The Husband Project

She looked out the window. “I’d eliminated everything except ovarian torsion.”

“Oh, that’s interesting. It’s not at all common for an ovary to twist, you know, and it’s just about as dangerous as an acute appendix.”

- “I know,” she said, and drew a deep breath so she could go on.

A hint of laughter crept into his voice. “That must be an extremely detailed medical guide you’ve got—or has the popular press made torsion the disease of the week?”

Alison was furious. “I am not a hypochondriac, Dr. Kavanaugh,” she said tightly. “I didn’t cast around for an interesting disease, I simply looked up my symptoms, and that’s what I found. I’m an - intelligent and informed woman—”

“—Who doesn’t know the difference between an appendix and an ovary, but thinks she’s an expert anyway.”

“What was it you were saying just now about unprofessional behavior?” Her voice dripped sweetness.

He ignored the interruption. “Do you have any idea how close you came to—” He shook his head, rubbed his hand across the back of his- neck, and stood up. “Never mind. I’ll let Sara jump on you about the risk you took by not seeing a doctor till it was almost too late. She’s getting paid to yell at you about taking proper care of yourself. I’m not. Goodbye.”

Forgetting her incision, Alison tried to leap up from her chair, and fell back, eyes wide, too startled even to swear. She sagged back against the pillows and tried deep breathing to ward off the stab of pain.

Logan had left the door standing wide open, so Kit didn’t knock. She burst in, dumped an overnight bag beside the bed, and leaned over Alison to give her a gentle hug. “Now this is more like it. You’ve even got some color back, I see. I met Logan in the hallway, but he seemed to be in a hurry. You didn’t slug him again, did you?”

“I didn’t slug him last time, either,” Alison pointed out. “It was an accident.” She eyed the overnight case—the last time she’d noticed, it had been on the top shelf of her bedroom closet—and raised an eyebrow at Kit.

“Your purse was still in Susannah’s car, so I stole your keys,” Kit said blithely. “I figured the cats needed feeding—”

Alison winced. “I can’t believe I forgot about my cats.”

“I not only fed them, I played with them—which is why I’m so late. And I picked up some clothes for when you’re ready to go home.” Kit perched on the edge of the bed. “I brought your medical guide, too. I thought you’d probably want to read it again, in light of the new developments. If you like, I could try to catch Logan so he can show you where you went wrong.”

Alison rolled her eyes. “No. thank you. That man is incredibly egotistical.”

A voice from the doorway corrected her. “That man is incredibly good.” Sara Williams strolled across the room, chart in hand. “Feeling better? The nurses tell me you’re doing quite well, so there’s no reason you can’t go home. There are a few restrictions, of course—the discharge nurse will give you a list. Do you live alone?”

Alison started to nod, but Kit intervened. “I’m taking her home with me for a few days.”

The doctor nodded approval, and hardly a moment later she was gone. Kit shook her head. “And I’ve always thought Susannah was a whirlwind,” she muttered.

“I can manage on my own, Kit. You don’t have to baby-sit.”

Kit had stooped to pick up the overnight bag. Very deliberately, she set it on the end of the bed and turned to Alison. “Sometimes, Alison, you don’t seem to need anybody at all.”

The somber note in Kit’s voice brought tears to Alison’s eyes. She tried to blink them away, furious at herself. Surely she wasn’t going to turn into a wet sponge, dripping all over the place at the least provocation! Quietly, she said, “Thanks, Kitty. I don’t want to go home alone.”

As they drove across Chicago to Kit’s lakeside high-rise, Alison wasn’t listening to her friend’s chatter. She was still hearing the unusual soberness in Kit’s voice as she said, Sometimes you don’t seem to need anybody.

But I do, Alison thought. I need somebody to love.

From the guest room of Kit’s condo, Alison stared down at the enormous expanse of Lake Michigan. The water was clear and blue under the morning sun; a light wind whipped up gentle frothy waves and bulged the bright sails of the armada of boats—at least a hundred of them. Alison could count so many not only because the condo was so high and the air so clear she could see almost all the way across the lake, but because the effort of taking a shower had worn her out so thoroughly that all she could do was drop into the armchair by the window and rest.

