LITMIR.BIZ

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      Seeking personal admiration of any kind wasn’t her style. People either accepted her for what she was—or too bad. For them. She didn’t care. She never had.

      She was good at what she did. Extremely good. Numbers spoke to her. Accounting had been her thing, from the first course she’d taken in high school to her last full credit in college. She’d never encountered a set of books she couldn’t balance. A statement of changes she couldn’t reconcile.

      She was efficient. Organized. A merciless perfectionist.

      Some people had a problem with those qualities. Probably because they themselves were incapable of meeting standards that high. Those people tended to avoid Kim, and she was fine with that.

      Which was one reason working at night appealed to her so much. She could concentrate without interruption. As an added bonus, she didn’t have to listen to the annoying chatter of others who obviously socialized with each other outside of work. Kim checked her Timex and was surprised. She hadn’t planned to stay this late.

      It was past ten. She’d been lost in her analysis of outstanding payables for—what?—almost four hours. The Birth Place was out of money. Again. It was up to her to decide which suppliers they simply had to pay and which could be put off for a few more months.

      It was a job many would hate. But Kim didn’t mind.

      She flicked off the radio by her desk. She’d been listening to a classical station, the sound a comfort in the empty complex. Now, through her open office door, traveled a disquieting noise. Someone laughing quietly… No, crying.

      Lydia and Gina had been in earlier with a delivery. But she’d heard them leave hours ago. The night janitor had already made his rounds.

      Kim shivered and pulled on her gray cardigan, doing up each button, from the bottom to the very top. Grabbing the three-hole punch from her desk and holding it like a baseball bat, she went investigating. The door to the chief administrator’s office was shut tight. Since his marriage to Hope Tanner, Parker Reynolds had been taking work home rather than putting in extra hours at the center.

      The sound grew louder as she stepped into the main hall. It seemed to be coming from one of the birthing rooms to her right—definitely someone crying.

      No longer concerned about her physical safety, Kim set the three-hole punch on the empty reception desk, next to Trish Linden’s silly snow globe of Venice. The middle-aged receptionist had never ventured out of New Mexico. What was she doing with a souvenir of Italy of all places?

      Kim followed the hallway around the curving counter. One of the birthing-room doors stood ajar. A faint light slipped out into the hall.

      The sobbing was louder now. Raw and unrestrained.

      All Kim’s instincts told her to walk away. She did not want to get involved with this. But what if the person crying was Lydia? Kim would do anything for Lydia.

      Lydia Kane had founded The Birth Place when she was a young mother herself, many decades ago. Though she was now in her early seventies she still worked full-time as a midwife. The only sign she gave of easing up was her recent resignation from the board of directors. Kim guessed she’d made the move under pressure, for reasons Kim could only speculate about.

      She peeked through the open crack in the door. Sure enough it was Lydia. She’d changed out of the trousers and shirt she’d been wearing for the labor, earlier. Her long gray hair now hung down the back of a forest-green caftan. Kim watched the older woman pull a beautifully patterned quilt over freshly plumped pillows. As she worked efficiently, briskly, her crying continued.

      Lydia’s typical self-control and natural dignity made this a most incongruous sight. Again Kim’s instincts warned her to back away. But then she inadvertently pushed on the door and the hinges squeaked. Just a little, but enough.

      “Who’s there?” Lydia straightened and turned to face the door. “Kim?” She wiped away tears with the back of her hand. “What on earth are you doing here?”

      “Just some late-night accounting.” She didn’t share her worries about the finances. It wouldn’t be news to Lydia, anyway. They were all used to the center being short of funds, though Kim had been working to rectify the situation since she’d been on board. One of her first projects had been the renegotiation of their contracts with the various health-care providers.

      “You work too hard.”

      Kim stepped into the room. “What about you? Surely this could wait until morning.” She knew some of their contracts required the midwives to file notice of a baby’s birth within twenty-four hours. But that was paperwork. Why was Lydia cleaning the room?

      Lydia compressed her lips and turned away. The old woman’s long, lean body shook with the effort of controlling her tears.

      “Did something go wrong with the delivery tonight?”

      A sob escaped Lydia. A sob filled with deep, wrenching grief.

      Oh, God. What was she going to do? There was no one else at the center to deal with this. “Lydia, can I get you something?”

      “No. Nothing.” She sat on the edge of the bed, and Kim perched beside her.

      “Want to talk about what happened?”

      “No.” She shook her head, then sighed. “Yes. Do you remember Mary Davidson and her husband, Steve?”

      Kim nodded. She’d never met the couple, but she’d processed the initial payment from their insurance company. Then Steve had quit his job to start his own company and been taken off the company health plan. Their account had been on her receivables listing ever since.

      “I still can’t believe it happened. But I lost her tonight, Kim. I lost Mary and the baby. In all my years of midwifing, it’s never happened like this before.” Lydia’s hand trembled as she plucked a tissue from a box on a nearby end table. Kim picked up the entire box and placed it on Lydia’s lap.

      “I thought I heard some commotion—around seven o’clock?” She’d been heating up soup in the microwave for her dinner when she’d noticed Gina dashing down the hall.

      “Yes. We ended up transferring Mary to the hospital. I had a feeling something was going wrong, even though there didn’t seem to be a problem. In the beginning Mary progressed so normally, you see. Every indication was that this would be an uncomplicated birth.

      “But as labor progressed, I began to feel anxious. Over the years I’ve learned to trust my instincts. And so I drove Mary to the hospital. Steve followed in his vehicle. Oh my God, if only he’d ridden with me…” Lydia pressed a tissue over her mouth, stifling a ragged sob.

      Kim shivered as an awful suspicion prompted her to ask. “Did something happen to Steve?”

      Lydia nodded, her hands covering her face again. “After—” She paused for a strengthening breath. “After he heard about Mary and the baby he took off. About an hour later, he was rushed back to the hospital in an ambulance. Dead. Oh, Kim, he had an accident on Switchback Road!”

      Kim starred blankly at Lydia, stunned by the massive dimensions of this tragedy. The older midwife continued to take big gulps of air and eventually regained some composure.

      “It’s all so senseless. Mary Davidson was a healthy woman. She never should have died. As for her baby— I saw his face before the trouble started. He was so dear, so precious. A big baby, a healthy boy.”

      “Tell me what happened.” Kim wasn’t keen to hear the details, but it might help Lydia to talk. For sure, the older woman wasn’t ready to go home.

      Step-by-step Lydia went through the stages of Mary Davidson’s disastrous labor and delivery. Kim didn’t stop her for explanations of medical terms or procedures that she didn’t understand. She just let Lydia talk and talk, second-guessing each decision, going through all the options that had been open at the time.

      Finally she fell silent.

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