Harvesting The Heart Part 22

"No hablo ingles. hablo ingles. "The man shrugs. "The man shrugs.

I try again. "Operation," I say. "I'm looking for the operations."

"Si, operacion." The man makes a jagged line across his stomach. He bobs his head, smiling. The man makes a jagged line across his stomach. He bobs his head, smiling.

I shake my head and try to remember the Sesame Street Spanish I'd heard when I turned it on for Max. "Uno," I say, holding my hand close to the floor. I move it up an inch. "Dos." "Dos." I move it again. I move it again. "Tres, "Tres, cuatro ... operation?" cuatro ... operation?"

The man claps his hands. "Si, si, operacion." "Si, si, operacion." He holds up three fingers. He holds up three fingers. "Tres," "Tres," he says. he says.

"Gracias," I murmur, and I jam my finger repeatedly into the elevator call b.u.t.ton, as if this might make it come faster. I murmur, and I jam my finger repeatedly into the elevator call b.u.t.ton, as if this might make it come faster.

Sure enough, the operating rooms are on three, and as the elevator doors part I get a glimpse of Nicholas rus.h.i.+ng by, now in his blue scrubs. Everything on him is covered, except for his face, but I would have been able to spot him from a distance simply by the stately manner of his walk. He looks over my head at a wall clock, then he disappears behind a double panel of doors.

"If you're a relative," a voice says behind me, "you'll have to go to the waiting room." I turn to see a pretty, pet.i.te nurse in a crisp white uniform. "Only patients are allowed in here," she says.

"Oh," I say. "I must have gotten lost." I give a quick smile and then ask her if Dr. Prescott has arrived yet.

Nodding, she takes my elbow, as if she knows this is a ploy and wants me out immediately. "Dr. Prescott is always ten minutes early," she says. "We set our watches by him." She stands beside the elevator with me. "I'll tell him you were here," she says. "I'm sure he'll come to see you when the operation is over."

"No!" I say, a little too loud. "You don't have to tell him anything." For the past half hour, I've had the upper hand. I'm where I want to be, and Nicholas doesn't know. I like like being anonymous and watching him. After all, I've never really seen him work, and maybe this is part of the reason I felt compelled to follow him to the hospital. Another hour or two, and I'll come into the open. But not now, not yet. I'm still learning. being anonymous and watching him. After all, I've never really seen him work, and maybe this is part of the reason I felt compelled to follow him to the hospital. Another hour or two, and I'll come into the open. But not now, not yet. I'm still learning.

I look at the nurse, considering a string of different excuses. I knot my hands together in front of me. "I ... I don't want him to be distracted."

"Of course," she says, and she propels me into the yawning mouth of the elevator.

When Nicholas comes back up to his office, he is still wearing scrubs, but they are dark with sweat, pressed against his back and under his arms. He unlocks his door and leaves it open, and I creep from my hiding spot behind a row of sleeping wheelchairs to sit on the floor beside the doorway. "Mrs. Rosenstein," Nicholas is saying, "this is Dr. Prescott."

His voice makes my stomach flip. "I'm calling to let you know that the procedure went well. We did four grafts, as expected, and he came off the bypa.s.s machine nicely. Everything is going just fine, and he should be waking up in a few hours." I listen to the calm currents running under his words and wonder if he uses that tone to put Max to sleep. I remember Nicholas telling me about making postoperative phone calls when he was a beginning resident. "I never say 'How are you,' because I know d.a.m.n well how they are. How else could you be if you've been sitting next to the phone for six hours, waiting to hear if your husband is alive or dead?"

I lose Nicholas for a little while after that, because he meets with some residents and fellows in a small room where there is nowhere for me to hide. I am impressed. He hasn't stopped yet. Everywhere he goes in the hospital, people know his name, and nurses fall over each other to hand him charts and schedules before he even thinks to ask. I wonder if that is because he is a surgeon or because he is Nicholas.

When I see Nicholas again, he is with a younger man, probably a resident, walking through the halls of surgical ICU. I knew he'd make a swing through here, even if he was planning to head to other floors first, because he'd have to check on that morning's patient. His name is Oliver Rosenstein, and he is sleeping peacefully, breathing in time with the steady beats of the heart monitor. "We make patients sicker than they are when they come to us," Nicholas is saying to the resident. "We elect to make them sicker in hopes that they'll be better in the long run. That's part of why you're put up on a pedestal. If you trust your car to a mechanic, you look for someone who's good. If you trust your life to a surgeon, you look for someone who's G.o.d." The resident laughs and looks up at Nicholas, and it is clear that he thinks Nicholas is as mythic as they come.

