KT stood as well. “Sure. Thanks.”

“Good luck, then,” Tory said as she left the room without looking back.

Just as KT moved to follow, her cell phone rang. She checked the readout and was surprised to see that it was a local number. “Hello?”

“Dr. O’Bannon?”

“Yes. Can I help you?”

A soft chuckle came through the line. “It’s Pia Torres. I was wondering well, there’s an empty apartment, a condo, actually in the main guesthouse adjacent to my cottage. 1 thought you might be interested”

“I am. Definitely. Who should I call?”

“I have a key. I thought perhaps this evening”

“Yes. That would be perfect.” KT checked her watch. Seven hours and she would be off her first day of work as an internist. “How about we have dinner at seven and then go take a look at this place.”

“Oh, I couldn’t…”

“Sure you could. Just say yes.”

There was silence on the line. KT found herself holding her breath as she waited for the woman’s response, a wholly new and unusual experience.

“I’d like that,” Pia said quietly. “Yes.”

Smiling, KT breathed out slowly. “You pick the place.”

“You might be sorry,” Pia said teasingly.

“No,” KT replied completely seriously, remembering the soothing tone of Pia’s voice and the sensitive touch of her hand. “I don’t think so.”

Chapter Thirteen

“Are you sure you can’t stay for lunch?” Kate asked.

“Hmm?” Seated at the fifties-style Formica table in her mother’s kitchen, Reese absently traced her index finger down the length of Reggie’s arm, around the bend of her wrist, and over her tiny hand and even tinier fingers. She turned her own ringer over and rested it in Reggie’s palm, fascinated to see the little fist close around it.

Smiling, Kate placed both hands on Reese’s shoulders and massaged the firm muscles, amazed still at the tall, strong woman her daughter had become. “Lunch?”

“Tory says she can’t see things, but look at how bright her eyes are and the way she keeps looking all around. I’m pretty sure she knows what’s going on.”

“I imagine that Tory’s right about her inability to focus just yet,” Kate noted judiciously as she kissed the top of Reese’s head. “But I’m also certain that she’s taking in the whole constellation of sounds and sights and touches and smells in her little universe.” She resisted the urge to kiss Reese’s head one more time and merely squeezed her shoulders again. “And you and Tory are her whole world.”

Reese glanced up from Reggie in her baby seat, grinning. “It’s amazing.”

“That it is.” Kate moved across the small kitchen and leaned against the counter by the white enamel sink. “Tory’s at work?”

“Yes. She’s supposed to be working six hours today.”

Kate said nothing.

“I suppose her first day back is going to be pretty hectic,” Reese noted as she leaned over to kiss Reggie’s forehead. “Did she tell you about hiring KT?”

“We talked about it last evening, but I didn’t know that she had decided for certain.” Kate took the coffeepot from the warmer and refilled her cup before gesturing to Reese, who shook her head. “I’m glad that she’s going to have help.”

“Me, too.” Reese stood and walked to the window that looked out on a small wooden deck and a narrow strip of sandy beach leading down to Provincetown Harbor. A red kayak came slowly into view followed by a group of yellow ones, a class from the boat rental place in town floundering along behind it like a disorganized line of baby ducks. She watched the leader, thinking how much she missed her morning drive to Herring Cove and the pleasant anticipation of waiting for Tory to appear on the horizon in her own red kayak. “It’s funny how it turned out to be KT.”

“Do you believe in coincidences?” Kate asked quietly.

Reese turned and met her mother’s eyes. “I’m a cop. I learned a long time ago that there are no coincidences.”

“Do you have a theory about what it means, then?” Kate studied her daughter’s expressive eyes, thinking how like Reese’s father’s they were. Sharp and discerning and so, so intelligent. Reese saw everything with such clarity and didn’t shrink from the sharp edges of truth. Kate imagined that had Reese been a combat soldier, she would have been a great leader, just like her father. But Reese was so very different from him in one critical way. One had only to see the way Reese looked at Tory or their baby to know that her heart was completely unguarded. As a woman, Kate appreciated that; as a mother, she worried.

“I don’t think much about the metaphysical nature of things,” Reese said with a wry smile, “but if I did, I’d say that when you’re wounded, your instincts are to head for home.”

Kate’s eyes widened. “Does that bother you?”

