Laughing, Wynter picked her way across the toy-littered floor and squatted down by the absorbed children. After a few whispered words to her daughter, she stood, Ronnie in her arms, and crossed back to Pearce. "Honey, this is my friend Pearce. We work together at the hospital."

Ronnie studied Pearce solemnly, her enormous blue eyes the exact color of Wynter's. Then with a squeak, she buried her face in her mother's neck.

"Oops," Pearce said.

Wynter rubbed Ronnie's back and rocked from side to side in a motion that was second nature to her. She shook her head. "It's just the age. Nothing personal."

"If you say so."

"Let me get her settled and then we can go."

"You sure? Because I can--"

"Stop," Wynter said firmly and returned Ronnie to the play area.

Within seconds, the two children were once more absorbed in their demolition activities.

As they walked outside, Pearce said, "She's gorgeous. She looks just like you."

"Thank you." The sidewalks were dry, but snow banks lined the walkways, remnants of the last storm. In the dark, with only the street lights for illumination, everything looked clean and oddly peaceful.

Wynter took a deep breath of the cold night air and felt good all over.

She did not have to work the next day, her child seemed to be settling into their new living circumstances well with the help of Ken and Mina's extended family support structure, and she was walking with a person whose company she enjoyed. An attractive, intriguing person.

A woman. A woman who occupied far more of her thoughts than any person in recent memory. She was going to have to think about that soon, but right now, she just wanted to be happy. "She's a really solid little kid."

"Uh...what about her father?"

Wynter looked straight ahead, her expression remote. "What about him?"

"Does he...you know...get to have her part of the time?" Pearce unzipped her army jacket halfway and slid her left hand inside against her body, letting the material form a makeshift sling. The cold was making her hand ache.

"Is your hand okay?"

"I know it's there."

"I want to take another look at it when we get to your place."

"It's just around the corner." Pearce recognized evasion. She was an expert at it. "Ronnie's father?"

"I have primary custody. He gets unlimited visitation--which he apparently has no desire for." Wynter pushed her gloved hands into the pockets of her coat. "He also has a new wife and an infant. He started that family before our divorce. I haven't seen or heard from him in six months."

"Fucker," Pearce said vehemently.

"Yes."

"I can't imagine anyone looking at another woman when they had you."

Wynter blinked, speechless, and tried to remember when anyone had ever said anything as nice to her before. And the funny thing was, Pearce hadn't said it to get anything from her. Not a date, not a kiss, not a promise of anything at all. In fact, she'd said it in an angry tone as if deeply affronted by the very thought. "Thank you."

Pearce whipped her head around and frowned at Wynter. "He was obviously a jerk."

"He was," Wynter agreed. "I feel stupid for not realizing it sooner.

He wanted a stay-at-home wife, but I never saw that, even when he tried to talk me out of surgery."

"But you were married when you were a medical student. He must've realized you weren't going to be that kind of wife." Pearce stopped in front of what had once been a huge single-family home.

It was set back from the street with a slate sidewalk that bisected the front lawn. Four mailboxes were lined up on the wall next to the double wooden front doors. "I'm in here."

"We met when we were freshmen in the combined BS/MD program. I don't think either one of us realized what medicine was going to be like--we were only eighteen years old. We got married in med school before I'd even had a surgery rotation. My choosing surgery was our first big issue, because he wanted a family right away and my residency was going to be a problem. My hours weren't conducive to easy child care."

"And what about him? Couldn't he have helped out there?"

"He's an orthopedic surgery resident at Yale. That's why I ranked Yale surgery first--he already had a promise of a spot outside the match, and obviously, I had to go where he was going." She tried to keep the bitterness from her voice. She'd followed him to Yale, even though it wasn't where she wanted to train. Her fault. She'd ignored all the signs that they were a bad match until it was far too late.

"You should have dumped him then."

Wynter smiled wryly. "Probably. But I was pregnant. I didn't mean to be--but the Pill never agreed with me and he hated condoms and sometimes--" She colored and looked away, realizing how pathetic she must sound to Pearce. "I made some stupid choices."

