When the Right One Comes Along

  “I... I’m sorry. I can imagine...” she finally said.

  The words sounded feeble. Inadequate.

  “Can you? I feel...betrayed.” His anger erupted. “I opened up to you, confided my most personal ordeals—about Haley and my ex. And you didn’t feel we were close enough to take me into your confidence? To tell me that you were thinking of leaving the country? Worse, it’s not even that big a secret, since your colleagues at Ocean Crest obviously know.” He paused again, struggling with his own feelings. “You should have told me.”

  “I’m sorry...” she whispered. “I told you now.”

  “It’s a little too late. It’s also after the fact. You’ve already accepted. It’s a done deal.” He got up to pace. He had to work off his anger in some way. “Would you have told me even tonight, if I hadn’t prodded you into it?” He knew he sounded harsh, but other than having Haley back, his life was in shambles. “One morning I would simply have found you gone. Is that the way it would’ve been?” The thought of not seeing her again pained him more than he’d expected.

  “I would have told you. I was going to tell you. Tonight.”

  His laugh was bitter. “Yeah. Right. I’m supposed to believe that? This didn’t just come out of the blue. Did they approach you or did you go to them?”

  “I went to them,” she admitted softly.

  “So, you must’ve started the application process a while back. Then, today, of all days, you decided you were going to tell me?”

  “Yes...because I sent back the contract today...”

  He looked at her grimly; he felt as if every muscle in his body was stretched to the limit. “It’s done, then?”

  She nodded.

  The finality of it weighed heavily on him. He realized he’d held out some hope that there’d been a misunderstanding, or that she hadn’t actually accepted the offer. That she wouldn’t actually go. “As I said, a little after the fact.” He rose. It was time to bring the evening to an end.

  After he closed the door behind Jessica, he stood at the side of his living room window, where he could watch her but she was unlikely to see him. He accepted that this would probably be the last time he saw her.

  Her shoulders were hunched; her gait lacked its usual spring as she walked to her car. She swatted impatiently at some bug that must have flitted by. Her body language told him she wasn’t happy.

  Well, so be it. Neither was he.

  * * *

  DRIVING HOME, JESSICA mulled over the evening. Now she understood why Cal had seemed emotionally withdrawn from her lately. It wasn’t related to his starting work again and no longer needing her. It was her fault. She’d hurt him by not being honest with him. Just like his ex-wife. She could see the parallel.

  She’d always thought of herself as a good communicator. Why hadn’t she just told him what she was thinking and asked what was bothering him? They could’ve cleared up their misunderstandings and... She cared about him deeply. She’d never felt this way about another man. Was she falling in love with him?

  No, if she was honest, she already was in love with him. She might as well admit it to herself, if to no one else. If she’d told him what she was contemplating, would he have talked her out of it? Would he have wanted her to stay? Who knew where it could have led?

  It was too late to turn back. To undo what had been done. She’d made her decision and, clearly, he no longer trusted her. Any idea about where their relationship could have led was conjecture at best; there was no opportunity for them now.

  She’d be gone in a month.

  She had no choice but to follow through with her move to Honduras.

  That night, she drafted her resignation letter for the hospital.

  After twenty minutes of tossing and turning in bed, she knew that sleep was impossible. Getting out of bed, she put on her housecoat and wandered through her house, making lists. She’d be gone for at least two years; she needed to decide which of her belongings she would sell, give away or toss, or pack and store. Oh, and she’d have to rent out her little house. She loved it too much to sell.

  She had a lot to do before she left for Honduras. She considered that a blessing, since it would keep her mind occupied—and off Cal.

  Eventually, when she was lying in bed again, exhausted, she felt a sense of panic. What had she done? She’d been so certain that working for Care Across Continents was the right thing for her, but now she wasn’t certain...

  She was impossibly sad as she finally drifted off to sleep.

  * * *

  CAL DIDN’T FEEL like sleeping. He sat on his deck nursing a beer, Scout curled up on the bench by his side, head resting on Cal’s lap. Cal had watched the sun sink lazily below the horizon, the stars ascend and flicker through the translucent clouds drifting across the night sky. He lost count of the number of couples who’d strolled along the boardwalk, holding hands or arm in arm. It made him wonder if he was the only person on the planet not in a happy, stable relationship, or at least enjoying the first blush of potential love.

  Of course, that was ridiculous; he knew the stats. Most relationships—heck, most marriages—didn’t last in today’s society.

  And yet he really believed in monogamy and lifelong commitment.

  But maybe he was fated to be solitary. Some people weren’t meant to be part of a couple. He’d thought Anna had shown him that about himself, but here he was, pining for a woman who was beyond his reach.

  He lifted the bottle, took a long, slow sip. He smelled the spicy scent of meat on a grill. He would’ve assumed it was too late for a barbecue, but this was California and plenty of people kept strange hours. He inhaled deeply, and the scent brought back memories of the first night he’d cooked dinner for Jess.

