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MARTI
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MARTI WAS TWELVE YEARS old the first time she remembered seeing a large amount of blood. They had been playing dodge ball in gym class. It was her favorite of all games, and nothing said happiness like wailing a rubber ball at someone’s face. Especially when your father and mother had been fighting for months like they couldn’t stand the sight of each other. Smacking someone in the gourd as hard as humanly possible was the ultimate release.
So, on that particular day in gym class, she was ready to kick some sixth-grade butt and expel a little pent-up frustration. The sharp thwack of the ball was all she could do to escape her inner turmoil.
Early in the game, her team was four kids down. Several of her classmates cowered behind her, using her as a human shield. Marti moved her feet quickly, auburn ponytail swinging like a flame. She dodged a fast strike from the opposing team and grabbed the ball. Taking aim, she cranked her arm back and launched it right at Johnny Marco’s face. The rubber impaled him like a torpedo, hitting him dead-center in the mug. It was a beautiful shot, and she puffed her chest out, lungs filling with pride. Until his nose started gushing blood and Mr. Savoy, their gym teacher, made her escort him to the nurse.
Her stomach roiled as she shuffled her way toward him, her sneakers squeaking on the freshly waxed gym floor. He clutched his nose, bent over, bleeding all over the front of his shirt and onto the ground by his feet, the crimson spreading like ink. And right as she went to grab his arm—okay, it was the sleeve of his shirt—Johnny tripped her, and she fell. In the blood.
Only a second passed before she lost her breakfast all over Johnny’s new shoes. Worse yet, Mr. Savoy banned her from dodge ball for the rest of the year. But it was the last time Johnny tripped her.
Ever since, Marti recoiled at even the slightest mention of blood. So, as she peered around the cavernous expo center, she prayed she didn’t encounter anything dealing with bodily fluids.
She smoothed the front of her black slacks and sweater, hoping she blended in with the other Med students. Everyone around her was eager-faced and wide-eyed like baby birds, and Marti wondered if she’d looked the same way when deciding on a career. Probably not. Her role as Queen of Single came so quickly, there was never any time for contemplation. She went from struggling college student, living off Ramen, to an overnight success story, attending exclusive events and drinking Moet from crystal flutes.
The large room was filled with booths and tables from doctors and medical practices of varying specialties, a veritable gathering of Who’s-Who of medical professionals in the city.
She passed a cardiology booth on Mel’s right and grimaced. A large plastic diagram of an anatomical heart mechanically mimed the human heartbeat, and she fought the urge to dry heave.
“Why are we wearing white doctors coats again?” Mel asked, peering down at her, complete with a sticker tag that read Dr. Belinda Bradford.
Marti shrugged. “I don’t know. It felt more official.”
“Right. But won’t Dr. Bradford and”—she squinted at Marti’s nametag—"Dr. Maddox come looking for their nametags? I mean, wouldn’t it have been easier to pretend to be med students?”
Marti glanced over at her like she was stupid. “They’re paper and written in permanent marker. I’m sure they can make new ones for them.” She shrugged. “They’ll just think they forgot a couple of names.”
“Okay, last question. What exactly are you here to ask him that can’t wait until later?” Mel asked as she paused at a table and snatched up a pamphlet on podiatry and stared at it with interest.
“I need to ask him whether he has a kid. And it can’t wait because I have an article due tonight, so it’s now or never.”
Mel halted, the pamphlet in her hands forgotten. “Hold up.” She grabbed Marti’s arm and yanked her to the side, allowing a few eager-eyed students to pass. “Logan has children? With who?”
“I don’t think it’s plural, but I don’t know. I did some snooping and found some photos of him and a fiancé who was very obviously pregnant.”
“Wow.” Mel frowned. “Don’t you think he would have mentioned that though, if he had a kid?”
“You would think, but I’m not taking any chances. It’s one thing to fake a relationship with him, but if he has a kid, it feels . . . different somehow. I at least need to know.”
“Yeah, makes sense. The last thing you want to do is have some reporter ask you whether you’ve met his children and be blindsided. You need to know what you’re getting yourself into. For all you know, there’s some crazy baby-mama, sticking pins in a voodoo doll with your name on it. Crazy exes are the worst.”
“Exactly.” Marti pointed at her, feeling slightly vindicated. “And if he does have a kid, it’s pertinent to make sure he knows what he’s getting into with this. I already warned him, but I’m not sure he gets it. I don’t want to be the reason an innocent kid gets dragged into the public eye. And if he has skeletons in his closet, they’ll come out. It’s inevitable. They’ll air all his dirty laundry.”
“Totally. You need to know his background if you’re to continue.”
Marti frowned. The thought of muddying Logan’s name was one thing, but a child was a total game-changer. If anyone knew about the lasting effects one negative event during childhood could have on your life, it was her.
Her father leaving them was bad enough. Throw a public spotlight on it, and she wasn’t sure she could have coped with it.
Marti turned the corner into a new row of stalls and eyed a psychiatry booth to her right, then scanned the remaining rows. Halfway down, she caught a glimpse of broad shoulders that led to a tapered waist and paused. The man half-turned as he spoke to a young man with a serious expression. The familiarity of the sharp jaw and dark hair tugged at something deep in her chest as his voice trickled out to her, only slightly muted by the surrounding noise.
Beside her Mel wandered lazily, unaware something had stolen her attention. “Do you think there’s free food here somewhere? I’m starving.” Her eye caught on the booth beside her. “Ooh, free cookies and coffee. I’ll be back.”
“Wait . . .” Marti called after her, but Mel was already gone, entering the pediatric booth on a mission.
