Losing Gabriel Read online

  Lani took deep breaths to calm her racing heart. Professional, she told herself. Most of all, she had to look and act professional. She gathered her things, went up the three steps to the brightly painted front door, and rang the bell. Moments later, the door opened and she looked into the dark eyes and surprised expression on the face of Dawson Berke.

  Dawson felt a momentary shock seeing this woman on his doorstep. His father had failed to mention she was closer to Dawson’s age than either Franklin’s or Paulie Richardson’s grandmother. All Franklin had told him was “I’m sending someone over for you to interview. She’s sharp, dedicated, and conscientious. Please consider her. We need help with Gabe, and she’s qualified.”

  Lani smiled brightly, held out her hand. “I’m Alana Kennedy, but everyone calls me Lani.” She had wondered if he would hold even a glimmer of a memory of her from their high school days, realized quickly he did not, and felt a momentary letdown. Why should he when he’d been with Sloan?

  He shook her hand awkwardly, remembering her purpose for coming, his lack of interviewing skills, and Gabe’s need of a daytime caregiver. “Come in. Please.”

  She followed him through the small foyer and into a formal living room where the furniture had been shoved against the walls, clearing the center of the hardwood floor for a child’s racetrack for motorized Matchbox cars. “My son’s.” Dawson gestured at the setup. “His playroom’s in the basement, but we play race cars here because there’s plenty of space. Maybe we should go to the den.” She followed him into a room of comfy well-used furniture. A lone Persian area rug in hues of reds and purples covered a portion of the bare wood floors.

  He motioned for her to have a seat on the sofa and took the leather chair near it. “Dad said that you’re studying to become a nurse and that you might be interested in a caregiver job.”

  “Yes, to both. I’ll finish my second year in May, but I’ve been in the hospital Step-Prep program since Dr. Berke started it. A volunteer at first, but now a very serious student in the three-year nursing program. I want to go into pediatrics when I graduate, but for now the program keeps me in the hospital and gives me clinical experience.” She didn’t want to oversell herself, but after seeing his initial reaction to her had decided she might have to persuade him she was right for the job.

  “You impressed Dad with your work ethic, as he calls it. Dad’s dedicated to his job too.”

  She smiled and shrugged. “I’m doing what I love. Makes a difference as to why I do it.”

  “Gabe’s only had one caregiver besides me and Dad since I brought him home from the hospital…Mrs. Richardson…but she wanted to retire and move to Florida. She left at Christmas. Gabe misses her. We all do.” Paulie’s grandmother had been the perfect helper when Gabe had been a baby, but once he’d turned two on his last birthday, she’d had trouble keeping up with him. “My work schedule will pick up soon, so we need someone here at the house with him.”

  “I can work full-time once classes end.”

  Dawson eased back into the chair, studying the brown-haired, brown-eyed girl. She was pretty, not beautiful, but she had an effervescent smile and her enthusiasm sparkled. “So, um, tell me more about yourself.”

  Lani laced her fingers together to keep them from betraying her nervousness. “I was born and raised here. I live with my sister now in one of those renovated apartment buildings over on Magnolia Street.”

  Mentally he mapped the distance. “Not so far.” It meant she could get to the house quickly if necessary.

  “My sister Melody’s a lawyer over on Main. Works for Mr. Boatwright in that converted Victorian that’s painted in shades of green.”

  “I’ve seen it. You come from a family of lawyers and doctors?”

  “A teacher and a journalist.” She flashed a smile, took a measured breath, and decided to put the unsettling part of history on the table. “Full disclosure. You and I were in the same senior class.”

  He straightened, and his heart kicked up a beat. “Ah. So you must know my story…my whole story.”

  Feeling the specter of Sloan Quentin hovering in the room, Lani picked her way around the thorny past, saying, “Small-town-itis. In Windemere, if anyone sneezes, someone blesses him two streets over.”

  That made Dawson laugh and it pleased her. “Anyway, after graduation, I worked in the hospital along with some part-time jobs. Currently hold one out at Bellmeade horse stables and the other serving food at the Waffle Palace. Imagine the daily excitement—‘Maple syrup, or blueberry, sir?’ ” She mimicked her waitress voice.

