Critical Care (21 page)

Sarah snapped the guide blade into the laryngoscope handle
and watched its tiny bulb light, proving its readiness to aid in the
insertion of an infant breathing tube. She repeated the process for
all the blades and all the bulbs, then took one more look at the
gauges on the oxygen tanks and nodded with satisfaction.

After closing the last drawer of the crash cart, she stared at it for
a moment, smiling. The rolling cart, red metal with half a dozen
lockable drawers, was actually the same kind mechanics used, that Sarah's father always used down at the body shop. She'd explained
that to him once and he'd gotten a kick out of it, saying doctors
could learn a thing or two from mechanics. He always joked that
way, always had a ready smile and a hug and an encouraging word.
Does he remember it's almost his granddaughter's birthday?

She turned to look through the window of the nursery at the
neat rows of infant carts. Their bundled occupants were in various
states of wakefulness: some red-faced and squalling, some peaceful with lips puckering in their sleep, and some squinting at the
overhead lights. All achingly precious. Each requiring infinite care
and protection.

Sarah checked her watch as she walked toward the elevators.
She had time to get the yogurt and be back from her lunch break
early. And then she'd stick around the ER another half hour or
so after she clocked out tonight to make up for being late. She
couldn't let it happen ever again. Erin didn't deserve that; she was
too good of a charge nurse to be burdened with sloppy staff. Sarah
would sleep better after Emily's birthday passed. Meanwhile, she'd
be careful with those pills. She wouldn't be late again. She couldn't
let Logan down.

"It's been great," Logan said, steering the jeep into the grocery store
parking lot where they'd arranged to meet this morning. He pulled
in next to Claire's SUV and left the engine running. "And I ..."
Don't want to let you drive away. So why was he? Why was he letting
her gather her things, sort her fishing gear from his, fumble with
those rubber boots? "No, Claire. Don't do that."

"What? Oh, are these your salmon eggs?" She looked up, lips
parting and cheeks pink from a day in the sun.

Logan's heart thudded in his ears. Don't go.

Claire held up the jar of fluorescent orange bait. "Did I take
yours by mistake?"

"No," Logan said, his voice sounding as breathless as it had
when he'd clambered after her on that mountain trail early this
morning. "I'm saying the only mistake is ending this day. I mean,
hey, it's not late-it's barely six. We could. . . " He smiled foolishly,
his mind a complete vacuum. "Let's go do something else, okay?"

Claire bit her lip, and Logan knew she was trying not to laugh
at him. He waited, half expecting her to beg off and say she had
to go buy Smokey's toy or run a marathon before dark, that she'd
already spent way too much time with him. But he had to try. Stay
with me, Claire.

She narrowed her eyes. "Where? Where would you take me?"

The idea came to Logan as naturally as breathing, though it
had never occurred to him to take any woman there before. Hadn't
wanted to. Until now.

"To my land ... my building site," he said. "I want to show
you the sunset."

Claire rested her palm on the sun-warmed granite boulder and
gazed across the vista, awed by its beauty. Mountaintop after
mountaintop brushed with late afternoon sunlight like molten
gold, tree-dotted valleys of purple and indigo, scattered meadows
of green, and the river slicing through the gorge below ...

She spread her arms wide and turned back. "It's ..." She shook
her head helplessly, feeling a wave of dizziness. "I can't even find
the words."

Logan's smile widened and spread to crinkle the edges of his
eyes, and Claire sensed that her breathless attempt at words had
been exactly what he'd hoped for.

"Wait until you see the sunset. But first, let me show you this."
He held up a rolled sheet of paper. "My house plans."

They pulled camp chairs from the back of the Jeep, along with
their jackets and the containers of coffee and oatmeal cookies
they'd bought en route-treats Claire insisted on paying for this
time. Then she followed Logan as he paced off the perimeters of
his rooms and described in detail the solar heating system, the
redwood and steel cable decks, a ceiling-high river rock fireplace,
and even a future golden retriever-likely named Scout in honor
of his first dog-who'd doze in front of it one day.

Logan stopped and pointed skyward. "You can't believe the
stars I can see from here. I'm thinking of putting in a skylight, right
up ... there." He looked at Claire, tapping the house plans. "We're
standing in the master bedroom."

"Oh." Claire glanced away, fighting a teen-worthy blush and
realizing that her wish to know more about this man couldn't have
come truer. Even if he hadn't broached the subject of his past marriage, Logan was sharing something just as intimate-his future
plans, his hopes, his dream dog ... and bedroom skylight. Claire
cleared her throat. "And I see that you also have a sizable oak
stump in the middle of your floor."

"Tell me about it." Logan groaned. "Are you as good with an
ax as you are with a fishing pole?"

