While they ate, Jan had sketched out the story of Zack and the broken engagement. Now here they sat at the table while her daughter struggled with the news.
“As I told you, I hadn’t seen him since before you were born.” Jan supposed she might have to repeat this story several times before the details make sense to Kimmie. “But now that we’ve moved back to California, it turns out we’re going to be working together.”
“He can’t be my dad,” Kimmie insisted. “He’s that other girl’s daddy. The one in the third grade.”
“She’s his stepdaughter.”
“Why didn’t he come visit me?” The plaintive note in her voice cut into Jan. It’s mostly my fault.
“I told you your father lived far away and had another family.” Thank goodness she had provided that much of the truth.
“I thought you meant in a galaxy far, far away,” her daughter said. “Or in a castle. Or...something.” From the dining nook, Kimmie stared across the front room.
Jan wished she could crawl into her daughter’s mind to help sort things out. But she had to sit here and let Kimmie work through her own thoughts.
As she waited for whatever her daughter might say next, she noticed how cramped this room was compared to the house they’d rented in Houston. As for the worn couch, chairs and tables purchased at secondhand stores, they’d gained even more nicks and scrapes in the cross-country move. The lace doilies and ruffled pillows Jan had added to freshen them had taken a beating, as well. She made a mental note to replace them.
In a corner sat their small, outdated TV. Jan tried not to compare it to Zack’s flat-screen TV or contrast these tight quarters with his house. Her salary at Safe Harbor would enable her to pay off the last of her student loans soon and start saving for a house. Meanwhile, she and Kimmie had a safe, comfortable place to live. Plenty of people in the world would be grateful for that.
“How come he loves that other little girl and he doesn’t love me?” her daughter asked.
That hurt. “He doesn’t know you because we’ve been living across the country, but he wants to. He’s invited you to lunch on Sunday. Just you and him.”
Kimmie’s eyes widened as if a new thought had struck her. “I don’t have to go live with him, do I?”
“Of course not!” Jan reached over to pat her arm. “You’re still my little girl. Why do you ask that?”
“My friend Allie has to spend weekends with her daddy.” Allie was her best friend in Texas.
“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to,” Jan promised. “I know this is a shock, but you have been wanting a daddy, and now he’s here. I couldn’t tell you about him until I’d spoken with him.”
“That other girl...” Kimmie frowned, thinking so hard Jan could almost feel the brain waves. “Where’s her mommy?”
“She died.” Jan hadn’t asked the circumstances. Nor, she admitted with a twinge of guilt, had she considered how terrible his wife’s death must have been for Zack. I used to resent her. Now I wish she was alive.
“What if I hate him?” Kimmie persisted. “Can I pick another daddy?”
Jan nearly laughed out loud. There was no predicting how a child’s mind worked. “You’ll like him. He’s a good man.” A responsible and usually kind one...but rigid and unjust sometimes, too.
Ever since their earlier conversation, old wounds that Jan believed were healed had begun to throb. This must be the psychological equivalent of the scar tissue her father used to complain about. A firefighter injured on the job, he’d chafed at working a desk position and pushed himself to get back into shape. Under stress, however, his old injuries had flared up. Worse, the damage from smoke inhalation had contributed to the lung disease that killed him.
“What will he do with Smidge?” demanded Kimmie.
Depending on how she described the situation, Jan realized she could easily put Zack in a bad light. But while this might feel to her like a battle for her daughter’s affections, she knew if she indulged in a me-against-him mentality, the loser would be Kimmie.
“He promised to take the kitten to a shelter that will find a good home for it,” Jan said. “It’s a place Mrs. Humphreys recommended.”
“He could keep it and let me visit.”
“There’ll be other kittens.” That weak response was the best she could devise at the moment. Time to change the subject. “Where do you want to go for lunch on Sunday?”
“Is what’s-her-name coming, too?”
“Berry.”
“That’s a funny name. Like a fruit.”
“It’s lucky they didn’t name her Banana!” They shared a chuckle. “Don’t tell her that, you’ll hurt her feelings. And no, she’s not coming. She’s singing with a church group.”
“Oh.” Kimmie considered. “How about pancakes? You never let me have pancakes for lunch.”
No harm in that, for once. “I’ll suggest it to him,” Jan said. “Okay?”
“I guess so.” More intense concentration was followed by “What do I call him?”
Important question, to which Jan had no easy answer. “What do you want to call him?”
“He said his name is Zack. I can call him that.”
Jan nodded and began clearing the dishes. If Zack preferred to be called dad or daddy, he could tell Kimmie himself.
That had gone well, she supposed. There’d be more questions and emotional ups and downs ahead, no doubt. Still, if she and Zack maintained their delicate balance, eventually the idea of having a daddy who lived nearby would begin to seem normal to their daughter.
Jan doubted being around Zack would ever feel normal to her. There was too much hurt and disappointment. The yearning she still felt, against her will, to touch him and see that special smile light his eyes—the loving support she’d needed so badly and the memory of how he’d given it to someone else—only made things worse.
