Keeping a problem instead of fighting it was counterintuitive. He’d seen from the first that Vicky was strong-willed. Doing things because she was told to didn’t sit well. She wasn’t rebellious or contemptuous of authority (as he admitted he sometimes was). For Vicky, it just felt better to do anything she did because she had decided to. The needle phobia was probably distressing because it overwhelmed her and blocked her ability to decide for herself. He was offering her a way to be in charge.
He’d done all the persuading he could by telling her she was losing. Now she had to make up her mind if she wanted to move on.
He kept the pace slow. He’d felt how quickly her arms had tired even under the stimulus of extreme fear and anger. Something was wrong. He prayed it was easily dealt with. He could do nothing to shield her. He could only offer her a way to deal with it from strength.
“Do you really hate needles too?” As he’d guessed she would, she had been thinking through everything he had said and coming to her own conclusions.
He nodded.
“You weren’t just saying that?”
He shook his head.
“What does ‘be bigger’ mean?”
“Every problem has an edge.” The ground under a magnolia was littered with large brown leathery leaves and seedpods the size of Vicky’s hand. To illustrate what he meant, he picked up a magnolia pod, some of its bright red seeds still attached. He brushed sandy dirt from it and handed it to Vicky. “Hold this up to your face, right in front of your eyes.” He pushed it even closer to her face. “Now can you see anything but it?”
“No.”
“But you know it has edges, right? Even though you can’t see them?”
“Yes.”
“I want you to remember that you can know it even when you can’t see it.”
Childlike, Vicky was already playing with the pod, turning it in her hands. “You know, it’s kind of interesting when you look at it up close like this.”
Caleb smiled. “Some problems are like that. When you look at them real close, they turn out to be kind of interesting. Suppose you want to know what the edges look like?”
Vicky held the pod at arm’s-length.
“Right. And once you look at the edges, not at the pod, what do you see?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Well, air, but you can’t see air.”
“How about your hands? Can you see them?”
“Oh!” Vicky laughed, delighted to suddenly see things a new way. The sound warmed in Caleb all the way to the bone. It was what he loved most about kids. They could shift on a dime. “My hands, yeah. And trees and bushes and grass. If I hold it up like this, I see the sky.”
“You have a choice about how you look at it. Both ways are interesting. If you want to choose the best way to pick it up and move it around, what’s the best way to look at it?”
Vicky extended the pod to arm’s-length again.
“What do you think?” Once again, it was up to her to make the choice to go further. He was telling her she could do something many adults had never learned. It was impossible to solve a problem at the level of the problem. And yet people refused to grow beyond it-sometimes it seemed like they were afraid they would lose themselves if they did.
“I’m bigger than this.” She held up the seed pod. “So looking at the edges is easy. How do I get bigger than the needle feeling?”
“You already are bigger than it. You just need to look for the edges. See what’s on the outside of it.”
“But I can’t. I can’t see any edges at all.”
“Remember what I told you to remember?”
“I can know the edges are there even when I can’t see them.”
“Right, and if you know they’re there, you can find them. Fortunately, when it comes to things you are afraid of, things you hate, all you have to do is think yourself bigger, until it is on the inside of you, and you are on the outside of it. When you do, on the outside of things you fear and hate, you’ll find people and books and TV programs-all there with some of the answers you need to win.” Caleb checked his watch. “Your mother is going to be looking for us. Ready to go back inside?” “Can I carry this?” She held up the pod.
Chapter 32
Charlotte stood to greet them as soon as Emmie and Do-Lord were ushered into the doctor’s office.
“Thank you for coming.” Charlotte held out a hand that trembled slightly. “As you know, my mother isn’t well herself, or she would be here.” Charlotte didn’t mention Fairchild. He hadn’t been at the hospital again. She hadn’t said, and Emmie hadn’t asked, what had happened to him. Charlotte also didn’t mention Calhoun. Emmie also didn’t ask. There were details she simply didn’t want to know.
“Vicky trusts you, and so do I.” Charlotte smiled apologetically. “I must ask you not to reveal anything that’s said here to anyone-even the family-until the senator’s aides can prepare an announcement.” Emmie, seeing how Charlotte and Teague lived at close range, understood what compartmentalized lives they led. Information, even among their intimates, was shared strictly on a need-to-know basis.
