Chapter 3

Eight years ago

She knows too much. She's dangerous.

So I think, Fine. I'll leave.

But why should I run away again? I like my apartment. I like my girlfriend. I like this corner of Montreal.

Then I think, blackmail. She knows some shit about me, I'll find out shit about her. If she coughs up some money to keep it quiet, I'll get some cash flow out of it too. Chinese doctors always have money.

Only problem is, I can't find any good shit about her. Her biggest sin is probably picking her nose on Sundays, and I can't even catch her doing that.

So I go with plan C: kill her.

***

Cinq à sept. Five to seven. Before I came to Montreal, I used to call it Happy Hour.

Actually, I didn't call it anything because I never went out. When I did med school in London, Ontario, we never seemed to take the time. For the first two years, I was in lectures forty hours a week and making love to my books when I wasn't sleeping. The last two years, I rotated through the hospitals as a clinical clerk, doing everything from trauma to mole removal. At the end of the year and each major rotation, everyone partied, but it wasn't the same as taking the time to hang out in a group as a part of life. So this was part of the joie de vivre I'd missed before I moved here. And if you think about it, isn't it cool that in Montreal, you get happy for two hours instead of one?

So when Tucker's note said "5-7," I knew exactly what he meant. Even though he was probably going to lecture me—again—about coming back to work too soon, I was looking forward to seeing him. And, well, since no one else had mentioned a cinq à sept, it could be just the two of us, sipping drinks under a patio umbrella.

Could be, but it wasn't. When I paged him, he told me, "Tori and I are throwing you a welcome back party." Sigh.

Still, after work, he was the only one waiting for me at a picnic table beside St. Joe's main hospital building. He waved as soon as he spotted me. I blushed and tried not to rush over to him. Usually, the smokers commandeer the picnic tables, which offer a fine view of the parking lot and the old brick nurses' residence that houses the Family Medicine Clinic, but at the end of the day, most non-doctors had taken off, and it was just me and Tucker.

He stretched out his long legs and grinned at me. His blond hair caught the sun like a white halo. I never thought I'd end up with a blond dude. Even if my sig other didn't end up being Chinese, I thought he'd have dark hair.

"How was your first day back?" he asked.

I considered several responses, at least one of them lecherous, but settled on, "I could use a drink."

He laughed. "Thought so." He quirked an eyebrow at me and I knew he wanted to ask about the big P.

In my case, that P stood for the panic attacks I'd been suffering during the past week, since Dr. Radshaw's the murderer had nearly strangled me. I could have ignored his hint, but I felt compelled to say, "Don't worry, I didn't get triaged as a psych patient myself."

"Good. I wouldn't want to have to see you." He meant as a patient. Like I said, Tucker did psych last month. Now he was doing psych combined with family medicine while I rotated on to pure psych. Tucker hesitated and added, "Like that, I mean."

Our eyes met and I looked away first. In July, when he was interested and I wasn't, it was so straightforward. Now, only a month later, we didn't know what to do with each other. He'd visited me lots of times while I was off last week, but usually with another friend, like Tori Yamamoto, in tow. Today, it was just us.

We sat in silence. The sun warmed my face and arms. For once, I hadn't reapplied my sunscreen and I didn't care. I closed my eyes and basked in the warmth. When I opened my eyes again, Tucker was staring at me with a mix of confusion and tenderness before his gaze slid away.

"You want to keep waiting here? We could always go ahead, get a drink by ourselves and tell Tori and Stan to meet us there," I said, trying to sound off-hand.

"Probably not a good idea."

My heart dropped before I caught the look in his eyes and he added, "You, me, alcohol. I'd have you pinned to the floor before you could say 'Uff-da.'"

I let the Norwegian or whatever slide. "Tucker—"

He stood up and shoved his hands in his pockets. "Just friends, remember? It's only been a few weeks since you and Alex."

I stubbed the toe of my shoe in the grass. I'd only been with two guys, in the carnal sense, in my entire life, but right now, I felt like I had a scarlet letter shining on my forehead. How 'bout a great big W, for Whore.

He bent over so he could look me in the eye. "Hope. Whatever you're thinking, forget it. I'd love to have a drink with you. Hell, I'd love to have a drink off you and bend you over this bench—"

My thighs tightened. Oh, he was nasty. In a good way.

"—and God knows, I'm no saint myself. But I'm trying. You're worth waiting for." He stopped short and ran his hand through his hair. Even with the hair gel, the top strands ended up endearingly askew. I reached my hand up to touch them before I caught myself.

