Adapting Desires (Endangered Heart Series Book 3) Read online

  “Nothing like that could ever happen while you’re still drinking, Mom.”

  “You don’t know how hard I have it!” Emilia sighed at the sound of crocodile tears brewing and closed her eyes. Maybe she should have listened to Claudette’s advice, to Kasper’s. When it came to her mother, it seemed all she would ever receive was misery and heartache. At the same time, Emilia hadn’t been lying when she said she was glad to see her mother this way again. Though they had been chatting on the phone and exchanging a few brief text messages, Emilia had remained skeptical that Susan had transformed at all. Seeing her this way was something of a strange relief, and in a way it was nice to know that Emilia’s instincts had been accurate instead of her personality simply becoming more cynical with age. “You lucked out finding a rich man,” Susan continued to rant. “Everything is so much easier with money, and you have everything now.”

  Emilia had to give Susan that point. She very nearly did have everything.

  “Mom, I’ll call you a cab and make sure you get wherever you want, but you do need to leave.”

  “You and your snotty friends have no right to judge me. Just because you drink better wine than me doesn’t mean—”

  “Madam.” The sound of Kasper’s voice coming up from behind Susan was plenty to startle them both. Emilia opened her eyes and took her head from her hand. As she suspected from Kasper’s tone, he was struggling to remain in control. With his fists bunched at his sides and his posture stiff and stoic, she saw him tremble slightly. If it came down to it would he pick her mother up and toss her right out on to the street? Emilia played the image over in her head. Frankly, she didn’t know if she wanted him to or not.

  “My wife has asked you politely to leave. I suggest you do so immediately.”

  His voice was nearly a growl, and faintly Emilia wondered if her petite male lab partner and the combined strengths of Claudette’s boyfriend and Aasif could hold him back. Then again, the idea of Susan getting bludgeoned to death was not as disturbing as it probably should have been.

  Susan’s brief terror became humor. “This?” She looked from Emilia to Kasper and back and forth again. “This is the husband?” Breaking out laughing, she turned to Kasper. “I guess it’s a good thing you have money, huh?”

  “Mom!”

  Kasper held out his hand to silence them both. “Madam, if you do not leave immediately, I will haul your sorry hide out of here and be none the sorry for it!”

  Susan gasped with shock. “I—you can’t talk to me that way!”

  “Yes.” Emilia stepped between them. “He can. And so can I. Now get out before I do something drastic.”

  Susan’s lip trembled slightly, but she said nothing else, pouting before stomping out into the living room and helping herself to a handful of chips, after which she walked out the door and slammed it behind her.

  “I’m sorry,” Emilia said. “I shouldn’t have—”

  “Don’t apologize, my love.” Quickly, Kasper pulled her to him and placed a kiss on her forehead. “Now go and join your friends and think nothing more of it.”

  As eager as he seemed to soothe her, she was even more eager to apologize. “But—”

  “This time tomorrow we will be in our bed, wearing little to nothing and watching that abhorring parade on the television. So if you want to spend any time with your friends, you had better do it now.”

  Leaning into him, she smiled. How did he always know the right thing to say when she was upset? She rubbed his lower back until the muscles relaxed, assuring her that he wouldn’t do anything violent.

  “Thank you,” she whispered at him. “Just—thank you.”

  ***

  Thanksgiving was a welcome distraction for both lovers, who each had many cares and concerns hanging over their heads. Therefore, they did indeed spend the day in bed, watching TV marathons and vintage cartoons. Occasionally, one, the other, or both would dress, but only to complete the chore of walking Tut or to clean up the kitchen after cooking a small chicken and heating a loaf of French bread.

  And when the night came and she slept soundly against him, Kasper finally allowed himself to consider the slight drama that had occurred the day before. He had never interacted with Emilia’s mother before—at least in person. While he had to agree with Emilia that the older woman did appear slightly better than she did in those earlier days when Kasper watched her in secrecy, he did not agree with Emilia that taking on a relationship with that woman again would be of any good.

  Kasper voiced his opinion—naturally. He knew better than to forbid his wife, feeling it was wiser to advise Emilia and to remain wary of her mother, watching protectively from afar in case she needed him.

  Perhaps then he should have known the moment he had walked into their apartment building Wednesday afternoon that something was going to go wrong. He had felt it in his bones, a lingering eeriness even after Aasif assured him of his paranoia, telling him to shut up and have a drink.

  Of course he did not express his worry to Emilia. His young wife was clearly having a great deal of fun playing hostess, a role she so rarely got to enjoy that he could not see the point in spoiling it for her. So he remained in their bedroom, keeping a watchful eye and trying to imagine what it would be like to have a semi-symmetrical face.

