Barefoot in the Sun

  “So, is Zoe your new girlfriend?”

  He opened his mouth to say no, but the denial didn’t roll out. “She’s a…friend.”

  Evan nodded, skepticism all over his little face. “I like her.”

  “Well, sorry, she can’t be your girlfriend.”

  That got him a toothy grin. “I know. I mean, I guess you and Mom…”

  Oliver felt his shoulders drop with the weight of the conversation. “We’re not going to be together, Evan, but we both still love—”

  “I’ve heard the speech, Dad.” He worked to swallow, and Oliver was filled with sympathy. Evan had been a trouper through this whole thing, better than any parent could expect. “I, you know, don’t want to get my hopes up and…”

  “Lose someone again,” Oliver supplied.

  Evan glanced toward the ground, his cheeks pink.

  “Trust me, son, I know how you feel.” And he took the silent admission to heart. Zoe could leave two broken hearts behind when she left next time. “We better go.” He gave Evan’s shoulder another nudge. “I’m not kidding when I say she could change her mind.”

  The Jeep was still in the driveway when he opened the door, but the two women in it were making no effort to get out. They were deep in conversation, a dark expression on Zoe’s face visible over Pasha’s narrow shoulder.

  Zoe looked up, a plea for help directed at him.

  “Wait here for a second,” he whispered to Evan, easing the boy back into the entryway. “I think this conversation requires privacy.”

  Evan agreed silently, and Oliver stepped out into the sunshine, approaching the passenger side. “Hello,” he called out.

  Very slowly, Pasha’s gray-haired head turned to him. “Hello, Oliver.”

  Close to a decade had passed since he’d last seen the spry little woman who claimed to be a gypsy and told the future in the craziest ways. A decade that had changed her far more than it had changed Zoe or Oliver.

  “Pasha, it’s good to see you.” He reached to give her a hand out of the high-stepped Rubicon, but she quickly shook her head.

  “I’m not staying.”

  “Aunt Pasha,” Zoe said, frustration in her voice. “Please come in and talk.”

  She closed her eyes. “I’m really not feeling up to it.”

  Actually, he believed that. Her hair, once lustrous and nearly blue-black, was only about two inches long in length, silver white, and facing straight into the air. She still wore too much silver jewelry, but instead of looking festive and wild, the chains and earrings seemed to weigh her down, which wouldn’t be difficult on a woman who couldn’t hit a hundred soaking wet.

  But the doctor in him saw more than the obvious.

  He recognized the sallow skin, the dim eyes, the full-body wastedness that consumed cancer patients.

  “It’s pretty hot to be driving around without air-conditioning,” he said.

  “She normally loves the top down,” Zoe told him.

  But Pasha held up her hand to stop them both. “I—I…” She turned to him again, this time looking at him as hard as he’d looked at her. “This is awkward,” she finally said.

  “It doesn’t have to be,” he replied quickly. “Come inside, have something cold to drink, and—”

  “Can I come out now?” Evan asked, already halfway across the driveway.

  Oliver seized the opportunity. “Meet my son,” Oliver said with a smile. “Who has a hard time doing exactly what I say.”

  Pasha leaned around his shoulder as Evan came running out to the car. “Hi, Zoe!” he called.

  “Hey, kid. How do you like your new house?”

  “I love it! Come and see.”

  Zoe hesitated a moment, checking out her aunt. But Pasha’s eyes were riveted on Evan, her mouth opened in a little circle of shock. “That’s your son?” Her voice rose with an odd crack.

  “C’mere, Evan.” He gestured for him to come closer. “This is Ms. Tamarin, Zoe’s great-aunt.”

  “Hi.” He gave her a little wave.

  “How old are—wait, wait, don’t tell me. Eight.”

  “Exactly.”

  Had Zoe already told her? Or was he going to get flattened by disgust when Pasha realized that this boy had already been conceived during the month Oliver had been a fixture at their little rental in Chicago, dating Zoe?

  “I knew it,” Pasha said, staring and then surprising them by sliding her legs around to get out of the Jeep. “Going into third grade?”

