ADELINE WAS EXHAUSTED from the long surgery, and they had to wait until Rosa was out of the post anesthesia care unit so Elias could tell her what was going on with Gabrielle.
Aidan had updated the family that Gabrielle was going into surgery in the morning but was stable and that he was staying at the hospital until Jeffery got there.
Jeffery was on a plane and would be landing in San Francisco early tomorrow morning. Rosa was devastated, but Manny and her parents were there to comfort her.
Elias had promised Rosa that he would return to San Francisco and take care of Jeffery and Gabrielle until she was released.
So by the time they returned to the vineyard, packed up their stuff and headed back out on the road, it was midnight.
It had been a long, grueling day, but Adeline was eager to get back to San Francisco. She knew that Elias needed to be with his niece, and Adeline wanted to get back to work. Being around Elias’s family made her homesick. She still hadn’t been to see her mother.
Nor had she heard about the genetic testing, but that could wait until they got back to San Diego.
“I want to thank you again,” Elias said after a while.
“For what?”
“For saving my sister’s life. If you hadn’t been there... I don’t even want to think about it. You’re a talented surgeon and you saved her.”
A blush tinged her cheeks. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” He glanced at her, smiling. “You know, I don’t think there’s anything left that you need to learn from Dr. Wilder. You’re fully capable of being an attending anywhere. You were an attending.”
That comment caught her off guard.
Was he trying to trick her?
He’s not trying to trick you. It’s been a long day.
“Thanks,” she said, and she smiled, but this time it was forced. It was fake, because she couldn’t get that niggling thought out of her head that he was saying this to confuse her. When they had met, she and Elias had been in competition, and the part of her that warned and protected her from getting hurt was telling her that Elias was still her competition.
That he wanted that position for himself.
Yet the other part of her, the part that had let him in, was telling her she was being foolish. Elias wasn’t like that.
She pulled out her phone and saw a text.
“It’s Dr. Wilder,” she said.
“Oh?” he asked.
“She flew into San Francisco. My twin-to-twin transfusion patient needs to be delivered tomorrow morning. Early.” Adeline groaned.
“You need to take care of yourself.”
“I know that,” she snapped.
“You have more than just yourself to take care of. You’re pregnant.”
“I know.” She was annoyed that he was reminding her of the obvious. He was right, but she knew this surgery would be the surgery that would prove herself to Dr. Wilder.
Haven’t you proved yourself enough?
And that was something she had never thought about before. She had been working with Dr. Wilder for a year. She had given up an attending spot to work with Dr. Wilder. Essentially becoming a student again. Doing everything, learning all she could. She had turned down many positions during this year.
She could become an attending anywhere.
She could have her own practice.
Dr. Wilder didn’t have the cure for TTP. No one did, but Dr. Wilder had so many clinical trials on the go. If anyone was going to cure that awful genetic disease, it was going to be Dr. Wilder, and Adeline wanted to be a part of that.
Who says you won’t be the one to do it?
She shook that thought away and tried to make herself comfortable, listening to the sound of the car rolling down the highway. Adeline leaned her head against the car door and watched as San Francisco’s city lights came into view. She closed her eyes to quiet her mind, which was racing.
Only the best ever got in with Dr. Wilder. And she wanted to be the best.
Do you?
It made her stomach knot. She didn’t know anymore.
Maybe you’re scared?
And she was. She was scared.
Elias parked the SUV in front of their rental apartment and then picked up Adeline out of the passenger seat with ease. She was fast asleep, and she only stirred slightly as he picked her up. He carried her inside, took her straight to her bed and laid her down gently, covering her.
She looked so peaceful.
He hated to disturb her. She had saved his sister’s life and he would be eternally grateful, but he wished that she wasn’t so hell-bent on being Dr. Wilder’s lackey for the rest of her career. Adeline was so talented.
She could easily take a head of obstetrics job at any hospital she wanted.
People liked her. Patients liked her. She deserved so much more.
She was brilliant.
She didn’t need Dr. Wilder and he wished she could see that.
She had exactly what she needed, but she was too scared to try.
