by Francis Ray
Lovingly dedicated to three men who had a tremendous influence on my life:
my father,
MCCLINTON RADFORD SR.;
my brother,
MCCLINTON RADFORD JR.;
and my husband,
WILLIAM H. RAY.
It was always a comfort knowing your love and your support were unshakable. I’ll miss you forever.
Acknowledgments
Monique Patterson, executive editor at St. Martin’s Press; Holly Root, agent with Scott Waxman Agency; and Holly Blanck, associate editor at St. Martin’s Press—for your support and encouragement in making this book a reality. I love having you on my team.
Contents
Title Page
Dedication
Acknowledgments
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Epilogue
Also by Francis Ray
About the Author
Copyright
Prologue
“It’s a boy.”
Carlton James heard his wife’s softly spoken voice, the tiredness, the regret. Somehow he’d known his first grandchild would be a boy.
His long fingers braced on the fireplace, trembled the tiniest bit as he stared into the flickering flames. In mid-March in Dallas, Texas, it wasn’t cold enough for a fire, but he had needed to keep busy once Christine’s labor started. That had been over sixteen long hours ago.
His hands fisted with anger, then unclenched. He had to be strong for his family. He’d failed once, never again.
“Christine?” he asked, knowing before his wife answered that if their only child and daughter had had any problems with the delivery, she would have come downstairs to tell him before now. It was her emotional state he inquired about and they both knew it.
“Resigned.”
Carlton felt every day of his forty-three years and then some. His first grandchild and he would never get to know him, to love him. Blowing out a breath, he slowly turned to see Lawanna. The joy and laughter that he was used to seeing on her pretty, open face wasn’t there. Her lips were pressed tightly together but they still trembled. There hadn’t been much to laugh about over the past six months.
He opened his arms and his wife rushed across the room, burrowing against his chest, her hands gripping fistfuls of his shirt. He felt the dampness of her tears, blinked back his own.
“Carlton, I hurt for her. We were supposed to protect her.”
Carlton’s black eyes narrowed in anger. “I should have put a bullet in that no-good bastard the night she came crying to us.”
Lawanna sharply lifted her head, fear gleaming in her tear-drenched eyes. “No.”
Carlton’s thumb brushed away the moisture from her dark lashes, then cupped her soft cheek. “He’s taken enough from our family, he won’t take any more.”
“You’re sure about what you’re going to do?”
He nodded. “I wish there was another way, but Christine has made it clear she wants the baby placed for adoption.”
Tears streamed down Lawanna’s cheeks. “Carlton, he’s beautiful with a full head of black hair and black eyes. He looks so much like your father. Maybe she’ll change her mind in a few days. We’ve kept to ourselves since we rented the house. The few friends we have in the area don’t know we’re here.”
They’d rented a house in Dallas in an exclusive neighborhood for the last month of Christine’s pregnancy. He’d taken a leave from his medical practice in Houston for the past three weeks, wanting Christine to know how important she was to them, how much they loved her. It hadn’t seemed to matter. She could barely look them in the eyes, and when she did, tears always followed.
“Did she even look at the baby, ask to hold him?” he asked, hoping against hope.
Lawanna lowered her gaze. “No. She wouldn’t even look at me.”
“She’s ashamed when it should be that bastard. He thinks taking advantage of naïve, unsuspecting women shows what a big man he is,” Carlton spat. “He doesn’t care about ruining their lives or about the child he refuses to claim. He won’t ruin Christine. She’s too gifted and has too much to live for. She just needs time and love.”
Lawanna nodded. “I just wish there was another way.”
There was, but Carlton wasn’t going to tell her. This was one burden he planned to carry by himself. “You go sit with Christine and send the nurse down with the baby. The social worker is waiting for my call.”
Lawanna bit her lower lip. “I don’t mind telling you that once you see him I’m hoping you’ll change your mind. We could tell everyone we decided to adopt.”
“If we did, we’d lose Christine. We don’t have a choice.”
Tears sparkled in his wife’s eyes. “We shouldn’t have to choose. I hope that man finds a hell on earth. He’s hurt too many people not to.”
Carlton kissed her on the cheek. “Send the baby down and I’ll make the call.”
His wife nodded and then left the study, closing the door softly behind her. Carlton picked up the receiver on the desk and called his lawyer. The call was answered on the first ring.
“Yes.”
“Is everything ready?”
“Yes.”
“They understand and agree to the terms?” Carlton asked.
“Yes.”
There was a knock on the study door. “Sir?”
“Just a minute,” he said, loud enough for the woman to hear. “The nurse is here. I’ll bring him out.”
Disconnecting the phone call, Carlton opened the door. He told himself it would be best if he didn’t look at the child, but the temptation was too great. He reached for the baby, felt the slight weight, heard the soft cry, and pulled back the soft blue blanket. His heart turned over. His chest felt tight. His wife was right. The baby did look like his father. He felt a fierce possessiveness, a fiercer love.
“If you don’t need me, I’ll go back upstairs.”
He shook his head, still staring down at the squirming bundle. “No. Thank you. You can go back upstairs with the midwife.” He heard the nurse move away, but his gaze remained on the now sleeping child. “I’m sorry. I wish there was another way.”
