Heartbreaker

by Laurie Paige

  “I’ll get them,” the nurse said, and hurried out.

  “Can you tell me how Maria is? Is she…will she live?” Susan asked her mother.

  Kate’s smile was one of vast relief. “Maria is fine. She’ll have a very short hairdo for a while and she’ll sleep on her stomach, but her burns are mostly superficial except for a few spots on her upper back and neck.”

  “How did she catch on fire?” Susan asked.

  “She was having a party for her doll and decided to light a candle the way her mother had for her birthday. She put it on the floor in front of the doll, then turned around and bent over to get her teapot out of the toy box. The back of her dress apparently was directly over the flame and caught fire. If you hadn’t seen her in time—” Kate pressed a hand over her lips and shook her head.

  “She was running,” Susan murmured. Odd, but it hurt to speak, as if she had strep throat. “Flames were all up and down her back. I yelled and chased after her. Then things started going black and I was afraid I couldn’t reach her.”

  Michael lifted her hand to his lips. “You saved her. The word is already out.”

  She wanted to cling to him, but she refrained from reaching for him as an anchor of safety. She had to stand on her own two feet. “How did you know I was here? Did the hospital call?”

  “Somebody from Mission Creek called. It doesn’t matter,” he added when he saw the question forming on her lips. “Ah, the forms.”

  He took them from the nurse and showed her the places to sign. When it was done, the nurse witnessed the signature, then walked briskly from the room.

  “How long?” Susan asked.

  “Before we get a heart?” Michael shook his head. “Only God knows that. You’ll have to stay here until we do. Just in case—”

  “In case my heart goes crazy again,” she finished for him. “It was terrible when I realized I might not reach Maria, that I couldn’t catch her, a seven-year-old.”

  “Don’t think about it,” Kate begged, patting her arm. “Your father and Rose and Matt are here. Do you feel up to seeing them?”

  Susan looked at Michael. He nodded. “They can come in as soon as they scrub and put on surgical garb, provided they don’t have colds or anything contagious. No one but immediate family will be allowed in. You might pass the word to her friends and the dance company.”

  Kate left to tell the rest of the family. The room seemed too silent when she was alone with Michael. She watched him check the machine readouts, which showed her heart and breathing rates. “What’s that one?” she asked, pointing to another number.

  “The percentage of oxygen in your blood.”

  “My, you can tell everything about a person these days, just by hooking one up to a machine.”

  “Not everything.” His smile flashed quick and brilliant. “It doesn’t read the female mind.”

  “Are you really going to do the surgery?”

  “Yes.”

  She thought about it. “I suppose making love once doesn’t constitute a…personal involvement.”

  He adjusted the IV drip into her arm. “I think it does,” he told her in no uncertain terms.

  “I thought doctors couldn’t operate on people they lo—they’re involved with.”

  His gaze speared into her. “I won’t let anyone but the best touch you. You have my word on that. We have one of the most competent cardiac teams in the world at this hospital.”

  “But people die on operating tables, some from the trauma of the surgery if not the disease.”

  “That’s a chance we have to take.” He leaned over her. “I can divorce my feelings as a man from my skills as a surgeon. It’s something a doctor has to learn early on. If he doesn’t, he has a heart attack within ten years and is forced to do so or has to go into research, where he doesn’t have to have direct contact with patients.”

  “I see.”

  Now that the surgery was a foregone conclusion, she found she was no longer worried about it or her future. In those moments of chasing after Maria, when her body began to fail her, she’d known she had no choice. It was either surgery or death. She could take her pick.

  Sleep began to claim her. She wondered if he’d put something in the drip. “I’m not afraid,” she said, her eyes refusing to stay open. “Not with you.”

  “I’ll do the best I can” were the last words she heard before sinking down into blissfully peaceful darkness, which was not at all like the torturous moments when she ran blindly toward those dancing flames….

