Until I Found You (22 page)

He hated the idea.
Hated
it.
“Are you sure?”

“I need to be alone. It’s just how I am.”

Independent.

Considerate.

Responsible.

Nick loved those things about her, but he knew that human strengths often signaled spiritual weaknesses. Independence could turn into lonely isolation. Consideration in the extreme became codependence. Being responsible was perhaps Kate’s most frightening trait, because she carried the entire world on her narrow shoulders. Not only did she need God more than she needed Nick, she needed to trust God more than she trusted herself. Once again she was back in San Miguel Canyon, caught on a cliff with someone telling her to let go and trust him. Only this time it wasn’t Nick. It was God.

“All right,” he said. “If that’s what you really want.”

“It is. But you’re right about the hotel across the street. Would you take me somewhere else?”

“Sure.” He considered renting a room in the same place, but he didn’t want to crowd her, especially when she needed the kind of security no human being could provide. He trailed a knuckle along her cheek, following the path of dried tears with a touch when he wanted to kiss them away.
Change your mind,
he pleaded silently.
Come
with me. We’ll face this mess together.

Kate stared bleakly into his eyes, then laid her palm on his chest but said nothing.

Giving up, he wrapped his arm around her waist and walked her to the passenger side. Before she climbed in, she faced him with the steel spine of the old Kate, the one who wore a business suit like armor and ran the show. “You’re a good man, Nick. If you could, you’d make everything right for me. I know that. But you can’t. As much as you want to, you’re—”

“Human,” he finished for her.

She gave him another sad look. “Tonight reminded me of something I learned a long time ago. I can’t depend on anyone but myself.” In a voice he barely heard, she whispered, “Not you . . . maybe not even God.”

He would have given anything to save Kate the pain of what she had just confessed. But he didn’t have that ability. She had to come to know God’s ways for herself, and she had to fight alone. All Nick could do was pray for her and stick to the speed limit as best as he could.

Leona woke up in a hard bed with her mind swaddled in fog. The misty cloud numbed her from the inside out until she opened her eyes and saw the curtain hanging from a metal
track on the ceiling. The low hum of conversation filled her ears, and phones rang in the same muted tone of the phone system in the Clarion office. Confused, she blinked her way into consciousness, saw a cluster of monitors next to the bed, and realized she was in an ICU.

Oh
, Lord. No . . . not again. Not another stroke.

Frantic, she recited her Medicare number. She still knew it by heart. She also knew her full name and address, her birthday, and the president of the United States. Her toes wiggled on command, and her hands clenched willingly into fists. With her tongue thick in her mouth, she tried to speak. “Help me . . . Oh, Lord. Pleash . . .”

Only a mild slur.

Still confused, she tried to pull herself up on the bed. When pain stabbed through her chest, memories of the previous night crashed down on her. Hurrying to the bathroom, falling against the side of the tub. Grimacing, she thought of the game she had played with her brother about choosing between afflictions.
Would you rather be deaf or blind?
Leona mentally added another choice. Would you rather have a stroke or broken bones? In spite of the pain, she gratefully chose the broken bones. In time, she would heal. But oh, the hassle! She hated hospitals, and she hated what her recovery would require of Kate, who barely had time to breathe.

Oh, Lord, why now?

Kate’s faith was tender and new, a blossom growing on the tip of a branch. The smallest pinch could rip it from the source of life and kill it. If her faith died, she’d become hard and bitter the way Leona had when she lost her son. In the wretched days after Peter’s passing, she had turned her back on a God she deemed cruel. That spiritual darkness had held her captive until yet another encounter with a condor, this time a female bird named Aqiwo.

Somehow Leona had to finish the journal for Kate. In spite of a broken shoulder and broken ribs, as soon as she could, she’d write about that long-ago day. But not tonight. Broken and battered, all she could do was pray for Kate and the trials that lay ahead.

I
n
the days after leona’s fall,
Kate settled into the motel where Nick had taken her that first night. She spent most of her time at Leona’s bedside, first at the hospital and now at Casa Rosa, a nursing facility that left a lot to be desired. She spoke with Nick on the phone every night, or he drove down for dinner when he could get away from the Clarion. Neither of them mentioned her meltdown, which was fine with Kate. She didn’t know what she thought about God or faith right now.

To add to her worries, the Eve’s Garden proposal was a shambles. Julie was on medical leave with severe morning sickness, and Brad’s idea of brainstorming was quoting marketing stats. Roscoe reminded her almost daily that she had a carved-in-stone February fourteenth deadline. That’s why she had set her phone alarm for 4:30 a.m., and why it was screeching in her ears now. Groggy, she staggered out of bed, popped open a diet cola for the caffeine, and stacked the pillows against the headboard. With the computer on her lap, she sipped the soda while the file loaded.

Without warning, the bed lurched. Earthquakes struck
California all the time. Most were small and lasted a few seconds; others lasted for minutes and destroyed skyscrapers and collapsed dams. The shaking didn’t stop. It intensified to a roar, rattling windows and causing the walls to groan and sway. Forgetting the laptop, she bolted for a doorframe, the strongest part of a structure, and hung on with both hands. When the floor bucked, she slid to her bottom and protected her head with her arms.

