Always (Spiral of Bliss #7)

by Nina Lane

  I just hope we don’t need too much of it, since that would mean—

  No.

  Just…no.

  By Wednesday evening, I’ve told everyone who needs to know. I’m proud of the way I’ve handled every conversation, with a calm dignity and the assurance that I believe everything will turn out fine. I’m sure my friends know I’m scared, but acting brave helps me feel that way inside.

  On Wednesday night, Nicholas and Bella are asleep, and I’m finishing cleaning the kitchen when I hear Archer’s truck rumble up the drive. My chest constricts. I have to be strong for Kelsey too.

  I hang the dishtowel on a hook and walk outside to where Archer is pulling the truck into a space by the garage. It’s a cold evening, the lights of Avalon Street glowing through the grayish dark.

  The passenger side door opens. Dean gets out, holding the door open for Kelsey. She jumps down, her gaze landing on me with the precision of an arrow.

  She straightens her shoulders and comes toward me, her stride long and determined. Her body is sleek and lithe in fitted jeans and a black sweatshirt. The navy streak in her blond hair glows like a flame.

  Kelsey March. My fierce, warrior-queen friend who confronts storms and looks as if she could banish the cancer from my body with one sweep of her hand.

  She stops in front of me, her blue eyes glittering behind her glasses. Without a word, she grabs my shoulders and hauls me against her in a powerful, unbreakable embrace.

  All the courage I’ve clung to for the past week drains out of me. My throat closes over. I press my face into Kelsey’s shoulder.

  “I’m going to cry,” I warn her.

  “That’s okay.” Her voice is gruff. She tightens her arms around me. “So am I.”

  Chapter 17

  Dean

  December 9

  The nightmares creep in, slow and insidious. Bella is screaming for me, but I can’t find her in the dark, slimy cave. Nicholas is in the ICU, almost unrecognizable attached to machines with tubes snaking down his throat. Liv is on the edge of a cliff, ghostly pale, her hair whipping in the wind. I’m running toward her, my muscles aching and lungs bursting with the effort.

  Just when I reach out to grab her, she stumbles backward, off the edge of the cliff. I watch helplessly as my wife falls through the gray mist, her scream stabbing me in the heart. Then I step off after her.

  I wake sweaty and shaking. I crawl out of bed, away from Liv’s warm body, and climb the stairs to my tower office. It feels like the safest place right now, locked above the world. I plunge into work, welcoming the reprieve of emailing people about conservation techniques and ancient monuments.

  To avoid the nightmares, I stay awake more often than not. I get through my lectures and office hours on auto pilot, trying not to think about the fact that I’m shortchanging my students, that they deserve more than a professor who is only half there. If that.

  I call my parents and sister to tell them about Liv, getting through the conversations by sticking to the medical facts. Though Liv and I aren’t close to my family, we’ve stayed in touch with them since Nicholas was born, exchanging emails and photos. Over the years, they’ve come to like Liv, and they’re shocked and saddened to hear of her diagnosis.

  I’d learned at a young age how to keep my private life private. My parents were rigorous about maintaining a specific public image, which meant hiding all our flaws beneath a veneer of perfection.

  That brittle perfection was the reason Archer and I fought, the reason I isolated myself when my grandfather was dying. And it took me a long time to understand, with bone-deep shame, that it was also the reason I’d kept my first marriage from Liv.

  Admitting failure, much less my worst failure, to anyone was an intolerable weakness. Admitting it to Liv was unthinkable. I hated the gut-wrenching fear of how she would react, that she might look at me differently, that it would change anything between us. In the end, it did, but in an ultimately good way, a way that made me love her beyond what I ever could have imagined. And then even more than that.

  Which is why I don’t know how to react when word of Liv’s illness spreads like wildfire around the history department. Within a few days my colleagues and students either don’t know what to say to me or are kindly but overly solicitous.

  The worst times are when well-meaning people ask me too many questions about her treatment or prognosis, and I give the same speech repeatedly, or when someone wants to tell me about their aunt’s or mother’s battle with breast cancer.

