River. Look, all my faculties are in place. I just—” She attempted to rise. Pain bloomed behind her eyes.
“Take it easy.”
“My head—”
“I know.” He checked her pupils with a small light. “We’re almost there. Doc’s waiting.”
“My kids…”
“Where are they?”
“With a sitter. Hallie…”
“I’ll call her. Got a number?”
She gave it. The ambulance rolled up to the hospital’s emergency doors.
“Really,” she said, “I’m fine. Can’t I just go home?”
“Not yet, Mrs. Franklin. You might have a broken leg.”
Because of her concussion, the doctor wanted to keep her for the evening, possibly overnight. She couldn’t afford to stay overnight. At First National, her bank account had dwindled to a mere ten thousand. Boone’s first wife had drained his savings with her illness just as Boone’s cancer had marked every dollar of his health insurance and most of Ginny’s account. In the last months, when he’d known he would not return home, she’d sold the house to pay off the remaining debts and moved into a rental duplex. Ironically Boone had the Oregon house repaired—unbeknownst to her—with a fund they’d saved for Alexei’s college.
Their worst—and final—argument.
I want you safe and secure, he’d said.
From what? she’d asked.
From whatever happens.
Premonition? Who knew.
But he hadn’t counted on her jaywalking.
Stupid, stupid, stupid.
Tonight her kids could be alone for the first time in their lives, without mother or father. Sure, they’d have Hallie. But they’d just met, and she wasn’t mommy. Ginny imagined Joselyn’s cries, saw her rosy mouth pucker, the tiny tears.
And Alexei. Would he hide in his bedroom with his music, the way he had while cancer ate Boone’s brain?
She studied the cast on her right foot, tractioned and swinging above the bed to keep the blood from pooling the first hours. A nice, clean break, the doctor had told her. How are broken bones nice or clean? Was it the same as having a nice, clean brain tumor? Nice and clean didn’t warrant painkillers. Didn’t warrant a young boy’s horror.
The door to her room opened. A bouquet entered—an immense fireworks-like display of deep gold sunflowers. Then the door closed and a face peered around the ribboned, blue vase.
Her heart jolted. “Luke,” she whispered as if she saw a phantom instead of the man who had once been her husband.
“Hey, Ginny. How are you?”
“I’m…” Amazed. Her mouth worked without words. “What—what are you doing here?”
“Seeing you.” He walked to the window where a high-rolling table stood, and placed his summer bouquet upon it before scooting the table near her bed.
As he moved about, she stared openly. If possible, his shoulders had grown broader under the cloth of his expensive teal shirt, and at his temples silver reeled into his clipped, pecan-brown hair.
Tucking his hands into the pockets of tailored black slacks, he looked down at her with the same somber gray eyes she had fallen in love with at seventeen.
She struggled past the fumble of her brain. “How did you know I was here?” she managed.
He studied her leg. “I live in Misty River. Have a law office just down the street from where you…from where I… Ginny, it was my car.”
That had struck her. That she’d walked into, mindlessly.
They hadn’t told her who, and she hadn’t asked.
She closed her eyes against the grim lines around his mouth. “I’m sorry.”
“No.” His warm hand covered her cool one on the lightweight blue blanket. “It was my fault. I should’ve been paying attention.”
A laugh escaped, short and bitter. She slipped her hand free, curling it into the palm of its twin. “Okay, so we agree to disagree. Like always.”
“Ginny.”
She opened her eyes, studied him while he studied the casted leg. His Adam’s apple worked. His hand found its pocket again.
“Sorry,” she whispered. “That wasn’t called for. I’m being a shrew.”
“You have the right.” For the first time his mouth shifted and she caught a half smile before it vanished.
She said, “The doctor figures it’ll be healed in six weeks. Only a hairline fracture in the tibia, just above the ankle.”
He swallowed. “Only. Right.”
“It’s not as bad as it looks, Luke.” She forced a smile. “I’m not dying.”
“Huh.” He surveyed the room.
“I’ll be released tonight,” she said, aspiring toward the positive.
His eyes wove to her. “Who’s with your kids?”
He knew she had children? “They’re with a sitter. Your niece, actually.”
“Hallie?”
“Yes.”
Relief loosened his shoulders. “Good kid. You won’t find anyone more responsible. I’ll check on her. Or…where’s your husband? Shouldn’t he be here? I asked at the desk, but no one’s come to see you. It’s like no one knows you in this town.”
Her chest hurt at his offhand remark. “We moved here eleven days ago. Hard to make friends when you’re uncrating boxes and setting up a home.”
Those gray eyes remained sober. “Is there a Mr. Franklin?” he repeated.
She glanced at the flowers, lustrous and cheerful in the window’s light. “My husband passed away.”
Luke tugged at his thick, short hair. “I’m sorry. I mean… Hell, I don’t know what I mean.”
“It happened three months ago.”
“Sudden?”
“I suppose six months of cancer is sudden by some standards.”
His eyes held hers. Seconds ticked away. “I won’t say a bunch of banal words for something I don’t understand and never experienced. But I will say