“No!” she cried. “Please God, no!”

As suddenly as it started, the earthquake stopped. With her breath rasping, she listened to a chorus of car alarms; otherwise the morning was still again. The quake had been mild to moderate in Valencia, but the epicenter could have been anywhere—right here or in downtown Los Angeles, or most frightening of all, on the San Andreas Fault near Meadows. With her heart wedged in her throat, she turned on the television with one hand and lifted her phone to call Nick with the other.

He answered in a sleepy drawl, clearly unaffected by an earthquake. “Kate?”

“Yes.” She felt silly for waking him. “You must not have felt it.”

“Felt what?”

“An earthquake—”

“How bad?” He was alert now.

“Moderate here, but I just turned on the news.” Los Angeles could be in ruins for all she knew. “I’m glad you’re okay.”

“I’m fine. No shaking here at all.” There was a pause where she imagined him sitting up on the side of the bed and running his hand through his hair.

“Are you all right?” he asked.

“I’m—” she gave a nervous laugh. “I was about to say I’m a little shaken up.”

“I bet. You must be quaking in your boots.”

Kate groaned at the pun, but inside she smiled. “That was awful.”

“Yeah.”

She held his humor close to her heart, but she stopped herself from wanting to be safe in his arms. Nothing in her life was the same since Leona’s fall, including her relationship with Nick. She didn’t hold the speeding ticket against him. He was the same good man she loved. But she no longer understood his trust in God. If she didn’t share Nick’s faith, how could they be a couple? A picture formed in her mind of a Clydesdale yoked with a Shetland pony. Kate didn’t want to be the pony.

Outside the last car alarm stopped, but her nerves were still wire-tight. Nick’s steady voice soothed her even over the phone. “Any news yet on TV?”

She read the crawl on the screen. “Cal Tech says it was a 4.1, centered north of—oh my goodness. It was centered here.”

“No wonder you felt it. You’re at the epicenter.”

“In more ways than one.” Just like an earthquake generated aftershocks for weeks, even months, the repercussions of Leona’s fall rattled daily through Kate’s life, and there was no end in sight. When Leona came home, she’d need constant help. Dody was spending February in Texas with her son, which meant Kate had to hire a caregiver. The cracks in her life just kept spreading. “I hate earthquakes,” she complained to Nick.

“Me, too. I’m glad you’re all right.”

“I am, but it never stops.”

“What doesn’t?”

“Life.” She stared at the TV, where a camera showed a broken window at a convenience store. “A week ago I had everything under control. I could handle Sutton and the
Clarion
,
but now Leona needs me, too. You’re working sixteen-hour days—”

“We’ll make it,” he assured her. “I know it’s trite, but God doesn’t close a door without opening a window.”

Kate answered with a skeptical hum. “Frankly, I feel like God slammed the door, nailed it shut, and boarded up the window.”
And
He had turned her into a pony. “It’s too much for both of us. What about
California Dreaming
? I know you were doing an article about some place in Mammoth.”

“I cancelled. It’s not a problem.”

“It is to me.” She hated the thought of Nick making sacrifices for her. Until she sorted her feelings, it seemed wrong to accept his help. “We need to hire someone fast. I’m so sorry for this—”

“Don’t be.” His voice took on an edge. “I’m glad to help. You know that.”

“Yes, but—”

“No buts, Kate. We’re in this together. And besides, there’s good news on the Help Wanted front. Do you know Heather Martin?”

“A little.” Kate had met her a couple of years ago. “She worked at the Clarion before going off to college.”

“She’s a grad student now, and she needs an internship. I hope you don’t mind. I hired her on the spot.”

“That’s perfect.”

“I thought so, too.”

Relief spun through her but only for an instant. Leaning on Nick was easy . . . too easy, she reminded herself. She couldn’t use him as a crutch. “I’ll do as much as I can, but Roscoe’s pressuring me. Leona needs me, too.”

“She’s the priority. How’s her shoulder?”

“Good.”

“And her ribs?”

“Not so good. She’s supposed to do breathing exercises, but she hates them. The ribs hurt and so does her shoulder. She seems so old.”

“Ah, Kate—”

“It’s really hard. I can’t bear to leave her, but the rest of my life is falling apart.”
Including us. S
he bit her lip hard enough to hurt, because she was afraid she’d blurt more to Nick than she wanted to admit. She missed him terribly, but she was terrified of leaning on him and being let down.

Ordering herself to stay strong, she inhaled a ragged breath. If she loosened her hold on her problems even a little bit, an aftershock would hit and the cracks in her life would spread even more. The Eve’s Garden proposal would fail, Leona would die of pneumonia, and the
Clarion
would fold. Maybe not the
Clarion
, but only because of Nick. Except he’d fall in love with the college intern, marry her, and Kate would never see him again. Melodramatic or not, that’s how she felt.

“You need a break,” he said in that forceful way she loved. “Can you come home tonight?”