  Michael half expected the two Mafia men to be at his condo when he arrived home late that evening. Fortunately the place was empty. He felt thankful for small favors.

  He’d spent the afternoon in his office after all, seeing patients on referral, then had returned to the hospital to check on the teenager who had OD’d on drugs and to see how Susan was doing. She’d been quite cheerful.

  An act, he decided, to reassure her family.

  He’d met Susan’s brother, Justin, sheriff of Lone Star County, who had flown in that afternoon. He had donated blood for her, as had her parents and Matt. Rose had been rejected due to her pregnancy. They would need twenty-seven pints of blood on standby before beginning the operation.

  Michael rotated his shoulders, working out the tension. He debated going to the gym but decided it was too late. He was too tired and, besides, he wanted to be at home in case the hospital called. In case Susan needed him, he corrected with total honesty.

  Before he had time to analyze the situation between them, the phone rang. He heaved an exasperated breath and picked it up.

  “The offer still stands,” a gravelly male voice said.

  For a moment, he was tempted. He’d have to force the donor heart past the board, but to save Susan…He sighed and rubbed a hand over his face. “It’s generous, but tell Carmine no thanks.”

  The silence on the other end was ominous. The mobster finally found his voice. “I hope you don’t live to regret this, Doc. If your woman dies, it’ll be tough.”

  “She’ll live, but thanks for your concern. Tell Carmine to come to my office next week for a thorough checkup. I’ll see what we can do for him. Legally.” Michael meant what he said. In spite of accusations of doctors playing God, he didn’t judge his patients on their worth to society as a condition for surgery.

  The man said he’d relay Michael’s advice to the Mafia don and hung up.

  Once in bed, Michael stared at the ceiling, his thoughts winging three blocks away to where Susan slept. His body stirred as he thought of her night here with him. He wanted more of those. Lots more.

  A lifetime? Yeah.

  Funny, a guy could go along not thinking of love or marriage or any of that stuff, positive he was immune to it, then bang, there it was, staring him right in the face.

  But for the present he couldn’t afford to think about the future. He had to concentrate on getting her through the surgery and the ordeal ahead.

  He slept but a second it seemed, then the phone started in again. He came instantly awake. “Yeah?” he said, expecting to hear the Mafia guy.

  “Dr. O’Day?”

  “Yes?”

  “This is Kelly McNeil,” one of the senior surgical nurses said. “We have a donor for Susan Wainwright.”

  “In town?” He glanced at the clock. Almost five. The sky glowed with the pink hues of dawn.

  “Yes. An accident on I-10. The family has given consent.”

  “I’m on my way.”

  A life for a life, he mused a few minutes later, driving the three blocks to the hospital. At any other time, it would have been faster to walk. This morning he was in a hurry, and traffic was light.

  The hospital board met in the conference room. Michael listened to the report from the attending physician, then looked over the chart of the victim. A girl, he saw, the same age as his niece. A life just beginning and already snuffed out.

  Setting pity aside, he joined in the discussion of blood factor
s and an evaluation of the patients waiting for a heart. The decision was unequivocal. Susan was the closest match of the top ten on the list.

  Before heading for surgery, he stopped by the waiting room where Archy and Kate, rumpled and tired, waited anxiously. They’d been awakened and informed of the possible surgery during the meeting. He assured them that things looked good for Susan.

  Next he stopped by Susan’s room. She was asleep from the drugs they’d started in her IV drip thirty minutes ago. He dropped a very light kiss on her lips, which were cool to his touch. Her face was pale. The oxygen tube was clipped to her nose again.

  He checked her vital signs on the monitors. She was as ready as she would ever be. For a second he lingered, then he resolutely forced his thoughts to the task at hand.

  An hour later Michael had his team assembled. He briefed them on the procedures and order of events. One thing he’d learned: There had to be someone in total control, coordinating each team’s efforts so that they flowed smoothly, like two rivers coming together to form one. That would be him.

  “Ready?” he asked.

