LATER THAT WEEK, Cecily sat in the waiting room of the expensive specialist’s office in the Upper East Side, holding Liam’s hand. She still couldn’t believe she was here, about to see Dr. Kelly, the so-called legendary oncologist who had a typical waiting list of at least six months to get in, or so Liam had told her. The office almost had the feel of a spa, rather than a medical suite: a small bubbling fountain lined with smooth black rocks sat in the lobby, and the soothing sounds of instrumental music percolated from some hidden speakers. The expensive, modern white couches and armchairs in the waiting room looked better suited for a high-end hotel than a doctor’s office.
“How do you know Dr. Kelly again?” Cecily asked, as she glanced at original modern artwork on the walls. She wondered how much the oversize paintings had cost.
“We went to grade school together and a bit of high school.” Liam shrugged, noncommittal. “Lost touch a few years ago. You know how these things go.”
Cecily quirked an eyebrow but said nothing. Grade school was supposedly where he’d learned French. She remembered that from him ordering in French at the fancy restaurant where they’d dined.
“Public or private grade school?”
“Actually, it was a private school,” he said, sounding evasive. “Not far from here.” The well-kept sidewalks outside, where they’d walked, had been lined with very expensive residences and high-end boutiques. “And we both spent freshman year together at Jordan Prep.”
“Jordan Prep?” Cecily knew of that school. One of the most exclusive—and expensive—prep schools in New York.
“Yeah.” Liam didn’t meet her gaze, and Cecily got the impression he didn’t want to talk about it. Just like he never wanted to talk about his past. An invisible wall would always come up, muting any hope at conversation. But the more Cecily learned about Liam, the more she suspected that he was a man full of secrets. She actually didn’t know much about Liam, or his family, at all.
Just then, the door adjoining the front office staff opened, and a beautiful woman with sleek dark hair walked out, her skin like perfect porcelain, marred only by a few well-placed freckles on her nose. She looked like she ran marathons—as she swung open her slim, fit arms.
“Liam!” she cried. “Haven’t seen or heard from you in years!”
“Hey, Rebecca.” He stood and hugged the gorgeous doctor. “You look great.”
The way Rebecca pressed herself against Liam’s chest made it seem like she wanted to stay in that position permanently. Who the hell was this? Cecily wondered, temporarily confused. Rebecca wore a white doctor’s coat, and that’s when Cecily glanced down at the stitching on the left side. Dr. Rebecca Kelly. Wait a damn minute. This was Dr. Kelly? This amazing, gorgeous bombshell was the world-famous oncologist? Why hadn’t Liam mentioned she was model-beautiful?
The good doctor then put both her hands in Liam’s hair and mussed it.
“What happened to the buzz cut?” she cried, combing her fingers possessively through his dirty blond hair. That was when she noticed the signature sterling silver Tiffany bracelet and matching ring on her right hand. On her left, she wore a diamond-encrusted Rolex. Okay, so Dr. Kelly was doing well.
“Got tired of it. And I stopped playing football.” He shrugged.
She laughed, deliberately giving him a flirty shove. “Figures. Whatever happened to you? You, like, disappeared after freshman year! Did you all move somewhere? There were all kinds of rumors—”
“They were just rumors,” Liam said curtly. Rebecca backed off immediately, and the two old friends stared at each other a minute, and Cecily felt the need to clear her throat to remind them both she was still in the room. Liam’s gaze darted to her face, and he quickly pivoted to include her in their little circle. “Rebecca, meet Cecily. She’s why we’re here.”
Rebecca offered her hand for a shake, and Cecily almost flinched at her surprisingly cold palm against hers. Rebecca smiled, but Cecily didn’t miss the quick sweep the woman did of Cecily’s simple flowered sundress, the assessing look the doctor gave her. Did Rebecca see her as competition? Cecily wondered. Then, she almost laughed out loud. Why was she worried about whether or not Liam and Rebecca were involved? She was dying. It wasn’t like she could expect Liam to be exclusive, not when she couldn’t offer him more than a few months at best, before she got too sick to do much of anything.
“Glad to meet you, Cecily. Shall the two of us head to the exam room?”
“Liam can come with us. It’s okay.” She suddenly didn’t want to be alone with Rebecca. The idea made her uneasy.
“You might have to undress,” Rebecca pointed out, as she sent a not-so-subtle glance in Cecily’s direction. Cecily wanted to tell the doctor that Liam had already seen her naked and up close, but she refrained. She didn’t know the history of these two.
