LITMIR.BIZ

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and tired. It was a natural consequence, she was certain, from running for too many days on too little sleep. Packing up in D.C., driving halfway across the country and taking over a department in disarray left no time for rest. Of course she couldn’t focus. She was tired. Not old and tired. Just tired.

      But she needed to focus on these numbers. She needed to win another research contract with PLI. Braden MacDowell’s company.

      Braden. He was why she felt so old. Six years had passed, but they felt like sixty. Seeing Braden had been a shock, but it was already over, and Lana would be dealing with Cheryl Gassett from now on. Myrna already knew the PLI representative, in fact. It was quite possible that Lana might never see Braden again.

      The thought almost made her sad. Braden was part of her lost youth.

      Lost youth? She was only thirty-four. This pity party had to stop. She had a job to do.

      Lana crammed her feet back into the pumps she’d kicked off. She sat up straighter in her chair and tugged her dress into place.

      My completely unsexy, strictly business dress.

      What had Braden thought of her severe appearance? Had he wondered what had happened to his former bed partner? Had he thanked his lucky stars that he hadn’t been saddled with her as a wife after all?

      God, she felt old.

      She turned away from the monitor and flipped open the three-ring binder that held the paperwork for the patients in the migraine study. They’d have to be contacted, asked to return early, and their remaining pills—whether active or placebo dummies—would have to be retrieved. Lana ran her finger down the page of names. Instead of numbers, letters jumped and swam on the page. So many people, so little hope for them. How could Braden be so heartless?

      He hadn’t always been. She’d been engaged to a man who’d been gentle with the patients in this hospital, gentle with the horses on his ranch, gentle with her when the grueling process of becoming a doctor consumed her life. Then he’d left her and their dream of working together behind, and she’d been heartbroken that her fiancé had been driven by the need to make money.

      There was no money in treating migraines, he’d said. Lana trailed her finger down the page, seeing patient after patient who would not be helped because they couldn’t generate a profit.

      One name, one name in the entire bunch, jumped off the page, crystal clear, in perfect focus.

      Oh, Braden, how could you?

      His own mother was about to lose her chance for pain relief. Marion MacDowell had been receiving the active medicine.

      Lana glanced at Braden’s card. She’d set it off to the side of her desk. Lana was not supposed to deal with PLI’s president directly, but this Cheryl Gassett did not have the power to keep a study running. Only Braden did.

      His mother’s involvement in the study might not be enough to sway him. One patient made no difference to a worldwide corporation, and Braden represented that corporation.

      Then again, even Braden MacDowell in pursuit of the almighty dollar might not be able to ignore his own mother’s needs. Maybe Lana could keep the migraine study going.

      I regret to inform you that Plaine Laboratories International has decided to end all trials. Goodbye, Dr. Donnoli.

      No, that couldn’t be the last word between them.

      Lana picked up the phone and dialed.

      * * *

      “Excuse me, Mom. I need to take this call.”

      No matter where he was in the world, Braden’s assistant took all his calls, acting as his gatekeeper. She only picked up on the fifth ring, however, an arrangement that gave Braden the option of answering if he felt it was necessary. As his phone rang, Braden recognized the first digits on the caller ID as being from West Central. It could be Jamie calling. Or Quinn. Or...

      “MacDowell,” he answered on the fourth ring.

      “It’s Lana. I’d like to set up a meeting. I’ve got more information on that migraine trial.”

      Or it could be his former fiancée, suddenly back in his life when he’d decided to let the last memory of her go.

      “Go ahead,” he said, standing up from his mother’s dining-room table and walking into the kitchen.

      “I’ve got availability every day this week. Is there a particular time that works best for you?”

      “I meant, go ahead. I’m listening. Let’s hear your pitch.”

      “Now?”

      He let his silence answer her. Did the woman not know how business was done? On the spot. At the moment. Around the clock.

      “I was calling to set up a future time. We can do this by phone, if you like, but I wasn’t planning on bothering you now, not while you’re traveling to Manhattan.”

      “If I weren’t ready to conduct business, I wouldn’t have answered the phone.” He didn’t say he wasn’t on a plane. He did not tell her he was standing in front of his mother’s kitchen sink, watching through the picture window as twilight settled over the distant barn and the even more distant fence line.

      Lana spoke evenly, although he was sure his terse response must have irritated her. “I didn’t call to give you a thirty-second canned speech. I am, however, ready to set up a time for the two of us to have an intelligent one-on-one discussion.”

      Braden heard the steel in her voice. Lana refused to be intimidated by him. She’d never been intimidated by anyone, he recalled.

      Good for her. She was going to need that backbone in her new position, but whether or not she had the chops to run West Central’s research was not his problem. In fact, West Central was not his problem, not directly. As president, he needed to deal with the big picture, not individual research sites.

      “Then when you’re ready to present whatever information you feel is necessary,” he said, “call Cheryl Gassett. I’m sure her contact info is in Dr. Montgomery’s records.”

      “I realize that the hospital your father founded is no longer worth your time, but I wanted to discuss something that I don’t think your regional rep needs to know.”

      Braden almost smiled. He had to give her points for bringing up his father, a blatant but understandable attempt to stir his emotions. In negotiations, when someone was stonewalling, it was possible to break through that wall by engaging that person’s emotions.

      Braden had always found it easy to stay detached during business negotiations. Emotions had no place in science. No place in research. Her attempt was useless.

      Lana spoke when he did not. “I’m worried about your mother’s involvement in this study.”

      Then again, his mother had no place in research, either. He glanced at her as she entered the kitchen. “My mother is ineligible for the study because she’s a relative of a PLI employee. She’s not enrolled in any study that I know of.”

      His mother looked surprised. She pointed to her chest and mouthed the question, Me?

      Braden raised an eyebrow in question, and she shook her head “no.”

      “In addition to being a PLI relation, my mother doesn’t suffer from migraines, so she wouldn’t be enrolled in this study in particular.”

      “Regardless, she is a patient in the study.” Lana’s tone was starting to reveal her irritation. Her emotions, at least, were engaged. “She was receiving the active drug, not the placebo. I’m asking you to reconsider. Don’t terminate a study that was benefiting your own mother.”

      “The study is not viable whether my mother is involved in it or not. And she’s not.”

      He looked toward his mother for affirmation, but this time she only used her hand to imitate a phone held to her

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