  He grinned at that too.

  “Everyone has a story, but since graduation, all of us have moved on. And so I remember when Gabe was born…in fact, I fed him and rocked him while he was still in the NIC unit.”

  Dawson startled. “You did?”

  “It was part of my job,” she quickly added. “But it was my pleasure too. We’re called snugglers. I still volunteer if the unit’s shorthanded.”

  Again, her smile softened him.

  “Gabe was three weeks old before I could bring him home.”

  “I remember when he left the unit. We all cheered. Every time a preemie goes home, it’s a victory.” She glanced around the room, at the gas fireplace with glowing logs, at the framed photos and family pictures on walls and perched in bookcases. There was a large montage of Gabe at maybe six months and another with Dr. Berke, Dawson, and Gabe hovering around a cake with a single glowing candle. “Is Gabe here?”

  “He’s taking a nap. That’s why I asked you to come right after lunch. I wanted to talk to you before he meets you.” Dawson glanced at the mantel clock. “He’ll be up soon, but you should know he’s shy around strangers. Don’t be too put off if he hides from you.”

  Lani brightened. “But I’m no stranger. Gabe and I are already friends.”

  Another revelation Dawson was unprepared to hear. Since Christmas and Mrs. Richardson’s departure, Dawson and Franklin traded off days of staying home with Gabe. Dawson worked three days a week and weekends at Hastings Construction and took evening classes at MTSU toward his business degree, but with the building season coming on, he needed to work longer hours. Franklin took Gabe to the hospital with him two days a week—where he had staff to help him with his grandson. “My father didn’t mention that Gabe already knows you.”

  “Oh! I thought he did.” She thought she may have fumbled the interview because Dawson seemed totally surprised by the admission. “Dr. Berke asks me to watch Gabe when he brings him to his office for the day—that is, if I’m in the hospital.” What she didn’t add was that she made time to be with Gabe, letting Dr. Berke know she would be available on the days Gabe came with him.

  “You’re full of surprises.”

  Dawson’s tone didn’t sound as friendly. Lani’s stomach clenched. Why hadn’t Dr. Berke told Dawson more about her before she’d come? “I…I think that’s why your dad asked me to interview. Because Gabe already knows me.”

  “And because of his condition,” Dawson added, feeling manipulated. This wasn’t really an impartial interview at all. His father had handpicked this girl, this Lani, to care for Gabe. She was a gung-ho nursing student, focused on pediatrics, personable, kind, friendly, already familiar with Gabriel’s medical circumstances, in need of a good-paying job—and apparently a favorite of her boss, Gabe’s grandfather. What Franklin really wanted was Dawson’s seal of approval on the girl. Why hadn’t Franklin simply hired her himself instead of going through the pretense of Dawson giving her an interview? He cleared his throat. “I…um…have a couple of other interviews.” His conscience twinged with the lie, but he was irked by his father’s subterfuge.

  “Oh, of course! No problem.” She shot to her feet.

  Dawson stood too, and started to speak, when the clatter of Gabe coming down the stairs calling, “Daddy! Daaaddy. Find me, Daddy,” broke the awkward silence.

  CHAPTER 22

  “I’m in the den, Gabe.”

>   Seconds later, the child raced into the room, arms wide open. He saw the woman and froze.

  Lani immediately stepped forward, crouched, and smiled. “Hey, Gabe. It’s me! Lani.”

  The boy looked confused, but then his eyes brightened and he ran forward and threw himself into Lani’s arms. She was knocked backward but held him, laughing. “You’re so strong.”

  Gabe looked up at his dad, all smiles. “It’s Lani.”

  His son’s exuberance surprised Dawson. “I guess you do know each other.”

  “We color together. He loves to color and he’s good at it.”

  Gabe’s face beamed with her words. “Color now!” He whirled and zipped through the doorway.

  “Gabe! Later!” Dawson called, but the boy was gone.

  “I…I don’t mind.” Lani rose from her crouched position. “I’m happy to stay with him for a little while, if…if that’s okay.”

