LITMIR.BIZ

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now. The person on the other end of the line was definitely not forty-five.

      Her mouth felt like cotton. Cate forced herself to speak. “Hello, this is Catherine Kowalski. Is this Joan Cunningham?”

      There was a short, breathless, nervous laugh. It was as if the girl was unaccustomed to speaking to people. “No, this is Rebecca.”

      That would be Joan’s daughter, Cate thought. There was a pause, after which Cate pressed on. “Then may I speak to Joan, please?”

      “Sorry, she’s not here.”

      Damn it, she’d waited too long. Joan had left the house for the day. According to what she’d found, her birth mother worked as an interior designer in one of those small, trendy stores along the Pacific Coast Highway. Athena and Daughter.

      With effort, she managed to rein in her impatience. “What time will she be back?” Cate asked politely.

      “I’m not really sure,” the girl responded. “My mom’s in the hospital.”

      Chapter 8

      Christian flipped the chart closed and frowned. This was the downside of his job and he hated it.

      He never minded being roused out of bed at some ungodly hour of the night or predawn to help bring a new life into the world. Even in his worst moments, when the futility of life got to be too much for him, there was something indescribably exhilarating about holding a brand-new human being in his hands. About seeing eyes open for the very first time. About seeing a tiny chest rise and fall as a baby took its first breath. All of it humbled him.

      And made him feel hope.

      Hope was what he tried to dispense now to Joan Cunningham, the woman in room 527. Hope that the life she cherished so much was not going to be cruelly yanked away from her now, in the prime of her life.

      He knew she was frightened. Who wouldn’t be in her place? She’d come to his office two days ago with huge eyes and a tremor in her voice. Even as she spoke, there was a silent plea in her eyes, a plea for him to tell her that her fears were unfounded.

      He wished he could. But the test results indicated otherwise.

      Walking into her hospital room, he tried hard to appear upbeat. It wasn’t easy for him. The moment she saw him enter, the woman stiffened as if she were anticipating a physical blow.

      He spoke quietly, softly, hoping to soothe her. “Joan, I’m afraid there’s no way to say this except to say it, so we’re going to get the bad part over with first.” Christian realized that he was bracing himself as much as his patient was. “The tumor appears to be malignant.”

      Joan’s long, delicate hands flew up to her mouth as she tried to keep the sob back. She paled, growing whiter than her sheet. He knew one could be braced for the worst, but never fully be prepared for it. Losing Alma had proven that to him.

      “Oh God,” Joan cried. “Oh God, oh God.”

      “But,” he continued gently, taking her hand and holding it tightly, as if to anchor her to the world, “there is every indication that once we remove it, everything’ll be fine.”

      “It?” Her voice was hollow, numb, as she repeated the single word. Her hand went to her right breast, covering it protectively. Joan was terrified. “You mean my breast?”

      He empathized even if he could not relate. “No, just the tumor.”

      It would have been prudent to add “For now” and cover his bases, but Christian refused to do that to the woman. Refused to hedge at her expense. They’d cross each bridge when they came to it. And they might not have to make that final journey. For now, that was all he was going to focus on.

      “It’s very, very tiny,” he assured her. “I’ve already spoken to the surgeon. You can be scheduled for surgery as early as this afternoon.” He saw fear rise in her eyes. She had to be feeling that things were careering beyond her control. In her place, he knew he would. Christian did what he could to make her feel that it wasn’t all out of her reach. “The final decision, of course, is yours.”

      Joan nervously passed her tongue over her lips as she raised her eyes to his. “What’s your opinion?”

      He gave her the benefit of his experience—and all the extensive reading he’d done on the subject. Christian didn’t believe in entering into a situation unprepared. “I think an aggressive course of action is the most effective way to go. Have the operation and recover. Your life’ll be on track again soon.”

      Joan swallowed hard. The lump in her throat was almost choking her. That’s all she needed, another lump, she thought cynically. Her fingers dug into his hand as her eyes searched his face. “Do you promise?”

      His profession had long since gotten away from making promises. The day of the promise had gone the way of exchanging medical services for a chicken and three potatoes. These days, people were far too eager to sue over the smallest of things, and this was by no means a small thing. But he couldn’t divorce himself from his patients, couldn’t think of them as merely names on a file, statistics in a computer, the way so many of his colleagues did.

      That wasn’t his way. His way was to care. Usually too much.

      Christian closed his hand around hers and looked into her eyes. “I promise.”

      Joan let out a shaky breath. Nervously, she ran her hand through her pale reddish hair and wondered if she was going to lose it in the treatment. She’d always been so proud of her hair. So vain. “I should discuss this with my husband.”

      He moved over to the telephone on the nightstand beside her bed, picked up the receiver and handed it to her.

      “Call him.” And then he nodded toward the door. “I’ll be back in a little while. I have a few other patients to see to.”

      Joan nodded mechanically. She looked like a woman whose whole world had been turned upside down, and who could blame her? he thought. It had. And he of all people could identify with the helpless feeling that had to be coursing through her veins.

      With any luck, though, all this would be temporary and they would have her back on her feet soon. In his case, the helpless feeling was permanent. Nothing was ever going to change that.

      He heard Joan begin to press the numbers that would connect her to her husband’s telephone at work. He moved out of the room to give her privacy.

      Preoccupied, Christian walked right into a woman standing directly outside Joan’s door. The impact was sudden and startling.

      He had close to a foot on her and nearly knocked her to the floor. Instinct had Christian’s hand shooting out to grabbed her and keep the woman from falling. Pulling too hard, he wound up pulling her into him. He was vaguely aware of soft breasts brushing against him a second before he stepped back.

      He was also mildly aware of the buzz of electricity just before contact was broken.

      “Sorry.”

      The woman, blond, twenty-ish and dressed for business, shrugged and forced a smile to her lips. “My fault.”

      He could feel her eyes sweeping over him, as if she was trying to place him. Did he know her? No, he was fairly confident he would have remembered a woman who looked like her.

      Christian sank his hands deep into the pockets of his lab coat. The almost pleasant hum throughout his body had yet to cease, even though he willed it to. “Are you looking for someone?”

      Still staring at him, she appeared to hesitate before finally answering. “An outpatient here.”

      Only two of the patients on the floor were his. The others were in the maternity ward two floors up. The woman with the soft smile would do best to ask for her friend’s room number where the names were listed.

      “The nurses’ station is right over there.” He pointed it out to her.

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