“Maybe.”

“Do it. We’ll have dinner together. My place. I’ll cook you a steak.”

After six days of hospital food and energy bars, she could practically taste the meat. If she relaxed with Nick and talked to him, maybe she could find her spiritual feet. She blinked and imagined being in his arms. “Dinner would be nice.”

“Good.” His smile echoed in his voice. “Hang in there, Kate. The problems won’t last forever.”

They said good-bye, and she went to take a shower. Fortified by Nick’s words and a cup of strong coffee, she went to see how Leona had weathered the quake at Casa Rosa, which meant
Rose House
in Spanish. The garden might have lived
up to the name in June, but now only thorns and withered leaves adorned the dry stems. The odors inside the building were even less rose-like. Disinfectant burned her nostrils, and a janitor passed her with a full garbage bin.

Ignoring the smells, she pasted on a smile and turned down the corridor leading to Leona’s room. The aroma of bacon wafted from a food cart. Good, Kate thought. She was in time to help her grandmother eat breakfast.

“Help me. Somebody help me. They’re trying to
kill me!”

The shriek blasted out of Leona’s open door. Yesterday the second bed had been vacant, but Leona seemed to have acquired a roommate. How long had the woman been yelling like that? And why had the staff put a dementia patient in the medical ward? Bristling, Kate picked up her pace, passing doors closed by other patients to block out the pitiful shouting.

“Help me. Somebody
help me. They’re trying to kill me!”

Kate ached for this suffering woman, but anxiety for Leona trumped every other concern. Rounding the corner into the room, she saw a curtain pulled around the first bed, passed by it and went straight to her grandmother.

“Kate! Oh, honey—” Leona reached out with her good arm, winced with pain, then moaned. “I can’t stand another minute.”

“How long has she been like this?”

“Since midnight.” Leona’s eyelids drooped with exhaustion, then flared wide when yet another shriek filled the room.

“Help me. Somebody help me. They’re
trying to kill me!”

Kate’s heart broke for the poor woman, but she was seething inside. Had Leona listened to those desperate cries all night? Kate had been here a minute and was shaken to the core. “Maybe I can get her to stop.”

“I doubt it.”

But she had to try—both for Leona and her own conscience. She stepped around the curtain and saw a gaunt woman in a bed raised to an uncomfortably high position, her eyes vacant and searching. She raised her arms to show restraints made of soft white cotton. “Help me! Somebody help me. They’re trying to kill me!”

Kate gentled her voice. “I’ll call the nurse for you.”

“No! She’s evil.” The woman pulled helplessly at the restraints. “Help me. Somebody help me!”

Kate would never understand this kind of suffering.
Why, God? Why allow this?
Incensed, she returned to Leona’s bedside. “I’m sorry for her. I really am. But this is
not
acceptable. They have to move one of you to another room.”

“I already asked.”

Kate’s brows snapped together. “They wouldn’t do it?”

“The hospital’s full, including the dementia unit. I thought—oh no.” Leona’s face knotted, then her chest heaved with a long, wet cough. Pain clawed lines into her tired face, and she moaned between hacks. When the coughing finally eased, she fell exhausted against the pillows.

Kate handed her a tissue from a nearly empty box. Leona used it and tried to drop it in the trash, but the tissue landed on the floor in a mountain of other tissues. Kate whipped her gaze back to Leona’s face, studying her for signs of fever and pneumonia. Her eyes were glassy, but she’d been crying. Unsure, Kate laid her palm on her grandmother’s forehead, felt cool skin but she still fretted.

Leona needed rest in order to recover. If she couldn’t rest, she wouldn’t heal. And if she didn’t heal, she couldn’t go home. And if she couldn’t go home—
Stop it!
Kate bit hard on her lip to stop her runaway thoughts, but nothing could quell the anger.

She laid her hand on Leona’s good arm. “I’m going to
speak to the director right now. If they can’t move you to another room, we’ll find another hospital.”

“Oh, honey—”

She stopped Leona’s protest with a kiss on the cheek and left. With her temper barely in check, she strode to the business office, where a receptionist buzzed the medical director, who greeted Kate with the plastic smile of someone well trained in the fine art of handling disgruntled people.

Twenty minutes later, Kate walked out of the director’s office with a head full of steam and her phone in hand. The director had politely explained that accommodations would be made when possible, but that Leona was in a double room and difficult roommates had to be tolerated.

“Over my dead body,” Kate muttered as she dropped down on a couch in the lobby.

With her fingers flying on her phone, she googled “skilled nursing facilities” until she landed on a website that stole her breath. Golden West Retirement was located a mile from her condo in West L.A., and it looked more like a Spanish hacienda than a hospital. The facility was a continuing care community, a place that offered three tiers of living—independent, assisted, and skilled nursing. As Kate read further, she realized she had visited the place when an elderly neighbor sold her condo and moved into a studio apartment there. Kate had been impressed by everything, including the staff, social activities, and the emphasis on dignity. She’d give anything to have Leona in a place like Golden West.