by Cheryl Wyatt
“I opt not to tell her yet,” Mitch said.
“For what it’s worth, I think that’s a good call.”
“Let’s hope you’re right.” Otherwise the repercussions could shatter Mitch’s friendship with Lauren and ruin whatever else was becoming possible between them.
“I’ll meet you at the center, Mitch.” Ian hung up.
Mitch returned to the kitchen slower than he left. “I need to run to the center for a bit,” Mitch said nonchalantly and avoided Lauren’s gaze. Don’t ask questions, he willed.
Lem was used to him leaving suddenly and didn’t bat an eye. Lauren, however, had grown acutely hawkeyed.
She rose, as if for once she’d offer to come. Figured. She knew something was off. He chanced a peek on the way out.
Too many questions swirled in her eyes.
He didn’t take ten steps before the tortured look on her face began to taunt him. If Mara truly was about to come out of her coma, she’d become incarcerated in an instant.
Lauren was better off not seeing what was about to ensue.
Mitch held to his judgment call and hoped all the way to the center that he’d made the right one. When the prosecutor, attorneys and police were waiting at the trauma center by the time they got there, Mitch felt better about not telling Lauren.
It had been the best thing to do. Right?
He’d find out soon enough.
Soon enough came sooner than Mitch was prepared for. Minutes after the legal team left, Lauren showed up at the center with a tray of sandwiches and suspicion in her vivid green eyes.
She was on to him.
* * *
“Something wrong, Lauren?” Kate put an EKG machine away.
“Mitch is avoiding me like the sharp end of an HIV needle.”
“That’s odd.” She wound cables.
“Yeah, so…about the scrubs you left in my locker.”
“Yeah? They fit you nicely.”
“Yep. I’m not sure the note does, though.”
Kate smiled. “Why not? You think about what I said?”
“I did. I appreciate you encouraging me to be a permanent part of the nursing team here. Your opinion means a lot.”
Kate slid sterile kits into cubbies. “Think about the other thing I said?”
“About considering a permanent future with Mitch, too? Yeah, but I think he’s still hung up on someone else.”
Kate straightened. “Why would you say that?”
“He has some other girl’s ring in his glove box.”
“You’re kidding?” Kate spun and stormed into the hall.
Lauren chased after her. “Kate, wait. Don’t hound him.”
“Who said anything about hounding? Pounding a big dose of sense into him is more what I had in mind.”
Lauren laughed. Then sped. “Wait. You look serious.”
“I am. Look, Lauren, I’m not sure why he still has that ring, but I am sure she means nothing to him. Not anymore.”
Lauren stepped close. “She hurt him?”
“Very badly. More than he knows. The bond between you two has done wonders for him, however.”
“Thanks, Kate. That helps. If nothing else, it breaks my stream of bad news lately.”
Kate’s expression became empathetic. She put her hand on Lauren’s arm. “So you know about Mara?”
Alarm screamed through Lauren like an ambulance driving by. Or maybe one really did. Lauren couldn’t be sure because her ears rang so loudly with her pulse swooshing in her ears.
She drew a breath. “Actually, I meant bad news from the bank that is holding my money hostage until I pay off a loan that won’t let me leave Texas for about ten years. What about Mara?”
Empathy turned to caution on Kate’s face. “Oh, wow. Never mind. I’m sorry.” Kate made her getaway.
“Kate, please. If there’s something I need to know…”
“Mitch will tell you. Because he hasn’t, it clearly means you’re better off not knowing for now.” Kate went for the nearest door.
“Not so fast. Tell me what’s going on or I’ll step foot out that door and not come back. I mean it. I’ll bail for good.”
That stopped Kate. She whirled. “Why would you do that?”
“Because if we were truly a team, like you and Mitch and Ian claim, I’d already know what was going on with Mara.”
Kate’s countenance fell but her shoulders rose. She drew in a breath and studied Lauren. “You know what? You’re right. But still, due to legalities, Mitch needs to be the one to say it.”
“Say what?” Mitch stood at the door with a bag of chips.
Both women eyed each other. “That’s my cue.” Kate slipped out. And took Mitch’s chips with her.
Lauren moistened her lips. “Kate misunderstood a conversation between us and almost let it slip about Mara.”
Mitch paled. Came closer. “Did Kate tell you?”
“No. Said she couldn’t.”
“Good. She was prudent to do so, Lauren. Don’t be angry.”
“I told her that if we were truly a team, if I was totally trusted and an integral part of your crew as you avidly claim, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Because I’d already be aware of whatever it is that I don’t know about Mara.”
“It’s complicated, Lauren. Come with me.”
“What, to the medication room so you can tranquilize me?”
He shook his head. “Conference room. We’re having a team meeting about Mara. You’re part of that team.”
A terrible sense of dread and foreboding gripped Lauren. What was Mitch about to reveal? Could she handle it?
That second, the trauma bell screamed. As loud and disconcerting as questions sirening through her mind.
What devastating piece of Mara’s puzzle had they felt the need to keep from Lauren? And why? To protect her? What else had Mitch neglected to tell her?
