Everyday Blessings

No welcoming greetings. No small talk. He wasn’t the most extroverted man. Maybe that’s why she automatically liked him. She was introverted, too. “I’m not sure when that will be.”

“I don’t mind waiting.” William shielded his heart with all his strength. He wasn’t going to let himself remember being in the same place in another hospital. In another time. He knew coming here wouldn’t be easy, but the antiseptic smell was more powerful a reminder than he’d anticipated. So were the echoing halls magnifying every movement and the sad shuffle of relatives waiting for news.

Enough, he told himself. He had to wipe his mind clean and not let a single thought in. That seemed to take all of his effort, and Aubrey was looking at him as if she wasn’t too fond of him.

He wasn’t coming across well and he knew it, but this was the best he could do. He couldn’t be the only one in this hospital with bad memories. Surely he could handle this better. He had to try harder, that was all.

“I don’t know if anyone thanked you,” Aubrey was saying.

It was hard for him to focus. The past welled up no matter his best efforts to blot it out. He felt as if he were traveling down an ever-narrowing tunnel and the light at the end of it was blinding him.

“That was really nice of you to mow the lawn.”

“Nice?” The sincerity in her violet-blue gaze startled him. He wasn’t being nice. He was doing what needed to be done. It was so little to do when he owed Jonas so much. “No. It took all of twenty minutes, I think. No big deal.”

“It was, believe me, and bless you for it. We’re simply swamped trying to keep everything together for Danielle’s sake and the kids.”

That only brought back the memory of her holding the small child, awash in light. He might not have been able to capture that extraordinary image with his camera, but apparently he had with his mind. “Danielle. Is there a chance I can see her?”

“She’s in with Jonas and he’s failing and she doesn’t want to—”

He held up one hand, the emptiness inside his soul splintering like fragile glass. “I’ll wait until she has time.”

“It might be a long wait.”

“I don’t mind.” He nodded once as if the matter was settled and strode to the first chair he came to in the waiting area. He folded his big frame into it and pulled a paperback book out of his back jeans pocket.

Aubrey watched him flip the book open to a marked page, tucked the book marker at the end of the book and bow his head to read.

Okay, so call her curious and a little protective of Danielle. Her feet seemed to take over, and on autopilot she wound up beside his chair. “Would you like something hot to drink while I’m up?”

“No.”

He didn’t look up from his book. Not the most talkative of fellows. Aubrey wasn’t at all sure she should like this guy, but there was something about him sitting there all alone, his entire body tense, and he didn’t look comfortable being here. Somehow the overhead light seemed to glance off him, leaving him lost in the shadows.

Her hand trembled as she reached for the hot water carafe on the heating plate. Why did this man unsteady her? He had a powerful presence and his gaze was sharp enough to cut stone. That ought to be enough, but it wasn’t the whole truth. Just as it wasn’t only curiosity that had her watching him out of the corner of her eye as she dunked the tea bag up and down in her little foam cup of steaming water.

The volunteer at the desk looked up from the newspaper she was reading, glanced in William Corey’s direction and gave Aubrey a knowing kind of smile as if to say, he is a handsome one.

Aubrey had to admit that she’d already noticed he was extremely handsome. It was a purely objective observation, of course.

He lifted his focus from his book and studied her through the curve of his long dark lashes. Microseconds stretched out into an uncomfortable tension as his eyes locked with hers. She couldn’t tell if he was annoyed or angered, then the left corner of his mouth quirked up into a hint of a grin.

Who knew the man could actually smile?

“What?”

That was sort of an invitation to talk, right? Aubrey dropped two sugar cubes into her cup and headed toward him. “I was wondering how you know Danielle and Jonas.”

“I only know Jonas.”

“Then why do you want to see Danielle?”

“It’s personal.”

That’s all he had to say. Aubrey stared at the man. He’d gone back to his reading. “I see you’re a very forthcoming type. And talkative.”

“I can be.”

“Talkative? I don’t believe that.” Did she detect another hint of a grin?

He shrugged one big shoulder. “I’m not here to talk to you.”

The corner of his mouth quirked into a definite, one-sided grin, not an amused one, but enough so that it softened the granite features of his face and hinted at a man with a good-humored nature behind the hard stone.

“I owe Jonas a favor, that’s why I’m here.” His eyes darkened with a terrible sadness.

Sadness she could feel.

He went on. “I want to know what I can do for Danielle. How I can help. Make a difference in their lives.” He paused. “The way Jonas had once done for me.”

“Jonas helped a lot of people in the line of duty.”

“I imagine.” He gave a curt nod, as if it were all he could manage. He swallowed hard, and his sorrow was a palpable thing drawing her closer. “I’m not handling this well. It’s the hospital. I’ve spent a lot of time in them.”

“In this one?”

“Yes.”

She slipped into the chair in the row next to him, leaving an empty seat between them. “Your story didn’t end well, did it? I’m sorry.”

He didn’t know why he was telling her this. What had happened to his resolve to keep this buried? “Four years, five months and twenty three days ago, no, twenty four days ago, my wife died in this hospital. One moment we were riding bikes on the shoulder of a country road, and the next, she was bleeding to death in my arms….”

He could feel the woman’s silence like a touch, her gaze on his face, her sympathy as soft as dawn’s light. The title on the front of the book he held began to blur. “Jonas answered the 911 call. He was going off duty, but he came to help. The paramedics were right behind him, but I’ll never forget what he did. He drove to the hospital and he sat with me while my wife was in surgery. I had no other family. No one else.”

That was all he could say. But there was more that Jonas had done, things that had made all the difference. A difference William could not face, much less put into ordinary words. He hung his head, willing the pain down and forcing his vision to clear.

Her hand settled on his arm, her touch light and comforting. He couldn’t explain why a sense of peace cut through the well of pain gathering deep within him. Or why she made the agony of an endless sorrow ebb away like low tide on a shore. He only knew how dangerous it was to open up to anyone, to let anyone in, and he jerked his arm away.

“Uh, there’s Danielle now,” Aubrey said in a startled voice, hopping to her feet, acting as if he hadn’t embarrassed her.

He was too overwhelmed to do anything more than close his book and try to find the will to stand, to greet Jonas’s wife with a voice that wouldn’t betray his own inner turmoil. He closed off everything else from his mind—even the bit of peace Aubrey had brought to him.

It was just about the saddest thing she’d heard. Aubrey ached for the man as she watched him amble down the hallway toward the elevators. Now that she knew what had happened to him and the loss he’d suffered, she could see that he was walking around broken down to the quick of his soul.

“I can’t believe this.” Danielle sank into the nearest chair in the waiting room and stared at the business card she held in her hand. “I’m too tired to think.”

She looked beyond exhausted, Aubrey thought as she eased into the chair beside her stepsister. Coincidentally, she discovered she had a perfect view of the elevator bank where William was waiting, head bowed, staring at the floor.