Dr. Carrie was in her office at the end of the hallway. She was in between patients.
She barely glanced up to see Natalie idling in the doorway.
“Natalie,” she replied, shoveling a stack of papers aside with a heavy sigh. “How are you? I’ve been meaning to talk with you about something.”
“Do you have a couple of minutes?”
“Yes,” she replied. “My next set of rounds isn’t for another hour or so. Have a seat.”
“I’ll make this quick.”
“What’s on your mind?”
“The past few weeks working here has been great,” she began. “It’s filled me with the sort of purpose that I’ve been missing. And I sincerely thank you for that…”
“I’m glad you’re mentioning this, Natalie,” she replied. “I’ve been meaning to speak with you about something that was brought to my attention.”
“Oh?”
“Yes,” she nodded. A slow smile crept along her face. She leaned into the desk slowly, lacing her fingers together.
“Are you bilingual, Natalie?”
It was a question she hadn’t heard in quite along time. It was one of those things that went right along with, “Where’s your father, Natalie?”
How the hell was she supposed to know? She couldn’t remember the last time she’d cared to know.
It was one of many things she’d blocked out for the sake of her own depleting sanity. It had worked well for many years.
Still, she continued with the charade. “Why do you ask?”
“Well, one of our nurses heard you speak it the other night.”
“Whom was I speaking to?”
“That was the other thing I was going to ask you,” Dr. Carrie continued. “Do you have any medical experience?”
“I’m not sure I know what you mean, Dr. Carrie.”
“Were you having an out-of-body experience at the time? We had a couple of nurses come to me yesterday and tell me that you saved Mateo Fonseca’s life the other night.”
“I don’t think I did that much,” she replied. “He was simply out of breath and getting cold. I immediately recognized the reaction and handled it effectively. The only difference was he couldn’t speak a word of English.”
“And I’ve arrived back at my original question…are you bilingual?”
Natalie sighed. Dr. Carrie was making it very difficult for her. Why?
“Yes. I speak English and Spanish with equal aptitude.”
“Great!” she replied. “Now, was that so difficult?”
“I really need to tell you something, Dr. Carrie.”
“Can it wait a moment? I have someone just down the hallway who would like to meet you.”
Before she could part her lips to speak again, she was trailing Dr. Carrie’s white coat down an unfamiliar corridor and up a small flight of stairs to a much nicer office with leather trim and certificates everywhere.
“Come in, come in!” It was a much deeper male’s voice. Older. Heavily accented.
He twirled his big chair around, revealing his open, wrinkled face and charming blue eyes. He was a smaller man, in comparison to Brandon, with a slender build and a full head of salt and pepper hair.
“Dr. Lambert,” Dr. Carrie began. “This is Natalie Greene. She works with me. She’s the one that everyone has been asking about. Natalie, this is Dr. Pierre Lambert, one of the leading surgeons in North America and the CEO of this hospital.”
“Ah, Ms. Greene,” he began. His accent was smooth, but manageable. Natalie couldn’t detect the origin. He watched her movements carefully until she was in the armchair directly across from him. “Have a seat.”
“You must be quite fond of Mateo,” he continued. His brow was furrowed.
“I’m fond of all children,” she replied earnestly. She released the breath she’d been holding in for a while. She felt better.
“All children deserve a chance to live a full, healthy happy life…”
“I totally agree, Ms. Greene. Now, were you aware that Mateo was someone who I’ve fostered from time to time?”
Natalie swallowed thickly, collecting her thoughts before she answered. “No, I was not. His familial or financial relationship to you would not have changed my motivations.”
“Good answer.” Dr. Lambert leaned into the table. “Nurse Sheffield was smart to have hired you. And you have no medical experience?”
“Not that I can remember, sir.”
“How did you immediately recognize what the problem was?”
“Women’s intuition.”
Natalie smirked at this, remembering a number of times her mother had used it over the years, wishing for the one day she could use it with equal sharpness.
Dr. Lambert matched her countenance, and sat back in his seat once more.
“Dr. Meyer you have a sharp one here…she must come to my fundraising event next weekend.”