  In a way, he was glad of Emilia’s silly little friends. If they had not been there, Kasper might have thrown that horrible old woman right out of the window—really, they and his restraint for Emilia were they only things that prevented him from doing just that the moment he heard her raise her voice to Emilia. Additionally, by being patient, he had given his Emilia some closure, a reminder of why she had given up on that wretched woman in the first place.

  She had done him proud too. Stayed strong in her convictions in not letting that woman take advantage of her good nature…it was only when it became evident that she had a full-blown headache that he could no longer resist rescuing her from the ignorance of her situation. And even then Kasper’s heart had swelled when she jumped to defend him. With Emilia’s eyes lit like a fresh flame, he truly believed in that moment she would have started a fist-fight herself if he hadn’t interrupted them.

  Oh, how he loved her.

  It would be her that would keep him steadfast while he endured the remainder of his procedures. The rhinoplasty had been marginal in terms of pain, even Taylor admitting it would be nothing compared to the procedure he would endure next. Whether they went well or not, the cheek augmentation would swell his eyes shut for days—the laser removal of the cartilage between three of his fingers so painful that he would not be able to work, or play for that matter, for several weeks.

  As he pushed aside pieces of her hair, so did Kasper push aside those thoughts of guilt that occasionally worked their way over him. It would be their first Christmas together as a married couple, and he was condemning her to servitude as a nursemaid. While neither of them were necessarily sentimental about the holidays, he was aware of how she worked too hard—much too hard not to be herself during her reprieves from school.

  As Kasper gave in to the cusps of sleep, he thought over all the ways he would make it up to her. With his face semi-improved this time next year, he could take her skiing in the Alps, or maybe to Australia so she could see the rare animals of the world she admired so…Who knew what he could do with a normal appearance? Oh, how the universe could open up to the both of them.

  Chapter 7

  In that world between consciousness and dreams, Kasper still counted backward from ten—though he was aware that his mouth was no longer capable of moving. His mind and body were detached from one another, distant somehow. He probably would have panicked at the lack of synergization, but Kasper found himself incapable of caring—the numbness the only thing his mind and body now seeming to have in common.

  Every so often, through his thinly taped eyelids, he would see the bright lights of the operating room beaming over him, hear the beeping of one machine or another, and the
murmured voices of one of the surgeons, perhaps a nurse. Other than these few elements, he remained aware of little else, his mind unfocused and unable to concentrate on any one thing. He was happy for those moments when his mind drifted to Emilia, even if it was usually to the last time he saw her—worried for him, and stricken with anxiety for this impending surgery. Oh, how he loved her! If she was with him now—and he had the strength—he would take her in his arms and kiss her until she giggled and snorted and begged him to stop.

  Kasper felt a pain then, not in his body, mind you, but rather in his heart. For whatever reason, he was suddenly reminded of how closely he came to losing his love less than two years ago. Because of that wretched Cyrus, Emilia could very easily have been taken from this earth, without any help from him.

  That additional thought brought forth more pain in his chest, and had he been able, Kasper would have lunged forward and grabbed his arm, and called out or cursed the God who created him.

  Really, it was Cyrus he should have cursed. In those first weeks after Cyrus’s attempt on Emilia’s life, Kasper had been so relieved to call Emilia his own again, so happy, he did not mind the new scar on his own head, the terrible swelling or the stitches. What he did mind, hated with every breath in him, was Emilia’s nightmares, how she called out for him in the night, crying and hysterical, thinking they were both dead, but not together.

  Another flush of hurt followed, this time bringing with it an increase of beeping of the machines and a shuffling of smartly selected shoes. Like in those instances when he had managed to get Emilia to drift peacefully back to sleep, Kasper considered all the ways he would make Cyrus suffer for what he had done, the damage he could and would have done. Ironically, this anger gave him a sense of peace. He seemed to acknowledge it, his body fell into sync with himself. And in that final moment of clarity, the complete and clear memory of Cyrus touching Emilia’s arm and how she was forced to welcome the advance made his heart burst—love and rage with every beat.

  ***

  Emilia was still finishing her clinical exam when she got the call. It was going relatively well too—the benefit of studying and lots of practice. Luckily, she had thought to inform her professor ahead of time that her husband was scheduled for surgery that day, and timing alone assured that Emilia processed most of the paperwork of the hamster’s x-rays, so when the time came to secure the plaster, she could leave, making the work split between her and her lab partner even.

