Dancing in the Dark
“Damn it.” The doctor rubbed his hands over his face. “I really screwed up, didn’t I?”
“Yes,” Seth said sharply, “you did. I don’t give a damn if you’re a surgeon or Mickey Mouse. You either trust me or we can part company, here and now.”
Pommier nodded. “You’re right.” He gave a low, unhappy laugh. “Guess I seem paranoid, huh?”
Seth took a long look at the other man. “No,” he said after a few seconds. “You just seem like a man who’s been hounded into the ground.”
“Still, that’s no excuse for seeing a conspiracy everywhere.”
“Yeah.” Seth took a deep breath. “Well, I suppose it’s only natural, if people are driving you nuts—”
“Remind me to tell you about the eighty-year-old grandmother who smuggled herself into my office in a laundry cart.”
“Are you serious?”
“Unfortunately, yes. She’d heard I worked miracles—her word, not mine—and the miracle she wanted was to look like she was twenty again.”
Seth laughed, and Rod did, too.
“I’m sorry, man,” he said, clearing his throat. “I really am. I never should have implied what I did. I know you’re not the kind who’d ask for a favor.”
“You’re wrong,” Seth said quietly. “I might ask, but I wouldn’t come at you from the back. If I wanted you to take Wendy on as a patient, I’d say so. I’d give you all the reasons I thought you should do it and count on the fact that you’d make the right decision.”
“If you and she were still involved, you mean. Okay. Fair enough.”
“Wrong. It has nothing to do with my relationship with her.”
“No?”
“I’ve read about your surgery, Doc. I know it’s still somewhat experimental. Risky. Right?”
“Right. I make that clear to each patient, but—”
“But they want it anyway.”
Rod nodded his head. “Yeah. And I can understand it. If you can’t walk or live a normal life, the risk is worthwhile.”
“What if you can walk? If you can do everything you once did except pin a number on your back and go down a slope at ninety miles an hour? What if you could live with that, but the person who’s been driving you since the day you were born can’t?”
“Is that the situation with Wendy Monroe?”
Seth paced across the room. “I’d bet my last dollar this is her father’s idea, not hers.”
“Well, it’s too bad. That she can’t stand up to him, I mean.”
“She just doesn’t see it. She’s got this image of herself as a failure unless she can get back into competitive skiing.”
“That’s how you see it, huh?”
“That’s how it is.”
“And you see her, how? Forgetting about skiing? Settling down here and doing something else with her life?”
Seth swung toward him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Just that it’s interesting you’re ticked off because you think her father is making life choices for her, and here you are, doing the same thing.”
“That’s nuts.”
“Hey, you said it yourself. If you wanted to ask me to do you a favor and see Wendy Monroe you would, right?”
“So?”
Rod shrugged. “Then you told me you weren’t going to, because she shouldn’t have the surgery.”
Seth’s lips compressed. “I didn’t say that.”
“Maybe not.” Rod grimaced. “Listen, man, we’re off the subject. Your specialty is cabinetry. Mine is orthopedics. I’m not licensed to be a shrink.”
“And a good thing, too, because you’ve got it all wrong.” Seth softened the words with a smile. “So,” he said briskly, “what’s next? You want a contract drawn up or you want to work this on a handshake?”
“A handshake is fine with me.”
The men shook hands.
“Okay,” Seth said, “that’s done. All we need now is a plan of work. What you want. How much you want to spend. That kind of thing.”
“I’ve got some ideas. If we could get together, say, tomorrow morning...?”
“Sorry.” Seth shook his head. “I’m full up tomorrow.”
“This evening, then. We could grab a bite at Tubb’s.”
“Sure.” Seth started to zip up his jacket. He walked toward the door, then stopped. “Damn. I almost forgot. I can’t make it tonight.”
“Heavy date, huh?”
Seth smiled, as if that were the answer. It was simpler that way. Truth was, he was taking Jo to dinner because he’d run out of excuses not to see her. She’d phoned several times over the last few days, suggesting they get together. He knew he needed to end things between them soon, if not tonight. He’d just been putting it off because he was a coward.
Jo deserved a guy who was looking to settle down, and that guy wasn’t him. A man who couldn’t get another woman out of his head, even if he didn’t want her there anymo
re, had no right to be seeing someone as good, as decent, as kind as Joanne.
“Well,” Rod said, “no problem. I’m heading to Vermont for a while—somebody told me about a couple of killer ski runs up there—but I’ll call you when I get back. We’ll get together then.”
“Okay. Fine.” The two men walked to the door. Rod shut off the lights and they stepped out onto the porch. The sun had set and the darkness was almost complete.
Seth looked into the sky and turned up his collar. “Snow before morning.”
“That’s what the weatherman says.”
“Well, for once he’s gonna be right. If it’s okay with you, I’ll touch base with Bob Ziller, ask him to take a look at that furnace and the heating system. There’s usually trouble when it’s been turned completely off for a while.”
“You’re the man in charge. You think something needs doing, do it.”
“Great. Well, see you later.”
“Right.”
They trotted down the steps, booted feet crunching noisily on the packed snow. Seth headed for his truck, Rod for his SUV. At the last second, Rod turned around.
“Seth?”
Seth swung toward him. “Yeah?”
“You think I’m some rich kid who slid through college and med school on my butt?”
“I don’t think about it at all,” Seth replied honestly. He grinned. “Disappointed?”
“Not a bit.” Rod grinned back. “But it’s true. I was a rich kid.”
Seth laughed. The doctor was okay. “There’s a point to this, right?”
“I didn’t have to work my way through school, but when I was an undergrad, I wrote a column on finance for the campus newspaper.”
“Great,” Seth said dryly. “I’m very impressed.”
“One day, a girl who did one of the other columns got herself tossed out of school.”
“The trials and tribulations of the rich.”
“We were desperate, so I said, okay, I’d fill in for her. I ended up doing her damned column for a month, until they finally got somebody else.”