But he was his own man. He always had been. That meant he paid his own way and was indebted to no one.
“No,” he assured the old man, “you really don’t owe me anything.”
This could go on all afternoon, Tania thought. She gently placed a hand to each man’s arm and motioned them out of the room. “I’m afraid that you two need to settle this outside.” She smiled brightly at Isaac. “We need the room.”
Isaac began backing out immediately. “Of course, of course.” He took both of her hands into his, his gratitude overflowing and genuine. “Thank you for all that you did.”
Jesse debated slipping on his jacket, then decided to leave it slung over his arm. A dull ache started in his shoulder. He was going to feel like hell by tomorrow morning, he thought, remembering his days on the gridiron.
“What about you?” he asked the old man as they walked out of the room. “How’s your face?”
Isaac touched the bandage, then dropped his hand. Even the slightest contact sent a wave of pain right through his teeth.
“If Myra, my wife, was alive today, she would say ‘as ugly as ever.’” He shrugged philosophically. “When you are not a good-looking man, a blow to the face is not that big a tragedy.” And then he smiled, nodding at his Good Samaritan. “Not like with you.” He stood for a moment, cocking his head like wizened old owl, studying the doctor’s handiwork. “Nice work. My brother Leon would approve. Leon is a tailor,” he explained. And then his eyes lit up. “Of course. I’ll send you to Leon.” The thought pleased the jeweler greatly. “He will make you such a suit. And I will pay him.”
How did he get the old man to understand that he didn’t owe him anything? That successfully coming to the jeweler’s rescue was enough for him. “No, really, I don’t—”
But Jesse got no further in his protest. Isaac pursed his lips beneath his neatly trimmed moustache and beard. “Pride is a foolish thing, young man.” He wagged his finger to make his point. “It kept the Emperor without any clothes.” His voice lowered. “Please, it’ll make me feel better.”
Tania passed the two men on her way to get the chart for her next patient. “I’d give in if I were you,” she advised Jesse. “It doesn’t sound as if he’s about to give up.” And then she winked at the old man, as if they shared a secret. “Trust me,” she told Jesse, thinking of her father, “I’m familiar with the type.”
And with that, she hurried off to a curtained section just beyond the nurses’ station.
Isaac watched her walk away. There was appreciation in the man’s sky-blue eyes when he turned them back to Jesse. “Nice girl, that one.” And then he asked innocently, “Are you married?”
“What? No.” Was the man matchmaking? Trying to line up a customer for a ring? Well, he wasn’t in the market for something like that right now. Maybe later, but not for a couple of years or so. “And not looking for anyone right now, either,” Jesse emphasized.
His words beaded off Isaac’s back like water off a duck.
“Sometimes we find when we don’t look. And should you find,” Isaac said, digging into his pocket, “you come to me.” Producing a business card, he tucked it into Jesse’s hand. “I will take good care of you. I’ll match you up with the finest engagement ring you’ve ever seen.” And then he added the final touch. “On the house.”
Jesse nodded, pocketing the card, fairly certain that this was an empty promise the old man felt he had to make. Once there was a little distance from the events of today, Jesse was confident the man would feel completely differently. He had no intentions of holding a man to a promise made in the heat of the moment.
Besides, the last thing he needed right now was an engagement ring.
“And you, do you have a card?” Isaac asked him curiously, his bright blue eyes shifting to Jesse’s pants’ pocket.
Just by coincidence, he’d been given his first batch of cards yesterday afternoon. He hadn’t had a chance to hand any out yet. “Yes.”
Isaac waited for a moment. When nothing materialized, he coaxed, “May I have it? So that I can have your phone number,” he explained. A gurney was being ushered by. Jesse and Isaac stepped to the side, out of the way. “Not to bother you, of course, but to see how you are doing and to find out when you are available for that suit.”
Maybe saving this man’s diamonds hadn’t been such a good thing, after all, Jesse mused. Then again, maybe he was being a little paranoid. After all, the man was justifiably grateful. But after what he’d been through recently with Ellen, well, it had him still looking over his shoulder at times.
“Believe me, it’s really not necessary.”
Isaac fixed him with a long, serious look. “Neither was coming to my rescue, young man, but you did. Isaac Epstein does not forget a kindness. You are a very rare young man.” So Jesse dug into his pocket and handed the man his card. “Jesse Steele,” Isaac read, then glanced at what followed. “You are an architect?”
It had been a long road to that label. He still felt no small pride whenever he heard it applied to him. “Yes, I am.”
“You know—” Isaac leaned his head in as if he was about to impart a dark secret “—my house could use expanding…”
Jesse couldn’t help laughing. Isaac was harmless and well-meaning, if pushy. He put his arm across the older man’s shoulders, leading him out of the area and to the outpatient station so they could both get on with their lives—especially him.
“I think we need to get out of everyone’s way, Mr. Epstein.” The police had indicated that he could come in later and give his statement, for which he was extremely grateful. “And I need to get to my office.”
They weren’t going to hold the meeting for him forever, he thought. He had a change of clothing at the firm, in case he had to take a sudden flight out on business. The suit might be wrinkled, but anything was better than what he was currently wearing.
“Let me make a call,” Isaac offered. “My cousin’s son, John, he owns a limousine service. You can arrive to your office in style.”
“I can arrive on the bus,” Jesse countered as he walked down the hallway with the older man.
Isaac released a sigh that was twice as large as he was. “I never thought I would meet anyone more stubborn than my Myra.”
Jesse tried to keep a straight face as he said, “Life is full of surprises, Mr. Epstein.”
“Isaac, please,” the man corrected him as they turned a corner.
A little more than two hours later the flow of patients temporarily became a trickle. It was then that Shelly Fontaine, a full-figured nurse with lively eyes and a quick, infectious smile, came up to her, dangling a watch in the air in front of her.
“What would you like me to do with this, Dr. Ski?” The name was one Tania had suggested after Shelly’s tongue had tripped her up several times while trying to pronounce her actual surname.
Glancing up from