  Dawson didn’t want Gabe disappointed, but he was still stewing. “All right. Color until I get his snack ready in the kitchen.” He turned for the doorway. “Look, Lani…I don’t mean to be difficult, but I worry about him, his health and all. I’m sure you’re competent with kids.”

  She wanted this job more than to just curry favor with Dr. Berke. Gabe had stolen her heart and she wanted to care for him. “I understand your special concern for Gabe…and his asthma.”

  Dawson turned back toward Lani, reminding himself he shouldn’t take out his irritation with Franklin on this girl. Since birth, Gabe’s lungs had been his weak spot, and his asthma most likely a lasting effect of the premature birth. “Look, I’m not playing the overprotective parent role with you. It’s just that I’m still dealing with his diagnosis too. It’s been less than a year, and he’s been to the ER twice and hospitalized both times. We don’t know all his triggers, not until one sneaks up on him and he’s wheezing, can’t catch his breath, and turning blue.”

  Naturally Lani knew it, but held off saying anything.

  Dawson gestured around the room. “That’s why, except for this rug—pure silk and cleaned often—all the floors are bare hardwood, all curtains replaced with blinds. The house has a HEPA air purifier too, because we already know certain inhalants can bring on an attack. Mold and dust mites for sure.” Dawson tried to express the difficulty of protecting Gabe from a world full of potential hazards. Here at home, his son was relatively safe, but outside these walls, he was always vulnerable.

  “But I also want him to have a normal kid’s life. He can’t live in a bubble. And when spring comes and everything starts blooming…” He shook his head. “Who knows? Sure hope pollen won’t be a problem, because my little guy loves to be outside. He’s undergoing some allergy testing, and so far his triggers are inhalants. I just want him to be safe.”

  She looked into Dawson’s dark eyes, and her heart filled with compassion. “I know how to take care of a child with asthma. I help with all the asthmatic children when they’re checked onto the peds floor. I give breathing treatments, play with them, and cuddle with them when they miss their families. I do what I can to make their lives better until they’re well and can go home. I can handle an emergency if one comes up.” She opened her purse and extracted a bronchial inhaler. “I carry this with me every day because I like being prepared.”

  Gabe raced back into the room, rattling a plastic box of crayons and holding a coloring book. Lani knelt so that he could spread out on the floor. “Dinosaurs? We’re coloring dinosaurs. I’m so surprised.”

  Gabe giggled at her tease. “Green ones with brown spots.” Gabe had a habit of dropping his r’s that always made Lani smile. He spread open the book to two clean pages and stretched out on his belly.

  Lani stretched out beside him and rifled through the box of mostly broken crayons. From the doorway, Dawson watched, still feeling manipulated by his father but knowing he couldn’t be an idiot either. He couldn’t arbitrarily reject this Lani simply because his dad was calling the shots.

  “So how did the big interview go?”

  It was the first question Melody asked when Lani stepped into the apartment’s shoe box–sized kitchen the two of them had painted bright apple green. “Not sure.” She settled at the scarred old café table tucked in a corner of the room near a window. “It was going fine until Dawson found out his father had sort of rigged the interview in my favor.”

  “Why should that bother him? I’d think he’d be thrilled to have someone preselect candidates for a caregiver job with an asthmatic child. You’re the one I’m thinking about. Honestly, if you get the job, the possible liabilities—”

  “Stop with the lawyer talk, Mel. I want this job. I need this job.” Lani had touted the caregiver job possibility to her sister before the interview but hadn’t confessed her high school crush on the interviewer. Water under the bridge of life.

  Melody stirred a pot of chili on the stove, and its rich peppery aroma filled the room. “You doing something with Ben tonight? Mom and Dad are going to Skype us around seven.”