Charlotte bit her lip, one of the few signs of agitation Emmie had ever seen her make. “The specialist in blood disorders, the hematologist, said he wanted to go over some tests with me, and I didn’t want to hear it alone.”
A man in a lab coat entered through an interior door. “Good afternoon. I’m Dr. Koppleman. I’m glad you could come in Mrs. Calhoun. Will the senator be coming?”
“He’s been delayed and asked us to start without him,” Charlotte replied smoothly. Emmie wondered if any part of that speech was the truth. “These are members of my family, Dr. Emelina Caddington and Chief Petty Officer Caleb Dulaude.”
Caleb might be considered a relation, though Charlotte didn’t know it, but Emmie wasn’t one at all. Emmie guessed it was easier to say they were family than explain who they really were.
Dr. Koppleman shook hands all around and asked them to be seated. He shuffled papers for a minute. “Mrs. Calhoun, as I told you, we’re still waiting for some of the tests to come back, but they won’t change what we know. Vicky has a rare form of anemia. A disease called Fanconi anemia.”
“I’ve never heard of it,” Charlotte said faintly.
“It’s rare. There are fewer than one thousand cases.”
“Is it serious?”
Dr. Koppleman nodded gravely. The compassion in his brown eyes told the rest of the story. “It’s a bone marrow disease,” he explained. “Her bone marrow isn’t making red blood cells as it should.”
“Are you sure?”
“I consulted with two nationally known specialists. They concur.”
“Can it be cured?”
“Fanconi anemia, or FA, is a genetically transmitted disease. Since genes can’t be changed, at least not at the present stage of stem
cell research, we don’t speak of cure. FA is usually diagnosed between six and eight years of age, and there’s a wide range of how severely the child is affected-how many organs are involved. Fortunately, Vicky seems to be largely unaffected by the disease. She’s nearly average in height and weight, normal in appearance, and she’s highly intelligent.”
“Normal in appearance?”
“Yes. We’ll need more tests to determine organ function, but just at a glance, she looks normal. Some children are not.”
Charlotte’s eyes filled with tears, which she managed not to let fall. “There’s no cure?”
“The bone marrow failure can be cured with a transplant. You will want to educate yourself about FA, but my recommendation would be to take her to one of the centers that specialize in Fanconi. It’s not a simple diagnosis, and you’ll want to know everything that can be done is being done.”
“Does genetic mean my husband or I passed it on to her?”
“Fanconi is an autosomal recessive disease. For the disease to manifest, both parents must have the gene. If both have the gene, their offspring have a one in four chance of developing the disease. Two will be carriers like the parents. They have one gene for FA, but because they also have a normal gene, they don’t have the disease. And there’s a one in four chance of not having the gene at all.”
“You say she can be treated with a bone marrow transplant?”
“If the transplant is successful, the anemia can be completely eliminated.”
“Can I give her my bone marrow?”
“Because the parents have the gene, they can’t be marrow donors.”
“Who can be a donor?”
The doctor looked at his papers. “I see here that Vicky doesn’t have any brothers or sisters. That’s a shame. The best donor is a sibling who doesn’t have the gene.”
“Are you going to say something to Charlotte?”
Caleb didn’t have to ask what Emmie was asking. The fact that Vicky might have a close relative who might not carry the gene had rumbled like a cart on the way to the guillotine since they had left the doctor’s office.
They had driven Charlotte home, then stayed with her while she made calls to her mother and Calhoun. She had been given pamphlets on Fanconi anemia, but she wanted them there in case they could better explain what the doctor had said about Vicky.
Vicky’s grandmother had been understandably upset. Charlotte had shed tears for the first time that Caleb had seen. He was beginning to know where Vicky came by some of her grit. After Charlotte hung up from talking to her mother, she called Calhoun. She seemed unsurprised that Calhoun couldn’t talk to her right then, and instead, described all that had transpired to an aide.
“Not yet,” he finally answered Emmie’s question.
“Are you ever going to?”
“I don’t know how Calhoun would feel if he knew about me, but Charlotte has enough to deal with. She doesn’t need a long lost bastard stepson to show up right now. I’m already a registered marrow donor, and the first thing they’ll do is check the registry. You heard what the doctor said. Only thirty-five percent find matches among family. Why upset her if I don’t have to? I might be a gene carrier, but even if I’m not, since I’m a half-sibling, the chances are even less that I match.”