  I can’t muster up appreciation for anything. Not the stories of success. Not the sympathy. Not the questions. Not even the offers of help.

  Because everything people are saying reinforces the fucking nightmarish truth of what is happening to my wife.

  My wife.

  “You’re reading Pride and Prejudice?”

  I look up at the sound of Kelsey’s voice. She’s standing at the door of my university office, dressed in a tailored gray suit with a folder in her hand. She walks to my desk and reaches over to pick up the paperback.

  “Uh, yeah.” It takes me a second to process her question. “I mean, I was. I haven’t read any of it for a while. It’s one of Liv’s favorite books, and she got all bent out of shape because I hadn’t read it. So I was…I was going to surprise her.”

  “Nice.” Kelsey sets the book back on my desk. “You still can.”

  I shrug. In the time since I first opened the book to now, the idea of reading a book for my wife has become meaningless. It sure as hell won’t help her in any way.

  Kelsey puts the folder on my desk and opens it to reveal a letter on university stationery.

  “I can take over your seat on the Admissions Committee,” she says. “The provost already approved it, so you’ll have at least one less commitment.”

  I scan the paper, my jaw tightening. “I didn’t ask you to do this.”

  “I know.” She rests her hands on her hips, eyeing me with that all-knowing stare of hers. “But the last thing you need right now is to deal with more committee meetings.”

  I crumple the letter into a ball and toss it in the trash. “What I need is for you to leave me the hell alone.”

  “Whoa.” She holds up her hands, unfazed by my snapping. “You really think I’m going to leave you and Liv alone right now? You don’t have to be nice to me, but you do have to realize you can’t do it all, no matter how much you tell yourself otherwise.”

  Goddammit. I don’t want to hear this.

  “Thanks for the concern,” I tell Kelsey evenly. “But I can handle it.”

  “By throwing yourself into work and research, I know,” she replies. “And you really think that’s the best thing you can do? Not only for yourself, but for Liv and your children?”

  “Kelsey, get the fuck out of my office.”

  The order fires out of me, harsher than I’d intended. She blinks and takes a step backward. Guilt slams me like a steamroller, but before I can say anything else, she turns and strides out, closing the door behind her.

  I drag a hand down my face. There’s a cold, hard knot right in the middle of my chest. I know I should go after Kelsey and apologize, but instead I turn back to my computer.

  A framed black-and-white picture of Liv sits right beside my computer—and the sight of her is both a torture and a comfort. Because she looks like she always does—soft, pretty smile; warm, brown eyes, and her tumble of dark hair spilling over a white, button-down shirt—but only I know that the shirt is mine and that Liv is naked underneath.

  Only I know what happened right before I took the picture.

  Only I know that Liv had been gasping and writhing underneath me, that she’d wrapped her legs around my hips and bitten down on my shoulder when an orgasm shuddered through her beautiful body.

  Only I know how she’d arched her back and stretched against me when I slid my palms over her thighs, her torso, her breasts…

  Only I know the jagged fear of how different thi
ngs are between then and now. Back then, I’d never have imagined anything evil could ever again happen to the beauty on the other side of my camera lens.

  And if it did, I’d battle heaven and earth to protect her.

  But now? I don’t know how. I don’t have a single weapon I can use to defend my wife. The realization runs through my head like a sick refrain: Nothing you can do, nothing you can do.

  What the hell do I do when there’s nothing I can do?

  More goddamned research.

  Even if I don’t come up with any answers, at least I know how to look for them. And I’m still not convinced Dr. Christopher Anderson is “the best” doctor we could find for Liv—he’s definitely not the most experienced—but she’s adamant he’s the one she wants.

  We meet with him again to discuss the possible outcomes after surgery, and he supports Liv’s decision to have a lumpectomy. I watch my wife say something to the doctor, her hair falling over her shoulders to her breasts, which look soft and round beneath her sweater. My throat burns.

