by Janice Lynn
Still, finding Natalie stooped next to Carrie was a pleasant surprise, especially since much of the meeting he’d just attended had involved Natalie and her role in the department.
“Oh, Dr. Coleman!” Stephanie gushed, hastening behind him. “Glad you’re back.”
“Speaking of being back...” he frowned at the nursing assistant he’d thought he could trust “...where have you been?”
The woman’s face reddened. “Sorry, sir, but I’ve developed an awful case of what I think is food poisoning. Now that you’re back, I’m checking in with my nurse manager, clocking out and heading home to the privacy of my own bathroom.”
“She has diarrhea,” Carrie piped up from where she sat at his desk, making the word four syllables.
The nursing assistant’s flush brightened even more.
“Yeah, well, glad you’re back,” the young woman said, then to Carrie, “Maybe next time we meet I won’t get sick. Dr. Sterling,” she acknowledged Natalie, then disappeared.
“Thank you for staying with Carrie while Stephanie was otherwise occupied.”
Looking uncomfortable, Natalie stood, smoothing her hands over her scrubs. “She was showing me her designs.”
“Carrie plans to take the fashion world by storm someday, don’t you, kiddo?”
Rather than answer his question, Carrie lifted big eyes to him and reminded him of something else he should have done prior to the meeting, but had run out of time when she’d not cooperated in his trying to get her dressed.
“Can we go eat now?”
Had he fed her breakfast? He thought so...
“Soon,” he told her guiltily, wondering if he had a protein bar in his desk he could give her to tide her over for another thirty minutes or so. “I need to finish a few things here, then we’ll go.” Was it wrong of him to make her wait while he finished? He couldn’t see leaving to eat and then having to drag her back by the hospital afterwards.
“Can Natalie go with us?”
Matthew watched Natalie’s expression tighten and started to come up with a reason why that wasn’t a good idea, because the last thing he needed was to spend time with her outside the hospital. But the color draining from her face and an onslaught of frustrated pride had him saying, “Of course she can go with us.”
Natalie’s eyes widened and she gave him a warning look. “Sorry, I’ve a dozen things to do before I leave for dinner.”
“We could wait on you,” Carrie offered, looking way too eager for Natalie to say yes, especially as Matthew knew she was hungry.
Natalie’s cheeks flushed. “I’d hate for you to have to do that.”
“We don’t mind, do we?” Carrie looked up at him expectantly, making him feel a jerk for having let her think there was any hope of Natalie going with them. Why had he?
Because whether he wanted to or not, he liked the idea of Natalie going with them. She’d seemed comfortable with Carrie, as though she knew what she was doing while she’d been sitting next to her looking at her tablet.
“We want to make new friends, right?” the child continued. “I could show you more of my game. There are more dresses with mermaid tails!”
Natalie was looking downright panicked. Matthew toyed with the idea of letting her off the hook, but he was curious as to why Carrie was so eager for her to go with them. Other than with regard to his mother, sister and nieces, she’d not shown interest in making new friends or getting to know anyone. Until Natalie. Go figure.
“That’s right,” he agreed. “Plus, I owe you for sitting with my favorite fashionista.”
“I was only here for, like, five minutes,” Natalie rushed to clarify. “Ten at the most. You owe me nothing.”
Her comment reminded him of her teasing in Miami. He’d liked owing Natalie because the paying up had been a lot of fun.
“Please?” Carrie pleaded in her most appealing voice, the one Matthew hadn’t learned to say no to. “He’ll take us to get really great food...” She named the restaurant they’d visited way too often over the past few weeks. Matthew didn’t normally eat fast food, but apparently kids loved it.
Natalie’s nose wrinkled and she frowned at him. “Not a very healthy choice for a four-year-old, is it?”
Probably not, but he’d just been so grateful when Carrie had started eating again that he’d fed her whatever she wanted. Still, as a cardiologist, he knew the dangers of too much high-fat, low-nutrition food and should have been making Carrie eat healthy. Another thing to feel guilty over.
Carrie turned pleading eyes toward Natalie. “Please say you’ll go. You can pick the restaurant.”
Still Natalie hesitated. If she could have thought of a way to get out of going, she would have. That was written all over her face.
Sensing Natalie was about to make a break for it, Carrie launched into a new plea. “I’ll be extra-good and eat something healthy. I promise!”
“You’re always extra-good.” Matthew tugged on her lopsided ponytail, wondering how it had worked loose when he’d thought he’d finally gotten it right. Then again, she acted as if he were ripping her hair out every time he brushed it or went to pull it up. He wouldn’t take back his comment, though. She’d dealt with so much that he figured a little acting out here and there was normal.
Carrie lifted her big eyes to Natalie again. “Please. Don’t you want to be my friend?”
* * *
How had Natalie gotten manipulated into this? She still wasn’t quite sure. The last two people on earth she wanted to be having dinner with were Matthew and his daughter.
She wasn’t sure Matthew wanted her there any more than she wanted to be there.
Yet she sat at the organic food restaurant, eating kale chips and freshly made salsa one after another to give her hands something to do while observing Matthew with Carrie.