Had the bond between them been a farce? Lauren wavered between wanting to trust Mitch’s intentions and feeling as if everything he said was a lie. If so, all he’d said about her being competent was also a lie. Yet Mitch would never put patients in jeopardy. He took extreme measures to ensure patient safety.
Lauren’s feet felt sunk in ten inches of sand as she ran to whatever waited on the other side of those emergency doors. Fear flew back. And doubt, with a vengeance. She forced it aside to focus on providing safe and stellar care.
She’d spent much of her downtime on Lem’s computer doing online trauma montages to better her skills. Had it all been in vain?
“This place has been a zoo!” Nita said hours later while scooping up paperwork for the fifteenth patient since midnight.
“Literally.” Lauren grabbed another bandage.
Kate came alongside her. “Yeah, what is it with all these animal-related accidents tonight?”
Lauren thought back. Kate was right. “Let’s see…we’ve had a man fall from a horse and fracture his foot and skull.”
“A kid bitten by a dog at a park. Not to mention the dog owner’s broken nose when the kid’s dad bashed him after the bite.”
“A man fell off a ladder shooing birds from his gutters,” Lauren said.
“A lady freakishly fractures her hip feeding squirrels.”
“No, freakish was the kid whose ear swallowed a tree frog.”
Kate laughed. “I will never understand how that happened.”
“His mom couldn’t, either. But I thought she’d die of shock when we told her what his earache was all about.” Lauren smiled.
“Freakier is that the frog lived to ribbit about it.”
“Don’t forget the youth leader who choked on a worm.”
Kate smirked. “That doesn’t count. It
was a gummy worm.”
“Then how about the attorney kicked by a wild deer who got loose in his office?” Lauren slid his chart in a discharge slot.
Kate’s face softened. “Speaking of attorneys, how are you?”
Lauren stopped. “I’m— What about attorneys?”
“Oh, man. Open mouth, insert shoe store. Mitch obviously hasn’t had a chance to talk to you about Mara yet?”
Lauren sighed. “Nope. In fact, he’s avoiding me again.”
“Trust him. Okay? He has your best interests at heart.”
“What about Mara’s?” Lauren’s stomach twisted.
“Helping people is why he became a doctor. No other reason. Know that about him. Believe he has Mara’s future at heart.”
“Then why do I feel like her only advocate?”
Kate’s stance firmed. “She wasn’t the only patient that night, Lauren. Understand that many things are out of Mitch’s control. Ethically. Morally. Professionally.”
“Don’t forget legally. You mentioned attorneys.”
Kate nodded slowly, confirming Lauren’s worst fear for Mara without breaking confidentiality. Someone related to the wreck pursued litigation. Mara had enough on her plate. Lauren couldn’t contain the compassion or explain her mercy flowing for Mara, but everything screamed it was God-given.
Things might be out of Mitch’s control, but never out of Yours. Despite her mistake, You have Mara’s best interests at heart. The nagging knowledge that some consequences stand after forgiveness didn’t give Lauren a good feeling. Not at all.
What was Mitch going to tell her about Mara? And when?
The questions dogged her into the night after she retired to the nurses’ sleeping room, since she was still on call. Lauren slept in restless snatches. The next morning in the central report room, Lauren, encircled by Ian, Kate and Mitch, surged from the table. “They’re putting her in jail?”
“Miss Bates, kindly sit,” the hospital attorney directed.
Lauren did so. “Excuse me. I’m sorry.”
Attorneys nodded. The director scowled at her. Mitch scowled at the director. Apparently the two didn’t play well together. Then again, the director didn’t get along with anyone.
“She committed a serious crime, Lauren,” Mitch said gently.
A lawyer leaned in. “Texting while driving is against the law. She’s been charged with vehicular homicide.”
“Homicide? She’ll go to prison.” Lauren’s heart thudded.
“Likely.” The attorney twisted his pencil on the table.
Lauren could puke. “May I speak to Mitch privately?”
Attorneys nodded. Once outside, Lauren grabbed his lab coat lapels. “Mitch, please. Don’t let that happen to Mara. There must be something you can do.”
“I can say with all honesty I wish there was. But no.”
“Can you see if they’ll go for a lesser charge? Involuntary manslaughter?”
“I have nothing to do with it. I haven’t spoken to the family since the night I had to inform them their son was killed. With her in and out of consciousness, we can’t know if she’s remorseful.”
“Did you put it like that? That she ‘killed’ him? Because I can’t imagine she meant to.”
“I don’t remember how I put it. I didn’t incriminate her, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
“I don’t know what I’m thinking. Look, I understand their side. I do. Mara incriminated herself. But—”
“You’re one of the rare few who can see Mara’s side, too.”
She shrugged. “I guess. I don’t know. You’re right. Maybe Mara deserves what comes to her.” Despite the words, tears streamed.
“Come.” Mitch led her down the hall, to Mara’s bedside.
“To say goodbye?” Lauren squeaked.
“To say goodbye.” Mitch swallowed. Hard.
Lauren took Mara’s hand and tried not to cry. When are they coming for her? she mouthed. Didn’t want to mention aloud that Mara was headed to the jail’s sick ward, where she’d be kept until well enough to stand trial.