Dr. Carrie looked in Natalie’s direction and winked.
“You’ll love it, Ms. Greene…champagne, snooty people, cocktail dresses, tuxedos. The whole to-do.”
Natalie nodded once. “I look forward to it, Dr. Lambert. Thank you.”
SHE WAS LATE MEETING BRANDON, but he didn’t seem to mind the extra time waiting for her. He was sitting by himself at a small round table under a well-decorated tarp at Kinsey’s artfully dressed sidewalk eatery. Clever he was to remember how much she loved their sweet potato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches.
He was flipping through a magazine when she approached the table. She cleared her throat and he gazed upward, smiling cautiously as though he couldn’t read her for the first time in years. Then he gathered to his feet swiftly, walked around the table to her, and wrapped his arms around her body as tightly as they’d go.
She’d missed the smell of him. She fought the urge to cry again.
“I’m sorry I lied to you.” Her voice was muffled into his clothed collarbone. He readjusted their stance so that he was gazing down at her, cupping her face in his hands.
“It’s my fault. I pushed you to it.”
She shook her head. “I should have told you. Like I tell you everything.”
“I shouldn’t try to control your every step.”
“You just love me too much, that’s all.”
He chuckled. “I can’t stand it when I wake up and you’re not there. I was so…I was so scared last night, Tallie.”
She leaned upward and pushed her lips into his. He embraced her tightly again, deepening the kiss between them. She didn’t care who saw.
Then she pulled away from him, pressing her forehead into his. “I swear to God, Brandy…I’m never running again.”
THEY BOTH MADE THE CONSCIOUS DECISION TO SKIP THE REST OF THE WORKDAY, and spend the remainder of it in bed.
Natalie lay helplessly naked beside him, stroking at his chest with her fingertips. The sun was dying outside of the window, and the smell of his heat made her want to go again. But he was tired and languid.
“Brandy…”
“Hmm?”
Playing with her hair distracted him. He’d always loved the texture of it.
“Why did you call her?”
He stopped moving for a moment, and then she felt him inhale deeply.
“I don’t know.”
“I’m not trying to start an argument.”
“I know.”
“I just really want to understand.”
“I see.”
“I mean, you two have quite the history together…”
“Yea.”
“And I’m a brat.”
“Only sometimes.”
“But I’m brat who’s wildly in love with you.”
He chuckled. “I just felt that.”
“And I don’t want to share.”
“I’m always yours. I don’t think I ever had a choice, baby.”
She kissed him, slowly rolling him on his back. Straddling him snuggly, she pinned his wrists down. She shivered at the way he stared up at her. He was ready for more of her.
“I had a dream last night that scared me.”
He scoured his face in concern. “About what?”
“You…marrying her.”
His face softened. “Who, Sophia?”
She nodded. “And I was the maid of honor.”
He sat up abruptly, clamping at her thighs, leaning his back against the headboard for support. It took a moment to adjust to his growing erection beneath her.
“No kidding?”
“Brandon, why would I kid about these things?”
Smirking, he started to kiss her neck, cascading downward to her collarbone, then her shoulder.
“Don’t you at least want to know what happened?”
He pressed his lips into the top of her breast. Her skin hummed to his attention.
“Not really interested in talking about my ex-girlfriend when my beautiful, naked wife is straddling my lap.”
“You didn’t even remember creating the nickname ‘Tallie’. You said that she’d done it.”
“Hmm.”
He was kissing her neck again. His tongue now made an appearance: long, slow strokes. She dug her nails into his back. She could feel him hardening against her. Why did he have to be so damn good at this?
“Are you even listening to me?”
“No.”
“Then perhaps we should stop so you can.”
“Your shortness of breath implies that you want to keep going…Tallie.”
He had her on her back again, thighs splayed in either direction. He was kissing her, groaning deeply, consuming her.
“Yes. Yes, baby, keep going.”
He pecked her lips once then gazed at her. “I’m in love with you, Natalie Chandler. I’ve been in love with you since you were that ashy-kneed, doe-eyed seventeen year old that I drove around everywhere. People have come between us before, but I guarantee it’ll never happen again. Understood?”
