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Liz watched her daughter skip on into the kitchen, her blond ponytail rising and falling with each step. At seven Sara Jane
was beautiful, bright, and full of questions. Liz thanked her lucky stars every day for such a gift.

In the kitchen, Emma stood by the wall phone, her hand over the mouthpiece. “For you, Mrs. Fairchild. Says it’s urgent.”

“Who is it?”

“He wouldn’t say.”

Frowning, Liz took the phone. “Hello?”

“Liz, it’s Fitz. I’ve got some bad news. Adam’s been in a serious accident.”

The urge to deny what she was hearing nearly overwhelmed Liz. Suddenly shaky, she stretched the phone cord and sat down. “Emma,
please give Sara her milk and cookies in her room, would you?” She turned back to the receiver. “How bad is it?”

“Bad.” Fitz’s voice was rough with emotion. “This damn rain. He was driving back to San Diego last night after giving two
speeches. He was tired and fell asleep. The car went off the road, hit a tree, and rolled over.”

“Oh, God,” she whispered, heart pounding in her throat.

“He’s got a concussion, a problem with one leg, a broken pelvis, and extensive internal injuries. I’ve been with him ever
since they called me. He’s still not conscious.”

Liz closed her eyes, her hand squeezing the phone so hard her knuckles hurt. “What can I do?”

“I don’t know if I’m doing the right thing, but I had to call you. He doesn’t open his eyes, but he keeps mumbling your name.”

Liz choked back a rush of tears. “What about Diane?”

“She’s on a trip to Bermuda with several other senators’ wives. I finally reached her, but there’s a severe storm there now
and planes aren’t taking off. She won’t be able to make
it back until morning, if then.” Fitz made a sound deep in his throat before going on. “I have no business involving you,
I know. But if you come, I’ll get you in so no one will know. Please, Liz. He’s… he’s critical.”

“I’m leaving right now. Tell me where to meet you.”

Grateful that she’d agreed to come, he did. “And please, drive carefully.”

It took Liz two tries to hang up the phone. Taking a deep breath, she went upstairs to instruct Emma about Sara.

Fitz was pacing in the small vestibule as Liz came hurrying through the side door near the back of the large metropolitan
hospital. His face was ashen as he took her arm. “Thank you for coming.”

“How is he?”

“No change. Let’s go up the stairs. It’s less conspicuous.” At the fourth-floor landing, he opened the door. “I’ve got him
in a private room at the end of the hall on the right.” Walking briskly, he held on to her. “So far, I’ve been able to keep
this from the press.” At the door to 430, he paused. “I’d better warn you. He looks bad.”

Trembling in her anxiety, Liz wanted to see for herself. Inside, she approached the bed quietly, pressing her lips together
to keep from crying out.

Adam’s usual tan had faded to a pale, sickly color, nearly as white as the sheet covering him. His face, neck, and arms were
covered with abrasions and contusions. There was a tube providing oxygen through his nose, a needle taped to his left arm,
and a thicker hose disappearing under the sheet in the area of his groin. Behind him, three separate machines blipped and
beeped eerily, their green computer readouts blinking in the dim room.

Liz handed her raincoat to Fitz, moved to Adam’s right side, and took his hand in both of hers. It was bruised, very dry,
too still, but she held on anyway. Her eyes inspected his battered face, noting that his eyes were both blackened.
There was a white bandage at his hairline near his left temple. His breathing, despite the oxygen assist, seemed strained,
labored. She squeezed his hand and got no response.

Fitz spoke from behind her. “The doctor told me to talk to him, that wherever he’s gone to, he can probably still hear.” He
paused, his throat swollen with emotion. “What worries me and the doctor is that Adam doesn’t seem to be fighting.”

She wouldn’t think about that,
couldn’t
think about it. “You said you heard him say my name?”

“Yes, several times. He gets restless suddenly, his head moves back and forth and he tries to talk. The only word I could
make out was your name.”

Still gripping his hand, she leaned closer. “Adam, it’s Liz. I’m here. Please keep on fighting.” Afraid her voice was perilously
close to a sob, she swallowed hard before trying again. “Please come back to us.”

