wasn’t involved.” Ben was Kylie and Seth’s son and the boy tended to be a bit accident prone. Earlier that month, he’d slipped on the rocks and tumbled into the icy water of Lake Michigan. Jadon’s new fiancée, Alyssa, had fallen in herself, when trying to save him. She’d been pregnant at the time, seven and a half months along with twins. Leila had been there when they’d been brought in and it was touch and go for a while. Thankfully, everyone was fine now, including Jadon and Alyssa’s twin girls, Grace and Gretchen, born several weeks early. The entire incident had been very scary, touching many of the Cedar Bluff staff members who’d been concerned when one of their own had been injured.

      Technically, Ben was Kylie’s son, but it was clear from Seth’s actions that he already considered the boy to be his own. Seth and Kylie were getting married next weekend, on New Year’s Eve.

      She envied their happiness, although reminded herself that she’d been lucky to have loved a wonderful man like George. George had understood and respected her hesitancy to have children, considering she didn’t know anything about her heritage. Heaven knew what genes she’d be passing on. She missed him, and tried to be grateful for the few months they’d shared together.

      Pushing the sorrows of the past aside, Leila was going to ask more details about their young patients, but in that moment both their pagers went off.

      “They’re here,” he said, leaving the staff break room in a rush to get out to the trauma room. Leila followed close on his heels, her previous exhaustion quickly submerged beneath a fresh wave of adrenaline.

      “Danny is the more seriously injured of the two,” Kylie Germaine was saying, as the gurneys were wheeled in. Leila was surprised to see Quinn Torres walking on the opposite side of the gurney from Kylie, hanging on to the boy’s hand. What on earth had he been doing on the sledding hill? “Danny is six years old, weighs an estimated thirty pounds and has sustained a head injury and possible fractured left tibia.”

      “And what about the second victim?” Leila asked, not willing to take only the paramedic’s word about which patient was worse, no matter how much she liked and trusted Kylie. She needed to make her own judgment.

      Quinn opened his mouth, but Kylie put a hand on his arm and continued, not giving him the chance to interrupt.

      “Charlie Atkins is also six years old, also estimated to be about thirty pounds and he doesn’t seem to have any obvious signs of injury,” Kylie informed them. “Charlie’s vitals are stable. Danny Torres was in the front of the sled and took the brunt of the force when they hit the tree.”

      Danny Torres? Leila suppressed a spurt of surprise in discovering Quinn had a son. She never would have guessed him to be a father. Did Quinn have a wife, too?

      And why did she care?

      Her gaze centered on the boy. Danny was crying, but not making much noise, his sobs choked as if he was afraid to make any sound. Her heart melted in empathy. She crossed over to him, trying to ignore Quinn’s sharp, penetrating gaze.

      “Hi, Danny, my name is Dr. Leila and I’m here to help make you feel better.” She gave Danny her best reassuring smile and the boy struggled to stop crying, seemingly listening to her soft voice. “You’re being very brave, Danny. I know you’re hurt. The

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