She nodded, allowing a tear to slide down her face. Then he found his place inside her again.
THE GARDEN PARTY
BRANDON WAS OUT IN THE YARD DOING SOMETHING. Probably killing time, she figured, and avoiding the inevitable task of having to get dressed in a tuxedo for the evening.
Standing in the mirror a week before, ogling himself with glorious vanity, he’d been surprised that his old wedding tux even fit him. “I’ve put on at least ten pounds since we got married. And it ain’t muscle.”
She’d pressed her hands into his shoulders, kissed his neck a little. “I think you look better than the day I married you.”
She figures that won him over.
She spent a little extra time mulling over her own outfit. She was barely showing in the pit of her belly, but she wanted something that covered Harper up well.
A protective sheathing, if you will.
As often as Brandon griped over the years at having to watch her pick out clothes, he insisted on accompanying her to the mall the previous Saturday.
“I want to make sure that no unnecessary skin is showing.”
“It’ll be unseasonably warm at the party. Do you want me to burn up on top of my changing hormones?”
“If I’ve got to be in that goddamn tux for five hours, you will suffer right along with me. Welcome to marriage.”
Showering together was the only way to get Brandon to care about getting dressed. Around three that afternoon, she poured his favorite shampoo into her palm, rubbed it together and dumped it on his head, coursing her nails through his scalp to calm him. He groaned a little.
“So, tell me about this Dr. Lambert.”
“I don’t know much about him.”
“So, this rich doctor just invites you to his party because you saved his grandson’s life?”
“Looks that way.”
“Does he know you were in med school?”
“Didn’t bring it up.”
“Why not?”
“Brandon, nobody wants to hear about the student who barely made it a year. Wasted time, money and energy. Made her mother cry. They want to hear the success stories, no?”
“I don’t know. Our story is realistic. We just love each other too goddamn much.”
She rinsed his hair and mulled over his words.
They really did.
She’d chosen a floor-length champagne-colored chiffon dress with an empire waist and no straps. She assured herself that if she got chilly, she could always use Brandon’s jacket.
She let her hair run languidly past her shoulders, pinning back a small portion at the center of her forehead for effect.
Brandon stood in the mirror watching her wistfully. She dusted her cheeks with a light blush, swabbed gilded shadow over her eyes, and dabbed her wrists with her husband’s favorite perfume.
He reached outward, trailing the pad of his thumb along her back. “How about we just stay here? You’re too damn beautiful. For once, I don’t want to show you off.”
“Now, that won’t make a good impression, Brandon David.”
“I have other ways of coaxing you.”
“Lovemaking won’t sate me today. I actually want to go.”
“I know. Pardon my difficulty.”
“If you weren’t difficult, you wouldn’t be my Brandy. Now, grab your keys, my handsome husband. Let’s go.”
HER MAMA TOLD HER ONCE that the only thing that seemed to make sense at the end of it all was how much a man made in his lifetime. Dr. Pierre Lambert was no exception. Nearly swallowed by freshly manicured acreage, the Lambert mansion was a sprawling Old Portland Style number with an obnoxious stone serpentine driveway, and lantern-filled wraparound porch. It was perfectly situated to face the Willamette River, and made not attempts at Pacific Northwestern modesty. He wanted people to see it, feel in awe of it, inferior to it. Any architect worth anything would die of envy at the sight of it, believing it to be an unimaginable thing, set right forth on earth by God Himself.
A shiny-vested valet stopped Brandon at the head of the driveway. Her husband was reluctant to hand over the keys.
The young valet, pimple-faced and confident, smiled reassuringly. “It’s in good hands, sir.”
The sky was just beginning to turn color. The heat was apparent but pure. Brandon reached for her hand and laced his fingers tightly with hers.
It was the first time since their wedding that she’d ever seen him this nervous. “Sheesh. You ready for this?”
She arched her feet upward toward him and pecked his cheek gingerly. “It’ll be fine. Just have a good glass of wine and you’ll be the life of the party.”