CHAPTER ONE
Aurelie Gardinier strippedoff her gloves and smiled.
“He’s beautiful and healthy, Kelly, and you look like you’re healing nicely.Have you picked a name yet?”she asked her patient.If she could bottle the wistful longing in her patient’s smile as she gazed down at her new son, she’d pull from that feeling every day.It was pure magic.
And she could use some magic, if for no other reason than the fact that moments like these were fewer and farther between lately.Obstetric patients with healthy deliveries made up about 10 percent of her caseload, the rest coming from complications that sent patients into the city and out of her care.Of course, it was better for moms to have access to the technology and testing afforded them in bigger hospitals, but Aurelie missed the connections she used to build with her patients like she had in Turks and Caicos.
Banberry, Montana, was great in so many ways, but rural healthcare would always come up lacking, which was part of why she was so excited to get the clinic up and running.Maybe then, she’d catch more of the high that practicing medicine and helping patients gave her, and they’d be able to treat more of the cases that were usually sent to Helena or Bozeman.
“We’re naming him Noel, after his grandfather.”
“It’s lovely.Ring if you need anything, but get some rest.Life is going to go pretty quick now that he’s joined you and Micah on the outside.”
Kelly smiled, her eyes tired.Sleep was definitely needed, but Aurelie understood that so was time to appreciate this moment.Rest would come eventually.
Out in the hall, Aurelie turned her cell back on, and it sprang to life.Three chimes in as many seconds; she’d missed out onsomething.As she glanced over the messages, she sighed.Or rather, it looked like she’d missedthreesomethings.
The first text made her tachycardic.
“We need to talk.Your visa was delayed, which means no more shifts until we work it out.”
Great.So much for an easy start to her week after her trip to Bozeman for training on the new ultrasound machines for the clinic.
“Dad’s out.I wouldn’t worry about him but wanted you to know.Be safe, Sis.”
She closed her eyes and wished the same for her brother.Her dad was a low-level gangster by American standards, but that didn’t make him any less dangerous when he was desperate.And now that he was out of prison—a sentencing Aurelie and her brother had helped make happen by turning state’s witnesses—he was desperate and probably pissed.Not a good combination.
A second text came in from her brother before she could reply.
“And because I know you’re probably saying, ‘You, too,’ lemme remind you who held his ground last time.We got this.Don’t even THINK about coming home to help.Love ya.”
She still had one text, this one from her best friend and colleague at the hospital, Paige Connors.They’d met when Paige had come to Aurelie’s islands to work in their rural hospital for a year, and they’d become fast friends.When Aurelie’s mother got sick, Paige helped her care for her, cementing Paige as family.When her mom had finally passed away, Aurelie had come here, to Montana, to heal with her best friend by her side.
No one was as surprised as her that she did more than heal.She thrived and had a life here unlike she’d ever imagined in Turks and Caicos.
Now, though, a text from Paige was as infrequent as good news in the delivery room.This shouldn’t rile her as much as it did, but still, worry tickled her skin.
What else could possibly have come up while I was in the delivery room?
Her imagination’s answer terrified Aurelie, so she switched tacks.
Please let her be okay.Let us be okay.
She swiped the text open and sighed with relief.Heat built behind her eyes.
“Can you still watch Maddie this week?We’re in desperate need of a night away.”
“Of course,”she shot back.“I’ve been looking forward to it.You guys have any plans?I heard there’s a new steakhouse in Bozeman that is making waves.”
Three blinking dots.Aurelie held her breath as she waited for the reply.This was as close as she and Paige had come to talking recently, and she missed it.
The dots disappeared and didn’t return.Aurelie tucked her phone away.
She and Paige had drifted in the past few months, but Aurelie couldn’t blame it on anything other than the ebb and flow of life.If life in the islands had taught her anything, it was that the seas followed a rhythm and pattern, and humans weren’t that different.Paige was a new mom, and it was only right that she turn inward to her family for restoration and to build this new phase of her life.
It did, however, beg the question, when would that phase start for Aurelie?
“Aurelie, can you meet me in Trauma One?”Fran, the head charge nurse, was waving people in all directions.She reminded Aurelie of ground control at an airport, directing traffic to and fro.Banberry Memorial Hospital would be chaos without Fran at the helm.“Brown’s ruptured placenta is bleeding, and Doc is in surgery.”