“It’s okay,” she reiterated.
“Fine, then,” Rebecca said, brightly—almost too brightly.
Liam reached over and clasped Cecily’s hand. The feel of his strong, warm fingers wrapped around her own soothed her. Who cared what Rebecca might or might not feel for Liam? This was a new hope at a treatment. And, probably, there wouldn’t even be a treatment for her. Hadn’t the doctors told her the cancer had spread too far, too fast? That there was little that chemotherapy would likely do, except make her sicker, weaker and die faster? This visit, Cecily reminded herself, was really just to help Liam feel better. To make him feel like he’d done all he could to save her. Because deep in her gut, she already knew, she couldn’t be saved.
Yet, still, a nagging little hope festered in the core of her heart. No matter how much she told herself she was dying, that this was it, still that tiny flame remained. Maybe the doctors were wrong. Maybe things weren’t that bad. With Liam by her side, she felt for the first time that maybe she could beat this thing.
Cecily sucked in a deep breath, telling herself she ought not to get her hopes up, that it was just as likely that this doctor would tell her the same as the last. Hope just made the disappointment later that much harder to bear. Hope was the worst kind of torture.
Liam squeezed her fingers and she glanced over at him as they walked down the narrow corridor of patient exam rooms. He smiled, and she felt the warmth of it in her toes. God, she was glad he was here. She couldn’t imagine herself in this upscale office alone.
“Here we are,” Rebecca chimed in, showing them into an unmarked exam room with a dark, sleek door. She wondered how anyone told the difference between one door and another, and wondered if marking doors with numbers was just too tacky? Cecily walked into the relatively small exam room with the paper-covered recliner, and the elegant black leather chair nearby. The room had a single window that faced the trees lining Central Park. She glanced at the brochure sitting on the small countertop near the exam table. It read “Concierge Service,” and Cecily wondered what that meant. She guessed concierge service was something only the very wealthy got from doctors.
“Please, have a seat.” Rebecca nodded to the exam table. Cecily hopped up on it, and smoothed down her skirt. She felt strangely on display, her sandal-clad feet swinging. Liam took a seat nearby. Rebecca took the file from the small sleeve on the door and began thumbing through it. Then, she turned to the computer nearby and logged in.
Cecily glanced around the small room, looking for the hospital gown she usually needed to change into, but found none. “Should I change for an exam?” she asked, hand hovering near the strap of her sundress.
“You know what? I don’t think that will be necessary after all for this visit,” Rebecca said, shrugging. Cecily wondered about the change of heart. But decided not to press. Rebecca turned back to her computer. “I did look at the images you emailed me. But, honestly, I’d like to take new scans. If you’re up for doing these again, I can set up the appointment at my hospital and...”
“I’d rather not,” Cecily said. All she could think about was the fact that she’d been laid off from her job and had no insurance. She couldn’t afford another CT scan. It would come entirely out of her pocket, and right now, she needed every penny to keep her apartment. And what would a new scan really tell her? That the cancer had grown?
Rebecca glanced at Liam. “New scans would be better,” she said.
“They’re too expensive,” Cecily said.
“Can we work with the old ones?” Liam asked, playing peacemaker.
“They’ll have to do, I guess,” Rebecca said, backing off. “Well, I did look at these scans, and while they’re not the best quality, I can tell a few things. I take it that doctors have told you there’s not a treatment they’d recommend.”
“That’s right. They said the cancer is too far gone, and that surgery can’t get it all. Chemo and radiation might give me a little more time, but I’d feel sicker. And the chemo and radiation wouldn’t save me in the end.”
“Right.” Rebecca nodded and studied the screen in front of her. Then, she looked up, taking a deep breath. “The bad news is that he’s largely right. The medical protocols as they are now mean that there aren’t many viable treatment options for you.”
“Is there anything you can do?” Liam asked.
Rebecca focused her attention on him. “Well, the good news is, a colleague of mine in Japan is doing cutting-edge fluorescence imaging surgery. It’s not approved in the US, but the technique basically lights cancer cells up, so surgeons can remove the tumor more efficiently, without ruining the liver. The preliminary results are promising. But...”
“But what’s the bad news?” Liam asked.
“Well, no US health insurance is going to cover an experimental surgery in Tokyo. There’s also the cost of getting there, and then recovering there, of course.” Rebecca clicked her mouse on her computer screen and a website, all in Japanese, came up. Dr. Nimura, it seemed, was the lead surgeon on the procedure. “But Dr. Nimura is the very best. And she’s probably your best shot.”