Just as I am wondering why I have never seen Nicholas work during the eight years we've been married, he is paged over the loudspeaker. He murmurs something to the resident and bolts up the nearest staircase. The resident leaves Oliver Rosenstein's room and walks off in the other direction. Because I don't know where to go, I stay where I am, at the open doorway to the room.

"Uhh," I hear, and Oliver Rosenstein stirs.

I bite my lower lip, not certain what to do, when a nurse breezes past me into the room. She leans close to Oliver and adjusts several tubes and wires and catheters. "You're doing fine," she soothes, and then she pats his yellow, veined hand. "I'm going to page your doctor for you." She leaves as briskly as she entered, and because of that I am the only person who hears Oliver Rosenstein's first postsurgical words. "It isn't easy," he says, barely audible, "not easy to go through this.... It's real, real hard." He rolls his head from side to side, as if he is looking for something, and then he sees me and smiles. "Ellie," he says, his voice a rough sandpaper snap. He clearly thinks I am someone else. "I'm here, kine ahora," kine ahora," he says. "For a WASP, that Prescott is a mensch." he says. "For a WASP, that Prescott is a mensch."

It is another hour before I find Nicholas again, and that is only by accident. I am wandering around the post-op floor, when Nicholas bl.u.s.ters out of the elevator. He is reading a file and eating a Hostess cupcake. A nurse laughs at him as he pa.s.ses the central desk. "You gonna be the next cardiac surgeon around these parts with blocked arteries," she scolds, and Nicholas tosses her the second cupcake, still packaged.

"If you don't tell anyone," he says, "this is yours."

I marvel at this man, whom everyone seems to know, who seems so controlled and so calm. Nicholas, who could not tell you where I keep the peanut b.u.t.ter in his own kitchen, is completely in his element at this hospital. It hits like an unexpected slap: This is really Nicholas's home. These people are really Nicholas's family. This doctor, whom everyone seems to need for a signature or a quiet word or an answer, does not need anyone else, especially me.

Nicholas stuffs the chart he has been reading into the box glued to the door of room 445. He enters and smiles at a young resident in a white coat, her hands jammed in her pockets. "Dr. Adams tells me you're all set for tomorrow," he says to the patient, pulling up a chair next to the bed. I scoot to the other side of the doorway so that I can peek in, unseen. The patient is a man about my father's age, with the same round face and faraway look in his eyes. "Let me tell you what we're going to do, since I don't think you're going to remember much of it," Nicholas says.

I cannot really hear him, but little drifts of dialogue float out to me, words like oxygenation, mammary arteries, intubate. oxygenation, mammary arteries, intubate. The patient does not seem to be listening. He is staring at Nicholas with his mouth slightly open, as if Nicholas is Jesus Himself. The patient does not seem to be listening. He is staring at Nicholas with his mouth slightly open, as if Nicholas is Jesus Himself.

Nicholas asks the man if he has any questions. "Yes," the patient says hesitantly. "Will I know you tomorrow?"

"You might," Nicholas says, "but you're going to be groggy by the time you see me. I'll check in when you're up in the afternoon."

"Dr. Prescott," the patient says, "in case I'm too doped up to tell you-thanks."

I do not hear Nicholas respond to the patient, so I don't have time to retreat before he comes out the door. He barrels into me, apologizes, and then notices whom he has run into. With a narrowed look, he grabs my upper arm and starts to pull me down the hall. "Julie," he says to the resident who has been in the room with him, "I'll see you after you round." Then he curses through his clenched teeth and drags me into a tiny room off the side of the hall, where patients can get ice chips and orange juice. "What the h.e.l.l do you think you're doing here?"

My breath catches in my throat, and for the life of me I cannot answer. Nicholas squeezes my arm so hard that I know he is leaving behind a bruise. "I-I-"

"You what?" what?" Nicholas seethes. Nicholas seethes.

"I didn't mean to bother you," I say. "I just want to talk to you." I start to tremble and wonder what I will say if Nicholas takes me up on my offer.

"If you don't get the h.e.l.l out of here," Nicholas says, "I'll have security throw you out on your a.s.s." He releases my arm as if he's been touching a leper. "I told you not to come back," he says. "What else do I have to do to show you I mean it?"

I lift my chin and pretend I haven't heard anything he's said. "Congratulations," I say, "on your promotion."