  The other three surgeons nodded. The four senior surgical nurses, already scrubbed, took their places, two in each operating room, which were side by side. Other nurses and technicians were already moving about. The other two doctors, the anesthesiologists, were at their stations.

  Michael made one last check, then he nodded to each team. He took his place at the operating table. The door to his emotions closed and locked. The still form on the table was that of a patient needing all his concentration and skill in order to survive.

  “Scalpel,” he said.

  Four hours later, he placed the last suture and stepped back from the table. It was done.

  After Susan was safely in recovery and hooked up to the monitors, he removed his surgical garb and headed for the waiting room. There he found the Wainwright parents, siblings and Matt. They all stood.

  “How is she?” Kate asked.

  Michael smiled. “She came through just fine.”

  “When can we see her?”

  “She’ll be in recovery for the next eighteen hours.”

  “Eighteen hours,” Justin repeated. “Isn’t that long?”

  “Not for this kind of surgery. However, you may scrub and go in, one at a time, for five minutes when she wakes up,” he continued. “The nurse will come and get you.” He looked at his watch. “It’s nearly noon. Why don’t we get some food? The cafeteria here is pretty good.”

  “Good idea,” Archy said, taking Kate’s arm. “Come on, Katie. We need something to protect our stomachs from the acid in the machine coffee.”

  Michael ate with the family, but said little except to answer their questions. After leaving them, he completed his office routine, worked out for an hour before going home, then returned to the hospital at nine that night.

  Scrubbed and dressed in mask and gown, he stopped by the nurses’ station before going to Susan’s room. Her family had been in to see her and had gone to their hotel.

  In her room, he looked over the monitors, touched her forehead, then pulled a chair close and took her hand.

  Her skin was cool to the touch, her beautiful face as expressionless as a wax mask. He missed her fire and the sparks they struck off each other.

  But that would come. Later. The next hours were crucial as her body and new heart began the long process of healing and adjustment. He yawned. It had been a long day.

  Susan woke reluctantly. When she tried to move, she became aware of a hand holding hers. Rolling her head to the side, she saw dark hair against the white sheet.

  “Michael?”

  He stirred and raised his head. His smile was heartwarming. “Hi. How do you feel?”

  “Like a big truck ran over my chest.”

  “Good. That’s entirely normal.”

  “My throat is sore.”

  He nodded and brought a straw to her lips. “From the oxygen. It’s so dry. Here, take a sip.”

  She took a drink of water, then realized it wasn’t water. “Tastes like a sports drink.”

  “It’s similar. You’ve passed the taste test, now let’s see how you do at following directions. Squeeze my hand.”

  Watching his face, she did so. His expression didn’t change. She tried again, harder. “What are you looking for?”

  “Reassurance,” he said with a grin. “I wanted to see if you were strong enough for this.”

  Bending, he gave her a surprise kiss, very quick and light, but enough to warm her lips. “I’ve never been kissed through a mask before. It reminds me of Zorro.”

  The darkness began to close around her. She clung to his hand, which still held hers. Maybe, for now, that was okay. Tomorrow she would be stronger, she vowed. Then she wouldn’t need him so much.

  From deep within came a warning. It wasn’t wise to depend on anyone too much. Love could come and go. Dancing had always been there for her.

  “Go home,” she whispered. “You need rest.”

  But he stayed until her senses shut down completely and she drifted in the endless sea of drugged sleep that erupted into pain each time she surfaced.

  Michael frowned at Carmine Mercado. “You’ve been smoking. I told you to give it up.”

  “I’m sixty-four, too old for that nonsense.”

  “A man your age can expect to live to ninety,” Michael informed him.

  “Ah, who wants to live that long? I got no son. My nephew hasn’t married and given us children for the future. What’s to live for?”

  “No more smoking,” Michael said firmly, refusing to take up the don’s lament.

  Carmine smiled as innocently as a cherub. “Come on, Doc. It’s one cigar a day. I don’t even inhale.”