Aren’t you scared to try?
Elias sighed and shut the door to her bedroom. His phone buzzed and he answered the call.
“Dr. Garcia speaking.”
“Garcia, it’s Wilder. I’ve been trying to get hold of Dr. Turner. She hasn’t responded.”
“She delivered a baby this morning and did a grueling uterine rupture repair in Napa today. We just got back to San Francisco. Adeline is sleeping, but I can wake her...”
“No. Don’t bother waking her. These twins need to be delivered in the next hour. The mother has preeclampsia. Can you come and assist me? You can fill me in on the details of this surgery Dr. Turner performed.”
“Sure thing, Dr. Wilder.” Elias ended the call.
He was tired too, but he wasn’t as tired as Adeline and he wasn’t pregnant. He could down some coffee and be ready to go. Dr. Wilder just needed an assist and he wanted to be there for the twins. They would need extra support as well.
It was apparent to him that Dr. Wilder didn’t care who was there. Even though Adeline was far more qualified.
And Adeline needed her sleep.
Elias quickly changed, left a note and locked up. He walked to the hospital and met up with Dr. Wilder at the operating room, where she was scrubbing in next to Dr. Spiner.
“So, Garcia, tell me about this delivery and surgery that Dr. Turner attended to,” Dr. Wilder said.
“It was my sister. It was a VBAC, but the baby was large and was delivered quickly, in barely an hour. My niece had a PDA and was airlifted to the Napa hospital before her transfer to the children’s hospital here in San Francisco.”
“Tell me about the rupture,” Dr. Wilder said. “Once the baby is born, it’s not my concern.”
That struck Elias the wrong way. It was clinical and coldhearted.
Arrogant.
“Dr. Turner suspected a rupture and we airlifted the patient to the hospital, where Dr. Turner led the surgery to repair the damage by doing a hysterectomy.”
“She’s fantastic!” Dr. Spiner announced out loud. “If you’re not careful, Dr. Wilder, I’ll steal her and Dr. Garcia away.”
Dr. Wilder looked at Dr. Spiner with curiosity. “Is that a fact?”
“They’re both talented surgeons and make a wonderful team, and San Francisco is a great place to raise a baby,” Dr. Spiner announced cheerily.
Elias stomach dropped to the soles of his shoes and Dr. Wilder looked at him, her eyebrow cocked.
“A baby?” she asked Elias.
“Rats. Sorry, Dr. Garcia, I wasn’t supposed to spill the beans. I thought Dr. Wilder knew.” Dr. Spiner finished and headed into the operating room.
Elias felt like he couldn’t swallow as he continued to scrub in.
“That certainly explains her exhaustion,” Dr. Wilder said quietly. “She has to take care of herself. She wouldn’t want to put any extra stress on herself or the baby.”
“She is taking care of herself,” Elias defended her. “And she is getting rest.”
“Is that why I was given genetic test results for her?”
“You were given the results?” Elias asked, confused.
Dr. Wilder nodded. “It was ordered on one of my lab request forms, so the lab sent it to me via email. I was hoping to see Dr. Turner tonight to give her the results.”
Elias wanted to know what the results were, but he had no right. He wasn’t her fiancé. He wasn’t her significant other. He was just the father of the baby, and the genetic tests, although they might affect the pregnancy, had nothing to do with him. He had no legal rights to her information.
“Well, I hope after your harrowing day with your sister that you’ll be able to work tonight, Dr. Garcia. I need assistance to deliver these babies, and I’m sure you will find it particularly fascinating how twin-to-twin transfusion syndrome affects the different twins.”
“Yes, Dr. Wilder.”
Dr. Wilder headed into the operating room and Elias finished scrubbing up. He was angry with himself for letting news of the pregnancy slip to Dr. Spiner, and he had meant to tell Adeline that he had accidentally told Dr. Spiner about it. Yet never in a million years had he thought that Dr. Spiner would spill the beans to Dr. Wilder.
But Dr. Spiner seemed to be a chatty, bubbly type of surgeon.