Stiffening his shoulders, Carlton quickly went to the front door and pulled it open. A slender woman in a black business suit stood on the porch. Before he could dwell on what he was doing, he thrust the baby into her arms, stepped back, and closed the door.
It was done.
He just hoped and prayed for all of their sakes he had done the right thing.
One
Sabrina Thomas clutched the leather-bound notebook to her chest and tried not to be impatient as the elevator in the south tower of Texas Hospital near downtown Dallas stopped once again on its climb to the eighteenth and top floor. But it was difficult.
Dr. Cade Mathis, the bane of her existence, would reach Mrs. Ward’s room first and then there’d be hell to pay. Sabrina jabbed the button to close the doors as soon as the last person stepped onto the already crowded elevator. Evenings were always busy at the hospital with the staggered c
hange of shifts and people dropping by to visit after work. Usually she didn’t mind the crowd, but today wasn’t usual.
Dr. Mathis wasn’t going to be happy with Mrs. Ward’s decision to postpone her surgery, and he wouldn’t be shy about voicing his opinion.
The elevator finally stopped on the eighteenth floor. As soon as there was enough space to allow her to slip through the doors, Sabrina stepped off the elevator, excusing herself as she brushed by people trying to get on. Hurrying down the hall, she almost groaned on seeing Dr. Mathis’s tall, imposing figure. At six foot three, he moved with a smooth, unhurried grace as he entered Mrs. Ward’s room.
Sabrina increased her frantic pace.
Cade Mathis might be the best neurosurgeon in the country, but unfortunately, too often he had the disposition of a warthog in heat. And no one, at least as far as Sabrina knew, questioned him or went against his medical dictates. The hospital’s board had gone all out to woo him from the Mayo Clinic. Housewife Ann Ward, in her mid-twenties, and her loving blue-collar worker husband a few years older, wouldn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell of standing up against him.
No one on the staff even tried. As patient advocate for Texas Hospital, it was Sabrina’s job to try. Her eyes narrowed. She’d do more than try.
Two steps from the door she heard Dr. Mathis’s clipped, precise voice that could be as lethal and as cutting as the scalpel he wielded so skillfully. She didn’t waste time knocking, she just went in. What she saw confirmed her fears.
Ann, in a patient’s gown, was sitting up in bed. Her husband’s work-worn hands clutched hers as he hovered over her as if to protect her from Dr. Mathis. Unfortunately, it would do no good. Dr. Mathis was a law unto himself and listened to no one, but that wouldn’t stop Sabrina.
“Hello, Mr. and Mrs. Ward,” Sabrina greeted. “Dr. Mathis.”
The Wards’ frantic gazes swung to Sabrina, clearly begging her to intervene. Dr. Mathis, hands on his lean hips, didn’t even glance in her direction. Clearly he thought her insignificant. Tough. “Is there a problem?”
Ann nodded, swallowed a couple of times before she could get the words out. “I-I just told Dr. Mathis I want to postpone my surgery like I mentioned to you yesterday.”
Finally Dr. Mathis’s gaze, cold and cutting, swung to Sabrina. Since she’d been subjected to his disapproval before, she didn’t cower as most of the staff did. Her first responsibility was to the patient. A fact that had put her at odds with her last supervisor, and the reason she had made the difficult decision to transfer from a Texas Hospital affiliate in Houston to Dallas six months ago.
“You knew about this yesterday?” he accused.
“Yes,” she admitted, aware that her chin had jutted.
“And did she tell you why?” he asked, his tone no less cutting.
“Her daughter’s birthday party is Saturday, the day after her surgery and she doesn’t want to miss it,” Sabrina answered.
Dr. Mathis’s midnight black eyes narrowed, then turned to his patient. “You have a tumor in the brain. Every second we wait to go in is a second too long.”
“I feel fine,” Mrs. Ward said, seeming to draw strength from her husband, who now had his arm around her shoulders. “The medicine you’re giving me is helping the headaches and my other symptoms. Clarissa, my little girl, wants me there with her Saturday. I’ve missed so much because I was sick for so long and could hardly get out of bed, let alone play or take care of her. I can’t disappoint her.”
“If you don’t have the surgery, you might not live to see her have another birthday,” Dr. Mathis told her.
Ann’s lips began to tremble, tears flowed freely from her big hazel eyes. She burrowed into the arms of her husband and sobbed. Her husband looked scared and angry.
“Dr. Mathis—” Sabrina began, only to be cut off.
“The next time one of my patients makes a critical decision, I’d advise you to tell me and not wait for the patient to call me less than sixteen hours before the surgery,” he said to her, then strode from the room.
Sabrina considered throwing the notebook at his retreating back, then wisely went to Ann to try to console her.
“What kind of doctor talks to a patient like that?” Mr. Ward asked, his body trembling as much as his voice. “Don’t listen to him, honey. You’ll be there to dance at Clarissa’s wedding. Isn’t that right, Sabrina?”
Two pairs of eyes, begging for reassurance, fixed on her face. “I hope you’ll invite me,” Sabrina told them. She’d made it a practice never to lie to patients. They had to trust her. She just hoped the evasive answer was enough.
