The Secret Heir

“Their case was a little tricky,” she admitted. “I can’t give the details, of course, but there were some problems in their application that made them seem less than ideal on paper.”

“But you were able to see beyond the paperwork problems to tell that they would be good parents.”

“Yes. Lots of people have made mistakes in their past. That doesn’t mean they don’t deserve to have children, especially if they can show evidence that they’ve overcome their problems.”

“It’s gotta be hard to make calls like that, though. We both know there are people who shouldn’t be parents, regardless of whether they look good on paper.”

Laurel thought of her own parents—the father who hadn’t wanted responsibility, the mother whose only thoughts were of her own fun and pleasures. No, they should never have brought a child into the world. Nor should any social worker ever have approved them had they applied for adoption. But mistakes were made on both sides, and sometimes children were placed in homes that were less than ideal, just as some good potential parents were never given an opportunity to prove their worth.

It wasn’t a fair world. But Laurel had made an effort to pair children who had been denied families with couples who had been unable to conceive. Maybe it was a foolish desire to make up for her own unsatisfactory upbringing. Or maybe it was just something she was good at, which gave her a feeling of fulfillment.

It had been a long time since she and Jackson had talked about her work, other than to quarrel about her hours. Of course, the same was true in reverse, she thought with a touch of guilt. She rarely asked about his job either, being more likely to criticize the amount of time he put into it than to show any real interest.

“I just do my best and hope I don’t make any drastic mistakes,” she said.

And then she turned the conversation to him instead. If they were going to do a better job of communicating, it would have to be a two-way effort. “How are things going at your job site? Are you still waiting on that big delivery from Seattle that’s been holding you up?”

Both his eyebrows rose. “I didn’t know you were even aware of that.”

“I pay attention to your concerns,” she said, trying not to sound overly defensive. “I know you deal with a lot of responsibility in your job. Just because I think you could spend less time at the sites and a bit more at home doesn’t mean I don’t respect what you do.”

He started to speak, and she sensed that he was going to take exception to what she’d said, making her regret her wording. Maybe it had sounded as if she were trying to start another quarrel about working hours, but she really hadn’t been.

Instead, he surprised her by saying, “You’re probably right. I guess I have spent too many hours at work. During Tyler’s surgery this morning, I was thinking of all the evenings I wasn’t there to play with him or read to him or tuck him in. I thought it was my responsibility to provide him with the best material things I could afford, but when I thought of losing him, it wasn’t the money that mattered. It was the time we could have spent together.”

Caught completely off-guard, she blinked at him.

He shook his head, looking somewhat embarrassed that he’d opened up even that much. “Never mind.”

She wasn’t sure what to say, except, “You’re a good father, Jackson. No one doubts that you love Tyler. But maybe it will be good for both of you if you can spend a little more time with him in the future. He doesn’t need all those material things, you know. He needs his daddy.”

“And his mommy,” Jackson replied. “Maybe we can both spend a little more time with him in the future.”

Because they had already agreed that spending more time together was one way to put their marriage back on track, Laurel nodded. She was needed at Children’s Connection, but she was needed more at home.

Tyler’s illness had served as a wake-up call for both of his parents.

Laurel had no complaints about the level of care Tyler received in the pediatric intensive-care unit. His condition was constantly monitored by medical staff who seemed genuinely concerned about his well-being. Laurel and Jackson were made to feel welcome in the unit and were encouraged to ask questions about everything that was done to their son.

Jackson hadn’t completely forgotten his earlier worries about medical mistakes. “Do you know that medical error is cited in some sources as the fourth leading cause of death in this country?” he asked Laurel, looking up from a news magazine he had been reading to pass the time. “Adverse reactions to drugs, accidental overdoses, mix-ups in prescriptions between patients—”

“Jackson,” she interrupted firmly, “calm down. Those are valid concerns, of course, but you and I are watching everything that’s being done with Tyler. We won’t be leaving him here alone, but I trust this staff. I work around this hospital every day. I hear who are the good doctors and the ones who have more questionable reputations, and we’ve got the best. As for the rest of the staff, this hospital administration has spent a lot of money and energy during the past year working on reducing the patient-error rate to the lowest it has been in more than a decade.”

“Everyone has seemed pretty efficient,” he acknowledged. “But that doesn’t mean I’m not going to keep an eye on them for the rest of the time Tyler’s here,” he added, returning to the alarming article he’d been reading so closely.

Not that her husband was a control freak or anything, Laurel thought with a slight sigh, but she supposed when it came to Tyler’s welfare, there was no such thing as being too vigilant.

Just this once she could even be grateful for Jackson’s insistence on perfection.

“Mr. Reiss?” A petite nurse’s aide poked her curly red head into the unit. “You have a couple of visitors in the waiting room. They said they work with you. They told me it was okay if you aren’t in the mood for company, but they just wanted you to know they’re here.”

Jackson looked questioningly at Laurel.

“Go,” she told him. “They made the effort to stop by, it’s the least you can do to thank them.”

“Come with me. Tyler will be okay for a few minutes.”

“Of course he will,” the aide agreed. “Actually, it’s time for me to take some readings, so both of you should have a little break.”