It was too difficult to remain, Fitz decided. He was so afraid Adam wouldn’t regain consciousness; it was a possibility, the
doctor had warned. He was worried about the press stumbling on to them. He wondered if he’d messed up by calling Liz. If Diane
ever found out, she’d have a fit. But the hardest thing was seeing the naked love on Liz’s face as she hovered over Adam,
the obvious pain she felt now. He’d give anything to be loved like that. “I’ll be just outside,” he said, leaving.

Carefully smoothing Adam’s hair back, Liz was scarcely aware when Fitz left. She knew only that she had to reach Adam, had
to bring him back. He was too young, with too much left unfinished, to be taken from them now.

Blinking back the tears that threatened to overflow, she leaned even closer. “Adam, darling, can you hear me? Squeeze my hand
if you can.” Nothing. She tried not to get discouraged. “Adam, you mustn’t die. I won’t let you leave us. Too many people
care about you. We need you.”

The only sound was the bleeping machines. She couldn’t
let up. So she pulled the chair over and sat down. Holding his hand in her own, she used her other hand to soothe him, to
carefully touch his face around the bruise marks. And she kept up a line of chatter, praying he could somehow hear her.

She reminisced about their summer together, then about how she’d followed his career. She talked about her home, how she loved
strolling by the sea, how she missed their walks. She purposely left out any references to Richard and Sara, and even to Diane.
She wanted him to think only about her, hoping those good memories would bring him to a state of consciousness.

Liz wasn’t sure how long she sat there quietly rambling on. At one point Fitz came in with a cup of coffee she didn’t want
but drank anyway. Nurses came in occasionally to adjust and check on Adam. Sometime along the way she called Emma to tell
her to put Sara to bed, that she wasn’t sure when she’d be home. A bit later Fitz returned to tell her Diane was further delayed
by weather and was frustrated, worried, and furious.

All of it meant little to Liz as she kept her bedside vigil. There were periods through the long nighttime hours when she
thought she felt his hand move, then was equally certain she’d imagined it. Occasionally he got restless and thrashed his
head on the pillow. The name on his lips, muttered softly but distinctly, was her own. She forced back tears that welled up
again and again. She would be strong for Adam.

Fitz came back in with fresh coffee as a pale gray dawn could be seen from the window. Though he handed a cup to Liz, she
set it down without tasting it. Standing in the shadows, he stayed out of the way.

Unaware of anyone but the one man she’d always loved, Liz tenderly ran shaky fingers over his dear face. She had to keep trying,
though her voice was hoarse and strained. “There’s so much I’d like to say. I wish things had turned out differently between
us. But even though we’re not together, I want you to know that I care. I care so much.” She paused,
hesitant to say out loud the words she’d wanted to tell him for so long. Maybe he needed to hear them as much as she needed
to say them. “I love you, Adam. I think I always have. And I know I should not feel it.”

Adam made a sound, quite indistinct, and his eyes flew open. Almost immediately they closed again, and his fingers tightened
on hers.

“Oh, Adam. Let me know you’re there, that you hear me, please. I love you so much. Please, darling.”

Slowly his fingers curled around hers of their own accord. Overwhelmed, exhausted, and very thankful, Liz bent her head over
his hand, held tightly in her own, and wept.

Having hurried over, Fitz, too, had tears to shed. Grateful tears. After composing himself, he went to find the doctor.

“I think it’s wonderful, exactly what you needed.” Liz poured tea from a ceramic-and-teakwood pot into two pale blue china
cups and handed one to Molly.

Molly took a small taste before replying. “I’ve never done much in the way of volunteer work, though Lord knows my mother
tried to get me into it often enough. But this
just feels
right, you know?”

Liz couldn’t have agreed more. After Nathan’s rejection last year, Molly had sunk into a deep depression that had frightened
her family and friends. She’d stopped seeing people, stopped painting, even stopped shopping, which really was out of character.
Finally, after some fifteen months, she seemed over the worst of it. Now she’d found something that had captured her interest
and seemed to make life worth living again.

“You say it’s called Helping Hands?”

Nodding, Molly set down her cup on the glass-topped table in Liz’s breakfast nook. “It’s small, because their funds
are so limited. They’ve got a storefront location off Broadway not far from that dumpy place Adam used for his first campaign,
but the rent is donated, so the price is right. The brother of one of the volunteers is a carpenter, and he put up some flimsy
partitions to provide a modicum of privacy. Still, they need so much.”

