Barefoot in the Sun (13 page)

That morning, very little.

“I’ll be right back,” Raj said, pushing out his chair. “I’m going to get some results from the international patients that I’m certain will erase any lingering doubts.”

When Raj left the room, Oliver and Zoe sat in silence for a moment. She reached for one of the charts, the statistics and symbols meaningless without Oliver’s simplified explanations. But she understood enough. This could save Pasha’s life, but there were risks. Or they could go traditional, which probably wouldn’t save her life and might even wreck any quality she had left.

Wordlessly, Oliver covered her hand with his, and Zoe’s gaze shifted to his long, strong, capable fingers. A healer’s hands. A lover’s hands. Very slowly, she lifted her gaze to meet his.

“You really think I should do this, don’t you?”

“After seeing her today, and this conversation, I’m inclined to say yes. There are some tests to run and we can start them tomorrow, but once she passes those, I think this is not only your best option, it’s a brilliant one.”

She smiled. “So humble.”

“Trust me, I’m only the lead oncologist. You’ll have a team of some of the finest, most talented professionals in the world.”

The words settled over her like a cooling salve on an open wound. This was the best imaginable solution, better than anything she could have dreamed of. Except…

“What about your stipulations?”

He frowned and shook his head. “Did I have any?”

“About insisting I see a lawyer.”

“That is entirely separate from this. I said I’ll fix her medically and help you fix her legally. That wasn’t a condition of anything, Zoe.”

It wasn’t? “But you made it sound like if I didn’t—”

“If you don’t, then we may end up with a healthy woman who’s still running. That doesn’t help her, and that doesn’t help…us.” He added a little pressure on her hand, kicking up her pulse. “Did you think about what I asked you yesterday?”

I’d like a shot at something real.

She shrugged. “I have a lot on my mind.”

He gave her a half smile. “Then let’s get it off your mind. The first thing you need to do is trust me.”

“I trust you,” she said. “It’s me who usually lets me down.”

He lifted her hand and brought it to his lips for a kiss so soft it was nothing but air and promise. “One more thing I’d like to fix.”

“You can’t fix everything, Oliver.”

He grinned and kissed her knuckle again. “I can sure as hell try.”

P
asha had gotten sleepy shortly after Ashley arrived, worn out by the game and sun and the little boy who had unknowingly dragged her down memory lane. She settled on a lounge chair in the shade, closing her eyes to listen to his childish voice, letting forty-seven years disappear. Time evaporated, along with the pain and heartache of running and hiding. And, of course, all the fear.

If Zoe ever found out…if Zoe ever knew what they were really running from. She blew out a sad, slow breath, and that forced her to press a hand on the pain in her chest.

That was the real reason for this tumor to take her, and fast. Although those dark thoughts of death had certainly lightened in the face of a little boy who reminded her of her own. A little boy who suggested by his smile and wit that maybe, just maybe, life was worth living a little longer, despite the risks.

That was probably because during those lovely moments of card playing and joke sharing, the little boy at the table became Matthew Hobarth, seven-and-a-half years old, a dark-haired dreamer who saw animals in the clouds and had given his one and only four-leaf clover to Pasha for her birthday.

This means good luck, Mama.

How do you know, little one?

Because there are messages in the grass and promises in the air. All you have to do is find them and figure out what they are.

“Dude, I’m so sorry I brought this puzzle. I thought you were eight.” Ashley’s teenage voice pulled Pasha from her reverie, making her startle.

“I am eight.”

“A normal eight.”

“He
is
normal,” Pasha said. “Just very bright and exceptional.” She grinned at him. How could she not? He was the same size, about the same age, and had the same sweet voice that hadn’t yet developed a baritone—and he looked so much like Matthew. The same inquisitive brown eyes, the same upturned and freckled nose. Even his mop of hair was the same shade of dark chocolate with hints of auburn in the tips.

“Oh, Aunt Pasha, I’m sorry,” Ashley said. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“I wasn’t sleeping,” she assured them both. “I was daydreaming. Don’t you ever do that?”

Evan shook his head. “I read or go on the computer. I live on my computer.”

Ashley smiled as if that amused her, but Pasha studied his earnest expression.

Well, that wasn’t the same as Matthew. There were no computers in 1966, and her little boy was smart, but not quite this serious.

“You obviously do a lot of puzzles, too,” Ashley said, selecting another piece. “I know this is My Little Pony, which probably isn’t your favorite, but it is for seven-to-nine-year-olds and you’re finishing it like a beast.”

“I’m good at puzzles,” he said, snapping a piece in place. “I do five hundred pieces in a day.”

“Wow!” Ashley’s eyes popped as she looked at Pasha. “Can you believe that?”

“I’m not lying,” Evan said, his tone rising in self-defense.

“I know you’re not,” Ashley said. “I’m so amazed at that. I don’t think I even owned a five-hundred-piece puzzle when I was your age, or even older. I might have, but if I did, it’s somewhere in Barefoot Bay now.”