  “No. He’s got a research paper due, so I’m home.” Lani remembered the day their dad had come home and said the local paper was shutting down and he’d lost his job. “Digital takeover of print. Farmers all have smartphones. No one reads the farm reports in the paper these days. They just call them up on the Web.” He’d said the words cheerily, but the family had known he was devastated. After an eight-month hunt for another job, he’d taken over the reins of a small biweekly paper in Kenai, Alaska. Jane had retired at the end of that school year, and they’d moved. They called often, raving about the wilderness landscape, or the midnight sun’s glow, and even the long dark winters. “Cozy. Always a fire warming us and elk in the front yard to entertain us.” Lani and Mel had flown out to visit them twice since they’d settled.

  Their house had been rented to a newly married Winslow cousin and her husband, who made the mortgage payments, freeing Lani and Mel of responsibilities for the place. Mel’s job paid the bulk of the sisters’ current living expenses. Lani’s jobs barely covered insurance and gas on her mother’s old car that she’d inherited from their move to Alaska. Her parents still covered her college tuition, but all extras came from her earnings.

  “So the job will pay well?” Mel tasted the chili.

  Dr. Berke had hinted that it would. “Way more than I earn now,” Lani ventured, but knowing she’d take it whatever the salary.

  “No day care available?”

  “Too risky given Gabe’s asthma.”

  “And no mother.”

  “I told you she left when he was still in the hospital.”

  Mel shook her head. “Sad.”

  “Raising Gabriel is a family effort for Dr. Berke and his son. I want to help. It’ll look good on my résumé too.”

  “And you’re the only one qualified? Seems strange.”

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

  “That’s not what I mean. Surely there are registered nurses or other health care workers qualified to take the job.”

  “But Dr. Berke asked me to interview. I want this job, Mel.” She frayed the paper napkin at her place setting, remembering the unenthusiastic expression on Dawson’s face. And even if she was hired, Ben wouldn’t be pleased. “Dawson said he had others to interview, so I doubt I’ll get it.”

  Melody stepped away from the stove, put her arm around her sister. “Hey. No moping. If you don’t get the job, and you’re over slinging waffles, you can always sell your horse.”

  Lani ignored Mel’s suggestion. “Not happening. I may have to eat hay with him, but I’m not giving up Oro.”

  Melody grinned. “Just checking out your priorities. Now make a salad so we can eat this bodacious chili I’ve fixed.”

  Dawson was waiting in the kitchen when Franklin came in from the garage.

  “Hi. Had a late emergency. Gabe in bed?”

  “Sound asleep.”

  Franklin eased his briefcase onto the granite countertop, as if sensing t
he tension in the air. “Everything all right?” He rolled his shoulders and faced his son. “How’d the interview go?”

  “You mean the one you blindsided me with? I felt sorry for the girl. She was as clueless as me about the setup.”

  “Not fair. I sent you an excellent candidate for Gabe’s care. Didn’t you like her?”

  “Yes, I liked her.”

  “Then what’s the problem?”

  Dawson struggled to find words to express his frustration. Living with his father gave him and Gabe a home, at little expense. Plus Franklin paid for Dawson’s night classes at MTSU, so he could work all day. Franklin’s generosity made it easy for Dawson to save money, and Dawson was grateful, but he felt stagnant and saw nothing changing for him. He wanted to be out on his own. He wanted more for himself and Gabe than living in Windemere still tied to his father. He wasn’t sure yet what more was. He only knew he wanted it. But he had no other choice right now. Unable to articulate his feelings, Dawson asked the only question he could come up with. “Why did you choose this girl, a student nurse?”

  Franklin sighed wearily. “Yes, I have RNs working with me at the hospital, but frankly, I need every one of them on the floors. It isn’t easy keeping personnel at small rural medical facilities, you know. That’s one reason I came up with the Step-Prep program. Tying a job to college credits gives me more loyal personnel. I can spare Lani because she’s a student and not full-time. She’s conscientious, Gabe already likes her, and she needs a job. I thought it would be a good fit.”

  “But she’s my age. And still in school. She’s not going to stay in the job after summer’s over.”

  “Son, I love Gabe very much, and Lani’s one of my brightest and best. She can handle an emergency. I trust her. But if you want to interview others, do so. Gabe’s your son, and you have the final say for him. Now I’m going to wash up, come down, and find something to eat.” Franklin picked up his briefcase and walked out of the kitchen.