  He wasn’t sentimental as a rule, and that only reinforced the depth of his feelings for Jessica. It was different from what he’d felt for Anna. They’d been young, and caught up in the heady excitement of first love. With Jessica, the feeling was much stronger. Steadier. Consuming.

  Now he was romanticizing, and that wasn’t like him, either.

  He stroked Scout’s snout. The dog pressed his head against Cal’s hand and snuggled closer.

  What if he drove over to Jessica’s place right now and declared his feelings for her? Beg her to stay and marry him?

  Would she laugh at him? Pity him for being such a sap? Or was there a chance she’d change her mind? What was the point, anyway? She was leaving. She’d made a commitment. Signed the contract. She’d follow through. She had too much integrity not to.

  But if she’d had so much integrity, why hadn’t she told him?

  She’d go, and even if she had feelings for him—and that was a huge leap of faith based on how things stood between them—the reality was that they’d drift apart during her time away.

  Whatever else happened, he was still in her debt for helping him reconnect with Haley. Because of that, if for no other reason, he would do what was right for her.

  What was that old saying—if you loved something, let it go? If it returned it would always be yours, if it didn’t, it never was.

  The job seemed to be what Jessica truly wanted. He’d let her follow her heart and do what she had to. Wasn’t that what selfless love was all about?

  He cared about her that much. He’d wish her well.

  He wouldn’t get in her way; he owed her that.

  He’d let her go.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  San Pedro Sula, Honduras

  THE SMALL CHARTERED plane banked steeply as it made its final approach to the La Mesa International Airport, located less than seven miles from the city of San Pedro Sula, in the Cortés Department in Honduras. Jessica’s stomach lurched at the sharp maneuver.

  The Beechcraft carried her, another doctor, a nurse and a
quantity of supplies for Care Across Continents’ operation in San Pedro Sula.

  On their final approach, the Central American coast shimmered like an emerald jewel at the edge of the turquoise-blue Caribbean Sea. From their elevation, it was the beauty they saw, not the poverty.

  As soon as Jessica stepped off the plane and onto the tarmac, the heat and humidity smothered her. A driver was waiting for them. He spoke broken English, interspersed with the occasional Spanish phrase. He explained how long the ride would be, what they could expect at their base camp and that a truck was on its way to transport their supplies. He assured them repeatedly that it was safe to go with him and leave the supplies, which would be taken to the base camp. Nothing would go missing; they had his word.

  It was Jessica’s first decision in her new role, and she didn’t feel entirely comfortable with it. But she lived by the basic principle of trust unless given a reason not to. She chose to trust the driver.

  Still, she breathed a huge sigh of relief an hour later when she saw the large canopied truck rumbling toward their base camp in a massive cloud of dust. She was more relieved when inventory was taken and all the supplies that had accompanied them on the plane were accounted for.

  She needn’t have worried. The Hondurans she met in the next few weeks were an honest, honorable people. They were enormously grateful for the aid provided by Care Across Continents. Although the organization’s services were free, Hondurans were a proud people, too, and they often tried to pay her with chickens, eggs, fruit or their own handiwork. She’d accept the small gifts that patients would bring her—it would have been rude not to—but she always politely declined the food they offered. She knew that many of them barely had enough to feed their own families. She didn’t want to deprive them of what little they had.

  Jessica appreciated the land, its people, and valued the work she did. But her days were long by choice, and lonely. Just a couple of weeks in, and she was miserable.

  She buried herself in work to stave off despair. On the plus side, her respect for Care Across Continents grew with each passing day. The organization and all its people, down to the most junior volunteer, were thoroughly committed to their cause. She felt proud to be contributing to the enormous difference they were making in the communities and lives of the people they served.

  Their team even had an adopted dog, a small stray, that looked like a beagle. They’d named him Scrubs, and he’d stayed mostly with Tania, one of the nurses, until Jessica arrived. From that moment on, Scrubs had become her shadow.

  Jessica’s mind was constantly occupied with her work, something for which she felt profoundly grateful. It kept her unsettling thoughts at bay. Until nighttime, when she’d lie on her cot and think about her life.

  She missed Cal. She missed Kayla, too. She often thought about calling just to hear his voice, but rejected the notion. A clean break was better, she convinced herself. Somehow her life had become ruled by avoidance. She seemed to be running away from her own inadequacies. She seemed to be running away from Cal.

  She wondered if she should’ve approached things differently with Cal, wondered if there could have been a chance for them.

  She’d fall asleep thinking of Cal’s smile and his laughing green eyes.

  She’d wake each morning sad and restless until she buried herself in work again. That was the cycle of her days.

  One morning during her second month in San Pedro Sula, she was roused by a tap on her office door. Helen, the nurse who’d flown in on the same plane she had, was standing there. “Jessica, you’re needed in the hospital building.”

  “Problem?”

  Helen’s expression was sad. “You need to hurry,” was all she said as she turned and left.

  Jessica shut down her laptop, shrugged into the lab coat she’d draped over the back of her chair and hurried after Helen.

