One More Dance by Roxanne Rustand (best ebook reader for pc txt) 📗

to get her,” the nurse continued. “They figure they’ll make it back here by early morning.” She handed over the note, the handwriting nearly illegible. “I thought I’d better decode Marie’s handwriting for you.”

When the nurse’s voice finally registered, Kate sagged against the back of her chair in relief. “Thank God.”

The two staff members exchanged awkward glances, then pulled up a couple of chairs to face Kate’s and sat down.

The chaplain’s brow furrowed as he reached out to take her hand. “There’s something else, dear. The sheriff wants to talk to you, but we asked him to wait until after your husband is out of surgery.”

“Why? He wants to deliver a ticket?”

“It’s regarding the other person in your husband’s car.”

“Who?”

“The deceased.”

“What?”

“You didn’t know?” The chaplain frowned and looked at the nurse, but she lifted a shoulder and shook her head in response. “I’m so very sorry if this person was a friend or relative, Dr. Mathers.”

“Someone was with him?” Kate thought back to when she’d called the law office, after Jared didn’t answer his cell.

Tom had said Jared was on his way north to a meeting, so Tom couldn’t have been in the car, and their legal secretary was on a Canadian fishing vacation this week. There’d been no mention of anyone else.

And Jared had been found on a road going south out of town, not north.

“Your husband was extricated just in time, but the other person was badly tangled in the wreckage and was dead at the scene. The EMTs and officers weren’t able to remove the body fast enough, and it was badly burned.”

Kate’s stomach roiled at the thought. That could have happened to Jared, too. Guilt followed her flash of relief. Her husband had been spared, but another family would be facing a terrible loss.

“She appeared to be a young woman,” the chaplain continued. “Slender. The investigators will need to use dental records for a positive identification, but it would save them time if you knew who she might be.”

Young. Slender.

The old, nagging uncertainty, dormant for so many years, flared to life. The late nights...the working weekends... Did this add up to a situation she’d never imagined facing again?

But just as quickly, Kate tried to extinguish her doubts.

“I...really have no idea who she is. Call Tom Williams, my husband’s law partner.” She rattled off Tom’s cell phone number. “She was probably a client.”

The chaplain jotted down the number. “I’m sure that must be the case,” he murmured. He handed the slip of paper to the nurse, who then left the room. “I hope that’s all the sheriff needs. If not, he may be calling on you later.”

“Of course.” Kate eyed the clock, willing the minute hand to move faster. Saying yet another silent prayer for Jared and the surgeons who were working to save his life. She tried to imagine what was happening right now, wishing desperately that someone would come out to tell her.

“I’ll be glad to sit with you for a while.” The chaplain’s soft voice broke through her thoughts. “This isn’t a time to be alone.”

His sad eyes and drooping jowls reminded her of a geriatric basset, and the weariness in his voice spoke of too many hours at the hospital as it was.

“You must have been here on overtime today, and I’m fine. Really.” She dredged up a smile. “I’ll try my mother-in-law’s phone every few minutes, and I know she’ll be here with me as soon as she hears the news.”

“Well...”

“Please, do go. Honestly, the solitude is peaceful.”

The old man led her in a prayer for Jared and his loved ones, then rose and clasped her hands in his. “If anything changes, have a nurse call me. I can be back in fifteen minutes.”

If anything changes.

Translated... If your husband dies. The enormity of it settled over her like a heavy mantle, making it hard to breathe.

“Thanks so much.” She nodded in farewell, slumping back in her chair after he left. She sat for a moment, then jumped to her feet and started to pace back and forth in the waiting room. Down the hall to the elevators, then back again, trying to settle the jitters in her stomach.

Every time she saw a nurse in the hallway she froze, half-afraid the person was coming to deliver bad news.

And every few minutes, she tried speed-dialing Jared’s mother.

At nine forty-five, Sylvia finally picked up with a terse, “Yes?”

Her irritable response changed to stunned silence, then near-hysterical tears when Kate gently explained the situation.

“I was just heading back to the Twin Cities from Stillwater.” Sylvia’s voice shook. “I’ll turn around at the next exit.”

“You’re almost three hours away. It’s late. Is there anyone you can call to come with you?”

“I—I don’t think so. But I can get there just a little after midnight if I push the speed limit. Call me if anything changes... And if you hear any news at all about his condition, I want to know it.”

“Sylvia—”

“I’ll be there as soon as I can.” The connection ended.

Kate stared at her phone for a moment, Sylvia’s tense voice still ringing in her ear, then she pocketed the phone and resumed her pacing.

“Dr. Mathers?” A deep baritone voice reverberated down the hall.

“That’s me.” She spun around to find a man in surgical scrubs, a mask dangling from his neck, standing just outside the double doors of the operating room. She hurried over to him. “Tell me—how is Jared doing?”

“We’re still trying to repair the damage to Jared’s chest and liver. There’s far more than we could see on the MRI, and we haven’t been able to stop the internal bleeding thus far.” The man’s deeply lined face revealed no glimmer of optimism. “He’s coded twice already, and the situation is grave. I’m so sorry.”

Kate felt herself go cold, clammy. The room grew dim as she focused desperately on the surgeon’s face. “B-but there’s still a chance. Once the surgery is over.”

“He’s on life support, and he’s in God’s hands, Dr. Mathers. I can’t rule out