“Let me talk to Dr. Mathis, and I’ll be right back.” Sabrina left the room and went straight to the charting area for doctors behind the nurses’ desk. Dr. Mathis was there, his broad shoulders rigid, his mouth set in a tight line. The charge nurse, standing beside the secretary, kept throwing troubled glances at him. When Dr. Mathis was unhappy, heads rolled. Two other nurses decided they could finish charting elsewhere and moved their carts away. Sabrina didn’t hesitate.
“Mrs. Ward was frightened enough without you adding to it.”
Dr. Mathis finished making his notation on a chart in quick, slashing motions before looking up. He stared at her as if she were some icky bug that had dared cross his path. The look angered her just as much as the annoying unsteady pulse. He might have the manners of a warthog, but he was as gorgeous as forbidden sin.
“It’s critical that Mrs. Ward have surgery sooner rather than later.”
Sabrina trusted his knowledge. It was his professionalism that set her teeth on edge. “You could have told her differently.”
Dr. Mathis slowly stood, towering over her five feet four inches, his unblinking black gaze locked on hers. “She’s playing Russian roulette for a birthday party that can just as easily be postponed. The surgery can’t.”
“She—”
“Is dying, Ms. Thomas. Enough time has been wasted already. Patients are too emotional. They don’t always think clearly. I thought it was your job to help, not make matters worse,” he said.
Her temper spiked at his accusing tone. Knowing she shouldn’t didn’t stop her from stepping into his space. “Making things worse is your specialty, Dr. Mathis.” She spat out the last word as if distasteful. Clutching the notebook, she spun to see two other doctors there. Disapproval was clearly visible on their shocked faces.
Sabrina cursed inwardly. In the short two years Dr. Mathis had been at Texas his reputation as a top neurosurgeon had grown. He was revered as much as he was feared. No matter what Drs. Mims and Carter might personally think of Dr. Mathis, doctors stuck together against the lesser mortals on the hospital staff. Doctors were never reprimanded—and certainly not in public.
And before now, she’d had a good relationship with both doctors. Her rash actions might have endangered that relationship. Even the charge nurse frowned at Sabrina.
One thing life had taught her early was not to falter over what couldn’t be changed. Head high, Sabrina walked from the nursing station aware that the efficiency of the hospital grapevine would have their conversation all over the hospital in a matter of hours.
She didn’t have time to think about it. Right now, a family needed her help. But how? She loved her job as patient advocate, but it wasn’t an easy one. Often there were hard choices to make. Her job was to ensure that patients had the information needed for them to make the best possible decisions.
She knew firsthand how important that was. If someone hadn’t been there to speak for her when she was too young to speak for herself, she wouldn’t be alive today.
Stopping in front of Mrs. Ward’s door, Sabrina took a calming breath. The patient’s decision had been based on emotions, but reasoning—not anger—was needed to help her decide if her decision was the best one. She opened the door and wasn’t surprised to see Mr. Ward still holding his softly crying wife in his arms. He glanced up.
In his gaze she saw helplessness
, fear with a good dose of anger. “He had no right to upset Ann like that. I’m reporting him to the medical association.”
Sabrina let the door swing closed. “Dr. Mathis is brusque, but he’s also the best neurosurgeon in the state, possibly the country. He was at the Mayo Clinic for three years before coming to Texas two years ago. Patients come from all over the country to see him.”
“That doesn’t give him the right to scare my wife,” Mr. Ward said, clutching his wife closer.
Sabrina knew he was doing his best to hide his fear. “Despite Mrs. Ward doing better, Dr. Mathis believes it’s in Mrs. Ward’s best interest to have the surgery tomorrow as scheduled.” Sabrina stopped at the foot of the hospital bed.
Mrs. Ward lifted her tearstained face from her husband’s chest. “What do you think?”
Sabrina had been asked her opinion many times in her job and always answered truthfully. “Dr. Mathis might not have the best bedside manner, but few neurosurgeons have his skill in the operating room. He was sought by some very prestigious hospitals. Texas is fortunate to have a man of his gifts and accomplishments.”
“He’s rude,” her husband snapped, clearly not wanting to let go of his anger.
“And gifted, as I said. He diagnosed your wife’s condition when no one else had been able to,” Sabrina reminded them gently. Grudgingly she had to give Mathis points for not pointing that out to her during their conversations. She’d never heard of him bragging. His accomplishments spoke for him.
Mrs. Ward glanced at her husband, then tucked her head. “The surgery has risks. He told us that. I just wanted to be there for Clarissa’s birthday—in case—” Her voice broke, trailed off. Her husband pulled her closer.
Sabrina went to the bedside. “I might not have any children, but I understand why you made the emotional decision. Dr. Mathis made his decision based on your test results.”
“If you needed a neurosurgeon, would you use Dr. Mathis?” Mrs. Ward asked, staring at Sabrina intently.
Sabrina didn’t even have to think. “He’d be at the top of my very short list.”
Mrs. Ward looked at her husband, then spoke to Sabrina. “Thank you. If you don’t mind I’d like to talk to my husband alone.”