Reese lifted her shoulder. “That KT came to Tory now?” Reese glanced at the baby, who in the midst of vigorously flailing her arms and legs was malting small happy sounds. “I can’t imagine not loving Tory, so I figure KT must still, too.” She heard Kate’s swift intake of breath. “Do you still love my father?”

“Oh, you have such a way of taking me off guard,” Kate said with a shaky laugh. She glanced down at the wedding ring she wore, the one that Jean had put there only weeks after the two of them had fled from their lives, for their lives, leaving pieces of their hearts behind. She looked up at the largest part of her heart, realizing again the terrible sacrifice that had been forced upon her when her husband had made her choose between Jean and her child. “No, I don’t love him. But I remember loving him. I was a different woman then, and he was a different man. I wouldn’t go to him now under any circumstances, but I never loved him the way that KT and Tory must have loved each other.”

“No, I guess not.” Reese slid her hands into her pockets and rocked back and forth. “Tory loved her very much, and there are places in her that aren’t…healed. She’ll be better when she settles things between them…things they should’ve settled a long time ago but couldn’t.”

“How do you know about those things?” Kate asked curiously. “Did Tory tell you?”

“She didn’t have to. When we first met, she didn’t trust me, and she didn’t trust love.” Reese’s jaw tightened, and her voice dropped a notch. “KT did that to her. There was a time I wanted to kick KT’s ass because of that.”

Kate laughed. “And now you don’t?”

Reese laughed, too. “Not too much. Tory can take care of herself, and if she can’t if KT hurts her I will personally put her on a plane back to Boston.”

“You’ve turned out to be a remarkable woman, Reese,” Kate said as she linked her arm through Reese’s. “I’m so glad that you’re my daughter, and that you and Tory are together.”

“Thanks.” Reese cleared her throat, which was suddenly tight. “It’s…nice…to have you and Jean here for Reggie, for all of us. It’s nice…being a family.”

“Yes,” Kate whispered, “it is.”

“And the next tune you ran out of medication,” Tory said in a gently chiding tone as she opened the door of the treatment room, “call Randy and we’ll phone in a refill. You need to take the blood pressure pills every day, or they’re not going to work.”

“All right, honey,” the octogenarian called cheerfully. “I’ll remember.”

Smiling, Tory turned and nearly bumped into KT, who was leaning against the wall just outside the room. Her smile faltered as she pulled the door closed. “Yes?”

“It’s a far cry from the ER on a Saturday night, isn’t it?” KT observed.

“It’s not without its occasional challenges,” Tory remarked dryly, thinking of the variety of problems she saw. Patients of every description crowded her waiting room every day young, old, male, female, representing varying ethnic and social backgrounds and with all nature of problems, from the common cold to trauma and prenatal difficulties. “But I suppose it lacks the cachet you’re used to.”

“I wasn’t putting it down,” KT said quietly.

Tory took a deep breath. “No, you weren’t. I’m sorry.” She cradled the patient chart against her chest and pushed her hair away from her face with her other hand. “I’m a little thrown by this situation. I’m not used to working with anyone, and I barely had time to adjust to Dan. Now…you…”

“I guess I’ll take a little more getting used to than he did.”

“How’s your hand?” Tory asked, noting that KT held the splinted appendage angled across her chest. From what she could see, KT’s ringers were swollen.

“It’s okay.” Almost unconsciously, KT slid her right hand into the pocket of her navy linen trousers and counted the remaining pain pills. She’d need to wait another two hours at least. “But I have a three-year-old with a lip laceration, and I…can’t handle it by myself.”

“Alt right. I’ll be right there. Just let me get the prescriptions for Mrs. Klein.” Tory turned away, refusing to think about what that admission must’ve cost KT. “Just tell Sally to set up the suture tray.”

“Already done.”

Five minutes later, Tory joined KT and her clinic nurse, Sally, in the treatment room.

“Hi, Andy,” Tory said to the small, young blond who cuddled a cherubic, tear-streaked towhead against her shoulder. “Patty been climbing trees again?”

“Swing set. She saw her brother do it yesterday and must have decided she could climb higher. I was hanging out the wash, and she was up the side like a monkey before I even noticed.” There was a note of pride in the young mother’s voice. “She only cried for a minute.”

“Well then, we’ll be sure not to give her any reason for more tears.” Tory inclined her head until she was almost nose to nose with the child. “Hi, Patty. Are you going to let me fix your lip?”

Dark eyes observed her warily.

“I bet it was a very big swing set,” Tory gestured to the treatment table. “Put her down over there, Andy.”