  He lifted a shoulder. “The dean wants me to skip third, but I’m not really sure if I should do that.”

  “He’s advanced,” Oliver explained, putting a proud hand on his son’s shoulder. “We’re trying to decide if moving him ahead a year is the right thing to do socially.”

  “He looks fine socially,” Pasha announced, climbing down with no assistance whatsoever, still focused on Evan. “Give me your hand, little one.”

  Evan frowned for a moment, then reached out to shake Pasha’s hand. “It’s nice to meet you.”

  She flipped his hand, palm up. “Of course it is,” she said. “Now let me see what you’ve got here.”

  Zoe came around the front of the Jeep, smiling at the exchange and then at Oliver, like they had shared a secret victory. She wore an ankle-length sunshine-yellow strapless dress as bright and sexy as her tanned face and summer-blonde curls.

  Evan tugged his hand away. “What are you doing?”

  “Pasha only offers to read your palm if she likes you, Evan,” Zoe assured him, with a gentle hand on his shoulder. “No need to worry.”

  Oliver took in the scene for a moment: Zoe so sweetly protective of his son, and the old woman doing her palm-reading game, sun pouring over all of them with warmth and light.

  And there went all those stupid things again. Braindead, gutsqueezed, hearthurt. Symptoms of something he really shouldn’t be thinking about with Zoe.

  She’d looked at him like he had three heads when he even suggested something more serious than pool sex. She’d never change. She’d never fit. She’d never stay. Why would he even ask?

  “Oh, look at that,” Pasha said, easing the boy closer.

  “What?” Evan asked, unsure. “Is it bad?”

  “No, it’s all good,” Pasha promised him, running her hand over his palm but mostly looking at his face with a little bit of wonder and a lot of joy. That’s what it was; she’d absolutely brightened since she’d seen Evan. “What I see is someone whose fate line joins his life line at a critical juncture. That means he’s a big thinker who knows exactly what he wants to be.”

  “A meteorologist,” Evan and Zoe said at exactly the same time.

  He did? How was it that Oliver didn’t know that? And Zoe did? A little guilt smashed with envy in his chest as Pasha continued.

  “Oh, my!” Pasha said with an exaggerated gasp.

  “What?” Evan looked concerned. “Am I going to die?”

  “Heavens no. Your life line is endless, and goes right past the edge of your palm, which means once you know someone, you’ll give them your whole heart.”

  That must be hereditary, Oliver thought with another glance at sunny Zoe.

  “Someone…like a dog?” Evan asked, getting a laugh from all of them.

  Pasha laughed the hardest, and it caught in her throat, making her cough so hard it turned hoarse and gruff.

  “Are you okay?” Zoe asked, instantly transferring her touch from Evan to Pasha, shooting a quick look at Oliver, making sure he’d heard.

  He had, and that cough didn’t sound good at all.

  “Fine,” she rasped, but it was a good fifteen seconds until the spell subsided.

  “Why don’t we get you inside?” Oliver suggested, half expecting her to freeze and return to the Jeep.

  But Pasha smiled and kept holding Evan’s hand. “Of course,” she said. “I want to finish this reading because I do see something very interesting.”

  They walked toward the door, Evan leading the olde
r woman in, his eyes wide with fascination. “What is it?”

  “The center X.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  “You’re very good at games.”

  “I’m a chess master.”

  “Oh, I was thinking about something a little less taxing for my old brain…”

  They disappeared inside and Oliver stayed back next to Zoe.

  “Well, that worked like magic,” she said, watching them disappear into the house. “He’s like the Pied Piper of little old ladies.”

  “She likes him, that’s for sure,” Oliver agreed, unable to keep himself from putting a hand on her bare shoulder. Her skin was so warm and smooth he had to fight the urge to bend over and put his lips right there and taste the sun on her.

  “I really thought she was going to refuse to come in,” she said.

  “She was, but I guess she likes kids.”

  Zoe shook her head. “News to me. And, believe me, it wasn’t easy getting her here. She thinks we’re stopping for two minutes on our way somewhere else.”

  He nodded. “I can see she’s very sick.”