How many hundreds of times had she mentally relived that night at the hospital, the one that had destroyed everything? She’d read the doctor’s orders in disbelief. This world-renowned cardiologist had prescribed what she believed to be an overdose of medication.
Certain the nursing supervisor would recognize the mistake as she did, Jan had gone in search of the woman. To her shock, Mrs. Snodgrass had reacted with fury. “You should know better than to question Dr. Ringgel’s orders. You’re barely out of nursing school!”
Jan had offered to show the order to the cardiology resident, who’d been sleeping in the on-call room after a long shift. The supervisor had refused to wake him.
Confused, Jan had asked another nurse what she thought. Although the woman agreed the dose was too large, she’d explained Mrs. Snodgrass had once countermanded Dr. Ringgel’s orders and suffered a reprimand that delayed her promotion to supervisor.
Afraid of causing injury, Jan had dredged up her courage and put in a call to the cardiologist. When he answered, she could hear crowd noises at the background. “You’re interrupting my granddaughter’s wedding reception to question my orders?” he’d roared. “You’re a little nobody. Follow my instructions or I’ll have you dismissed!”
Once again she’d gone to Mrs. Snodgrass, who’d become even angrier on learning Jan had disturbed Dr. Ringgel. “Where did you earn your medical degree, Nurse Garcia?” she’d demanded. “Administer the medication now.”
Later, Jan had wished over and over that she’d stood her ground. Had she been more experienced and confident, she
could have insisted she was too uncomfortable to give the dose and that the nursing supervisor administer it herself. But she’d been only twenty-two and accustomed to obeying her superiors, and had begun doubting her own judgment.
So she’d followed orders and nearly killed the patient.
She’d been horrified and guilt-stricken. When Dr. Ringgel denied speaking to her and Mrs. Snodgrass claimed Jan hadn’t mentioned the situation, she’d been stunned but certain the hospital records would back her up. Only they didn’t.
The other nurse hadn’t dared open her mouth. When Zack insisted Jan must be lying, she’d felt utterly betrayed.
For weeks after breaking their engagement she’d been trapped in a haze of disbelief, which gradually yielded to anger. When she discovered she was pregnant, despite the fact they’d used contraception, she’d flung the information at Zack. Although she’d brought papers for him to waive his parental rights, she’d hoped he would beg her to take back the ring and marry him.
Instead, he’d signed the papers. No expression of warmth or concern—merely icy acceptance.
Facing an uncertain personal future and a career in shambles, Jan had hired a lawyer with her parents’ help. He’d subpoenaed phone records that showed she’d called the doctor. He’d also persuaded the other nurse, who by then had quit in disgust to work at a different facility, to testify about her conversation with Jan that night and about seeing the doctor’s wrong dosage.
By the time Kimmie was born, the hospital had quietly settled, providing enough money for Jan’s living expenses and part of her master’s degree, as well as clearing her name. The doctor, diagnosed in the early stages of dementia, had been allowed to retire and relinquish his medical license. The nursing supervisor had been demoted. If she’d falsified those records herself, she should have been fired, but Jan never found out the rest of the story.
In any event it had been too late for her and Zack. Although she’d persuaded herself she’d made the right decision in keeping Kimmie without his knowledge, the day of reckoning had come at last.
As she loaded the dishwasher and prepared to read with Kimmie, Jan hoped the change in their lives wasn’t going to harm her little girl or Zack’s stepdaughter, or disrupt the environment at work. With luck, the two of them could keep this matter private, as they’d agreed. Eventually the girls might become friends. Perhaps even feel like sisters.
But she had a suspicion this process wasn’t going to be nearly as easy as that.
Chapter Five
Zack awoke Tuesday morning with a kitten sitting on his face.
Sitting might not be the correct term. Falling, pouncing, or possibly stumbling. All he knew was one minute he was performing mental surgery on an endless row of dream patients lying anesthetized in a long operating room, and the next tiny claws dug into his face while fur tickled his nose.
He sneezed and instinctively batted the thing away. A mew of protest brought his startled attention to a small orange-and-white figure trying to right itself while thrashing amid the sheets. Against the dark blue bedding, the creature stood out like a sunburst.
Reaching for it, Zack halted with his hand in midair. His face stung from the piercings, which he assumed were unintentional. Now the kitten appeared to be in fighting mode. The last thing a surgeon needed was deep scratches on his hands.
Sitting up, he stared at the furry invader, trying to figure out how it got here. Technically, the answer was a jump from the floor onto a footstool Berry used to need, then to a chair, and then to the bed.
But he’d firmly closed the downstairs bathroom door. And that was a steep flight of stairs for such a small creature.
“Berry?” he called.
His daughter’s face poked into view in the open doorway. “Oh, there she is!”
“You brought her upstairs?” The answer was obvious. Even though he’d expressly told her the kitten was to stay in the washroom, Zack decided not to press the issue.