"Maybe, maybe not. But you have the little angel to show for it,"

Pearce said quietly, gratified to see Wynter's smile deepen to one of pleasure. "Look, do you want to come in for a minute?"

"I'd like to see your hand again."

"Come on, then." Pearce led the way up the sidewalk and unlocked the front door. She stepped into a small granite-tiled foyer with beaten tin wainscoting painted eggshell white. When Wynter followed her in, she felt the press of Wynter's body close against her side. She never wanted to move. She wanted to stay in that warm secluded space where they had nowhere to go except up against one another. She wanted Wynter to hold her injured hand again, to cradle it against her breast, to ease the pain with the force of her caring. She couldn't think of anything except Wynter and the smell of her hair and the soothing tones of her voice, and she fumbled for the doorknob on the interior door with its leaded glass windows. Her voice sounded hoarse to her own ears.

"One flight up."

"Okay," Wynter said softly.

Pearce led the way up the wide curved wooden staircase to the central hallway on the second floor. She unlocked a door on the right side that opened into what once had been a formal sitting room. It was now her bedroom, living room, and study all rolled into one. A dark burgundy sofa bed sat in front of the bay windows, facing into the room.

A stone fireplace was centered on the opposite wall, a desk next to it, and an archway beyond that led into a small kitchen. A dresser stood in the far corner of the room next to another door that undoubtedly led to the bathroom. There were books and journals everywhere, and the room reminded Wynter of the abandoned residents' lounge in the hospital. It was definitely Pearce.

"I like your place," Wynter said.

Pearce was busy making space on the sofa, awkwardly stacking textbooks and stapled articles into piles on either side with one hand. "I don't get many visitors."

Wynter wondered whether Pearce brought women here. Dates or...whatever. The thought unsettled her, because it was so unlike her to even go there, let alone to have the quick surge of jealousy that accompanied the visions. "That's okay. Don't fuss."

"I have..." Pearce ran a hand through her hair, looking flummoxed.

"I don't know what I have. Beer for sure. Maybe a bottle of wine somewhere. Hot chocolate?"

"You have hot chocolate?" Wynter asked with pleasure.

Pearce grinned. "Yup. It's a weakness of mine."

"Mine too."

Relieved to have something to do, Pearce indicated the sofa.

"Sit down. I'll have it in a minute. I like mine with warm milk. Is that okay?"

"It's perfect, but let me help. You're one-handed, remember?"

The kitchen, although tiny, was impeccably clean. Probably, Wynter surmised, due to the fact that Pearce obviously didn't cook.

The refrigerator held a container of milk, a pizza box on the bottom shelf, a six-pack of beer, some cheese, and a half dozen eggs. While Pearce got mugs and cocoa, Wynter warmed the milk. "How long have you had this place?"

"Since I was a medical student."

"You didn't live at home?"

Pearce carefully placed the mugs on a metal tray with a Coca Cola sign painted in the center. She didn't look at Wynter when she answered. "No. I haven't lived at home since I was seventeen."

Wynter leaned one shoulder against the refrigerator, watching the shadows flicker over Pearce's face. "Did your father and your grandfather go to Penn too?"

"Yup. And my great grandfather, and my great great grandfather."

"Did you ever think about going somewhere else?"

"No."

"It must've been tough."

Pearce pointed to the refrigerator. "I should make another ice pack."

"I'll get it." Wynter opened the freezer door and jiggled the ice tray to free it from the accumulated frost. Pearce was very adept at deflecting the conversation away from the personal. At least her personal life. Wynter realized she'd shared more with Pearce in a few brief conversations than with anyone other than Mina. Pearce had a way of listening that made her feel heard. "That's quite a legacy to live up to. Did it bother you?"

"I always knew what I would be. I always knew where I would end up." Pearce spoke quietly as she searched in a cabinet for a dish towel. "It never occurred to me that there was any other choice."

Wynter turned with the ice cube tray between her fingers, trying not to freeze her hands. She held it out. "Are you happy with the way things turned out?"

Pearce settled the tray onto the palm of her uninjured hand, studying the orderly alignment of the rectangular cubes. "I don't know.