Nicholas stares at me. "You're crazy," he says, and then he walks down the hall without turning back.

I watch him until his white coat is a blur against a distant wall. I wonder why he cannot see the similarity between me and his patients, whom he keeps from dying of broken hearts.

At the Prescotts' Brookline mansion, I sit for seven minutes in the car. I let my breath heat up the interior and wonder if there is an etiquette for begging mercy. Finally, driven by an image of Max, I push myself up the slate path and rap on the door with the heavy bra.s.s lion knocker. I am expecting Imelda, the short, plump maid, but instead Astrid herself-and my son-opens the door.

I'm immediately struck by the contrast between Astrid and my own mother. There are the simple things-Ascrid's silk and pearls as compared to my mother's flannel s.h.i.+rts and chaps; Astrid's antiques set against my mother's stables. Astrid thrives on her fame; my mother goes to great lengths to protect her ident.i.ty. But on the other hand, Astrid and my mother are both strong; they are both proud to a fault. They have both fought the system that bound them, and recreated themselves. And from the look of things, Astrid-like my mother-is beginning to admit to her mistakes.

Astrid doesn't say anything. She looks at me-no, actually she looks into into me, as if she is sizing me up for the best lighting and direction and angle. Max is balanced on her hip. He watches me with eyes that the color blue must have been named for. His hair is matted with sweat on the side of his head, and a crinkled line from a sheet is imprinted on his cheek. me, as if she is sizing me up for the best lighting and direction and angle. Max is balanced on her hip. He watches me with eyes that the color blue must have been named for. His hair is matted with sweat on the side of his head, and a crinkled line from a sheet is imprinted on his cheek.

Max has changed so much in just three months.

Max is the image of Nicholas.

He figures out that I am a stranger, and he burrows his face in Astrid's blouse, rubbing his nose back and forth on the ribbing.

Astrid makes no move to give him to me, but she also doesn't shut the door in my face. To make sure of this, I take a tiny step forward. "Astrid," I say, and then I shake my head. "Mom." "Mom."

As if the word has triggered a memory, which I know is impossible, Max lifts his face. He tilts his head, as his grandmother did at first, and then he reaches out one balled fist. "Mama," he says, and the fingers of the fist open one by one like a flower, stretching and coming to rest on my cheek.

His touch-it's not what I've expected, what I've dreamed. It is warm and dry and gentle and brushes like a lover. My tears slip down between his fingers, and he pulls his hand away. He puts it back into his mouth, drinking in my sorrow, my regrets.

Astrid Prescott hands Max to me so that his arms wrap around my neck and his warm, solid form presses the length of my chest. "Paige," she says, not at all surprised to see me. She steps back so that I can enter her home. "Whatever took you so long?"

chapter 34

Nicholas.

Paige has single-handedly ruined Nicholas's day. Nicholas knows he has nothing else to complain about-his surgery went well enough; his patients are bearing up-but discovering Paige tripping along at his heels has unnerved him. It is a public hospital, and she has every right to be inside it; his threat about calling security was only that-a threat. Seeing her outside his patient's door rattled him, and he never gets rattled at the hospital. For several minutes after he walked away from her, he had felt his pulse jumping irregularly, as if he'd received a shock to the system.

At least she wouldn't find Max. She hadn't followed him to the hospital; surely he would have noticed. She must have showed up later. Which meant that she didn't know Max was at his parents', and never, never would she guess that Nicholas had swallowed his pride and in fact was starting to enjoy having Robert and Astrid Prescott back in his life. On the outside chance that Paige did did go over there, well, his mother certainly wouldn't let her in, not after all the pain she'd caused to Astrid's own son. go over there, well, his mother certainly wouldn't let her in, not after all the pain she'd caused to Astrid's own son.

Nicholas stops at his office to pick up his suit jacket before heading home. In spite of the name on the door and the fact that he has his own secretary, it is still really Alistair's place. The art on the walls is not what Nicholas would have picked; the nautical paraphernalia like that s.e.xtant and the bra.s.s captain's wheel are not his style. He would like a forest-green office with fox-and-hound prints, a banker's shaded lamp on his desk, an overstuffed cranberry damask couch. Anything but the pale white and beige that predominate in his house-which Paige, with her predilection for color, has always hated and which, all of a sudden, Nicholas is starting to see that he doesn't like himself.