“Before ten.” In other words, within minutes. Lauren bit her lip. Mitch hugged her. “If it’s any consolation, I think God’s heart for Mara comes through you.”
“That means?”
“No idea. Just sounded like the thing to say.”
“Maybe it was one of those things you hear from God and speak His mind about without realizing it. You do that often. He operates so naturally through you during codes, triage and trauma care, Mitch. It’s beautiful and awe-inspiring to watch.”
“That’s good to know.”
“He’s good to know. My comfort and prayer for Mara is that somehow she’ll also realize that He is good to know.”
She took Mara’s hand and prayed exactly that.
Chapter Seventeen
“Lauren, wake up. You have to see this,” Mitch said days later.
Lauren looked adorable as she roused herself from sleep in the women’s on-call room. Momentary disorientation ebbed with each blink.
Mitch knelt beside her. Kate snored one cot over.
It had been too busy for anyone to leave, and the trauma crew staggered shifts and napped in batches.
Mitch angled his phone screen. Lauren looked into it. Her focus centered on a photo with eerily familiar words scrawled across a medical clipboard. God is a good person to know. The best.
Lauren blinked. “Where did that come from? Who wrote it?”
“It came from a chart in Mara’s room on her jailhouse hospital bed. She woke up and couldn’t talk because her throat was sore from intubation. So she wrote.”
“She wrote that?” Lauren sat abruptly, causing Kate to stir.
“Every word, Lauren. I’m not making this up. She penned the exact phrase you left her with.”
Lauren leaned into his open arms. “She’ll be okay.”
“I hope this gives you faith for other things.”
Lauren nodded. “He hears.”
Ian burst through the door. “We got a fallen planker. ETA fifteen minutes. Bilateral leg fractures.”
Kate flipped over and up like a pancake, and shoved her feet into shoes before she grew fully awake.
“What’s a planker?” the three asked Ian simultaneously.
Ian shifted. “Planking is where people pick odd surfaces to lie facedown and flat on. Then take photos of themselves doing the stunt and post images on social network sites to outdo one another with the coolest funny photo.”
Mitch smirked. “I’m scared to ask how you know this, Ian.”
He jabbed Mitch, and the two commenced a clipboard joust.
Kate inserted herself like a referee. “What else, Ian?”
“Unfortunately this kid planked on a second-story brick ledge. Eagle Point High School. He fell. Knees first. Onto concrete. Landed hard.” They followed Ian to the staff hub.
Kate and Lauren’s faces twisted identically. “Ouch.”
Ian rapped the desk. “Let’s put him in O.R. Three.”
Mitch cornered Lauren near the O.R. suites. “So, you scrubbing in with me on this case?”
“Just try and keep me from it.”
Kate smiled. “That’s what I like to hear.”
“No, you like to hear that there’s chocolate involved.”
Kate laughed. “True. Got any?”
“In my bag at the desk. Leave some for Ian or he might be grumpy.”
“Hey, what are you trying to say?” Ian smirked.
“Uh, that you might need a chocoholic intervention?”
“I love the laughter you bring to the team, Lauren,” Mitch said as he reached for a sterile hand scrubber.
“Then go w
ith me to the jail to visit Mara sometime, and I’ll work with you until the day I leave for Texas.”
Mitch paused scrubbing. Wow. She drove a hard bargain. “I’m not sure I can legally do that. She awake?”
“On and off. She’ll be devastated when she wakes and gets informed that people died in the accident she was involved in.”
“Responsible for.”
Lauren’s head whipped around. “Have you no mercy?”
Mitch narrowed his eyes. “Not with people who don’t pay attention when they drive. That kind of person killed my dad and destroyed my family.”
No one moved. Or spoke. Or breathed. All motion ceased.
The only perceptible sound originated through the O.R. door, where vital-sign monitors beeped in anticipation of a patient.
Jaw clenched, Mitch held up scrubbed and dripping hands and backed himself into the operating room with a conflicted scowl on his face. Today was monumentally hard.
He didn’t know who he was more irritated with: Lauren for standing up for Mara. Mara for vehicular homicide, which Mitch’s dad also died of. Or himself for still being mad about the other two.
Not to mention Lauren had said “until the day I leave for Texas,” which indicated intent to return.
Lauren walked in, garbed for surgery. She cast an apologetic glance, same time he did. They acknowledged one another with nods.
“Amazing how you two communicate so well without words. My wife and I never had that.” Ian lined his anesthesia tray with syringes and pulled equipment within reach. He eyed Mitch carefully, then Lauren.
Now who was talking without words?
Ian’s expression willed Lauren to tread lightly. “It’s not that he doesn’t have a soft spot for Mara. Today’s the anniversary of his dad’s wreck.”
Mitch wasn’t sure he was relieved for Ian’s verbal intervention or not. The whole world didn’t need to know.
Yet this wasn’t the whole world. This was his crew. His closest friends, cohorts, confidants. He’d acted like a jerk to them.
Especially the one he cared about the most. Not that she knew. He sought her out.
Lauren’s eyes rimmed with tears. “I’m so sorry, Mitch.”