“How much are we talking here?” Liam asked. Cecily almost didn’t want to know. She only had about twenty-five thousand in her 401(k), and she’d been planning on using that to live out what time she had left.
“Easily two hundred thousand.” Rebecca glanced down at the folder on her lap. “Maybe more.”
“More?” Cecily squeaked. That was much more than she had.
“You’re saying maybe a quarter of a million dollars?”
“Easily.” Rebecca shrugged, as if money didn’t matter. But then again, she was an oncologist in a very wealthy neighborhood. Cecily was sure that maybe to her, it wasn’t that large an amount.
“And there’s no way insurance could cover it?” Liam asked.
Cecily already knew the answer to that. She’d already spent hours on the phone arguing about co-pays with her insurance company and that was after seeing doctors in her own network, in New Jersey, not halfway around the world. And that was before she’d been dropped.
“I don’t have insurance, anyway,” she pointed out.
“We could get you on mine,” Liam suggested. And then she wondered what that meant. How would she become his dependent? Rebecca frowned, shaking her head.
“Wouldn’t matter,” she said. “No. Insurance companies aren’t going to cover surgery in Japan. It’s an unproven treatment in the United States.”
“How successful is it in Japan?”
“Very promising so far.” She stood, opened a cabinet above her head and pulled out a medical journal. Cecily glanced at the cover and saw the promise of the surgery plastered across its front page. She felt a little bit of hope rise in her chest. Could this be it? Could this surgery actually work when her other doctor said surgery was impossible? She wasn’t sure what to think.
“What happens if it doesn’t work?” Liam asked. She glanced at him, surprised he’d ask such a pointed question.
“There are risks. Like progressive liver failure,” Rebecca said.
Cecily knew what that meant. It meant death. Maybe in days. Maybe in weeks. But death, all the same. Was she willing to trade in the months she had left on the hope the treatment might work? She wasn’t sure. That was the honest truth.
“But this is your only shot, in my opinion,” Rebecca said.
“Her only choices are a risky surgery or nothing?” Liam asked.
“A risky—and expensive surgery,” Cecily pointed out.
“All surgeries are expensive,” Rebecca said sharply, glancing at Cecily as if she were slow. Cecily didn’t appreciate the sidelong glance, or her tone, for that matter. “There is no guarantee it works, but it might. And maybe is a better answer right now than definitely not. With Cecily’s condition, there’s very little to be done. It might not work, but what do you have to lose?”
“That’s all well and good, but I don’t have that kind of money.” Even if Cecily cashed in her 401(k), she’d still be short.
“Liam might be able to help you with that, I imagine,” Rebecca offered.
Liam frowned at her. What the hell did she mean? That Liam just had a few hundred thousand dollars lying around?
“Let’s not talk about that,” Liam said, voice low and gruff. Rebecca raised a slender eyebrow in surprise but fell silent.
“Well, I can give you Dr. Nimura’s contact information. You can follow up with her and she can tell you if you’re a good candidate for the surgery or not. How about that? You can argue about how you’re going to take care of that bill later.”
Liam left the doctor’s office feeling as if he was carrying a four-ton elephant on his back. Of course, it would all come down to money. Hadn’t he learned growing up in one of the wealthiest families in Manhattan that money both caused—and solved—almost all problems? He felt anger bristle the back of his neck. He vowed never to ask his family for a dime. Not after he’d seen them try to tear each other apart over it. He knew the evils of greed, knew how it could destroy families, and he’d walked away from it because he believed, in his heart of hearts, that money corrupted people. Money made people forget their humanity. Turned them into greedy monsters.
And now here was Cecily next to him, pensively biting her lower lip, the most perfect, most beautiful woman he’d ever met, and a quarter million dollars might just save her life. How could he or anyone else put a price on a human life? He wished there was another way. Something else. Why did it have to come down to money?
“Are you okay?” Cecily asked, blue eyes bright as they left the doctor’s office and made their way to the elevator. The hem of her flowered sundress fluttered as she walked, distracting him with flashes of her leg above the knee.
“Just have a lot on my mind,” Liam said, noncommittal. That was the understatement of the year. How could he tell her that with a mere phone call to his half brother, he might get the funds to save her life? Except, he knew there’d be strings attached, there always were. And that was if for the first time in his life Wilder did the right thing. Then what? He hated that he even struggled with this decision. It should be a no-brainer. He ought to just call Wilder and ask to borrow the money.