Evan easily fit the new piece in place and looked up. “You threw it in the ocean? I mean, the Gulf. It’s not the ocean, I know.”

Pasha noticed very quickly that this boy couldn’t stand to have his facts wrong. One more trait that didn’t remind her of Matthew, but it didn’t matter. She was already smitten.

“I lost everything I owned in a hurricane almost two years ago,” Ashley told him.

“Oh, that was you! Zoe told me. I thought she said it was her friend.”

“She meant my mom. I was fourteen and we lived about half a mile from here, down where the main building of the resort is now. During the storm, my mom and I spent the night in a bathtub with a mattress over our heads.”

Evan looked suitably impressed. “That is so cool.”

“No,” Ashley said with a sarcastic roll of her eyes. “It was totally
not
cool. We lost everything, which is why the only puzzle I have left from when I was a little kid is this one. It was at my grandma’s house.”

Evan sat up, tucking his feet under his little body. “Was it a real hurricane, like a category five?”

“Four and, yes, trust me, it was so real.”

“Was it loud? What did it feel like? Did you get hurt? Was there lightning? Were there tornadoes? Did you see them with your own eyes?”

Ashley laughed, and Pasha did, too. “Um, yes, it was as loud as a train. I don’t remember any lightning or the tornadoes and, as a matter of fact, I was certain we were going to die. Why are you so obsessed with this?”

“Because I love weather,” Evan said, shifting his attention back to the puzzle.

“He’s going to be a meteorologist,” Pasha told Ashley, getting rewarded with a gorgeous smile from the young boy. “What is it you like about weather so much, little one?” she asked.

“Everything, but I’m not that little.”

“Of course not. Force of habit.” She rose from the chaise and ambled over to the glass-topped patio table, taking a seat and resting her chin on her hands to watch him and
remember
.

She and Matthew used to do puzzles and play games like Hi Ho Cherry-O and Barrel of Monkeys. They’d play cards and take long walks to the lake for picnics. And, of course, they’d read the messages from Mother Nature, making up all kinds of funny things together. Every time she made a “prediction” now, it was really a secret whisper to heaven.

Could Matthew hear her—forty-seven years after that horrible night?

“The thing about weather,” Evan said. “It always changes.”

“It does indeed,” Pasha agreed.

“And there’s a reason why I like it.” Evan hesitated with a puzzle piece, but not because he didn’t know where to place it. There were only about six pieces left, and she had no doubt he knew where every one of them fit.

“Weather is the neatest thing in the world.” He looked up, his eyes very much like his father’s, keen and earnest, fringed with black lashes and bright with the emotion of talking about something he loved.

“It’s certainly one of the most powerful,” she agreed.

“Right!” He dropped the piece of the puzzle on the table. “Like nobody in the whole world can do anything about it,” he said. “Weather just does what weather wants to do. And it does some really neat things. Did you know that if a butterfly flaps its wings in Hong Kong, it can change the weather in California?”

“That’s not true!” Ashley said, earning a dire look from him.

“Oh, yes it is. You can look it up on weather.com or any of the really good weather Web sites.”

Ashley gave another eye roll. “Like that’s my idea of a fun time.”

“Well, it’s obviously his,” Pasha said gently. “So you should respect that, Ashley. And, Evan, that might be the most interesting thing I ever heard.”

“Oh, I know all kinds of things like that,” he told her. “Like, do you know that if you weighed all the rain that falls on the earth in one year, it’s like five thousand million million tons? That’s
two
millions.”

“That’s a lot of rain,” Pasha said.

They’d lost Ashley, who started putting in the last pieces of the puzzle, but Evan was on fire with excitement. “And you know what else?” he asked.

“Tell me,” Pasha said, fighting the urge to reach out for his little cheeks and squeeze them. “What else?”

“Did you know the temperature of a lightning bolt is hotter than the surface of the sun?” He pushed himself up so he was practically kneeling.

“I did not know that,” Pasha said. “Did you know that, Ashley?”

“That’s super hot,” she said, utterly bored. “You want to do the last piece, Evan?”

“No.” He was locked on Pasha now, the two of them connected. “Did you know there’s such a thing as a moonbow?”

Every cell in her body—the sick ones, the healthy ones, the old ones, the near-dead ones—froze for a moment.

“A
moonbow
?” Her voice shuddered a little.

“It’s like a rainbow, but at night from the moon. Isn’t that cool?”

She tried to swallow, but her damn wretched throat made it impossible.

“As a matter of fact…” Heavens above, maybe Mother Nature really did talk to her! “I saw a moonbow once.” The announcement came out hoarse, and she had to work not to go into a coughing fit. She didn’t want to ruin this blissful moment.

“Really?”

“Do you know what a moonbow means?” she asked.

“It means it rained and the moon’s light is reflected through the water, creating a prism.”

She shook her head, smiling. “It means that your one true love will return.”

He squished up his face. “Ewww.”

Ashley giggled. “You don’t have a true love back at school in Chicago? A little third-grader you have your eye on?”

He curled his lip. “Hell no.”