He was saying the things I longed to hear. Before Alex, and maybe before my ex-boyfriend, Ryan, I would have jumped him. But now we were both gun shy. Part of me wished we could just go back to flirting without consequences or any possibility of a future. I cleared my throat. "Thanks. I'll put that on my c.v."

He leaned close enough to kiss me. I caught my breath. He said, "Hope—"

"There you are!" Stan Biedelman hollered from across the parking lot, hands cupped around his mouth. "Did you turn off your pagers or what?"

I checked mine, but it hadn't gone off. Sometimes, the incompetent operators couldn't figure out how to page me. Tucker didn't bother to check his. "Saved by the Stan," he murmured.

I pretended not to hear. I waved at Tori, who popped out from behind Stan and frowned like she knew what I'd been thinking.

Within the hour, the four of us were ordering drinks on a bar-café’s térasse under a striped umbrella on St-Denis Street. I marveled how a café managed to cast a spell negating the exhaust fumes and rumbling car engines.

When Tucker's legs bumped into mine, I edged my chair closer to Tori. He grinned at me like he could read my impure thoughts.

I turned away from him to sip my water and mop up a circle of condensation on the green plastic table. I glanced around to make sure no one else was within earshot before I said, "I can't wait for my drink. I deserve one after Dr. Gatien."

Stan snorted. "What about me? I did ICU today."

"How was that?" asked Tori.

"Same old. Saved some lives," he said.

I refused to be impressed. "Yeah. It must have been so taxing, you were out of there almost before I got out of psych."

He shrugged. "When you're good, you don't have to write five pages of notes."

"You do when you're on psych. At least if you're trying to make up for missing the first quarter of the block. If I miss one more week, I'll have to make up this entire rotation."

Tori made a disapproving noise low in her throat.

I balled up my wet cocktail napkin. "C'mon, Tori, you promised me no more guff when I came back to work. It was my decision."

"Yeah, but we can still make you feel guilty about it," said Tucker.

"No need." I flicked the wet napkin at him with my thumb and index finger. He caught it and slapped it on the table while I said, "I'm already being punished."

"Yeah, you got Mrs. Lee," said Stan. "I saw you guys in emerg. That poor woman."

I straightened in my seat. "You know her?"

He laughed. "Since I was a med student."

Right. Stan was from Montreal, born, bred, and trained, so of course he knew Mrs. Lee after nearly a decade of ER visits. "Did she ever tell you about Laura?"

"Yeah, but I didn't really know her. She was a few years ahead of me."

My jaw practically dropped open. "You knew Laura Lee?"

"Well, she played the piano in an end-of-year play in med school. She was pretty good. Back then, I was doing accounting and thinking about going medical. I didn't actually know her. But after she died, if Mrs. Lee came in when I was doing psych, we talked about Laura playing the piano and it made her feel a little better."

I don't know why, it hadn't occurred to me until then, that Laura had been a flesh and blood presence at McGill until she died. "How about you, Tori? Did you know Laura too?"

She shook her head. "I'm from Alberta, remember?"

I laughed. Some detective I made. It wasn't that small a world.

Tucker's dark blond eyebrows drew together into a single line before I could ask him. "Oh, no. Don't tell me."

"What?"

He sighed. "I didn't know Laura. But I know Mrs. Lee, and I know you. You believe her, don't you? That someone killed her daughter?"

It sounded so unscientific, like I believed in Ouija boards and spirits rapping the table, once for yes, twice for no. "I don't know. I don't have any evidence to the contrary yet. I'm just keeping an open mind."

He narrowed his eyes. "But you're not going to see Mrs. Lee again, unless she comes in—oh, my God. Did you offer to help her find out if Laura was run down on purpose?"

Instead of answering, I turned to Tori. "Have you ever met Mrs. Lee?"

Something about Tori is an oasis of calm and precision. She'd started drawing on her still-dry cocktail napkin with a black, felt tip pen while we spoke. Now we all shut up and watched her. She finished a few strokes before replying. "I know who you're talking about. I saw her in the emergency room because she'd cut her hand."

"And did she talk about her daughter?"

She shook her head and picked up her pen again. "I just sutured her up and updated her tetanus shot."

"It didn't look like a suicide attempt, did it?"

She raised her eyebrows. "No, just a cut in the web space between her thumb and index finger. She was washing a glass and it broke." She added a few lines. It looked like a bird's wing.

"So how did you know it was Laura Lee's mother?"

"One of the nurses told me the story."

The emergency room was a cauldron of gossip. Not that our foursome was any different. But she told me what I needed to know. Mrs. Lee was lucid then and now. She did not go around telling all Asian women they looked like her daughter and must read her file.