He obviously loved the girl. Which seemed an odd thing to think. Of course Matthew loved his daughter.
The girl obviously adored him as well.
But there was something about their relationship that didn’t feel quite right, almost an awkwardness in how Matthew regarded her and how she regarded him. Still, Carrie truly had been well-behaved, had listened closely to her menu options but then let Natalie choose her meal for her, promising to eat every bite.
They’d been at the restaurant about fifteen minutes when the child dropped a bombshell that caused Natalie to almost choke on a chip.
“My mommy and daddy died in an airplane crash and I live with Uncle Matthew now.” The child kept talking, very matter-of-fact, but Natalie didn’t catch anything else she said.
Just that her mommy and daddy had died.
Which brought back some terrible memories of her own, and gave Natalie a whole new empathy for the girl. Eyes blurring, she took a drink of her water, wishing she’d ordered something a lot stiffer, then offered, “I’m sorry about your mom and dad. My parents died when I was young, too.”
Why had she offered that last tidbit? Matthew didn’t need to know about her sordid childhood. Nor did she need to form any connection with this child.
“Did they die in a plane crash?” Carrie asked at the same time as Matthew’s leg brushed up against her from across the table and he said,
“I’m sorry.”
She didn’t want his sympathy. She didn’t want anything from him. Or Carrie. Just...
“No,” she managed, hating that her eyes watered. “But they were in an accident. A car wreck.” She fought the sadness that threatened her when she recalled the horror of losing her parents. “It was a long time ago. I was around your age.”
“It feels like forever since my mommy and daddy died.” Carrie turned sad eyes on Matthew. “How long has it been?”
“Just over four months.”
Four months. That wasn’t long ago. Poor Carrie. How had Matthew ended up with the
girl?
“Carrie’s parents were my best friends,” he said, seeming to have read her mind. “I was her godfather and now she’s stuck with me.”
In the way that children do, Carrie jumped to another topic. “Did you know that a baby giraffe is about to be born at the zoo?”
Natalie shook her head.
“It’s so exciting!” Carrie continued, her eyes glowing. “You can watch the momma giraffe online and they have a special app for your phone. Do you have it?”
Again, Natalie shook her head.
“You should get it so you know when Zoie is about to be born.”
“Zoie?”
“That’s what they’re going to call the baby giraffe. It’s a girl. The zoo held a contest on naming her and Zoie won. You want the app?”
“Um, maybe.”
“I can help you,” Carrie offered, reaching for Natalie’s phone.
Not sure whether she should trust a four-year-old with her phone or whether she wanted a zoo app to notify her about a giraffe, Natalie handed the device to Carrie.
She tapped several buttons, explaining to Natalie each step of the way, as if Natalie were the child and Carrie the adult.
“There,” she said, handing the phone back. “Now you have the zoo app and you’ll get Zoie updates.”
“Thank you,” Natalie said, sliding the phone into her scrubs pocket.
“Uncle Matthew says I can have a puppy soon as we get settled.”
“A puppy?” Natalie had never owned a pet. Her foster parents had often said it was enough work raising her without adding an animal to the mix. A few of them had acted as if Natalie were an animal... To redirect her thoughts, she met Matthew’s gaze. “Are you sure? I hear puppies are a lot of work.”
“It’s not as cool as a baby giraffe, and I’d rather have a big dog,” Carrie interjected, “but Uncle Matthew says I have to pick a small one that can stay in the house because we’re gone so much.” Carrie wrinkled her nose. “But if we get a puppy we shouldn’t be gone so much, especially if it’s a little puppy.”
Natalie lifted her gaze to Matthew.
“She makes sense, and,” he bent to Carrie’s level, “I’m working on being home more. That’s why we’re in Memphis, remember?”
“To be near Grandma and Aunt Elaine and Mandy and Liz. They are excited about the giraffe, too.”
So much began to click.
“I guess it is easier living closer to your family,” Natalie mused, then went hot-cheeked, straightened, and brushed her hands over her scrubs. “Not that it’s any of my business.”
“Oh, it is definitely better being close to my family. My mom’s awesome. Since I couldn’t convince her to move away from the rest of the family to come live with me in Boston, we came here.”
Natalie traced her finger over the rim of her water glass. “Do you have a big family?”
“Big enough. A sister and several aunts, uncles and cousins. It’s a few years since I’ve been to a family get-together, but they’re unforgettable.” He shook his head as if recalling past holidays. “They can get a little crazy.”
Having little memory of any family other than what she could recall of her parents, Natalie struggled to imagine what it must be like at those holiday gatherings.
How many times over the years had she longed to belong to a family? To make memories like the ones Matthew was obviously recalling? How could he have missed family holiday gatherings? Didn’t he realize how blessed he was?
She stuffed another kale chip in her mouth.
“Do you have kids I could play with, too, Natalie?”
Coughing to clear her throat of the chip that lodged there, Natalie shook her head. “No, I don’t have any kids.”
Carrie’s brows veed together and she shook her head, making her ponytail sag further. “Well, that’s just sad.”
