SEBASTIEN WALKED PAST the picture of his son, just as he did every morning. Except normally he gave it a passing glance before moving on with his day. This time, however, he picked it up and looked at it, studying the curly brown hair and tiny lips. Maybe because of his encounter with Rachel yesterday. He wasn’t sure why, but he’d had a hard time sleeping last night. And when he had fallen into slumber, he’d had dreams of Bleu being carried away by ocean currents while he’d trudged through the surf, unable to reach him.
The dreams he understood. They were caused by little Sharon’s near drowning. Fortunately, she’d been fine the rest of the night at the hospital, and she was set to be released.
Today was a new day. For that he was glad. He looked again at his son’s image.
The pregnancy had been unexpected, but he’d been prepared to marry Layla and make a family with her and their child. He’d been young and idealistic and had even managed to convince himself that he loved her. All would be right with the world as long as he believed it was so. But, of course, it hadn’t been, and after Bleu died, there’d been a thread of relief when Layla walked out.
Maybe it was because he’d needed to grieve Bleu’s death privately, but he didn’t think that was the entire reason. And despite any regret he may have had about Layla’s absence, it just drove home the fact that people left. Whether they wanted to or not.
Afraid he might somehow forget his son, he’d impulsively walked into a tattoo parlor a few weeks later and had Bleu’s name and favorite toy tattooed on his left shoulder. Of course, he never forgot him, but he did forget about the ink on his body most days. But when he’d done another impulsive thing and slept with Rachel, she’d reminded him of exactly why he avoided relationships. He’d been sitting on the bed reaching down for his clothing when gentle fingers had touched his shoulder and he realized what she’d found. A spear shafted straight to his heart as he relived those terrible days leading to Bleu’s death.
He couldn’t afford another accidental pregnancy, and despite the protection he’d used, a sense of fear oozed through him right after their encounter. He’d wanted to ask her about it later on when he saw her at the hospital a few weeks after their night together, but he couldn’t bring himself to. She’d tell him if it somehow happened, wouldn’t she?
And she’d acted so chilly toward him after that night, he didn’t think she’d welcome any probing questions about her fertility.
Hell, even thinking about it in those terms made him cringe.
Maybe the tattoo was a good thing. The few times he’d slept with someone, there’d always been that question—the one about the meaning of that tat. It would either jerk him out of the moment or remind him of his silent vow not to become a father again. Bleu would keep him on the straight and narrow, even from the grave. Strangely, Rachel had not asked about it. She’d simply traced gentle fingertips across it and left it at that. But that soft touch had left its mark. He could still feel it in unguarded moments. Or whenever he saw her at work.
He set the picture back down on the end table, swearing he felt a sharp twinge in his shoulder as he did. Maybe there really was an afterlife and that was his son’s way of communicating with him.
“Wish you were still here, kid.”
Sighing, he went into the bathroom and looked himself in the face. Thirty-five years had not been kind to him. There were gray strands threaded through black hair that was a little too long. He swept it back off his forehead. He always seemed to go too long in between cuts. Maybe because of that huge mirror in most salons and the awkward conversations with strangers who inevitably asked about family relationships. And kids.
How did you answer that question?
He did have a kid. But to speak of Bleu in the present tense seemed like a lie. But to tell the truth? That was even more awkward and usually resulted in shocked silence, followed by swift backtracking and murmurs of sympathy. And it all happened in sight of that mirror.
Yeah. Well, his hair would survive another couple of weeks before he went through that again. Right?
With that, he brushed his teeth and shaved, having taken a shower before going to bed. It was a habit now. Because you never knew when the phone could ring in the middle of the night with an emergency case.
He still got a Christmas card from Bleu’s maternal grandparents every year. And almost every year, they updated him on their daughter’s life. She still wasn’t married. Still didn’t have any other kids. It was almost as if they were trying to get him to call her. He wouldn’t.
He realized now that their reasons for getting married would have made for a difficult union at best.
Besides, his life wasn’t in Tahiti anymore. It was here in Taurati. And if Layla’s parents wanted more grandchildren, they needed to look to someone else. Because it wouldn’t be him. There were too many might-have-beens juxtaposed with what actually was. Not a good basis for marriage or anything else.
And that held true for friendships as well. His conversation with Rachel yesterday had exposed the same glaring contrasts between their situations. But he could see it a little more clearly now. That while Rachel might feel fortunate to still have her daughter, that clawing fear of loss was never far from the surface. Sebastien had just assumed that it went away with time. But evidently not.
