From Father to Son. Janice Johnson Kay

before Rowan reappeared, dressed in a haphazard way, Desmond at her side. Niall had wondered where Sam the dog was; he hadn’t showed himself when Niall crossed the yard or entered the house. Now he peered cautiously around the door frame but didn’t come any closer.

       Smarter than they’d given him credit for, maybe.

       They took Rowan’s car since the kids’ safety seats were already in it. Niall drove while she sat in back between them. In his desperation, he exceeded a few speed limits and rocketed to the load/unload zone in front of the emergency entrance at the hospital.

       “You take Anna,” he suggested. Please. Please take Anna. “Desmond and I’ll follow you once I park.”

       “Thank you.” Rowan clambered over her daughter, unbuckled her and carried her into the maws of the hospital. Niall and Desmond sat without moving or speaking for a moment in the absence of sound. Niall didn’t know about the kid’s eardrums, but his were ringing.

       “She gets lots of ear infections,” the boy finally said, matter-of-factly.

       “Does she.” Niall gave his head a shake and put the car back into Drive. Maybe he and Desmond could walk really slowly.

       Would the doctor only give her antibiotics, or would they be able to do something to take her pain away? A shot of morphine, maybe?

       Desmond was able to unbuckle his own seat belt. However, when Niall circled the car to him, he said, “Can you tie my shoes? I can’t see.”

       “Sure.” Did he know how to tie them? Niall didn’t remember how old kids usually were when they learned. Sure enough, when he knelt on the pavement he found the laces straggling. He could feel a bony ankle, too; no socks.

       Tying this little boy’s shoelaces, Niall had a feeling of unreality. What was he doing here? How had this happened? Why hadn’t he stayed in bed?

      I don’t get involved, he thought desperately, but here he was. No. He wasn’t involved, for God’s sake, he was only giving an hour or two to help out a young mother. And it didn’t hurt to stay on his landlady’s good side, right?

       A small hand tucked itself confidingly into his. “You’ll be able to find Mom, right?”

       “Yeah,” he said, rising to his feet. “We’ll find Mom.” His smile came out of nowhere. “Hey, all we have to do is follow the sound of Anna crying. We could track her down in the deepest, darkest forest. Never mind a hospital. That’s easy.”

       “Yeah.” Desmond suddenly sounded cheerful. “She is kind of loud, isn’t she?”

       “Oh, yeah.”

       They walked across the parking lot, lit by sodium lamps. They seemed to be alone out here. The faint crunch of their footsteps was the only sound.

       “I’m glad you came.”

       Niall looked down at the face turned up to his. Bizarrely enough, he realized that, in a way, he was glad, too. Rowan’s kids could be pains in the butt, no question, but they were okay. Even sweet, in their own way. And Rowan had needed someone tonight. He’d seen it in her eyes.

      This isn’t personal, he told himself. I’m a cop. Cops protect and serve. That’s all I’m doing.

       All the same, he hoped like hell no other cops happened to be lurking in the emergency room to see him. His reputation as the ultimate loner would be shot.

       The glass doors slid open. Ahead he could see Rowan, turning away from the check-in counter, Anna clutching her and crying, but more quietly now. Sadly. Rowan saw him, and the weariness and distress on her face eased. Niall had the strangest sensation under his breastbone. He couldn’t begin to identify it, and didn’t try very hard, only led Desmond over to his mother.

       “She’s heavy. Do you want me to take her?” he offered.

       He had the thought that this could be atonement for his part in what had happened to that other little girl, in the bank parking lot.

      ROWAN WANTED TO CRY AGAIN, which was ridiculous. She hadn’t cried in years, not even when Drew had died. For weeks her eyes had been so dry they burned, and she’d wondered if something was wrong with her. But now, Niall’s kindness was doing something to her. Weakening her.

       “I’m okay.” There were only five other people in the waiting room, thank goodness. A man who was leaning over and clutching his stomach, the woman with him watching anxiously, her hand on his back. A scrawny, twitchy, tattooed girl with a bruised, puffy face. And a woman who might be in her forties who was cradling a ten- or twelve-year-old boy close, her tenderness and worry palpable. Rowan went to the closest chairs and sank gratefully down, holding Anna in her lap. Desmond climbed onto the chair next to her, and Niall sat on his other side.

       “Did they say how long the wait would be?”

       She shook her head. “It shouldn’t be long, though. Since there are so few people here.”

       She’d seen him assess every single person in the room, from the receptionist to the ten-year-old, the minute he walked through the sliding doors. Now his gaze lingered on the tattooed teenager who looked as if she’d been beaten up.

       After a minute he said, “Desmond says Anna gets these a lot.”

       “Yes. The antibiotics always work, but she has a miserable day or so first. I keep hoping she’ll outgrow this.” She rubbed her cheek against her daughter’s hair. “So far, no cigar.”

       “There must be a reason.”

       How like a man. There was a problem; there ought to be a fix. And he wanted to know—now—why no one had found it.

       Obscurely, she found his attitude to be comforting. Maybe only because someone else cared.

      Not fair, she reminded herself. Donna and Glenn cared. Except she could tell they thought she was somehow at fault. Because she’d passed on some frailty that ran in her family—certainly not in theirs—or because she let the kids eat junk food too often, or should be cleaning wax out of Anna’s ears, or in some unknowable way wasn’t a good enough mother. The implication was always there.

       Niall’s quiet, reassuring presence, the way he was looking at Anna with worry, his implacable tone—as if the doctors were the ones to blame, not her—it was so different, she found herself feeling steadier and, at the same time, less self-reliant. Weaker, she thought again.

       “I’m not sure they even look. I don’t know. Desmond’s never had a single ear infection.”

       A nurse appeared through the swinging doors and called a name. The man clutching his stomach and the woman with him stood and followed her into the back. Ten minutes passed. Desmond grew bored. Niall found him a Ranger Rick magazine with pictures of wild animals that entertained him for a while. Anna’s cries dwindled into an occasional miserable whimper. She grew heavier as she relaxed. Rowan shifted to get more comfortable.

       Niall suddenly stood, came to the chair on the other side of her. “I’ll take her for a while. You need a break.”

       He meant it. Rowan didn’t know why she was surprised. Drew had been a good father. He’d have insisted on taking a turn, too. But that was different. Nonetheless, she gratefully shifted Anna to his arms and watched as he settled her against him as if he’d done it a thousand times. After a minute, Rowan turned her attention to Desmond. She found a crayon in her purse and they did a simple word match puzzle in the magazine.

       The teenage girl went back. Five or ten minutes later, so did the mother and boy. None of them reappeared. An ambulance raced into the bay, lights flashing, briefly exciting Desmond. Hospital personnel hurried out and helped unload a man onto a rolling gurney, hooking a bag of fluids above him and adjusting an oxygen mask. Everyone moved really fast. After a while, the two EMTs came back out and drove away. Desmond fell asleep against Rowan’s shoulder. She peeked at Anna and saw that she was still awake, but barely, her eyes mere slits between puffy, red lids.