  “Oh, is it that obvious?”

  “I’m afraid so, but that doesn’t mean she has cancer.” Although he’d put his money on it.

  “You have to work fast, then, Oliver.” She looked up at him, squinting in the sunshine, her eyes moist. “She wants to die.”

  “What?”

  “She thinks I’d be better off without her. I could have a…life.” Zoe shrugged. “I think it’s her solution to your more legalistic approach.”

  “Did you tell her you’re going to talk to a lawyer?”

  She shook her head. “It’s not happening. She went batshit crazy. I can’t do that to her. My God, Oliver, she’s practically hoping the cancer will take her.”

  “Talk about batshit crazy.”

  “I’m serious. If she knows I’m considering that, I’m afraid she’ll take her own life thinking it’s best for me.”

  For a second he stared at her, an old but sickeningly familiar sensation washing over him. Numbness. Pain. Disbelief. Anger.

  So much anger.

  The feelings erased any of the much nicer emotions he’d been nursing all morning. “We can’t let that happen,” he said simply, leading her inside. “We can’t let that happen,” he repeated, getting a strange look from Zoe. Of course she didn’t know. In their brief month together, he’d held back a few things about his past, too.

  “What can you do, Oliver?” she asked, obviously sensing he’d changed his tune a bit.

  At the doorway, he hesitated. “I haven’t told you much about my approach, Zoe. You have to understand something now. Our treatments are not typical, they’re not proven, and they’re not blessed by the FDA. Like I said, my clinic specializes in experimental treatment. And that has risks.”

  She looked dubious. “Is it legal?”

  “Absolutely. We work with the National Institutes of Health, researchers, and some of the top cancer institutions in the country. Like I said, we’re the last stop for the hopeless.”

  “And what kind of results do these hopeless patients get?”

  He smiled a little, unable to hide his pride. “We have some miraculous stories, and I have the living, breathing, golf-swinging patients to prove it.”

  Hope brightened her eyes. “Would you take a living, breathing, palm-reading patient?” She put her hand on his arm. “Even if I don’t talk to a lawyer?”

  He nodded slowly. “Let me talk to her, and get her comfortable, then we’ll see what’s next. I’ll want to consult with my partner.”

  She wrapped her arms around him, pulling her body right into his. “Thank you.”

  “Don’t thank me yet. Let’s take step one.” With his arm around her, they walked inside. The living room was empty, but the sound of Evan’s laughter came from the patio. The two of them were already outside, at a table, with Pasha shuffling a deck of cards.

  “Zoe, she’s going to teach me the Egyptian game!”

  Zoe put her hand to her heart, feigning pain. “Ugh, I’ve been replaced.”

  “No!” Evan almost jumped out of his chair. “You can play, too.”

  “It’s more fun with two people,” Zoe said. “But we’ll watch. Your dad knows how to play.” She shot him a playful look, memories of cards and tequila and disappearing clothes arcing between them like a thousand-volt defibrillator to his chest.

  “Dad plays cards?” Evan almost choked with disbelief.

  “I’m actually really good at that game.”

  He could feel Zoe’s look.

  “Sometimes,” he added, nudging her playfully.

  “You better pay attention,” Pasha said, snapping the deck in front of Evan’s face. “You need brainpower and speed to play this.”

  “I have a hundred-and-sixty-two IQ.”

  Oliver cringed. “You’re not supposed to tell people that, Ev.”

  Pasha flipped the cards. “I don’t care if you have a four-hundred-and-sixty-two IQ, this game takes skills.”

  “Nobody has an IQ that high,” he said, ever the literal little guy.

  “And nobody has ever beat me at this game on the first try.”

  “Oh yeah?” He shimmied closer to the table, and they were off. Oliver watched her teach him, a little in awe at how quickly his son learned, but also taking in as much as he could of the older woman.

  Not a medical examination, by any stretch, but her cough was not in the lungs. And she unconsciously touched her throat more than her chest. With a gun to his head he’d say esophageal. But he had to talk to Raj before they did anything else. And so did Zoe.