Nicholas rests his hand on the bra.s.s wheel. Maybe one day. He is doing a good job as chief of cardiac surgery; he knows that. Saget has as much as told him that if Alistair decides to cut back his schedule or retire completely, the position is Nicholas's for keeps. It is a dubious honor. Nicholas has wanted it for so long that he has slipped into the schedule naturally, joining the proper hospital committees and giving lectures to the residents and visiting surgeons. But all the extra hours and the grueling pressure to succeed keep him apart from Max and from Paige.

Nicholas shakes his head. He wants wants to be apart from Paige. He doesn't need her anymore; he wants her to choke on a taste of her own medicine. Setting his jaw, he pulls together the files he needs to review before tomorrow and locks his office door behind him. to be apart from Paige. He doesn't need her anymore; he wants her to choke on a taste of her own medicine. Setting his jaw, he pulls together the files he needs to review before tomorrow and locks his office door behind him.

At eight o'clock, there isn't much traffic on Storrow Drive, and Nicholas makes it to his parents' house in fifteen minutes. He lets himself in and steps into the hall. "h.e.l.lo," he calls, listening to his echo in the cupola above. "Where are you guys?"

He wanders into the parlor, which is primarily a playroom now, but no one is there. He peeks into the library, where his father usually spends the evenings, but the room is dark and cool. Nicholas starts up the stairs, his feet falling onto the worn track of the Oriental runner. "h.e.l.lo," he says again, and then he hears Max giggle.

When Max laughs, it rumbles out of his belly, and it overcomes him so thoroughly that by the time the sound bubbles up through his throat, his little shoulders are shaking and his smile is like the sun. Nicholas loves the sound, just as much as he hates Max's piercing crabby whine. He follows the giggle around the hall and into one of the extra bedrooms, the one that Astrid has redecorated into a gingham nursery. Just outside, Nicholas drops to his hands and knees, thinking to surprise Max by crouching like a tiger. "Max, Max, Maximilian," Nicholas growls, pawing his way into the half-open door.

Astrid is sitting on the only chair in the room, an oversize white rocker. Max is in the middle of the pale-blue carpeted floor, tugging at tufts of the rug with one fist. His free hand is used for balance and is propped comfortably against Paige's knee.

Although Astrid looks up, Paige doesn't seem to notice that Nicholas has crawled into the room. She reaches for Max's bare toes and pulls them one by one, the pinkie last, and then runs her fingers up the length of his leg. He squeals and giggles again, leaning back his head so that he can see her upside down. "More?" she says, and Max slaps his hands against her thighs.

Somewhere in the back of Nicholas's mind, behind the red haze, something snaps. He stares at Paige, dumbfounded that she is actually in the same room as his son. his son. She looks impossibly young, with her red hair spilling down over her shoulders and her s.h.i.+rt untucked in the back, her sneakered feet just out of Max's reach. It wasn't supposed to happen this way. But Max, who wails when the UPS man comes to the door these days, has taken to Paige as if she's been there all his life, instead of only half. And Paige makes it look so easy. Nicholas remembers the nights he had to walk up and down the halls of the house, letting Max cry in his arms because he didn't know how else to put him to sleep. He even took books out of the library to learn the words to "Patty-Cake" and "Three Blind Mice." But Paige walks in from nowhere, sits down, spreads her legs in a circular playground for Max, and she's got him crowing. She looks impossibly young, with her red hair spilling down over her shoulders and her s.h.i.+rt untucked in the back, her sneakered feet just out of Max's reach. It wasn't supposed to happen this way. But Max, who wails when the UPS man comes to the door these days, has taken to Paige as if she's been there all his life, instead of only half. And Paige makes it look so easy. Nicholas remembers the nights he had to walk up and down the halls of the house, letting Max cry in his arms because he didn't know how else to put him to sleep. He even took books out of the library to learn the words to "Patty-Cake" and "Three Blind Mice." But Paige walks in from nowhere, sits down, spreads her legs in a circular playground for Max, and she's got him crowing.

Out of the blue, a vision of Paige flashes across Nicholas's mind -Paige with her hand in the Miracle Whip jar, sc.r.a.ping together the last of the stuff for his sandwich. It was four-thirty in the morning, and he was leaving for surgery, but she, as always, had got up to make his lunch. "Well," she said, ringing the knife against the empty jar, "we can call this one quits." And she looked around the kitchen for a dish towel and couldn't find one and wiped her hands on the soft white cotton of her angel's nightgown when she thought, incorrectly, that Nicholas wasn't looking.