Tucker threw up his hands. "So you did offer to help her. God, Hope. You want to give yourself an MI before you're thirty?"

I ignored the heart attack crack. "I didn't offer. She asked," I replied with dignity.

"You didn't have to say yes." He stared at me, and I could see his thoughts marching across his face. The same things he'd said when he told me to take a longer stress break: you almost died. Look after yourself. There's only one you. The patients will take care of themselves. I found his transparency refreshing, but I didn't need his bossiness.

"I'm not doing anything," I told Tucker. "I'm just reading Mrs. Lee's file. If it doesn't go anywhere, neither do I."

"And if you do find a lead, or think you do?" Sarcasm laced the last part.

I hesitated. He had a point. I hadn't thought it all through. But I knew the right answer. "I'll talk to the police."

"Bullshit," said Tucker.

Just then, the waitress arrived with our drinks, so he got to look like a cursing barbarian while I smiled sweetly. Still, he was right in that I might not leave Laura's case in the police's hands.

The waitress set down a martini for me, the first in my life. I took a sip. Yuck. Not sweet at all. Well, at least the olive should be good, and the triangular glass was amusing.

Stan held his beer mug up in a toast. "I guess you're taking that 'detective doctor' thing seriously. Well, à chacun son goût." His French was terrible, but at least he wasn't giving me a hard time. I clinked my glass against his and he gulped his Guinness.

Tucker muttered under his breath.

Stan turned to him. "What's it to you, bud? She's a grown-up."

Tori said, "He's worried about her. We both are." She laid down her pen.

I glanced at her drawing. It was a bird in a cage. Was that supposed to be symbolic or something? I suspected as much from the way she refused to meet my eye. I made a face.

Meanwhile, Tucker was so mad, his nostrils flared. "Look. We all go into medicine thinking we're going to save the world, but most of us figure out it's not worth grinding ourselves into powder. Especially if you're already—"

Do not mention the panic attacks. I will kill you.

He caught himself, glanced at Stan and finished, "—in a vulnerable state."

"You're in a vulnerable state?" Stan said. "Let me guess. The Gaza Strip?"

I hardly heard him because I was so busy staring Tucker down. He blinked at the venom in my glare, but he didn't back down.

Neither did I. I'm old-fashioned enough that I like guys looking out for me. But that doesn't mean patronizing me. Tori and Tucker were the only people who knew about my panic attacks. Now that Tucker had almost told Stan the Mouth, I could see my secret spewing forth into the halls of St. Joe's.

Forget about the 'detective doctor.' I'd be the defective doctor.

Tori put her hand on Tucker's arm, but it was too late.

"I'll put you in a vulnerable state," I said to Tucker.

"Hope. Tucker," said Tori. "We've probably all said things we regret. Let's try and enjoy our afternoon."

I fixed my eyes on Tucker and enunciated very clearly. "I haven't even gotten started. For the past week, I've been listening and listening to you guys while I tried to get my head together. Well, I decided to come back to work. You don't have to agree with me, but for Chrissakes, if you're my friends, just support me. Don't tell me I'm wrong, I've screwed up, or I practically belong in a psych ward myself. I'm twenty-six years old, okay? I'm a medical doctor. I survived this long without you mapping out my every move. Lay off."

Tucker opened his mouth. "It's just—"

I stood up so fast, I rocked the patio table. The others grabbed their drinks. My martini stayed standing without me laying a finger on it. "Save your prescriptions for your patients."

Tori reached out as if to lay her hand on my arm, but hesitated and let her fingers flutter back into her lap.

Stan banged his mug on the table. "Hey, I don't have a problem with you investigating Laura Lee. It probably won't do any good, it's been what, almost ten years? But who cares. It's your funeral."

Funeral. Yep. I could have died last month.

I didn't say anything. Neither did Tucker or Tori.

After a frozen minute, even Stan figured out he'd just said something inappropriate to a woman who'd had a near-death experience. "Sorry. I'm an ass."

"Me too," said Tucker, mouth twisting.

"Me three." I sat back down. Tucker handed me my glass. I took it, careful to avoid brushing his fingers. I wanted him. I hated him. And I hated him even more for pointing out I was more out of control than I'd thought. In my mind's eye, I saw myself writing a psych note on Dr. Hope Sze. Judgment: impaired. Insight: poor.

"So how about them Expos?" said Stan.

"They don't exist anymore," I said. I'm not a baseball fan, but even I knew that.

"Sucks, huh?" he said brightly. And conversation sort of turned back to normal, but after half an hour, I threw my money on the table. "Thanks. It's been a slice."