  He took her into the kitchen to talk privately. “I want us to meet with my partner. Today. He’s at our clinic and you can talk to him about Pasha.”

  “Shouldn’t we bring her?”

  “I need you to know exactly how we work and what IDEA is.”

  She frowned at the acronym.

  “Integrated Diagnostics through Experimental Analysis,” he said. “Like I said, we have a team of top-notch medical researchers working tirelessly on advanced, untested treatments. But it’s not unusual for our patients to be the guinea pigs of cancer treatments, even to be the case histories for the government organizations to study when they approve a new treatment. It’s cutting-edge stuff.”

  “You know you’re singing my song, doc.” She glanced out to the patio. “But I don’t want to leave them here alone. Let me call Lacey’s daughter, Ashley, for some backup and we can go.”

  “I’ll go tell them we’re off to run some errands.” He returned to the patio in time to see Evan snatching a card back with lightning-quick hands.

  “Ha ha!” He pointed at Pasha. “Got it!”

  She beamed back. “You are absolutely the…the…sweetest little boy I’ve seen in years.”

  Oliver interrupted the game long enough to tell them the plans.

  “Just bring lunch when you get back,” Pasha replied. “We’re going to work up an appetite, right, Ma…” She hesitated as if she couldn’t remember his name, then grabbed it. “Evan?”

  “Right!”

  She gave him a grin that put her whole heart on the line. Certainly not like a woman who was contemplating the unthinkable act of suicide. But then, she wouldn’t be the first sweet lady to fool a little guy like that, would she?

  Chapter Nine

  You’re great with Evan,” Oliver said as they climbed into the Jeep. He adjusted the seat to his six-foot-one frame, sunglasses hiding his eyes but making him look cool. And hot.

  “Not as good as Pasha. Good heavens, I’ve never seen her make such fast friends with anyone.” Truth was, she made friends with so few people. “But he’s a great kid, Oliver, as I’m sure you know.”

  “I know he’s great. He’s also tough.”

  She glanced at him as she pulled on her seat belt, not quite sure what he meant. “He seems pretty easy to me.”

  “That’s what I mean.
You make it look so easy.”

  “Maybe Evan and I are on the same maturity level,” she teased. “Which is not meant to be self-deprecating. That kid is smart.”

  “Maybe too smart for his own good.” As they drove off the property and into town, Zoe could tell he wanted to talk more about Evan, but she was itching to know about his clinic and the possibilities.

  “I think you’re trying too hard,” she suggested. “You know, with the divorce and all, and him being in your care all summer. Relax and have fun with him.”

  He threw her a smile. “Fun is your specialty.”

  “You just need to be yourself with him.” She put a hand on his leg, loving the muscle that tensed under her touch. “You don’t need pointers, Oliver, honestly.”

  “I’ll try.” He turned the Jeep onto the causeway to the mainland, nodding like he was mentally filing the advice away.

  “Tell me about your clinic and your partner.”

  “Sure. I met Raj Mahesh at that oncology conference at the Ritz a few years ago. When I saw you in the lobby.”

  “And in the parking lot.”

  He frowned. “I don’t remember that.”

  She blew out a breath, embarrassed but not willing to lie. She’d freaked that day, seeing him and his wife, and had dived to the floor of a Rubicon very much like this one, the kind she rented every time she came to Mimosa Key and wanted a muscular convertible for the beach. “I was with Jocelyn and Tessa having lunch there, and you and your wife got out of a car at the valet parking.”

  He sort of shook his head, the moment probably not as crystal clear in his memory as it was in hers. “I remember meeting Mike Genovese, one of our investors, but I can’t believe I wouldn’t recall seeing you.”

  “You didn’t exactly see me,” she admitted. “I hid on the floor of the car.”

  “What? Why?”

  “Why do you think?” She let out a dry choke. “I didn’t want to see you or explain you or…” She waved her hand. “You were with your wife.”

  “What do you mean, ‘explain’ me?”

  “To my friends.”

  “They don’t know you have ex-boyfriends?”

  “Of course they do, and they would want to know why we broke up and why I was…” A basket case for the next two hours. “So how exactly did you get involved with this clinic?”