Paige hasn't made his lunch since Max was born, and although he isn't about to blame a newborn or admit to jealousy, he suddenly realizes that Paige hasn't been his his since Max was born. He clenches his fists in the carpet, just like Max. Paige hasn't come back here for him; she's come for Max. She probably traced Nicholas to the hospital only to make sure he wouldn't be around when she found Max. And although this shouldn't bother him, because he's pushed away all his feelings for her, it still smarts. since Max was born. He clenches his fists in the carpet, just like Max. Paige hasn't come back here for him; she's come for Max. She probably traced Nicholas to the hospital only to make sure he wouldn't be around when she found Max. And although this shouldn't bother him, because he's pushed away all his feelings for her, it still smarts.

Nicholas takes a deep breath, waiting for brilliant anger to replace the pain. But it is slow in coming, especially when he looks at Paige, at the picture she makes with his son. He narrows his eyes and tries to remember what is familiar about this, and then he sees the connection. The way Max looks at her-as if she is a deity-is exactly the way Paige used to look at Nicholas.

Nicholas jumps to his feet and glares at his mother. "Who the h.e.l.l told you to let her in here?" he seethes.

Astrid stands calmly. "Who the h.e.l.l told me not to?" she says.

Nicholas runs a hand through his hair. "For Christ's sake, Mom, I didn't think I had to spell it out. I told told you she was back. You you she was back. You know know how I feel. You how I feel. You know know what she's done." He points to Paige, still wrapped around the baby and tickling his sides. "How do you know she isn't going to steal him away when your back is turned? How do you know she isn't going to hurt him?" what she's done." He points to Paige, still wrapped around the baby and tickling his sides. "How do you know she isn't going to steal him away when your back is turned? How do you know she isn't going to hurt him?"

Astrid lays a hand on her son's arm. "Nicholas," she says, "do you really think she's going to do that?"

At that, Paige looks up. She stands and pulls Max up on his feet. "I just had to see him, Nicholas. I'll go now. It's not your mother's fault." She scoops Max into her embrace, and he locks his dimpled arms around her neck.

Nicholas takes a step forward, so close he can feel the warm rush of Paige's breath. "I don't want to see your car at home," he says in his quiet, steely surgeon's voice. "I'll get a restraining order."

He expects Paige to turn and slink away, intimidated, like everyone else does when he speaks that way. But she stands her ground and rubs her hands over Max's back. "It's my house too," she says quietly, "and it's my son."

Nicholas explodes. He grabs the baby so roughly, Max begins to cry. "What the h.e.l.l do you think you're going to do? Take the kid the next time you decide to bolt? Or maybe you already have a plan to leave."

Paige knots her hands in front of her. "I am not not going to bolt. All I want is to be let back in my house again. I'm not going to run anywhere unless I'm forced to." going to bolt. All I want is to be let back in my house again. I'm not going to run anywhere unless I'm forced to."

Nicholas laughs, a strange sound that comes through his nose. "Right," he says. "Just like last time. Poor Paige, driven away by a twist of Fate."

In that moment, Nicholas knows he has won. "How come you have to see it like that?" Paige whispers. "How come you can't just see that I came home?" She steps back, speaking through a broken smile. "Maybe you're perfect, Nicholas, and everything you do turns out right the first time. The rest of us ordinary humans have to try over and over again and hope that we'll keep getting second chances until we figure it out." She turns and runs out of the room before a single tear falls, and Nicholas can hear the heavy oak front door pulled shut behind her.

Max fidgets in Nicholas's arms, so he sets him down on the carpet. The baby stares out the open bedroom door as if he is waiting for Paige to come back. Astrid, whom Nicholas has forgotten about, reaches down to pull the dying leaf of a potted palm out of Max's hand. When she straightens, she looks Nicholas right in the eye. "I'm ashamed of you," she says, and she walks out of the room.

Paige is at the house when Nicholas returns with Max. She sits quietly in front of the porch with her sketch pad and her charcoal. In spite of his threat, Nicholas does not call the police. He does not even acknowledge that he sees her when he carries Max and his diaper bag and the files from the hospital into the house. From time to time that night when he is playing with Max on the living room floor he can see Paige peering in through the window, but he doesn't bother to close the drapes or to move Max into another room.

When Max has trouble falling asleep, Nicholas tries the one thing that always works. Dragging the vacuum cleaner out of the front hall closet, he sets it over the threshold of the nursery and flips the switch so that the whir of the motor drowns out the choked cries of Max's screams. Eventually Max quiets down and Nicholas pulls the vacuum away. It works because of the white noise that distracts Max, but Nicholas thinks it might be genetic. He can remember coming home from thirty-six-hour s.h.i.+fts, falling asleep to the hum of the vacuum as Paige cleaned the house.