And he hoped that Dr. Wilder wouldn’t use the pregnancy against Adeline. Dr. Wilder had made it clear to all those who were vying for a position in her program that studying maternal-fetal medicine was not for the faint of heart. It took up a lot of time.
There was no time for a personal life. No time for family.
And that was one of the reasons that had drawn him to vie for the spot. He hadn’t wanted all of that. He hadn’t wanted a personal life. His life had been his work. That’s what he’d done since medical school. He’d been running from his pain.
And then he had met Adeline, and everything had changed. Now he wanted it all. He wanted Adeline and the baby, and he wanted to work here in San Francisco so that he could be close to his family.
The thing was, he wasn’t sure that it had changed for Adeline. She was so single-minded about winning this fellowship. It was what she wanted.
It’s what she had always wanted, and he wasn’t sure that he was enough for her.
Adeline woke up early the next morning, because she had set her alarm after Dr. Wilder had texted her. She showered quickly and went to check on Elias, but Elias wasn’t there, and it looked as though his bed hadn’t even been slept in.
Which was strange, but then she thought that he was probably at the children’s hospital with Gabrielle. Which made sense, and if Dr. Wilder asked about him, Adeline would tell her that Elias needed to be with his family.
Adeline gathered everything she needed for her day at the hospital, although her body was protesting. She was still exhausted from yesterday.
She hadn’t told Elias that after the successful surgery on Rosa, she had been offered a position to be an attending in obstetrics in Napa. It was tempting—they had offered her a lot—but she was so close to getting everything she wanted.
Is this everything you want, though?
And that thought surprised her, because there had never been a moment in her entire career when she had second-guessed this fellowship. Except recently, when she had met Elias and fallen pregnant and everything had changed in her life.
She shook her head as she continued her walk to the hospital from the apartment. She couldn’t let herself think this way.
Elias didn’t want a family.
He barely wanted to be around the family he had, and she hadn’t been home in a few months. She hadn’t even told her mother she was pregnant.
Adeline paused at the top of the street, looking back down at the park. The sun was rising, and San Francisco was waking up. It was a clear day and from where she was standing at the top of this street, she could see the peaks of the Golden Gate Bridge rising over the city.
Even though she visited home, she hadn’t ever really been home.
She’d forgotten how much she loved it here.
How peaceful it made her feel.
Ever since she went away to school, when she had decided to devote her life to medicine and helping women, Adeline hadn’t really taken a moment to live, to breathe.
It was like that day in the operating room. Right before she operated on Rosa. She took that moment to breathe and it was calming.
She’d been going for so long. Running herself ragged.
This is what you want, though.
Dr. Wilder would teach her everything. Elias might think that Adeline was capable enough, but she wasn’t. She wasn’t ready to take the leap yet. She needed to learn more. She needed to save more lives.
She wasn’t ready.
Yes, you are.
Adeline sighed and continued on her way to the hospital. She didn’t want to be late for Dr. Wilder, who didn’t like it when her staff were tardy. She entered the hospital and made her way up to the obstetrics floor.
She wanted to check on her patient before they prepped her for surgery.
After she put her stuff in a locker and got into her scrubs, she headed for the nurses’ station and looked through the clipboards for her patient’s file.
“Um, do you know where room nine’s file is?”
“Room nine?” the nurse asked, confused.
“Yeah, the twin-to-twin transfusion patient. I did that surgery a couple of days ago, but Dr. Wilder texted that we were going to operate this morning and deliver the babies.”
“Oh, Dr. Wilder and Dr. Garcia delivered those babies early this morning,” the nurse said. “The mother is currently upstairs in the NICU with the twins.”
Adeline shook her head, not quite hearing what the nurse was saying. “Sorry, what?”
“The babies were delivered about two a.m.” The nurse picked up another file and headed off.
Adeline just stood there, stunned. Not sure what to think.
Elias had delivered her patient’s babies with Dr. Wilder.
See? What did I tell you?
Adeline swallowed the hard lump that had formed in her throat and she made her way up to the NICU, because she had to see this for herself.
When she got there, she saw her patient in a wheelchair with her husband. Elias was standing next to the incubators and was speaking with the parents.