But after calling him a son of a bitch and telling him he hoped he rotted in hell, the chances were probably slim he’d agree to it anyway.
And Wilder would be the only one, he knew in his gut, who’d likely be able to come up with that kind of cash on short notice. His mother probably didn’t have the cash. She was perpetually broke. Liam’s twin brother, Stuart, and older brother, Seth, were hardly better. Seth was on his yacht halfway around the world spending everything he got from the trust on fuel, and then there was Stuart, and who knew what he was up to lately. Spending money as fast as he got it. Plus, neither brother was happy with him for always siding against Wilder.
There was one sure way to get cash, but Liam didn’t want to think about it, didn’t even want to consider it. He wasn’t going to ask Wilder for a thing. Not now. Not ever. And he shouldn’t have to. If his father’s will hadn’t been amended right before his death, then Liam would have had the funds to help Cecily. He wouldn’t need to beg and borrow to do it. Old resentments flared in his chest.
The elevator dinged, announcing its arrival at the lobby.
“Are you going to say anything?” Cecily asked him.
Say what? That if his backstabbing half brother hadn’t stolen his father’s money, then he could simply write her a check and send her to Japan and save her life?
“I’m sorry. I’m distracted. That’s not fair to you.” Cecily didn’t deserve his pity party. She deserved his attention. He reached out and grabbed her hand. She took it.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“Nothing.” He didn’t want to talk about it. “How are you? What did you think of the experimental surgery?”
“It’s too expensive.”
“If we could get the money?”
“You planning on robbing a bank?” She laughed at her own joke, and slowly shook her head. “Even if we did win the lottery somehow, I just... I don’t know if the surgery is the right thing to do.” She bit her lip, glancing up at him with her clear, cornflower blue eyes. They reached the bottom floor and the elevator doors slid open. The two walked out to the lobby, lingering near the door. “That’s my honest answer.”
“But it might help you,” he said, and reached out and touched her shoulder. “This might save your life.”
“I can’t afford it, Liam.” She shook her head. “Where am I going to get that kind of money? Even if I cash in my retirement savings, it won’t be enough.” She swallowed, hard. “And I need that money. If—when—I need to go to hospice.”
That was the very last thing Liam even wanted to think about. Hospice? That was a place where they made the dying as comfortable as they could. No way.
“You have hope now. You might not need hospice.”
“It’s a Hail Mary pass and you know it.”
“It’s something. We have to try,” Liam offered.
“So you’re saying you have the money? You just have a couple of hundred grand just lying around?”
He paused, his chest feeling tight. “No. But...”
“But what?”
He could tell her about his family right now. But the words lodged in his throat. Cecily clutched her bag and hurried out, her body tense as she headed for the lobby door. Liam found himself chasing her out to Sixty-Fifth Street.
“Cecily, wait.” He reached out to grab her arm as she sped ahead of him on the sidewalk. She whirled.
“I don’t get you.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, you promised to be honest with me, but you’re not. You think we can somehow magically get a couple of hundred thousand dollars. You went to a fancy private school on the Upper East Side? And you hang out in dive bars in New Jersey? What’s the deal?”
“There’s no deal.”
Hurt flickered across Cecily’s eyes. “So much for being honest.”
Dammit. “Look. It’s a long story.”
“That you don’t want to tell me.”
“It’s not that I don’t want to tell you...” He stopped. That was another lie. He didn’t want Cecily to know the truth because he didn’t want her to look at him any differently. He didn’t want to see the expression on her face when she realized he walked away from millions. Everyone was sympathetic until they realized just how many zeroes were involved. Women, men, everyone judged him and usually found him wanting. Or crazy. Few people thought he’d made the right decision. He didn’t want to see Cecily’s disappointment.
The hurt in her eyes blazed at him. He didn’t want to hurt her anymore, either. She hurried away from him now, toward Central Park.
“Cecily, wait...”
“It’s fine if you don’t want to tell me. You don’t owe me anything.”
He caught up to her, jumping in front of her. She had no choice but to stop. She let out a frustrated breath. “Stop saying that. I’m trying to help.”
“And...and I appreciate it. But...this surgery. It sounds great. But there’s no way I can afford it. I don’t live in this neighborhood.” She spread her arms wide to encompass the Upper East Side.
“I don’t, either.”
“But you used to.”
Liam let out a frustrated sigh. “Yeah. I used to.”