“I guess you’re right. After all, you don’t know for sure that he is your father, and you are Vicky’s brother. But I wish you had a way to get closure-for your sake.”
Caleb had never been so aware that he was lying by indirection.
He couldn’t tell Emmie that even if he knew he was a perfect match, he couldn’t donate his bone marrow. He looked at himself through her eyes, and he didn’t like what he saw at all: a man who would let his agenda threaten a child. But he hadn’t. That’s what he had to keep reminding himself. By his own choice, he would never, ever have put Vicky in danger.
When he’d gone looking for Calhoun’s vulnerabilities, he’d been thinking he’d find a scandal, some malfeasance. Maybe that the man looking to become a North Carolina “favorite son,” was getting some on the side, and if the universe was really benevolent, from a man.
He had already stayed his hand because fellow SEALs would be threatened if he killed Calhoun. How many more perfect opportunities would the universe offer him? This, after all, was the most exquisite justice he could ever ask for. The perfect eye for an eye. He could do exactly what Calhoun had done-nothing- and Calhoun would get exactly the same results.
No, he never, never would have chosen Vicky to be the instrument of his revenge, but the perfect symmetry of the situation was awe-inspiring in its destructive beauty.
He could make it even more perfect by telling them now that he might be a match. He would be a gift-horse they couldn’t afford not to look in the mouth. And when they did? He would win either way.
And yes. He could contemplate a course of action he would have found despicable at any other time. It was part of being the man he was. He’d done things and been part of things. There were terrible things that happened in war. Innocents lost their lives, were burned and maimed, in gruesome accidents and miscalculations.
There were other horrible things- not accidents- that happened because the innocents simply weren’t as important as the objectives. You didn’t justify it. You accepted it. He accepted it. This was part of being the man he was.
Chapter 33
Caleb brought in a load of wood to replenish the family room fireplace at Aunt Lilly Hale’s. Pickett and Jax and Tyler had been able to come for Christmas, filling Pickett’s mother’s house to capacity. So Emmie and Caleb were spending the night with Aunt Lilly Hale. The family would come over tonight to have supper and open presents. In the morning, Emmie and Caleb would go to Pickett’s family’s house for more present opening and to have Christmas dinner.
The next day, the day after Christmas, Caleb’s leave would be up. He had been so right that they didn’t have time to waste. Emmie was clinging to him a little, and she knew it. Every sight of him was precious. They had already talked about how they would adjust their schedules to have time together, but it wouldn’t be easy. It was too soon to talk about forever, yet Emmie knew she had found exactly what she had always dreamed of in Caleb.
A future together shone with bright promise.
Caleb hunkered down in front of the fire, arranging the split logs with the same attention to excellence that he paid every job. His open-weave sweater revealed the play of muscles in his back, and the light of the fire burnished his golden skin.
He’d been a little quiet for the last hour, but so had she. There was still much to say. And the knowledge that their time was almost up made the smallest observation about the weather or wh
at they wanted to snack on, unbearably poignant. It was easier to remain silent.
When the log had caught, Caleb added another. One-handed, he checked the number on his cell phone without removing it from his belt. He frowned and went back to his fire tending.
“Do you have to return that?” Emmie asked.
“No.”
It was the second or third time in the last couple of hours that there had been a call he hadn’t taken. Suddenly, it all clicked into place. The phone. His solemn silence.
“Caleb? That’s the donor registry calling, isn’t it? Oh, my Lord, and I mean that in the fullest and most reverent sense. That means Teague Calhoun is your father. And you are a donor match for Vicky!”
She knew she was right-she never been more sure of anything-but a cold hand touched her heart. He was so… still.
“Caleb. What’s going on?”
He dusted his hands and replaced the fire screen. “You remember when I told you about the portrait of my grandfather?”
“Oh, yes, the portrait in the library.”
“I didn’t need this,” he said as he tapped the phone at his waist, “to confirm that Calhoun really is my father.”
“What? I thought you said-”
“I know he’s my father. I palmed a glass he had used at the wedding reception. I sent it to a DNA lab for a paternity test. He passed. Or failed, depending on how you look at it.”
“What do you mean, failed?”
“There’s something I didn’t tell you.” His hazel eyes sought hers. “When I saw the portrait of Calhoun’s father and I realized my mother’s stories might be true, I didn’t research him out of curiosity.”
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