Page 71 of Tasting Fire
“How crazy is it that I want a dead man to be proud of me?”
This time, when he tugged on her hand, she didn’t resist. So he drew her back into the bed and into his arms. “We all have voices in our heads. Advice and guidance from people we love and respect.”
“The difference is that most other people know better than to let those voices take over their lives.”
“You are a great doctor. You’re a great TMT lead. You know that. The situation with Jesse Giddings today doesn’t change any of that. You’re not infallible. No one is.”
“What if I was never meant to be a doctor? Maybe I was supposed to work in a bank or be a teacher.”
“The only way you were meant to work in a bank is if it was being robbed. You get off on the pace and the thrill of life-and-death situations as much as any of the rest of us. Em, we land exactly where we’re supposed to be. I believe that implicitly. Don’t let today shake your faith in yourself.”
“That’s the problem with slowing down. Having fun and taking the time to meditate.” She leaned her forehead against his shoulder, and her defeated posture broke Cash’s heart. “It opens up space. Too damn much space.”
Yeah, he knew about the World of Doubt. When you just kept blowing and going, you didn’t have to wonder if you were on the right track. Giving the proper attention to and appreciation of the life God gave you.
From the other room, Cash’s phone rang. Damn. Talk about shitty timing.
“People don’t call at this time of the morning unless it’s important,” Emmy said. “Go get it.”
Reluctantly, he released her and got out of bed. When he swooped up his phone from the coffee table, the display said St. Elizabeth’s Hospital.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
“Cash Kingston.”
“Cash, this is Peggy Gallo. I’m a post-op nurse.”
Yeah, he’d known that the second he looked at the screen. “Do you have an update?”
“I…uh…was supposed to call Dr. McKay, but I just couldn’t. The young man she called about yesterday is gone.”
“Gone like left the hospital or…”
“Twenty minutes ago, Jesse Giddings suffered a postoperative complication and died.”
It had been over twenty-four hours since she found Cash in her living room staring at his phone as if it had just turned into a rattlesnake. But the sick emptiness Emmy felt inside after hearing of Jesse’s death hadn’t abated.
If anything, the intensity of her nausea had gone from Zofran level to Phenergan-worthy. But damned if she could afford to dope herself up with a pill that would knock her out for hours.
She had important things to do. Like meet with Sheriff Kingston and Captain Styles.
“I’m here to see the sheriff and captain,” she said to the sheriff’s assistant, whom she’d met briefly when talking with Maggie and Jonah about the TMT.
“Are they expecting you, Dr. McKay?”
Emmy got the impression that Maggie’s assistant didn’t like her, but she forced a smile and said, “Yes.”
The receptionist picked up the phone and said, “Sheriff Kingston, Dr. McKay is here to see you and Captain Styles.” When she replaced the receiver, she told Emmy, “You can go on in.”
The sheriff was behind her desk, and the captain was sitting in a visitor’s chair in front of it.
Captain Styles turned around when Emmy walked in, and the woman looked as if she’d been run over by the megabus that traveled between Charlotte and Durham. Her short gray hair stood out in little tufts. The lines on her face showed her age. And the sorrow in her eyes was a direct shot that pierced Emmy’s heart.
Sheriff Kingston’s expression, on the other hand, was blank. She gestured to the other seat in front of her desk. “Have a seat.” She pushed a report across the desk toward Emmy. “You’ll probably understand this better than we do.”
Emmy sat and took the papers. Jesse Giddings had died from apparent postoperative pulmonary complications at 0314. PPC could be anything from pneumonia to a spontaneous pneumothorax, or partially collapsed lung.
The questions that Emmy had been chewing on since the nurse called swirled in her head. A postoperative complication was curious enough, but a PPC in an otherwise healthy teenage boy with a gunshot to an extremity?