They laughed and set their chairs side by side on what would
one day be a deck, then dug into the cookies and coffee while waiting for the sunset. Claire leaned her head back, closing her eyes
and thinking that this time with Logan, which had been penciled
nowhere on her long list of plans, had been perfect. From the daffodils on the hood of the SUV last night to that ridiculous tussle
with the trout, lunch in Tahoe ... all of it. And there was nothing
more she needed to hear about Logan or his past. It was enough
to be sitting here close enough that their shoulders brushed, ready
to share a sunset. Claire glanced at Logan out of the corner of her
eye and saw his eyes were closed too and that his lips had curved
into a half smile. Maybe he was thinking the same thing about
their day.

"Beckah would change everything about this house," he said,
opening his eyes.

Huh? Claire's breath stuck in her chest. What on earth was she
supposed to say to that?

Nothing apparently, since Logan continued without looking
her way. "My ex-wife," he explained. "I can see it now. She'd have
French doors, painted shutters, stained glass, and Victorian birdcages in the breakfast room."

"Your ex-wife ... liked ... birds?" Claire asked, knowing that
the silly question would completely derail his train of thought. But
she wanted to respond in a gentle way so as not to appear intrusive.
No, that wasn't it. That wasn't it at all. Claire nearly groaned at
the irony. For days she'd been dying to know more about Beckah
Caldwell. But now I don't want him to talk about her. I don't want to
think of him ever having a wife.

Logan laughed and turned toward Claire. "Ever step into a tub
and find a pair of finches perched on the showerhead? It was bad
enough we didn't have a real shower and the showerhead was so
low I had to stoop down to wash my hair, but ..." His voice faded
into a chuckle and he shook his head. "Yeah, you might say she
has a thing for birds."

Has. Present tense. Because he still talks to her. Claire glanced
at the mountains. Suddenly she wanted the sunset over and done
with. So she could go home to Smokey and go to work tomorrow, then go on doing anything else but listening to Logan talk
about-

"Beckah and I are two different kinds of people," Logan said,
his expression growing serious. "And we didn't want the same
things out of life. I should have paid more attention to that." He
shrugged slightly and his shoulder moved against Claire's. "If I had,
we might not have gotten married."

"Um . . ." Claire reminded herself to breathe. Unfortunately
she'd gotten exactly what she'd asked for in this awkward conversation. Logan wanted to talk about his ex-wife. So be it. "How long were you married?" she asked as casually as she could after taking
a sip of her coffee.

"Almost three years. Seemed shorter. Probably because I was
working an insane number of hours. Commuting between hospitals in three different cities to pay down my student loans, studying for the Emergency Medicine Boards, and. . . " He sighed. "You
know how this business is."

"I do," she answered with complete sincerity.

"Well, she didn't ... doesn't. That was part of it, I suppose. She's
from a family with seven kids. With those Sunday suppers where you
risk being stabbed with a fork if you try to reach for more than your
share of meat loaf?" He smiled. "Nah, really, they're great people.
Beckah's mother especially. They made me feel like part of the family
from the very beginning. I'm sure that had a lot to do with it."

Claire's throat tightened, imagining Logan in that warm setting after a childhood filled with loneliness. It must have seemed
like a second chance at having a complete family. It had everything
to do with that, Logan. She nodded, watching him take a sip of his
coffee. "What does Beckah do? I mean, does she work?" Claire
realized with surprise that she was now feeling concern for a wife
whose husband was never home.

"She's a preschool teacher." Logan broke an oatmeal cookie
and handed Claire the larger half. "And she's really good at it.
Finches in the shower and dozens of finger paintings taped to the
wall of our kitchen." He gazed out toward the mountains, quiet for
a few seconds. "She wants at least four children."

Like Gayle did. Claire swallowed, thinking of Kevin's fiancee
and so many dreams that never came to be. The sun was lowering in the sky, and Claire watched as the gold deepened on the
mountaintops.

Logan turned to look at Claire, the emotion on his face difficult
to read. Was it concern, confusion ... regret? "Maybe she'll have
that chance now."

Claire raised her brows, not certain what he meant.

"She's getting married. On Saturday," he whispered.

"Ah." Claire nodded, not knowing what she could say after a
statement like that or what Logan wanted her to say. The sunset
couldn't come fast enough, because she did know one thing for
sure now. Logan still has deep feelings for his ex-wife.

Erin pressed her eyebrow tweezers into the tiny filigree box, tamping a last strip of paper down against the half-dozen others. Stay
there this time. She held her breath and reached for the miniscule
latch of the prayer bracelet charm. Before she could close it, the
fan-folded strip of paper sprang upward like a child's jack-in-thebox. Erin moaned. More like Brad-in-the-box.

The paper, fortune cookie thin, was Erin's printed prayer that
Brad was the kind of man she might have a future with one day. A
man she could finally trust with her heart. It was the very same thing
she'd prayed for with the last guy she dated, the guy before that, and
every doomed relationship she'd had in the last ten years. All the
frogs that flunked Prince 101. Was it possible she was destined to
meet every bad egg in northern California? Or is it ... me?