LITMIR.BIZ

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on your hands.”

      Olivia’s eyes stung. Had she made the wrong decision? No, this woman would never have survived the trip. Never.

      Mike had to work around her fingers. If she moved just a fraction of an inch, the blood poured from the bullet holes. The pain in Olivia’s shoulder became a steady fire and the shaking in her legs spread to the rest of her body. Still she held her position while Mike slipped a tiny piece of felt beneath her thumb and stitched it into place. But the exit hole was not so easy to close. It was large and nearly impossible to reach without damaging the heart in the process.

      She watched the lines deepen in Mike’s forehead as he struggled with the needle.

      “Please, Mike,” she whispered.

      He finally shook his head. The felt refused to hold, and the blood seeped, then poured from the back of the heart. Olivia felt the heat of it on her fingers as the green line of the monitor shivered and flattened, and the room grew hushed with failure.

      For a moment no one moved. No one spoke. Olivia could hear Mike’s breathing, rapid and deep, keeping time with her own. She straightened up slowly, gritting her teeth against the pain in her back, and looked at Kathy. “Is any of her family here?”

      Kathy nodded. “Yes, and we called Kevin in. He’s with them in the little waiting room.” “I’ll tell them,” Mike said.

      Olivia shook her head. “I should do it. I was with her from the start.” She turned and started walking toward the door.

      “Whoa.” Mike caught her arm. “Better change first.”

      She looked down at her blood-soaked scrubs and felt a ripple of doubt. She was not thinking clearly.

      She changed in the lounge and then walked to the small, private waiting room. Through the high window in the hallway she caught a glimpse of snowflakes dancing in the darkness. She wished she could step outside for a second. Her muscles still burned. And she hated what lay ahead of her. She hoped Kevin Rickert, the social worker, had prepared them for what she had to say.

      Kevin looked relieved to see her. “This is Dr. Simon,” he said.

      There were three of them—a girl about thirteen who looked strikingly like the woman she had just left on the table, a boy a few years older. And a man. Annie’s husband, Alec O’Neill. He was dark-haired, tall and thin, with an athletic tightness to his body. He wore jeans and a blue sweater, and he held his hand toward her, tentatively, his pale blue eyes asking her what his future held.

      She shook his hand quickly. “Mr. O’Neill.” She would make the words come out very slowly. “I’m so sorry. The bullet went straight through her heart. The damage was too extensive.”

      There was still hope in his eyes. It was always that way. Until you said it clearly, until you stopped mincing words, that hope would be there. The son understood, though. He looked like a younger version of his father—the same black hair, striking pale blue eyes beneath dark brows. He turned to face the wall, his shoulders heaving, although he made no sound.

      “Do you understand what Dr. Simon is saying?” Kevin asked.

      The man stared at her. “Are you saying Annie’s dead?”

      Olivia nodded. “I’m sorry. We worked on her for over an hour but there was …”

      “No!” The girl threw herself at Olivia, knocking her into the wooden arm of one of the chairs. She flailed at her with closed fists, but Kevin wrapped his arms around her from behind before she could cause any real harm. “She can’t be dead!” the girl screamed. “There wasn’t any blood.”

      Alec O’Neill extracted the girl from Kevin’s grip and pulled her into a hug. “Shh, Lacey.”

      Olivia regained her balance and set a hand on the girl’s back. How did she know about the blood? “She was bleeding inside, honey,” Olivia said.

      The girl pushed Olivia’s arm away. “Don’t call me honey.”

      Alec O’Neill pulled Lacey closer to him and she began to weep against his chest. Olivia looked at Kevin. She felt helpless.

      “I’ll stay with them,” Kevin said.

      Olivia walked to the door but turned back to face the family once more. “If you have any questions, please call me.”

      Alec O’Neill looked across the room at her and Olivia stood fast, forcing herself to face the hurt in his eyes. She’d taken something from him. She needed to give him something back.

      “She was very beautiful,” she said.

      Jonathan and the helicopter pilot were standing in the hallway, and she had to pass them to get to her office.

      “Nice job,” Jonathan said, his tone mocking.

      She ignored him and walked into her office, where she cranked open her windows to let in the cold air. The snow was still falling, so silently that when she held her breath she could hear the thunder of the ocean two blocks away.

      After a while, Kevin poked his head in her door. “You okay, Olivia?”

      She turned away from the window, sat down behind her desk. “Yes. How’s her family?”

      Kevin stepped into the room. “Dad and the son went in to see her,” he said as he sat down across the desk from her. “Daughter didn’t want to. I think they’ll be okay. Pretty solid family. Mom was the hub, though, you know, so it’s hard to say.” He shook his head. “Life sucks sometimes, doesn’t it?”

      “Yes.”

      “Looks like this one was pretty rough on you.” She felt a tear hit her cheek and Kevin plucked a tissue from the box on her desk and handed it to her. “Cramer’s an asshole,” he said.

      “I’m all right.” She sat up straight, blew her nose. “So, do you ever have to comfort Jonathan or Mike? Hand them tissues?”

      Kevin smiled. “You think women have exclusive rights on feeling like shit?”

      She thought of Alec O’Neill’s eyes when she’d left the waiting room. Those eyes were going to haunt her for a long time. “No, I guess not,” she said. “Thanks for stopping in, Kevin.”

      It was after seven. Her shift was long over. She could leave now, anytime she wanted. She would drive to her house on the sound where she would have to tell Paul what had happened tonight, and for the second time that night she would watch a man crumble. What was it about Annie O’Neill?

      Olivia looked down at her hand where it rested in her lap. She turned it palm side up and thought she could still feel it—the life, the warmth of Annie’s heart.

      CHAPTER TWO

      Paul Macelli turned off the Christmas tree lights at seven forty-five and returned to the dining room table, where the turkey, the sweet potatoes, the green beans had grown cold. The gravy had formed a skin and he dabbed at it with his knife, watching the pale brown film coat the silver. He’d lit candles, poured wine. He was trying, wasn’t he? But damn Olivia. She gave his anger justification at every turn. Her work was more important than her marriage. Even on Christmas she couldn’t get out of the emergency room on time.

      He looked up at the darkened tree. He probably wouldn’t have bothered with one this year, but Olivia had bought it on her own a week earlier, a mountainous blue pine that she set up herself in front of the window facing Roanoke Sound. She decorated it with the ornaments they’d collected over the nine years of their marriage and strung it with tiny white lights. Last year he had dropped the crystal star they’d always put on top, and so, he thought nobly, it was up to him to find a replacement. He knew exactly what he wanted, had seen it weeks earlier in Annie’s studio. He’d been excited by the prospect of having a legitimate reason to go back, a legitimate reason to see her and feel himself surrounded by her stained glass and photographs. But she hadn’t been there on that particular morning,

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