  She knew something was very wrong even before she entered the hospital. She could hear a child screaming and the anguished cries of a woman. She quickened her pace, steeling herself against what she might find.

  She pushed back the curtain hung over the doorway and her stomach roiled.

  A child, of no more than seven or eight, sat on a bed. The woman, whom she assumed to be his mother, knelt in front of him, arms wrapped around him. Her wails had dropped to a sorrowful keening sound. The boy’s left arm was bound to his body by what looked like a bedsheet, but it was stained with blood, as were his ragged shirt and shorts.

  An image of Jake—the boy she couldn’t save—flashed through her mind. She could see the huge gash in Jake’s upper arm, where the rusty survey stake had torn through it. She tried to block the memory as she rushed over.

  Her immediate assessment was that there’d been too much blood loss. It was a miracle the boy hadn’t bled out or at a minimum passed out.

  “What happened?” she asked tersely.

  Tania, the other nurse, explained that the boy had been working on his father’s farm, when another young boy driving a harvesting machine accidently drove into him, impaling him on one of the sharp tiller blades.

  Jessica listened as she injected the boy with a local anesthetic. When Tania was done, she gave orders to the members of her team and instructed Helen to take the mother out of the room. She asked Helen to try to reassure the woman and find someone to stay with her so they could attend to her son.

  She knew she projected an aura of focus and control, but inside she was a mess. The image of Jake as she’d first seen him had morphed into one of him lying on the hospital bed, pale and motionless, as she called the time of his death.

  Jessica shook her head to dispel the haunting images, but her vision blurred and the memory persisted. She asked where Dr. Lyons, the other senior surgeon on their team, was. She couldn’t do this; she needed him to take over.

  She was told he’d left over an hour ago, traveling to the village of El Progreso, to assist a woman experiencing complications with childbirth.

  That meant Jessica was the only one qualified. She had to do this; she had no choice. When she noticed her hand shaking as she reached for a pair of scissors, she drew in a deep breath and counted to ten before exhaling again.

  “You’re going to be okay,” she said to the young boy as she prepared to cut off his makeshift bandage and shirt so she could examine his wound.

  She did what she was trained to do. What she had to do. But she questioned each move she made, and questioned it again and again.

  Perspiration beaded on her forehead. Her hands were cold and clammy inside the latex gloves. When she raised them, they were still shaking, which concerned her greatly. The slightest slip of an instrument could harm this child.

  His injury was bad. The boy was fortunate the blade hadn’t severed his arm altogether. She was told the harvester had been working in an area where there would’ve been manure used for fertilizer, pesticide dust and all sorts of other contaminants that could have gotten into the wound. The wound was dirty and some of the contaminants might have found their way into the boy’s system.

  Jake was stubbornly rooted in her mind. She tried to ignore the thoughts as best she could and concentrate on the boy before her.

  Should she try to clean the wound—torn, jagged and deep, complicated by an open fracture of the humerus? Or should she amputate?

  “Please save my arm.” She could hear Jake begging her.

  “You killed our child,” Jake’s hysterical mother accused her as his father dragged the woman away.

  She had to amputate. That was the sure way to save the child. The only way to save the child. “No!”

  “Excuse me?” Tania was staring at her.

  “What?” Jessica asked, confused.

  “You yelled, ‘No.’ Was I doing something wrong?”

  Jessica hadn’t realized she’d shouted the word out l
oud.

  “Sorry. You’re doing everything fine. Let’s save this boy’s life,” she added with conviction.

  * * *

  TWO HOURS LATER, Jessica pulled off the surgical cap and gown, tossed them in the hamper by the door and washed her hands and face. Then she headed to her quarters. She scooped up Scrubs and sank into the only chair in her room. Hugging the little dog to her, she buried her face in his coarse, scruffy fur. Her body shook with the deluge of tears. Crying was not something Jessica allowed herself to do often, but this time she couldn’t prevent it. Even Scrubs, whining and licking her neck and face, couldn’t stem the outpouring of tears and grief. When her sobbing finally subsided, she was drained and nauseous. She rose and on unsteady legs padded to her bed. Lying flat on her back, she let Scrubs jump up and curl in beside her as she stared at the ceiling.

  Had she done the right thing? Did she save the boy’s arm or would he develop sepsis, like Jake had? What would her colleagues think of her, shouting back at the voices in her head? The voices goading her to amputate the boy’s arm. No, she’d yelled. She would not do it.

  The field hospital facilities and supplies were rudimentary compared to what she had had at her disposal in San Diego when she’d operated on Jake. She knew that created an added risk. But she’d made her decision. Now she’d have to live with the consequences. If she’d been wrong...again...she didn’t know if she could live with it.

  As for the bigger picture, she was coming to the realization that she was not suited to providing direct care, regardless of the circumstances or how little time she spent with a patient. She’d committed her life to medicine, but she couldn’t keep doing this. The indecision—the second-guessing before and after any procedure—was torture for her, and not in the best interests of her patients. A wrong decision or a split-second delay in making the right decision could cost a patient his or her life.