Rolling her eyes, Marti stared at Logan a moment longer, bracing herself for a confrontation. Asking him about the baby thing would be awkward. It would require her to admit she had trolled him on Facebook. It might imply she cared, which she certainly did not. It was merely her due diligence as a writer to look into his past.
When Logan started to turn in her direction, she squared her shoulders, preparing to confront him directly when a hand came down over her arm. “There you are,” a harried voice said beside her.
Startled, Marti turned to see a silver-haired woman wearing a pair of blue scrubs. A look of relief ghosted her expression, and before Marti knew what she was doing, she tugged on her arm and steered her toward the row of tables in the back. “I’ve been waiting for you. You’re late, you know. The clinic said you’d be here a half-hour ago to assist.”
“What? I’m not—”
“It’s fine.” She flapped her hand in the air as they walked. “I’m just glad you’re here now. We’re swamped.”
“But I—”
“Look at all these people.” The woman stopped and motioned around what appeared to be a makeshift waiting room. “We’ve got to get the next wave of people ready to go, so we can get them in and out. Do you need anything else Dr. Maddox or are you all set?”
Dr. Maddox. The name clanged in her head, a hollow gong.
Her nametag. Oh, no . . .
Marti shook her head frantically. “There’s been a mistake.”
“I know it’s sort of beyond you. Heaven knows doctors don’t do this kind of thing post med-school, but we’re grateful you signed up to help.”
Marti’s heart started to pound. “But I didn’t sign up.”
The nurse chuckled. “Of course. Your physician’s assistant did. Either way, we sure are grateful you showed. Now.” She waved to the people waiting with bored expressions. “You can either do the intakes or draw the blood. Which would you prefer?”
“Blood?” she rasped.
She felt woozy. Her pulse was a stampede as she fully took in her surroundings for the first time. Just beyond the cubicle, there were beds. With people. Tiny tubes of blood curled from their arms where it drained into thick plastic bags like liquid jelly.
Marti recoiled, her eyes widening to twice their size. Of all the booths to get trapped in, she got stuck in this one. “They’re donating blood?” she croaked.
The woman scowled, her patience clearly waning. “We don’t have time to joke, Dr. Maddox. They told me at the office you were a bit eccentric, but we’re on a schedule here.” She motioned to a young man sitting close by. “You can do intakes, if you want. He already finished his paperwork. You just have to review it.”
Marti nodded. Relief sank in her veins. She could breathe again. Paperwork she could handle.
“Afterward, check his hemoglobin. Just like this,” the nurse said, quickly swabbing the young man’s finger, then pulling out what appeared to be a little thumbtack. “And prick.” She brought the sharp tip of the tack down on the boy’s finger before Marti could protest. “Easy peasy.”
Marti stood, transfixed by the drop of crimson. The blood formed a perfect bubble on the tip of his finger.
Easy peasy. Easy peasy . . . The nurse’s voice looped in her head as her vision glazed over and the floor whirled around her. A tingling sensation started at her toes and worked its way up her body in quick succession. The nurse’s voice faded, and Marti’s stomach squeezed. The room tipped on its axis, so she focused on her breathing, desperate to slow her racing heart.
But it was too late.
She felt her knees buckle before her body turned to rubber. The room swam, and just as her eyes rolled back in her head, she saw a flash of piercing green before the world went black.
#
SHE FLOATED, SURROUNDED by a forest . . . woodlands and the scent of fresh grass. Pine. Cedar. Base notes of leather.
She blinked her eyes open. Her fingers gripped the sides of a cot, soft beneath her back.
Her vision blurred, then slowly cleared as she peered up into familiar eyes. Green—so green. The flash of color before everything went blank.
She tried to sit and groaned when her head throbbed.
“Easy there.” Logan hovered over her and placed a steadying hand on her back.
The events of the last few moments flashed through her mind—the nurse thinking she was Dr. Maddox, the blood, her woozy head . . .
Logan must have seen her faint.
He broke her fall.
Reaching a hand up to her aching head, she tried to quell the pounding as she glanced up at him.
“Welcome back.” He grinned. “You know, if you wanted to get me alone, all you had to do was ask. You didn’t need to fake fainting.”
Marti brought a hand to her head and groaned. “I wasn’t faking.”
“I didn’t know you were a doctor. Funny you never mentioned it. Doctor by day, writer by night? Or do you only practice on Tuesdays?”
“Funny,” Marti rasped, scowling.
In an effort to clear the fog, she shook her head and glanced around her. They were in the back of a tented booth, hidden away from the crowd of Med students strolling by.
“It’s unusual for a doctor to faint at the sight of blood,” he plowed on, clearly more than amused by her presence there, in a white lab coat, sporting a foreign nametag.
“I have epilepsy.” Marti glared at him, but her lips twitched, betraying her.
“Do you now?”
“It’s not exactly the kind of thing you advertise. Is it?”
“So you’re a doctor and you have epilepsy? And here I just thought you might be spying on me.”
Marti picked at an invisible stain on her coat. “Fine. You’re right. I came to this death chamber to talk to you. Happy?”
Logan snickered. “Quite. Death chamber, you’re so dramatic.” He gripped her hands and helped her stand, while the cot creaked in protest.
She stretched her sore back, and the smirk on his face spread. For a man who had a lot of explaining to do, he looked way too pleased with himself. And the sooner he started talking, the better.
“Do you have a child?” she blurted.
Those perfect lips froze, mid-smile. “What?”
“Because if you do, I’d like to know why you thought that wasn’t an important piece of personal information I needed to know.”
He said nothing, staring down at her, eyes wide with shock.
“Oh, come on.” Marti huffed. “It’s not like it was hard to find. I saw a picture, with you and your pregnant fiancé online.”