He wasn’t sure he could handle going through that every time he faced a difficult case.
Not even if it meant having Bleu still here with him?
Well, that was different. Of course he wished his son had lived. The difference was, Claire wasn’t his. And he wasn’t going to willingly walk into a situation where he would be reminded day in and day out what the future might hold.
Selfish? Absolutely. But wasn’t self-preservation a selfish instinct at its core?
That hadn’t stopped him from sleeping with someone who’d had a child, though. But he hadn’t known at the time about Claire’s cancer. If he had, things might have ended very differently that night. Instead, they had indulged in some sexy give-and-take banter that reminded him how fun it used to be to do that. She’d been new to the island, and he’d offered to show her a few sights. And she’d shown him a few as well—like the interior of her overwater bungalow, where they’d fallen into bed together.
The next morning, she’d traced his shoulder. The memory sent a shudder through him.
Damn. He swung away from the mirror and finished dressing. This was why he didn’t connect with people, even in friendship. It was why, despite his years in Taurati, real friends were few and far between. And all the ones he did have were colleagues at work.
He wasn’t actually on call today, but most mornings found him in his office doing paperwork. His office was safe. Private. And it was where he liked to pass the time.
To avoid taking part in the world at large? To avoid another incident like the one with Rachel a year ago?
Probably. But it was what it was.
He caught a taxi and headed to the hospital. The second he pushed through the doors, his phone pinged. Weird. Almost everyone knew that Tuesdays were his day off. He glanced down at the screen. It was from the hospital administrator.
Hey, are you here yet?
His lips curved. That was the one downside to being so predictable. Neves was one of those few friends, and the man pretty much knew exactly where he could find Seb. The administrator was sharp and was very good at his job, which was to keep the hospital running well, heading off problems before anyone even knew there was one.
He texted back. Just arriving.
Can you come up?
He sighed before responding. He’d been looking forward to some alone time after his thoughts this morning. But it wasn’t like he could just refuse.
On my way.
Neves Bouchet’s office was in the same fourth floor wing as his and most of the other permanent physicians’ spaces. Waiting for the elevator around the corner, his eye caught sight of the ocean a short way from the hospital. Framed by green palm fronds and white beaches, the calm azure color of the water was as alluring on Taurati as it was on the other islands of French Polynesia. Except he saw it so often that sometimes he had to remind himself of its beauty. His time in medical school in France had given him a new appreciation of the islands where he’d been born.
The elevator doors opened, and he was dumped onto the fourth floor. Rounding the corner, he pushed through the glass door to Neves’s waiting area. He frowned when he spied Rachel in one of the chairs. He glanced around. No one else was here.
Hell, he hoped this wasn’t about what had happened between them last year. In all honesty, he’d been waiting for that to catch up with him. But after a year?
You’re being paranoid, Seb.
They’d both been consenting adults who’d agreed to remain mum about the night they’d shared. Not that the hospital really had any rules against colleagues sleeping together, although the unspoken consensus was that it could be a sticky situation. But it evidently worked for some. There was at least one pair of surgeons at Centre Hospitalier who were married. And his and Rachel’s encounter had only been one night long.
Rachel didn’t even look at him. Dressed in a gauzy white skirt and a blouse that was as blue as the ocean, she looked almost as inviting as the warm currents a short distance away. And when she crossed her legs—that slow slide of calf over calf was reminiscent of... He swallowed. Okay, don’t go there.
But at odds with his thoughts were the tense lines in her face and her refusal to glance his way. It couldn’t be a coincidence that she was here. Did she know why they’d been summoned? Was this about the girl at the beach yesterday?
He glanced at Neves’s administrative assistant, who must have guessed his thoughts, because she nodded. “He hoped you were in the building so he could meet with you both together.”
His eyes went back to Rachel before returning to the desk. “About?”
“Hey, I just work here.” Cécile raised her hands, palms out, in a way that said she had no idea why they were here. And he couldn’t very well ask Rachel if she knew. Not in front of Neves’s assistant.
Cécile picked up her office phone and murmured something into it. Then she looked up. “You can go on in.”
When no one moved, she grinned. “Both of you.”
