cheeks heated and he took her right back to that night so long ago. “Why did you pretend not to know me?”
“Why did you?” he countered.
“I was surprised to see a stripper as a surgeon.” And she regretted the hateful words the moment they’d slipped past her lips.
“I’m not a stripper. I’m a surgeon. That’s all I am. Of course, it’s hard to practice as a surgeon when your program is being slashed.”
“Your program is not being slashed. Only the pro bono fund. You can practice on patients who can pay.”
Alejandro opened his mouth, but then a thin, long wail sounded from behind a Dumpster. It was weak, frightened.
“Was that a baby?” Kiri asked.
“Yes.” Alejandro turned and they listened, trying to drown out the sounds of traffic and thunder. Then they heard the small wail again.
Weaker this time.
Alejandro dashed over to the Dumpster and behind it saw a grease-stained box filled with newspapers. Kiri knelt down beside him and gasped as Alejandro peeled back the papers to uncover a small, blue-gray baby. Very small and obviously newly born, because the cord was still fresh and hastily cut off.
“Oh, my God,” Kiri whispered. “It’s a baby.”
A tiny infant that had been abandoned in an alleyway of a hospital. Alone and afraid.
“Fools,” Alejandro cursed. “Who would do such a thing?”
And Kiri couldn’t help but agree. Someone hadn’t wanted this poor mite, but to abandon the baby in the heat next to a Dumpster? That was dreadful.
It was times like this that the loss hurt even more. It reminded Kiri again that life was cruel and dirty.
Life was unfair.
Alejandro whipped off his jacket and gently lifted the infant, wrapping the boy up. “Let’s get him inside. It’s sweltering out here and, with the storm coming, that’s the last thing he needs.”
Kiri nodded as Alejandro gingerly picked up the baby. She opened the door and they ran inside. All she could do was keep up with Alejandro’s long strides as he called out for nurses, residents and equipment. They laid the baby down on a bed; he looked so small on the large gurney.
Alejandro moved quickly, giving him oxygen, holding the mask over his nose while they waited for an incubator.
“Who would do such a thing?” Kiri wondered out loud as she stared down at the small baby, new in this world and all alone.
Alejandro shook his head. “I don’t know, but it’s a good thing we found him. He wouldn’t have lasted long out there. Look, his stats are very low—I’m surprised he’s lasted this long.”
The incubator was brought in and a resident took over respirating the baby while they ran an umbilical line to get fluids into him. Kiri reached down and stroked his tiny hand between her finger and thumb. The hand was so small it made her heart skip a beat. It made her yearn for what she’d lost.
And what she’d probably never have since her obstetrician had said she’d probably never again conceive or carry a pregnancy to term. Motherhood was not meant to be for her.
“How old do you think he is?” Alejandro asked, invading her thoughts.
“I think probably about thirty weeks. Maybe. More like twenty-eight,” she whispered as they intubated the baby and transferred him over to the incubator to take him up to the nursery. She’d lost her son at twenty-three weeks. He had only been slightly smaller than this boy.
Alejandro nodded. “We probably just missed the mother. I’ll let the ER doctors know to be on the lookout for her.”
Kiri nodded as the resident team wheeled the incubator and the baby up to the nursery. “Good call. I’ll take the little one up to the nursery and arrange for his transfer to County.”
“County?” Alejandro asked, stunned.
“Yes,” Kiri said. “I told you, the hospital has cut the pro bono cases.”
Alejandro frowned and crossed his arms. “He won’t survive the trip to County and County doesn’t have the facilities of a level-one NICU.”
“Then Seaside,” she offered. “He can’t stay here.”
He shook his head. “We have the foremost neonatal intensive care unit here at Buena Vista. He needs to stay here.”
Kiri didn’t want to send the baby to County either, but her hands were tied.
“And who will pay for his medical expenses? He doesn’t have a family. He’s an abandoned baby.”
A strange expression crossed Alejandro’s face. “I will pay for his medical expenses. I’ll take responsibility for him. I’ll act as his family.”
“PARDON?” KIRI SAID, because she wasn’t quite sure she’d heard Alejandro correctly. “What did you say?”
“I said I would pay for the child’s medical expenses,” Alejandro snapped. “You’re not sending him to County.”
Before she could say anything else to him he stormed out of the room. Kiri stood there stunned for a moment, taking in the ramifications of what he’d said.
He was going to pay for him?
She wasn’t sure what she was feeling at the moment because she thought about the moment she’d planned to tell Alejandro about their baby five years ago. She’d expected him to be horrified and angry, what she’d thought would be a typical reaction in a man who was finding out he was going to be a father after a one-night stand.
Maybe her assumption of him had been wrong, because he was offering to take this sick infant as his own.
She ran after him. “You’re planning to adopt this boy?”
Alejandro froze in his tracks and spun around. “What’re you talking about?”
“You just said you’re going to be the boy’s guardian.”
“No, I said I was going to pay his medical bills. I didn’t say anything about adopting him.”
“Well, usually when someone offers to become financially responsible for a child like this they intend to invest in their health care and adopt.”
Alejandro frowned. “I have no interest in adopting him, but I’ll give him his best shot at a family. People who actually want children.”
It was like a splash of cold water.
People who actually want children.
So