Liz lifted her hair off her neck, trying to catch the cool ocean breeze coming in through the open window. It seemed quite
warm for late March. The winter hadn’t been harsh; they seldom were in southern California. There’d been a lot of rain, and
she was ready for drier days. “What is it you do there?”

“Mostly just talk with the women who walk in seeking shelter.” Molly leaned forward. “I’d never been involved with an abused
woman before my cousin called me from the shelter last month. They’re so vulnerable, with such low self-esteem and little
self-confidence. They’ve lost their pride, their possessions, their hope. It’s truly pitiful. And yet, time after time, they
go back to their abusive situations.”

Molly had told her that her cousin had been battered by her husband and that she’d returned to him anyway. It seemed a pattern.
“Remember that case Adam had, Sam Lorenzo’s daughter, who was ultimately killed by an abusive husband?”

“Yes, I do. Every time I see one of these women decide to go back, I’m afraid for her. But it isn’t just the physical battering,
bad as that is. It’s the mental abuse.”

Liz reached over and squeezed her friend’s hand. “You must be very good with these women. You have such an empathetic heart.”

Caustic and irreverent in college and even after, Molly had been changed radically by the hurtful way Nathan had thrown her
over. The bitterness still crept through occasionally, but she listened more intently these days and was keenly aware of the
pain of others. She was still suffering inside, Liz felt. Despite the fact that Molly was wearing a sassy
pink outfit today with an outrageous broad-brimmed hat, Liz knew she was working hard to keep her spirits up, to keep from
sliding back down into the well of depression.

“Thanks, but I get as much out of volunteering there as I give. Maybe you’d like to come with me sometime. Your heart would
melt if you saw some of the children these women bring with them. Huge, frightened eyes, undernourished, afraid to trust.”

Liz wasn’t sure she could handle that. It had been wrenching enough working with underprivileged kids years ago in little
theater. “I’ll think about it.” The ringing phone had her rising and going through the archway into the kitchen to answer.
“Hello?”

“Liz, it’s Fitz. Can you talk?”

Since Adam’s accident last November, he’d taken to calling her occasionally to update her on his brother’s recovery. Liz braced
herself, for usually the things he had to say were upsetting. “Yes. How are things going?”

Fitz sighed audibly. “Not good. Adam’s body has healed more quickly than the doctors had predicted, as I told you the last
time we talked. But recently, he had a setback. He sits in that house in Sacramento and stares out the window for hours. I’ve
been taking some work to him, but he seems to have lost interest. Diane’s frustrated, and I’m worried.”

Liz had heard of depression as a delayed reaction after a serious injury. But usually it involved concern over an incapacitation.
“I don’t understand. His injuries have healed, he can walk and even resume work. What kind of a setback did he have?”

“Adam won’t talk about it, but I got after the doctor and learned that two weeks ago, they told him that due to his pelvic
injuries, he’s become sterile. It’s a real blow to him. He’s always loved kids.”

Liz felt her heart plummet. Dear God, sterile. And two miles away his eight-year-old daughter sat in her third-grade
class, looking more like her father every day. She closed her eyes, praying for strength. “I’m so sorry, Fitz.”

“Yeah, so am I.” He wasn’t sure why he’d called Liz with this information or why he’d been phoning every couple of weeks since
that endless night. Maybe because in his mind she’d brought his brother back from a place Adam had seemed reluctant to leave.
Despite their two separate marriages, Fitz had realized that night that Liz loved Adam, and that her words of love had finally
penetrated his subconscious. Fitz didn’t consider himself an emotional man, but he’d been terribly moved by the scene at the
hospital.

He’d also watched Diane try to raise Adam’s spirits, but he wasn’t responding to her. Fitz was just cynical enough to feel
that Diane wasn’t so much concerned with Adam the man, but rather worried that Adam the senator might not recuperate and take
her back into the political social whirl she loved more than her own husband. Diane had told Fitz just yesterday that she
now regretted that she hadn’t had a child with Adam. Too late, lady.

“I shouldn’t have called,” Fitz said at last, wondering what Liz was thinking on the other end. “It’s not fair of me to keep
dragging you back into this.”