Sophie's Path. Catherine Lanigan

thoughts filled her mind, putting an acrid taste in her mouth. She couldn’t find the strength to beat them back to their cave.

      She felt utterly inadequate. She wished she’d continued with school. She should have become a doctor. Maybe with more knowledge she would have known how to save this young woman. Though she was certain that Aleah’s chances had been worse than the man in the next bay, and he hadn’t made it, either.

      Sophie blinked slowly. Time trudged forward as though she was moving through a thick gelatin. She felt weightless and leaden simultaneously. She would have liked to sit right down on the floor and go to sleep.

      “Nurse Mattuchi!” Nate shouted.

      “Yes, Doctor?” Sophie snapped out of it. Whatever it was.

      “Are you okay?” He pulled off his latex gloves.

      She looked down at Aleah’s lifeless body. “She...”

      “Never had a chance,” Nate said. “I’m surprised she lasted this long. Your assessment was on target. So was Dr. Hill’s. I also think she was anorexic.”

      Sophie’s eyes flew to Aleah’s body. She understood what Dr. Barzonni was saying. The improper balance of electrolytes alone, in an anorexic person, was enough to bring on a heart attack. Aleah had a congenital heart condition, anorexia and blunt chest trauma. “I thought she was rather thin. It just didn’t register.”

      “This was a massive trauma. She was hit very hard. I’ll get more about it from the cops outside. But with her birth defect and the punctured lung...” He shook his head and put his hand on her shoulder. “You did all you could.”

      “I wonder...” she started.

      “No,” Nate said and turned to Dr. Hill. “Eric, you and I will have a lot of paperwork. Do you know if either family is here?”

      “Just the girl’s,” Bart interrupted. “We’re still searching for the John Doe’s family. He was driving without a wallet or any papers. Maybe the cops have an update.”

      “I’ll talk to the police,” Dr. Hill said.

      “And I’ll handle Aleah’s family,” Nate volunteered.

      “We still have Mr. Carter here overnight,” Dr. Hill said. “Nurse Mattuchi, you’re on duty?”

      “Yes, Doctor. I’ll see to him.”

      “I want a CT scan. I want no other—” He swallowed hard. “You know what I mean.”

      “I do,” she replied, softly feeling a flood of empathy for both these highly trained professionals who had lost not one, but two patients in a matter of minutes.

      Sophie checked the clock. It had only been twenty-five minutes since all three victims had been brought in. She’d been assigned to Jack Carter first. She’d spent fifteen of those minutes with him. Then five minutes with Aleah before the John Doe flatlined. In the final five minutes, they’d lost both of them.

      Time. Sophie had never taken time for granted. She trained hard and worked hard. She spent time with her family and helped them out whenever she could. But this absurd, needless loss of two lives shocked her to her core. Aleah had only been twenty-one. The man was in his late thirties. They both had a lot of life in front of them. They could do anything they wanted to with their time. Laugh. Love. Try to find happiness and joy...

      Odd that Sophie would think of happiness at a time like this, but she did. She felt tears fill her eyes as she covered Aleah’s body, but not her face, with the sheet. Her parents would want to come in to see her. Sophie would meet with them and try to comfort them. She hoped she would find the right words to say. Good words. Or maybe no words. Maybe they would just ask her to go away.

      Sophie wiped the tears off her cheeks with her fingertips. She wasn’t just crying for this young woman. She was crying for herself. She believed she’d done all she could as part of the team tonight. These were tears of self-pity. They came from a deep and lonely place inside of her. A place she seldom visited and barely acknowledged. She guessed these tears had been trying to form for a long time, but she’d told herself that crying was for weaklings. She was strong. She was able to handle just about anything, including injury, illness and death.

      But happiness? That was really tough.

      Sophie’s twenties were nearly behind her and she’d done little to grab happiness for herself.

      She couldn’t afford to wait any longer. Tonight had shown her how lives could be snatched away in an instant. Oh, she’d begun her self-evaluations and internal makeover, but she’d only stuck the spade into the first few inches of her psyche. She had a lot of digging to do before she’d find treasure.

      For the first time, though, she thought she knew what she was looking for.

      Happiness.

      She just hoped she recognized it when she uncovered it.

CHAPTER FOUR

      JACK WAITED ON teetering legs for some definitive word about Aleah. He’d heard the commotion. He’d heard the second round of instructions for a defibrillator. He’d heard the second heart monitor announce the dreaded flatline bleep, but he couldn’t see around the heads of the doctors and nurses. He watched people going in and racing out. Then suddenly, they all stopped moving and became still.

      Aleah was dead.

      Jack’s mouth had gone dry and his blood had turned cold. It had been a long time since he’d experienced death that was close to him. Not since his father died. He’d mourned him deeply, but his father had battled cancer for over two years. The family had expected him to die. He’d been prepared.

      Jack battled the biting tears and thunder in his chest. He’d liked being a mentor to Aleah. She and Owen were only a decade or so younger than he, but right now, he felt ancient.

      All his concerns from earlier in the day came back to him suddenly: his banter with his sister and brother-in-law, his anxiety over the White Sox’s loss to the Yankees. Even the ambitions he’d been mulling over after the seminar seemed trivial compared to what he was facing now. He would give everything he had to save his sweet, unsuspecting assistant from death.

      He pinched the bridge of his nose. This shouldn’t have happened. It was a mistake. Some cruel trick of the universe. And it was hitting Jack hard.

      He wished he felt stronger because he wanted to do something. He was so confused, and Jack was seldom confused. He prided himself on his ability to stay focused. Responsible. That’s what everyone in his family had called him. He was their rock. He was the leader.

      If only he could remember the accident. Maybe he could have prevented it, but the pieces of his memory were as vague as the fog he’d been driving through.

      Jack watched as Nate Barzonni shuffled down the hall with a somber face, his hands shoved into the pockets of his surgical scrubs. He moved like a man carrying a cross. Jack knew Nate and Maddie Barzonni both. He was almost a daily customer at Cupcakes and Coffee. Maddie’s brew was legendary and her made-to-order cupcakes and icings were his must-have indulgence.

      Jack hobbled to the entry of his bay. A sharp pain made a jagged path up his calf.

      His ankle hurt more than he’d anticipated. “Nate, please. What happened?” He had so many questions.

      Nate barely glanced at him, giving him a dismissive nod. Then Jack saw the raw pain in Nate’s eyes. He understood.

      “Jack, I’m sorry about your assistant. Real sorry. But I have to see her parents. Is that okay?” Nate choked out the words and shook his head sorrowfully. “I can’t...not right now.”

      “It’s okay,” Jack replied empathetically.

      Nate gave Jack a slight wave and then practically jogged to the ER