Nicholas walks to the front hall and turns out the light. Then he steps to the window, knowing that he'll be able to see Paige without her being able to see him. Her face is silver in the moonlight, her hair a rich bronze glow. Puddled around her are scores of drawings: Max sitting, Max sleeping, Max rolling over. Nicholas can not see among them a single image of himself.

The wind blows a couple of the drawings up the steps of the porch. Before he can even think to stop himself, Nicholas opens the front door in time for them to fly into the hall. He picks them up -one of Max playing with a rattle, one of Max grabbing his own feet-and walks onto the porch. "I think these are yours," he says, coming to stand beside her.

Paige is on her hands and knees, trying to keep the other drawings from blowing away. She has secured a stack of them under a big rock and has pinned the rest with her elbow. "Thanks," she says, rolling awkwardly onto her side. She gathers the pictures up and stuffs them inside the front cover of her sketch pad, as if she is embarra.s.sed. "If you want to stay out here," she says, "I can sit in the car."

Nicholas shakes his head. "It's cold," he says. "I'm going to go inside." He sees Paige draw in her breath, waiting for an invitation, but he's not about to let that happen. "You're very good with Max," he says. "He's going through this stranger thing now, and he doesn't take to just anybody."

Paige shrugs. "I think I've grown into him. This is more what I pictured when I thought of a baby-something that sits up and smiles and laughs with you, not just something that eats and sleeps and p.o.o.ps and completely ignores you." She peers up at him. "I think that you're the one who's very good with Max. Look at what he's turned into. He's like a whole different kid."

Nicholas thinks of many things he could say, but instead he just nods his head. "Thanks," he says. He leans against the step of the porch and stretches out his legs. "You can't stay here forever," he says.

"I hope I don't have to." Paige tilts her head back and lets the night wash over her face. "When I was in North Carolina, I slept outside with my mother." She sits up and laughs. "I actually liked it."

"I'll have to take you camping in Maine," Nicholas says.

Paige stares at him. "Yes," she says, "you'll have to."

A chill sweeps across the lawn, beading the dew and sending a s.h.i.+ver down Nicholas's spine. "You're going to freeze out here," he says, and he stands before he can say anything else. "I'm going to get you a coat."

He runs up the porch as if it is a refuge and pulls the first coat he can find out of the hall closet. It is a big woolen overcoat, one of his, and as he holds it out to Paige he sees it will sweep her ankles. Paige steps into the coat and pulls the lapels together. "This is nice," she says, touching Nicholas's hand.

Nicholas pulls away. "Well," he says, "I don't want you to get sick."

"No," Paige says, "I mean this." this." She gestures between herself and Nicholas. "Not yelling." When Nicholas does not say anything, she picks up her sketch pad and her charcoal, and as a second thought she offers a half-smile. "Give Max a kiss for me," she says. She gestures between herself and Nicholas. "Not yelling." When Nicholas does not say anything, she picks up her sketch pad and her charcoal, and as a second thought she offers a half-smile. "Give Max a kiss for me," she says.

When Nicholas steps into the safety of the house and stands in the folds of the dark hallway, he is momentarily disoriented. He has to lean against the doorframe and let the room settle before his memory returns. Maybe he believed that at some point he'd stop playing the game and let Paige back; but he can see that isn't going to happen. She's come for Max, only for Max, and something about that is driving him crazy. The feeling is like a fist being driven into his gut, and he knows exactly why. He still loves her. As stupid as it seems, as much as he hates her for what she has done, he can't quite stop that.

He peeks out the window and sees Paige settled in his overcoat and a sleeping bag she's borrowed from some G.o.dd.a.m.ned neighbor. Part of him hates her for being given that comfort, and part of him hates himself for wanting to give her even more. With Paige, there have never been easy answers, only impulses, and Nicholas is beginning to wonder if it has all been a huge mistake. He can't keep doing this; not to himself and not to Max. There has to be a reconciliation or a clean break.

The moon slips under the front door, filling the hallway with a spectral glow. Suddenly exhausted, Nicholas pulls himself up the stairs. He will have to sleep on it. Sometimes things look different in the morning. He crawls into bed with his clothes still on and envisions Paige lying like a sacrifice beneath that stifling moon. His last conscious thought is of his bypa.s.s patients, of the moment during surgery when he stops their hearts from beating. He wonders if they ever feel it.

chapter 35

Paige.