Sebastien waited for Rachel to stand and then motioned for her to go ahead of him. It was the polite thing to do, but it would also help him put a halt to his racing thoughts. If Neves wanted to talk about possible rumors or innuendos surrounding their night together, he wasn’t sure what he was going to say. And if it was something else entirely?
Well, it would be a relief.
Rachel ducked through the door, and he followed her.
Neves stood to greet them. “Hi, guys. Thanks for taking some time out from your day. I have something I want to discuss, but I’d rather it not go any farther than this room at the moment.”
Merde. Maybe there was something floating around the hospital after all.
Rachel beat him to the punch. “I’m not sure I understand, Neves.”
Although Neves was technically an internal medicine doctor, once he took over the hospital’s administrative duties, he’d stopped practicing medicine. He said it was because of how much time the position took, but he also said it could give the impression of favoritism if one patient got resources that another was denied.
“Sit, please.”
There were only two chairs across from the desk, so there was no option but to sit next to her. Seb hoped to hell his afternoon went better than his morning was going so far. Or yesterday, for that matter. Working so closely with Rachel on that case had brought back some memories of its own. And he’d been surprised by the easy rhythm between them as they worked to resuscitate Sharon. He didn’t want easy between them. He wanted their interactions to be damned hard. So hard that he kept avoiding her like he had for the past year.
He dropped into his chair and looked at the administrator. “What’s this about, Neves?”
The man looked down at some papers on his desk before lifting his head to look from one to the other. “Did either of you catch the news today?”
Seb attempted a smile. “Not today. Is Centre Hospitalier on lockdown or something?” Kind of a stupid question, since he’d just walked right through the front doors.
“Not yet.”
What the hell? Was there some communicable disease swirling around? COVID had done a number on them a while back. The last thing they needed was something new on the horizon. “So we might have to go on lockdown? Why?”
“You haven’t seen the weather reports?”
Sebastien remembered thinking the good old South Pacific looked pretty calm today. And the sun was a big hot orb in the sky, just like it was most days.
Rachel cocked her head. “No. What about them?”
“There’s an area out there that could become worrisome if it develops any further.”
“An area, as in a hurricane? I thought those didn’t happen here.”
Neves nodded. “They don’t normally. And cyclones, as they’re called in this part of the world, are rare in Polynesia. But they’re certainly not unheard-of.”
The last major cyclone to strike the area was named Wasa-Arthur, if he remembered right. But that had been decades ago. Surely if there was one off the coast, he would have heard about it by now. “What does any of that have to do with us?”
Neves leaned forward. “Again, I don’t want any of this leaving this room.” His voice lowered. “Rachel guessed correctly. There’s a low-pressure system out there.”
“A low-pressure system.” He frowned. “This is the time for them. Is it threatening the island?” November through April was normally when cyclones formed in this part of the world.
“Right now, I’m choosing to err on the side of preparedness.”
“What does that mean, exactly?” Rachel’s voice slid past him.
“It means I would like you two to go over hospital protocols and make sure everything is up-to-date and in place. I normally have Laurence and Britan do that this time of year, even if there’s no system forming out there, but they’re expecting and I don’t want to put any more on them.”
Laurence and Britan were the married surgeons he’d thought about this morning. “I didn’t know they were expecting.”
“I found out about it last month. But she’s had a couple of spikes in her blood pressure. Nothing serious, but Laurence came in after hearing about the depression and asked if they could be replaced as the cyclone committee this year.”
Committee. Okay, so that meant multiple people, right?
“Can’t other members of the committee pick up the slack?”
Neves laughed. “If there were any other members, then yes. But they worked well together and always got the job done. And since you’re here most days, even on your days off, Seb, I thought you could step in.” His glance moved to Rachel. “And as one of the newest members of our medical staff, I thought you might like to get an insider’s view of how things work at the hospital during emergencies. Unless there’s some reason you’d rather not be a part of a working committee.”
Several seconds went by with a series of expressions winding across her face. Consternation. Tension. Dismay. And then relief.
Relief?
Maybe, like him, she’d thought the administrator had called her in for a completely different reason. Maybe they could make this quick if they were stuck working together.
Rachel shrugged. “No, it’s fine as long as I can help with it during most of my on-duty hours. I have a daughter at home.”
“Of course. And if you’re swamped with cases, those come first, obviously. Just in the quieter times of the day. Maybe an hour or two here and there. You two figure out when you can meet.”
And hour or two? Here and there? A lot could happen within that set of parameters.