  We don’t yet have a surgery date, but I want it over and done with. Not until the tumor is taken out will we get the complete pathology report telling us the exact kind of cancer, the size of the tumor, if it’s invasive and aggressive, if it’s spread to her lymph nodes, if she needs chemo, if…if…fucking if.

  The comment from another doctor slithers into the back of my mind.

  “If we discover the cancer has spread…

  I rip the thought apart, crush it to pieces. Can’t go there. Won’t.

  …the game changes.”

  A bolt of remembered anger fires through me, a welcome relief to the terror. The game.

  As if my wife is a pawn on a chessboard. To that fucker of a doctor, she obviously would have been.

  I can’t yet tell what she is to Dr. Anderson, except a patient he wants to help. He doesn’t know how important she is—not only to me and our children, but to her friends, her co-workers, her employees, her customers. Hell, to the whole town.

  He doesn’t know she can make a perfect meringue and roll fondant like a French pastry chef. He doesn’t know she once cooked and served a flawless five-course gourmet dinner to a group of European diplomats and scholars. He doesn’t know she’s a great artist, that Mr. Darcy is her favorite fictional hero, that she alphabetizes the cereal boxes in our cupboard and likes to put potato chips inside her peanut-butter sandwiches.

  He doesn’t know she paints green leprechaun footprints on the kitchen floor the night before St. Patrick’s Day, or that she made me go outside at eleven on a freezing Christmas Eve to ring sleigh bells so the kids would know Santa was on his way, or that she spends the month of October hand-making Nicholas and Bella’s Halloween costumes.

  This doctor doesn’t know Liv. And he doesn’t know that saving her life also means saving…everything.

  Liv laughs suddenly. The sound is startling in the hushed atmosphere of a doctor’s office. A doctor who treats cancer. A doctor who is trying to kill the cancer inside my wife.

  I blink, attempting to focus on why Liv would be laughing—now of all times—at something Dr. Anderson said. He’s still speaking, also looking amused, before he reaches across the desk to pat her hand.

  “It’s a good plan, Liv,” he says. “Every case is different, and yours will be unique to you, but I’m optimistic. Once we get the surgery scheduled, we can move forward.”

  “What…what’s so funny?” I ask.

  They both look at me.

  “Funny?” Liv repeats.

  “Yeah.” My tie suddenly feels too tight around my neck. “You were just laughing.”

  “Haven’t you been listening?” Liv eases the mild reprimand by putting her hand on my knee. “I was asking Dr. Anderson about chemotherapy and losing my hair. He said it was likely I would, so I said I could start a new career as Sinead O’Conner. And he said, ‘Or a bowling ball.’”

  I stare at her. My insides twist.

  “You’re joking about losing your hair?” I ask.

  She shrugs, the lingering amusement fading from her expression. “It was funny. I mean, obviously I don’t want chemo, and Dr. Anderson doesn’t know if I’ll need it yet, but…why are you so mad?”

  “I’m not mad.” My fists clench and unclench.

  “You sound mad,” Liv says. “You look mad.”

  “I don’t think joking about cancer and chemotherapy is funny. Especially not with the doctor who’s treating you.”

  I shoot Anderson an accusing look. He pales, looking aghast at the thought that he’d behaved unprofessionally.

  “Dean, I apologize,” he says quickly. “I really didn’t mean to be offensive.”

  “Well, you fucking were,” I snap.

  “Dean!” Liv glares at me and turns toward the desk. “Dr. Anderson, you don’t have to apologize. I would much rather have a doctor with a sense of humor than one who acts like he’s sending me to the gallows. And Dean isn’t going to swear at you again.”

  She looks at me as if to say, “right?” Anderson stands, his expression somber.

  “It’s all right if you do, Dean,” he says. “I can take it. But I want you to know that, bad jokes aside, I’m doing everything I can to help Liv, and I’m deeply committed to her care. I’m fully on her side, and yours.”

  I can’t muster up any words of thanks, but I manage to nod before turning and leaving the office. I stop in the hallway, holding the door open for Liv, hearing her voice as she speaks to Dr. Anderson again.