  “Smoking interferes with the body’s ability to absorb oxygen. It puts an unnecessary strain on the heart. Either stop, or forget about surgery.”

  “What are my chances—slim to none?” Carmine shrugged aside his own mortality. “I know I’m far down the list. So how’s the Wainwright girl?”

  “The staff thinks she’s a miracle. She’s doing so well, we’ve moved her out of the ICU and into a room in the cardiac wing. Most patients spend three to five weeks in the hospital. She’ll stay maybe two. If we can hold her in that long.” His snort of laughter was wry.

  “A fighter, huh? I like that. So how’s my ticker?”

  “The same as your doctor reported. You need to stay on your high blood pressure medication. You should have been on it years ago. Take an aspirin a day. If you take vitamins, check the amount of E. More than four hundred units a day and it acts as a blood thinner, too.”

  “Okay, okay. I’ll be more careful.”

  Michael thought the chances of Carmine following orders were as likely as the chances of his getting a heart.

  Oddly, after the week of tests—the same ones he’d administered to Susan the week before her collapse and consequent surgery—he’d developed a rapport with the old guy. Carmine Mercado was tough and dangerous, but there was also an aura of dignity about him and a sense of integrity—if one played by his rules.

  Michael had made it clear he didn’t play any kind of game with people’s lives. Carmine had respected his stand and offered no more deals or veiled threats. He’d become simply another patient, one with a sense of humor about dying. He chuckled as he explained the jockeying going on behind the scenes to see who would succeed him.

  “I’d like for my nephew, Ricky, to take over the business,” he told Michael with the earnestness of a banker discussing the next CEO of his company. “But Frank…he’s tough, not as smart as Ricky, but more ruthless.”

  The old man was really worried, Michael realized. It could only add to the stress on the overburdened heart, but he had no suggestions for his patient on this score.

  “A man has to be firm to handle business, but I never did anything that wasn’t necessary, you know?” Carmine continued thoughtfully. “I’ve never hurt women and children,
either. A man’s family ought to be sacrosanct.”

  “Mmm,” Michael said. “Take a deep breath.” He listened to the beating of the man’s heart. Like Susan’s before the operation, it was too fast, too hard and too erratic. “Okay, you can get dressed. I’ll call you when I get the results of the final tests.”

  “Thanks, Doc. I appreciate your looking at me.”

  This was said in a perfectly sincere tone, as if his goons hadn’t visited or called Michael several times to add their not-so-subtle pressure in the decision.

  Still following Spence’s advice to string the don along, Michael had done the tests on the old guy and found he liked him. To a point.

  “I’ll do what I can,” Michael said, “but I’m making no promises.”

  Carmine waved the disclaimer aside. “Okay, okay, I understand. Where am I on the list?”

  “Second tier, actually. We don’t have a numbered order since it depends on how well you match up to a donor. The patients in the highest group get first dibs, then those in the second group if there’s no good match in the first.”

  “That’s fair.”

  “I’m glad you think so,” Michael said with a touch of rueful amusement. Had the don been less honorable, Michael supposed it wasn’t beyond imagining his men disposing of those on the A list.

  Since Mercado was his last patient, Michael left the office and headed for the hospital. There, he scrubbed, slipped into surgical garb and went in to see Susan.

  “I feel as if I’m surrounded by bandits,” she complained good-naturedly, eyeing his mask. “When do I get to go home?”

  “When do you want to?”

  She frowned suspiciously. “Tomorrow?”

  “How about next Friday?”

  “A week from today?”

  “Yes.”

  Her green eyes widened in surprise. “Really?”

  He laughed and chucked her under the chin. “Really. I’ll fly you to the ranch. That will be a good place for you to convalesce.”

  “No way,” she protested. “I feel great. I’ve talked to the ballet director. I can start back as assistant manager and chief fund-raiser as soon as I get a clean bill of health.”