Yes, Natalie supposed it was, but bringing a child into the world just so she wouldn’t be alone would be just as sad. She’d once thought she’d meet someone who would want to stick around, who wouldn’t leave her, who’d want to have babies with her. But after Jonathan’s betrayal she wasn’t so sure. Maybe some people weren’t meant to ever be a part of a real family. Certainly she never had been.
“Some people might think so, but I’m not sad. My life is very full,” she defended, not wanting the child or Matthew to feel sorry for her. At Carrie’s continued look of skepticism, Natalie continued, “I’m quite happy with my life, really.”
Mostly, she told the truth. Except for the part where Matthew had taken her job and occupied her thoughts.
“Here, let me fix your ponytail before your hair gets in your food,” Natalie offered, removing the loose band and using her fingers to comb Carrie’s hair back into a ponytail.
Natalie could feel Matthew’s hot scrutiny and finally she looked up, meeting his eyes.
“You make that look easy.”
Natalie shrugged. “Not much to it.”
“Maybe not, since she sat perfectly still for you.” Matthew gave Carrie a pointed look.
“She didn’t hurt me,” the child defended, then gave Natalie an exasperated look. “He pulls my hair out when he does it!”
“I’m getting better,” Matthew assured, his expression almost one of need for Carrie to reassure him that he truly was improving. Carrie gave Natalie a look that said she didn’t agree with Matthew’s assessment, then rattled on in her four-year-old chatter about how her mother had used to style her hair.
Finding herself wanting to give Matthew that reassurance, Natalie stopped herself. She shouldn’t be here, shouldn’t be seeing this side of Matthew. A side where a renowned heart surgeon who topped his field took on raising an orphaned child who had no one else, even when it meant giving up a job he loved and becoming a fish-out-of-water parent.
She stared at him, fighting a barrage of swirling emotions.
Oh, good grief. The last thing she needed was to soften toward a man who was supposed to have only been a three-day vacation affair and had ended up turning her life topsy-turvy.
* * *
Natalie loved her patients. From the tiny babies to the teenagers she cared for, she never felt awkward or self-conscious. The only other children she’d been around had been other foster children. Kids who’d been down on their luck and as defensive as she was.
Then there’d been the birth children of the foster families. The loved children who’d often seen her as inferior and felt they had the right to lord it over her, to abuse her verbally and sometimes physically.
She hadn’t gotten close to any of them, had more negative memories than positive ones about those encounters, and would forever be grateful for the final foster family who’d taken her in when she’d been fourteen. She’d stayed with the McCulloughs until she’d left for college. They’d never had children of their own, but had raised several foster kids. It was after she’d been taken in by that wonderful couple that she’d met Suzie and Monica and made her first real friends.
None of that had prepared her for Matthew’s daughter and the bond she already felt with the orphaned little girl.
Dinner had been interesting. They’d eaten their healthy dinner while Carrie told Natalie about going to the park with her grandmother the day before.
“I was only supposed to be at the hospital for less than an hour or she’d have gone to Grandma’s today,” Matthew added.
“Uncle Matthew used to take me to the hospital a lot before we moved.” Carrie didn’t sound happy about the memory.
“Now that we’re closer to Grandma, that shouldn’t happen too much. Plus, Aunt Elaine can watch you some and has a list of sitters for me to interview. You shouldn’t get stuck going too often once I get settled in at work.” Matthew turned to Natalie. “She doesn’t like going to the hospital.”
“Because you take so
long,” Carrie reminded.
“Because I take so long,” he agreed, then tried to lighten the mood. “And because the hospital isn’t the place for high fashion. She’d much rather I take her to the mall.”
Natalie found herself wanting to defend Matthew, to help Carrie see how difficult it must have been for him to have had a child thrust into his busy life.
“You could use your hospital trips as research to design us new scrubs with the mermaid tail like we talked about earlier,” Natalie suggested, trying to ease the underlying tension between Matthew and the child.
The girl’s nose wrinkled. “Scrubs are boring clothes.”
Natalie glanced down at the blue ones she wore. “Completely boring.”
Yet they were her preferred wardrobe and what she had on more often than not.
“Which is why doctors and nurses around the world need you to come up with something stylish for us. Help us be more fashionable.”
Carrie seemed intrigued by that idea, and she and Natalie carried on a quite lengthy conversation about hospital fashion.
The conversation jumped from one topic to another and before Natalie knew it she was at Matthew’s house. How had that happened? She’d had no intention of going to his house. Or spending one second more with him and his daughter than was absolutely necessary.
Only Carrie had wanted to show off her new bedroom, something she was excited about and super-proud of. Natalie hadn’t had the heart to say no, and when she’d looked at Matthew for guidance he’d just shrugged as if to say he didn’t care one way or the other.
She supposed he didn’t.
Since his Memphis arrival, he’d been professional and nothing more. He’d probably forgotten all about Miami. It was what she needed to do. What she wanted to do.
For most of dinner, he’d listened to her and Carrie’s conversation, throwing in a comment here and there, but almost seeming as if he was studying their interactions.
His house was in an upscale neighborhood on Mud Island not too far from where she lived, and just ten minutes from the hospital. A modern brick monstrosity within a gated community with a circle drive and a fenced back yard. It was a house for a family, not two people.