  We walk to the parking lot in silence, Liv’s mood shifting palpably into one of tension. Now, in addition to being irritated by the doctor’s remark, I’m angry with myself for smothering my wife’s first real amusement since her diagnosis.

  “Dean, come on.” She closes the passenger door and puts her hand on my arm. “I’m glad to have a doctor who doesn’t feel like he has to walk on eggshells around me.”

  My fingers tighten on the steering wheel. This is about her, I remind myself. What I think or feel doesn’t matter one fucking bit if Liv is happy—or at least, satisfied—with the way things are going.

  “Is this about you not liking Dr. Anderson?” she asks.

  “What? No.”

  She drops her hand away from my arm. I can practically feel her withdrawing, and my self-directed disgust intensifies. I start the car and back out of the parking space.

  “He’s my doctor,” Liv says. “It would be nice if you both accepted that and realized he’s the one who can help me. Do you think for one second it’s remotely helpful for me to know you don’t like him?”

  “I don’t dislike him,” I say, slamming too hard on the brakes at a stop sign. “He’s not as experienced as the others, but he’s competent and—”

  “He’s far more than competent, and you know it. There is no way in hell you would let a doctor who was only competent treat me.”

  That’s true. I take a breath, acknowledging that maybe Anderson is more qualified than I’ve been willing to give him credit for.

  So what the hell is going on? If Liv trusts him and is comfortable with him, and if she likes his sense of humor, and he’s committed to helping her through this nightmare, then who the fuck am I to argue?

  Liv and I are silent for the rest of the ride home. I don’t even know what to say to myself, much less her. I sure as hell don’t know what my problem is—aside from the fact that the love of my life and center of my universe has a life-threatening disease.

  A thousand curses blister in my head. The anger is like an active volcano I can’t control—sometimes it only simmers, and other times it explodes without warning through my blood, drenching everything in a red haze of rage.

  When that happens, all I can do is run. The kids are still at school, so after Liv and I get home, I change into track pants and take off, running on the sidewalks bordering Colonial houses and leaf-strewn lawns.

  Down the street leading to the high school, across the parking lot to the football
stadium where I can circle the track and pound my way up and down the steps of the bleachers.

  Get out! Get out. Get the fuck out of my wife, you goddamned fucking insidious disease… I will fucking crush you, obliterate you, rip you apart…

  I stop at the top of the bleachers, my chest burning. Sweat drips from my temples. I grip the chain-link fence lining the back of the bleachers and fight to catch my breath.

  As my heartbeat slows, a thin thread of sanity filters past my anger. A fuck lot of good it does anyone for me to rage at cancer.

  I turn and go back down the steps. A grayish light has fallen, storm clouds covering the sun and rising over the mountains.

  I walk home slowly. Hollowness opens inside my chest. The rage burned away my guard, and now bitter helplessness and fear slither through me. My pulse ratchets up again, my muscles stiffening in defense.

  I reach the Butterfly House just as a crack of lightning splits through the sky and rain starts to fall. I toss my keys onto the foyer table and go into the kitchen.

  Liv is at the table in the sunroom, working on her laptop. The table is covered with papers—insurance forms, prescriptions, website printouts, pamphlets…

  “Oh, I’m glad you made it back.” She turns to me. “Looks like a heavy storm for the next hour at least.”

  I stop in the doorway and look at her. Long hair pulled into a ponytail. Soft, curvy body underneath her fleece shirt and yoga pants. Pale skin. Sprinkle of freckles over her nose.

  The fear digs in harder, like claws. Puncturing. Bleeding. My hands curl into fists. My breathing is fast, choking my throat.

  “Dean?” A crease appears between Liv’s eyebrows. “Are you—”

  I can’t stop myself. Don’t want to. Won’t.

  I cross the room to my wife in three strides and grab her shoulders, hauling her perfect, beautiful body against mine. Her gasp of surprise is lost against the pressure of my mouth. I grip her harder, forcing her lips apart with mine, needing to taste every part of her.