Tucker said, "Do you want—"

I cut him off. "I have to grab a few things before I head. Feminine hygiene products."

Oldest trick in the book: invoke menstruation and the men will melt away. It even works on doctors. Tucker sank back into his chair. I marched away to the sound of Stan's laughter.

I had to think. Thinking was easier without Tucker around.

Should I have stayed off longer?

Should I tell Mrs. Lee to forget it?

While these thoughts buzzed through my head, a man walked by with a brown dachshund in a carrier strapped to his chest. It doesn't get more metrosexual than that. I had to laugh.

Montreal was a lot different from London, Ontario. On St-Denis alone, I could hardly count the number and type of restaurants. Vegetarian Thai. Afghan. Vietnamese. A gelato shop. Plus cute clothes and stores selling mainly French CD's and books. If I had money instead of our resident's slave wages, I'd be in heaven.

Maybe literally. A cyclist nearly mowed me down as I crossed the street. He didn't say sorry or even turn around, just kept speeding down the street in his helmet and Spandex. I thought about giving him the finger, but what was the point?

I'd rather window-shop. Tori had mentioned a medieval clothing store. I felt like surrounding myself in brocade and satin and fantasy instead of real life.

"Hope!" called a male voice.

Was that Tucker? I spun around, already gritting my teeth, ready to face him.

But it wasn't Tucker. Or Stan. Or any guy from my residency program.

The guy walking toward me was one I'd know anywhere, any time, even though I hadn't seen him in almost two years. My breath froze in my throat.

His face seemed almost as familiar as my own, maybe more so, since I'd spent hours, days, even years memorizing it, from his gentle eyebrows to his well-shaped lips. I missed his hair, though. It was still crisp and black, but he'd pared it down to a crew cut instead of letting it touch his collar in the back.

Ryan Wu, my first love. My first lover. My only real boyfriend. Live in Montreal.

He was breathing a little faster from chasing after me. That made me think of other, more intimate times I'd seen him breathless.

We stared at each other. I couldn't believe how little he'd changed. I could see the same laughter in his brown eyes. He'd retained his slim build and long runner's legs. A few times I'd wished him fat and bald after we'd broken up, but now I was glad he looked almost exactly the same. I could mentally rewind the clock three, four years, before it all went sour.

I said, stupidly, "You cut your hair."

"So did you."

True. My hair used to spill past my shoulders, but I'd tried a chin-length bob and liked it.

He smiled. I smiled back. Then, suddenly shy. I glanced back at the café I'd just left. We were a few blocks away, so I could barely make out our table, let alone Tucker.

Ryan nodded at me. "You look good,"

He said it first, thank goodness, which let me admit, "You too."

Ryan sticks to the truth. He was brutally honest, annoyingly Christian sometimes, but not a liar. Such a tonic after Alex, the first Montreal bad boy I got mixed up with.

I wanted to eyeball every detail of Ryan's body. Part of me wanted to make sure he was really here and now, within licking distance. The other part of me wanted to sprint far away from him.

I exhaled. "So what are you doing here? I mean, I didn't know you were in town."

His smile hitched up at the corner and he glanced over his shoulder. A girl in a miniskirt marched toward us on coltish little legs, black hair swinging with every step. She was pretty and she was pissed. I'd never met her, but her expression told me exactly who she was with respect to Ryan.

"Sorry, Lisa," he said. "I didn't want Hope to get away."

"No, we wouldn't want that," she agreed in a high-pitched voice. I looked down at her. She wasn't just short, she was made miniature all over. In other words, the stereotypical Asian doll-like build that made even me feel like a tank, even though I was just as Chinese as she was.

"Hi, Lisa, I'm Hope Sze." I tried to smile. I hadn't so much as glimpsed Ryan in over a year and a half, so why did I feel so bereft, meeting his girlfriend?

To my surprise, she held out her hand and pumped mine. She had a good grip for someone sparrow-sized. She said, "Pleased to meet you. I was just taking Ryan on a tour of Montreal."

He smiled. "I'm here with some buddies. I gave Lisa a call."

Well, that didn't sound too lovey-dovey. Neither did their stance, side by side but not touching. Not to mention him racing after me. My heart lifted, even as I scolded it. No men. Not even ex-boyfriends. Especially not ex-boyfriends.

"We're having a great time," she said.

He smiled. "Yeah, Lisa's an awesome tour guide. Listen, Hope, I'm here two more days. Maybe we could catch up sometime?"

I knew the mature, responsible, Lisa-friendly thing to do. Instead, I gave him my phone numbers, home and pager, with my best smile. "Definitely. Call me."