Ashley gasped. “Watch your mouth.”

He ignored the warning and turned to Pasha. “That’s not what a moonbow means.”

“Yes it is.”

“Aunt Pasha knows,” Ashley said. “She can predict the future by looking at the clouds or dirt or even the foam at the beach.”

Evan looked from one to the other, clearly not buying it. “I don’t know anything about that. I only know what’s real and scientific, not that kind of woo-woo stuff.”

“Finally, something you don’t know,” Ashley said, pulling out her phone to tap on the screen. “Oh, Aunt Zoe texted. They’ll be here in ten minutes.”

“Good, ’cause I want to go on my computer and look up moonbows.”

“You won’t find what I told you on the Internet,” Pasha told him.

“Then it’s not true,” he shot back. “ ’Cause everything in the world that’s true is on the Internet.”

Ashley snorted. “Not hardly.”

“It’s true,” Pasha assured him. “I know things like that.”

He looked uncertain, but then he smiled, revealing his too-large teeth and a gleam in his eyes. “ ’Kay,” he conceded. “I like to learn things.”

“Then we’ll be a great team.”

His smile was so real, so heartfelt, and so much like Matthew that for the first time in months and months, Pasha almost wanted that black pressure in her chest to go away. She almost wanted to live.

“Hello, we’re home!” Zoe came breezing onto the patio, her green eyes sparking like she had a secret, her hair wild from the wind.

Home? She thought of this as home already? Of course, with Zoe’s life, she could think of a motel room on a rural highway as home. That was the sad, sad legacy that Pasha had given her.

Zoe came to the table, leaning over to give Pasha a kiss, her cheek warm from the summer air. Or was it that Oliver Bradbury gave her a flush of love?

The moonbow promised the return of true love. But whose love? A little boy like the one Pasha had lost, or a man like the one Zoe had lost?

The one Zoe had lost
because of Pasha
. “How was your ride, honey?” she asked Zoe.

“Amazing.”

Pasha couldn’t help but grin. “I like the sound of that.”

Zoe slipped into one of the empty chairs, and Pasha got a good look at her face. Her sweet cheeks high with color, her ever-present smile as wide as ever. “I have so much to tell you.”

“Is my dad here?” Evan asked.

“He’s bringing some things out of the car,” she said. “We stopped by his storage unit and picked up stuff for this house.”

Evan’s eyes grew wide. “I hope he remembered my Xbox. I had to use the system in the Shitz-Carl—” He gave Pasha a guilty look. “I mean the Ritz-Carlton. Be right back.”

Pasha watched him tear back into the house and Ashley got up to follow. “I better keep an eye on that kid,” Ashley said. “He’s a cussing computer trapped in the body of an eight-year-old boy.”

Zoe laughed, but Pasha sighed with contentment.

“He’s wonderful,” she said.

“You really like him, don’t you?” Zoe asked, absently turning the puzzle spread out over the table.

“I do. He reminds me…” Oh, dear.
Careful, Pasha
. “He’s a very endearing and intelligent young man.”

“So’s his dad,” Zoe whispered, leaning close.

“Ahh, I thought you looked like a woman all smitten.”

“Pasha, I’ve been to his clinic.”

And that was what had her glowing? “Why did you go there?”

“Why do you think? Oh my God, I’m so excited. They can cure you.”

“Zoe, I doubt—”

“Don’t doubt!” Zoe squeezed Pasha’s hand. “Do you want to talk to Oliver about it now? We’ve been with his partner, another doctor, and they can do gene therapy, Pasha. They can do amazing things that no regular hospital can do. It’s this new—”

“No, no.” Blood rushed in Pasha’s head, thrumming and pounding.

“I know what you’re worried about, Pasha,” Zoe rushed on, undaunted by Pasha’s protests. “This will be completely confidential and no one will have to know anything, not your name or identification. It’s perfect!”

No, it wasn’t perfect. “I’m sure it’s dangerous and risky, though.”

“Not as risky as dying!”

Pasha inched back at the outburst. “I don’t think you should fight nature, dear.”

Emerald eyes popped wide in response. “What are you saying? You won’t treat this illness, even if it doesn’t mean…exposure?”

Pasha turned toward the pool. The day had been nice. Warm sunshine and memories. But she’d made up her mind, and as long as she was alive and the threat existed, she was blocking Zoe from happiness.

“I’m tired and I want to go home.” She put her hand on Zoe’s arm. “Real home.”

“Back to Arizona?”

“No, no, to the bungalow. Our temporary home.”

Zoe’s shoulders slumped. “They’re all temporary, Pasha.”

“Precisely.” But if she were gone, Zoe could find permanence. “Please take me back so I can rest.”

“He only wants to ask you some questions.” She leaned closer. “Pasha, he’s not a typical oncologist. I know what you’re worried about, but there’s no chemo, no radiation. He’s working with this brilliant doctor and this really extraordinary research facility and they’re doing all these exciting things like, oh, God, I can’t even pronounce the words but it’s a whole experimental way to treat canc—”