Adeline felt nauseous. She felt like the rug had been pulled out from under her.
Why hadn’t she been contacted?
Why had Dr. Wilder chosen Elias instead of her? Adeline was the one who had assisted with that twin-to-twin surgery. She was the one with more experience. She was the OB-GYN.
She was the one who had been the primary surgeon here in San Francisco. None of it made any sense and she felt betrayed by Elias.
He had stolen her patient. He had just let her sleep and taken her surgery. She had thought they were becoming friends. She had thought they were falling for each other.
She had thought she could have more with him.
She had thought she could give him her heart.
She had thought the crazy competitive drive was over. How wrong she’d been.
It was like a gut punch.
A punch in the heart.
Adeline headed down to the obstetrics floor. And as she made her way back to the nurses’ station to see what she could find out, still stunned and feeling hurt and worried, she saw Dr. Wilder was there.
“Good morning, Dr. Turner,” Dr. Wilder said, barely looking up at her.
“Good morning, Dr. Wilder. I see the twin-to-twin patient came through her surgery well.” She could barely swallow.
“She did. We had to deliver early this morning. I tried to call you, but there was no answer. However, Dr. Garcia answered his phone and was a great help.”
“That’s wonderful,” Adeline said, but she could barely get the words out of her mouth.
“Can I speak with you a moment, Dr. Turner?” Dr. Wilder said, which sent a shiver of dread down Adeline’s spine.
“Of course.” It was not like she was going to say no.
Dr. Wilder walked to a private room and opened the door.
Adeline headed inside, shutting the door behind her. She was worried she was going to get chastised for not being there early this morning, for missing that call. She felt awful about it, because this was her career. This was what she was working towards, and she had never missed a day yet.
Dr. Wilder took a seat and Adeline sat down as well.
“So, first things first. I have your genetic test results.” Dr. Wilder reached into her pocket and held out a slip of paper.
“You have my test results?” Adeline asked, confused. “Why?”
“The lab request paperwork had my practice address and name, so the lab sent me the results, thinking that you were my patient.”
Adeline’s cheeks heated with embarrassment. “My apologies, Dr. Wilder.”
“Don’t apologize. That is an important disease to be aware of. Who in your family was afflicted with it?”
“My mother. She’s had multiple flare-ups of TTP since my birth, but it was only recently that they found the gene and deemed it genetic. I thought it was time that I got tested.”
Dr. Wilder. “A smart thing, too. Well, I’m pleased to report that you do not have a genetic predisposition for it, which is good for you, given that you’re what...five weeks pregnant?”
Adeline’s heart stopped.
And she could feel the blood drain away from her face. “Pardon?”
“Dr. Spiner informed me that you are pregnant. He was trying to convince me that he could steal you away and that San Francisco is a good place to raise a family.”
The lump in her throat got larger and her pulse was racing. “And how did...how did Dr. Spiner know? I didn’t tell anyone.”
“Dr. Garcia I believe told him,” Dr. Wilder said offhandedly.
Her heart was crushed then. It shattered into a million pieces.
She shouldn’t have put her trust in Elias. She shouldn’t have let him into her life, let him into her heart. She tried her best to control the tears that were stinging her eyes. This was what Gregory had done—thrown her under the bus to protect himself.
She’d been a fool listening to her heart.
“As you know, my fellowship is a grueling four years. Successful candidates for maternal-fetal medicine need to be available twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. They have to master many procedures, take part in my clinical research and travel where I can’t. You’re going to have a baby, Dr. Turner. You won’t be available to work the hours that I would require. That’s why I offered the position to Dr. Garcia.”
“You offered it to Dr. Garcia?” Adeline asked, clearing her throat and feeling defeated. All the years she had spent, all the offers she had turned down, it had been for nothing.
Nothing.
And here she was, with a broken heart again.
“I did offer it to him, but he turned me down. So I called Dr. Simpson and offered the position to her. She’s not my first choice, obviously, but she’s not pregnant and she is available to do the work. Maybe in a few years when your child is older and you have a few more years under your belt, you can apply again.”