“Are you going to tell me who you are? Because you’re not just some roofer from New Jersey. I’m not dumb. Tell me the truth.”
He realized then that he did owe her the truth, no matter how painful that truth might be. He’d promised to be honest. He needed to honor that promise. He owed her that much.
“I’m Liam Lange, as in Lange Communications.”
“Wait.” She tried to process the new information, as both hands flew to her temples. “Lange Communications, as in, They Own Everything Communications?”
As if to drive home the point, a big white cable utility truck with Lange Communications blazed across the side lumbered down Sixty-Fifth Street. One of this half brother’s new expansions of his ever-growing empire. That didn’t even cover the fact that the company also owned at least half the magazines at the newsstand across the street. He frowned.
“Yeah.” He felt a deep heat at the back of his neck, as he always did when he talked about the family business. The business Wilder stole. “Remember when I told you that there was a fight in my family over money?”
Cecily nodded, still looking a little dumbstruck.
“Well, the fight was over a lot of money. And Wilder won. He’s my half brother.”
“The playboy? The guy always dating new pop stars?” Cecily began walking again, and Liam followed. He shoved his hands in his pockets.
“Yeah, the same. Although, I heard he settled down with someone. I don’t know much about what he does now. I don’t talk to Wilder anymore. And my mother is only interested because it could be someone else to dilute whatever money is left in the company. That’s why I walked away. I was offered a job, but I didn’t want it. All I kept was a seat on the board. I wanted a vote, at least.”
“I see.” Cecily had grown quiet. It was just what Liam had been afraid of. That she’d judge him poorly. “I just... I didn’t put two and two together. I knew the name Lange, but I just never thought...”
“My half brother was a billionaire.”
Cecily glanced up at him. “Never occurred to me.”
“He offered me millions, to pay me off, for that seat. But I didn’t take it. I wanted him to have to look me in the face.”
“I see.” She seemed to be mulling over all the new information. It was a lot to process, no doubt. But he worried that she’d be like most of the other women who’d walked in and out of his life. They never understood why he didn’t just take the money.
“Do you see me differently now?” he asked her.
“No,” she said. “But it explains a lot.” She reached out and took his hand as they walked down the sidewalk.
“Like what?”
“Like how your mom could afford Persian cats. And how you knew which fork to use at that fancy restaurant. And how you learned French in elementary school. That especially has been bugging me.” She glanced up at him, a teasing smile tugging at the corners of her pink lips, her blue eyes bright with mirth.
“Really? That’s what you think about when I tell you I walked away from a fortune?”
“Yeah.” She giggled, looking up at him through her thick lashes.
“You’re not going to tell me that I’m crazy?” he asked. “You don’t think that I should’ve worked it out? It’s a lot of money I walked away from.”
Cecily shrugged. “Look, my whole family thought I was crazy for leaving Ohio and heading to Manhattan. They thought I’d get murdered. Or would go broke. Or both. Sometimes, if you don’t fit somewhere, you leave. Even if that means leaving a family. Even if that means turning down a fortune.”
As she stared at him, the sunlight hitting her golden hair and making it shine, he knew he’d never seen a woman more beautiful than her. She always tried to see the best in everyone, including him. To hear her talk, she was a hero. Not the villain. It was a welcome relief. As the wind ruffled her golden waves, a bolt of desire rushed right through him. He had the urge to take her straight home to his bed.
“That’s not how most people think.”
Cecily tightened her grip on his hand. “I’m not most people.”
“Ain’t that the truth.”
Liam glanced up and saw a sign pointing the way to a path that would take them to the Central Park Zoo. “If you want to hear more about my family, maybe we should head to the zoo. They’re more dangerous than any grizzly bear or snow leopard.”
“Are they really that bad?”
He chuckled a little. “You have no idea. It’s amazing they didn’t eat me when I was young.”
Cecily wrinkled her nose. “Ew.”
“You’re the one who wanted to hear about my family.”
“Maybe I’m regretting that decision,” Cecily teased as she laced her delicate fingers in his.
“Oh, you definitely will regret hearing about the dysfunctional Langes. Come on, you.” He led her down the path. He tried to figure out just what to tell her about his backward childhood, about how everyone loved money, but few people loved each other. But the worst of it all, if he were honest with himself, was that the worst regret he had right at this moment, was not having a Lange bank account that could cover Cecily’s surgery. He’d never missed money before now.
He entwined his fingers with her, as they headed into Central Park and wondered what he was going to do about making sure he got that money. He’d have to figure out a way.