Eventually, however, she pushed herself up from the chair, put on a set of soft knit exercise clothes, and walked down the hall to the kitchen.

Kit looked up from the chopping block where she was dicing green onions and ham. “Good morning, Ali. How about an omelette?”

“You don’t need to pamper me.” Alison dropped into a chair beside the breakfast bar. “Surely you’ve got enough to do with your brunch to prepare.”

“You’re certain you don’t mind? I can still cancel it, you know.”

“No, you can’t. When you invite ten people for brunch, you can’t change your mind two hours beforehand.”

“They’d understand.” But Kit sounded a little less than convinced.

“Well, I wouldn’t. You’ve had this planned for weeks. Cancel and I’ll really feel like I’m imposing on you.”

Kit shrugged. “You already know better, so there’s no point arguing about it. Shall I set a place for you? You’re looking much better this morning.”

“And make your numbers odd? Now that would be a disaster,” Alison teased. “I’ll spend a couple of hours lying in one of those canvas chairs on the terrace, hiding behind a ficus tree and reading a book. So party on—you won’t disturb me a bit, and your guests won’t even know I’m here.”

The terrace was beautiful; it stretched the length of the Websters’s spacious condo and looked out over the lake. Alison chose a chair on the comer just outside the guest room, as far as possible from the elegant living room. If Kit’s brunch guests spilled out onto the terrace, she’d have plenty of warning, and she’d just slip quietly back into her bedroom.

She tried to read, but the light novel she’d found on the guest room shelves didn’t have the power to draw her in. Instead she found herself gazing at the waves, forming and breaking in a hypnotic rhythm, rolling toward the horizon as they always had and as they would, for eternity.

Eternity. She’d come a littte closer to it yesterday than she wanted to think about, and of course there wasn’t any need to dwell on that, now. The danger was over, and she’d been very, very lucky.

However, the reason she’d put off seeing a doctor—the reason she’d hidden behind denial instead of taking care of herself—was just as real now as it had been a few weeks ago when she’d picked up her medical guide, looked up her symptoms, and realized the threat which hung over her head.

The threat that she would no longer be able to have a child.

Alison would never forget the sick horror of that instant. She’d always known, of course, that she wanted a child—at least one, maybe several—but she hadn’t realized till then exactly how desperate that longing had become.

When she stopped to think about it, however, the timing made perfect sense. Her two best friends were focused on family right now; with Kit celebrating her first pregnancy and Susannah newly married and starting to think about children, the subject resounded throughout Tryad at the drop of a paper clip.

With all that going on, it was no wonder Alison’s biological clock had started to tick. The oldest of the trio by a couple of years, she was getting uncomfortably close to thirty. If she was going to have a child at all, the time was soon. It was no wonder she’d been so frightened when her medical guide suggested that she’d already put it off too long.

But fortunately her fears hadn’t been real. Once her recovery from the surgery was complete, she’d be in her normal excellent health. There was no reason she couldn’t have a child.

Of course, there was one minor problem. She was unmarried, and there were no prospects in sight. Which wasn’t to say there weren’t plenty of men in her life—but that was a different matter.

She got up from her chair and went to lean on the waist-high wrought-iron terrace rail, thirty-five stories above the lake. Kit will have a hard time child-proofing this place, she thought idly. It would be far easier to make her own row house safe...

Absorbed in her daydreams, she didn’t hear footsteps coming slowly across the terrace.

A deep, soft voice was the first warning that she wasn’t alone. “Not thinking of climbing over that fence, are you?”

Startled, Alison twisted to face him, forgetting her incision.

Logan Kavanaugh crossed the intervening distance in a couple of steps and slipped an arm around her.

He’d actually put on a jacket and tie for Kit’s brunch party, Alison noted, even as she said irritably, “You don’t have to restrain me. I’m not suicidal.”

“That’s good. Sara told me she took particular care to leave you a scar that’ll look cute with a bikini, and I’d hate to see her work wasted.”