Adeline nodded. “Thank you, Dr. Wilder.”
Dr. Wilder got up and left. Adeline sat there in shock. She was shocked that Dr. Simpson had gotten the position and enraged that after all of this, Elias had turned down Dr. Wilder.
He had sabotaged her career, her dreams, for nothing.
Absolutely nothing. Silent tears streamed down her face as she processed all the information. She was so angry, so hurt.
Why had she thought that she could have a happy-ever-after?
Why had she ever believed that Elias loved her?
If he loved her, he would have kept their secret. If he loved her, he would have taken the position. She had been so close to it and it had all been snatched away from her.
There was a knock at the door. It opened and there was Elias.
She glared at him. Angry...so angry with him. She stood up, with her fists clenched.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. “Was it bad news about your genetic test?”
“You asshole!” She slapped him hard across the face. Her palm stung. She tried to push past him, but he blocked her exit.
“What was that for?”
“You told Dr. Spiner, who told Dr. Wilder that I was pregnant?” she screamed. “And then you sneak to the hospital to deliver the twins without telling me?”
“I left you a note.”
“I didn’t see it. You still told people I was pregnant.”
He sighed. “I accidentally let it slip to Dr. Spiner and I didn’t think that he would say anything. I’m sorry.”
She shook her head. “No, you’re not. You did this on purpose. All of this.”
“I did not,” he said angrily. “It was an honest mistake.”
“She offered you the position.”
“She did, but I turned it down. It should go to you. I accepted a position here as the chief of the NICU.”
“You accepted a position here? In San Francisco?”
“Yes. This is what I want. And I know it’s not ideal, with you in San Diego with the baby and me in San Francisco, but...”
Adeline shook her head. “After you turned her down, Dr. Wilder gave it to Dr. Simpson. Dr. Simpson isn’t pregnant. I don’t have a job.”
“Do you really want to work for a woman like that?” Elias asked. “You’ve done everything for her for a year. You were so focused on her. It made you a brilliant surgeon. You don’t need her.”
“I do! She’s doing research on TTP. I have to be there. Don’t you understand? A doctor like her could have saved my mother years of heartache. She could have saved the lives of my sibling.”
Elias’s expression softened. “I’m sorry that you pinned all those hopes on her, but who’s to say you won’t discover the cure or the treatment?”
“I won’t if I don’t learn from her.”
“You have learned from her. It’s time for you to take a place. You are a competent, well-respected, well-liked surgeon. Why can’t you see that?”
She shook her head. “You ruined my chances. I should never have...”
“Should never have slept with me?”
“Right. You broke my trust and for what? You won the position and you’re walking away.”
“Because I don’t need it. I don’t want it.”
“So you were stringing me along?” Adeline asked sadly. “Obviously you were since you accepted the job here and were planning that I stay in San Diego with our baby!”
“I wanted to tell you.”
Adeline wiped the tears away with the back of her hand. “It’s a little too late. You tell me to take a leap of faith, but can you? You blame all your problems, all your insecurities on your family. You jump around place to place and are never satisfied. You wanted the position I worked hard for and you earned it, but now you don’t want it. Like it’s some kind of toy? Just like the baby and I would be some kind of mild distraction to you? What do you want, Elias?”
“I don’t... I don’t know.”
Adeline’s heart was crushed. “Well, you’re an idiot, Elias Garcia. A complete fool. Congratulations, you won. Which is all I think you cared about in the first place.”
Adeline pushed past him.
He didn’t try to stop her.
She had to get out of here.
She collected her things and headed outside. She went straight to the apartment and grabbed all her personal belongings. She was going to have to figure out how to get down to San Diego and collect the rest of her stuff, but for now, she knew where to go.
The cab ride didn’t take long.
And soon she was in front of her parents’ home in Cow Hollow.
She walked up the stairs, exhausted, heartbroken, and not sure what her next steps were going to be. All she could do was ring the doorbell.
There were a few moments before the door opened.
Her mother’s eyes widened in surprise. “Adeline? I wasn’t expecting you. What are you doing here?”
“I was fired. Can I come in?”