Last night when he’d explained about the baby he’d given up for adoption and who wasn’t adopted after all, she’d received the news with her usual somberness. When he’d added that Kimmie attended the same school and had rescued the kitten, Berry had frowned.
“I heard about that!” she’d said. “That’s where Smidge came from?”
He’d already regretted revealing the little creature’s name. “Yes, but she can’t stay. You know our rule about pets.”
Receiving no response, he’d added that he had asked Kimmie to lunch on Sunday while Berry was singing. Since parents weren’t invited to the convalescent home, his absence hadn’t seemed to pose a problem.
He must have missed something. Bringing the kitten upstairs constituted an act of rebellion for Berry.
As she crossed the room, her cranberry-colored pajamas flattering the milk-chocolate creaminess of her skin, he noticed with a start how tall she’d grown. Berry came from a tall family: Rima had been five foot eight, and at six foot two, Berry’s uncle Edgar had a good four inches on Zack. Berry wasn’t there yet, but she must have grown two inches over the summer.
“Good morning, angel.” He reached out to hug his daughter but missed. She’d bent to scoop up the kitten.
Holding the little creature, she sat on the edge of the bed. “I’m keeping her.” Was that a trace of defiance? Totally out of character.
“We already discussed that.” This wasn’t a negotiation. Parents set the rules.
“My room’s plenty big. She can sleep with me, and we’ll put the litter box in my bathroom.” Apparently she’d given this a lot of thought. “You won’t know she’s there.”
Don’t kid yourself. Zack glanced at the clock. They’d have to rush to get ready for school and work. He had patients tightly scheduled this morning to make time for this afternoon’s staff meeting, and Berry shouldn’t be late for school, either.
However, an eight-year-old deserved the truth. “I’m coming home at noon to take her to the animal shelter. Like I said, they’ll find her a good home.”
Berry clutched the kitten to her shoulder. Her fierce expression reminded him of Kimmie’s. “This is her home.”
“We’re gone all day.” Zack threw off the covers and slid out the other side of the bed. “It’s unfair to her. She’ll be lonely.”
“Roar will watch over her.” That was Berry’s stuffed lion. “She likes being a mommy.”
“Roar is a she?” That was news to him, Zack reflected as he tugged the covers into place.
Berry nodded. “We both love Smidge.” She rubbed her cheek over the kitten, which poked a paw into her curly hair. The claw stuck. The more the kitten tried to pull its paw free, the more entangled it became. “Ow!”
Zack gently freed his daughter’s hair. “We should get this cut.” She’d worn cute, short curls until last spring, when she insisted on letting her hair grow. It was long enough now to braid for special occasions.
“No!” As soon as she could move freely, she drew away.
“Fine. You can let it grow as long as you like.” Even though Zack considered longer hair inconvenient, she had a right to choose her hairstyle. Pets were another matter. “But I don’t want you to come home expecting to find the kitten here.”
“Then I’m not going to school!” Lips quivering, Berry hurried out of the room cradling the animal. Down the hall he heard her door shut, not quite hard enough to constitute a slam.
This is what comes of doing Jan a favor. No, that wa
s unfair. He hadn’t brought Smidge home for Jan’s sake, but for Kimmie’s.
Almost certain that despite her words his daughter had the sense to dress for school, Zack showered and put on slacks, a freshly laundered shirt and a sport jacket. In the mirror he saw that his dark blond hair swept across his forehead in the casual style he preferred. What if someone told him he had to get a buzz cut to be more practical?
I didn’t say that. Keeping an animal in the house was another matter. In addition to the risk of fleas and infections, there’d be the litter box to change, food to monitor, hair balls and fur everywhere and expensive trips to the veterinarian.
His arguments lined up like soldiers on a parade field, Zack went to knock on his daughter’s door. To his relief Berry emerged in jeans and a clean T-shirt, her hair damp and combed. From the way she closed the door behind her, he gathered the kitten was inside.
Zack fixed a breakfast of cereal, milk and sliced fruit. Because Berry came from a family with a deadly history of heart disease, he emphasized a healthy diet and exercise even more than he might have otherwise.
After washing her hands at Zack’s insistence—he wasn’t taking any chances with that kitten—Berry ate hungrily. Zack wasn’t sure whether to mention the cat again or leave the matter alone. He’d already informed her he planned to drive Smidge to the shelter at noon. While she might fuss when she got home and found the kitten gone, Berry would get over it quickly.
He’d buy her a new stuffed animal. Better yet, he’d take her shopping this evening.
Berry set down her spoon. “On Sunday,” she announced, “I want to go to Brady’s house after we sing.”
“Brady’s house?” Although Berry sometimes kidded around with the younger boy at church, they weren’t close friends. However, he did sing in the choir and his mother, Kate, served as assistant choir director, so they’d both be participating in the special event. “I can try to arrange it, but why?” Zack asked.
SH Medical 09 - The M.D.'s Secret Daughter Page 5