His brain swore at him again. No. Nothing was going to happen. Other than what Neves had asked them to do: review protocol.
“It shouldn’t take long, then.”
Neves sent his gaze Seb’s way. “However long it takes for that system to burn itself out or head in a different direction. I don’t want what happened in ’91 to catch us unprepared again. Our hospital’s power grid was taken out with that one, resulting in the deaths of two patients.”
Sebastien remembered hearing about that. “I’m not sure how we can prevent something like that.”
“I know you can’t make any guarantees. But you can go through the evacuation procedures if it comes to that and oversee their implementation. It’s what Laurence and Britan were charged with. I thought if you were both willing...” Neves’s voice trailed off.
If Seb said no, his friend would want an explanation—one he was loath to provide. Especially not in front of Rachel.
“I’m fine with it.” He looked at Rachel, brows slightly raised in challenge. “How about you?”
“Y-yes, of course. If it will help. My daughter comes first, though. She’s just getting over a virus.”
“Understood. Bring her to work with you, if it will help.”
Oh, hell, no. He and Rachel would have to keep this within the boundaries of work hours. “I’m sure we can get this all done during our scheduled shifts.”
He was relieved to see Rachel nod. “Yes, I’m sure we can. Besides, if it’s been that long since your last storm, then I’m sure this one will spin out before it even starts. Nothing will happen.”
Even before her confident words ended, a low chill slid through Sebastien’s veins. She hadn’t been here long enough to know what every islander understood from birth. One thing they were careful never to do. One did not challenge their island and expect to walk away unscathed.
He would do well to listen to his own counsel and realize you did not challenge fire and expect to come away with clear lungs and unsinged hands. So if he and Rachel were going to have to work together in a manner that was unlike what they did on a day-to-day basis at the hospital, then he was going to have to be on guard. Each and every hour that they spent together.
Why her? Why on earth had the hospital administrator chosen her of all people?
He’d already told her. She’d drawn the short straw because she was one of the newer members of Hospitalier’s team. Something she wasn’t thrilled about at the moment. Especially in light of her shakiness in working with Sebastien yesterday. Her knees had been like rubber. And once they’d handed Sharon off in the hospital, she’d been in danger of falling apart. He’d noticed, inviting her to take a break for a few minutes. Once she realized it would be with him, she should have refused. But to do that would let him know just how uncomfortable she was in his company.
But for the administrator to ask her to help monitor a cyclone?
Which cyclone was she referring to? Sebastien? Or the actual weather pattern?
Right now, it was both. Even sitting beside him for those few minutes in Neves’s office had sent her nerves through the roof. In fact, the second Sebastien had walked in the door of the reception area, her senses had gone on high alert, a feeling of doom hanging over her head.
She hadn’t been wrong about the doom part.
They left the office together, and she couldn’t help but ask, “How bad was the storm he was referring to? The one where those patients died?”
“I wasn’t on Taurati at the time, but it was bad. I was still a kid, living in Tahiti. It was hit pretty hard, too. But Taurati has fewer resources. Less money.”
“Fewer options.” She hesitated before asking what was first and foremost on her mind. “How can I get Claire off the island if it looks like it’s going to come our way? My mom lives in the States, in Wisconsin.”
He looked at her for a long minute. “Let’s go get some coffee and talk without worrying about being overheard.”
That didn’t sound good. Did he think she was being totally selfish for voicing that question and wanted to chastise her in private? Maybe he would be right to.
Would they actually be able to evacuate anyone, or would there be widespread panic that would keep people from getting out? She made a mental note to call her mom as soon as they were done here. Maybe Claire could take a week or two vacation from school and leave before it became necessary. Before there was a crush of people trying to get out.
That made her tense and sent her back to her first question—wasn’t she giving herself an unfair advantage that others on the island didn’t have?
Maybe Neves had been wrong about choosing her. After all, she and Claire could just slip unnoticed off the island and never come back, and she’d never have to face what the rest of the folks here might have to endure.
She already knew she wasn’t going to do that.
If she could do something to help on Taurati, she was going to stay and do it. And if it meant sending Claire away so she could focus on her job, she would. Whatever it took. Even if that entailed working with a man who sent her pulse soaring into the heavens. She just hoped that, unlike Icarus, she stayed well out of the danger zone and made sure her feet weren’t too far off the ground. And that her heart didn’t venture too close to the sun.