  To keep Emilia from driving off the road, Mrs. Levkin talked to her throughout most the drive back—via Bluetooth of course—updating her on Kasper’s condition and keeping her informed on every facial expression the surgeon, nurses, and anesthesiologist produced. They separated their communications only when Emilia stopped for gas and when she had to contact their landlord to say she would be leaving New York a day early.

  Every so often, Emilia would catch herself biting her thumbnails, prompting Mrs. Levkin to ask her to repeat herself. The stress was at its worst when Mrs. Levkin was on the other line with Hartwell or Mr. Shiraz at the same time, and Emilia was forced to count the seconds before she received the answer to her questions.

  Because of a sudden drop in his blood pressure, the surgeons were forced to stop the procedure a third of the way through. Apparently, startled and alarmed by this sudden change in his vitals, the operating team tried to give Kasper a small dose of epinephrine only to have his heartbeat continue to fall rapidly. When that didn’t work they began CPR with another large dosage of epinephrine. Still unconscious, they had gotten him stable and transferred to the hospital shortly before Emilia arrived.

  Mrs. Levkin and Emilia spotted each other at the same time. In an instant, Mrs. Levkin tossed down her tablet on one of the waiting room chairs and Emilia dropped her phone in her bag—the two women running to embrace each other in a moment of solidarity.

  “How is he?” Emilia sobbed. “Do we know anything yet?”

  Mrs. Levkin nearly laughed. “Not since we spoke less than five minutes ago.”

  “This is insane!” Without waiting for a comment, Emilia began pacing, taking care to memorize nametags with faces. “Hartwell called that cardiac specialist he went to school with, right? H-e should have been here by now! I don’t care who’s on call, with the donations Kasper has made, this hospital should have their best doctors here and waiting on him hand and foot.”

  “Mrs. Zafar?”

  Emilia turned to see a short red-haired woman wearing a white coat and carrying a thick clipboard walking over to them. With her smartly braided hair and thick glasses, Emilia hoped that the doctor, whose nametag read Dr. Hughes, was as intelligent as she appeared.

  “How is he?” Emilia was almost bouncing on her toes to hear the news—bad or good, it was better to know than to not know. “What’s going on? How bad is he?”

  “Hello, my name is Dr. Hughes—”

  “Get on with it!” Even the normally polite Mrs. Levkin had had enough, waving at the doctor with her hands impatiently.

  “Stable now. It does not appear to be a heart attack, and tests are negative for a stroke.”

  Emilia’s sigh of relief could have knocked them over. She hadn’t realized she had been holding her breath for so long. Though Mrs. Levkin patted her shoulder gently, Emilia found herself barely able to breathe properly.

  “We do have some questions.” Dr. Hughes lifted up a paper on her clipboard and moved her eyes as if carefully reading the information there. “On your husband’s pre-operation paperwork he claims not to have any prior heart conditions, nor are there any in his family history. Is it possible he could have been mistaken in that somehow?”

  Emilia searched her mind but failed to think of anything. “I honestly don’t know. Both of his parents died when he was a baby, and he never knew his grandparents. He used to get the most terrible anxiety attacks with heart palpations—still does, though they’re so rare now…”

  “Anxiety attacks?” For the first time, Dr. Hughes’s interest seemed genuinely piqued, and Emilia stared while the woman’s red eyebrows went up. “What kind of anxiety attacks?”

  Emilia shrugged. “A typical anxiety attack: shortness of breath, sweating—”

  “Heart palpations?” The doctor asked, cutting her off.”

  Emilia swallowed hard as she nodded. Suddenly, words were not so easy to come by and she found the need to brace herself on the arm of a waiting room chair.

  “Oh dear,” Mrs. Levkin interrupted. It seemed the realization hit the three women at the same time. Dr. Hughes was the first one to say it out loud.

  “It is possible there is a small heart murmur, a deformity in the heart valve. Considering his genetic history—”

  “Why wasn’t this found earlier?” Emilia nearly screamed, drawing attention to the small group. “He had blood work done, a physical exam, and surgeries as a child.”

  The doctor shook her head. “Those surgeries were entirely experimental, and nothing like this would have shown up in the blood work or even necessarily during the physical if it was routine.”

  Emilia nodded, but knew the details the doctor wouldn’t say. The fact of the matter was that there were probably no complications during the rhinoplasty because it was such a short procedure. Kasper had only been in twilight—either that or he had just been extremely lucky.

  “W-well is he going to be okay now?” she heard herself ask. “How serious is it? What do we have to do?”

  “Please, calm down,” Dr. Hughes said, “I know this is upsetting—”

  “You’re damn right it’s upsetting!”

  This was the very thing she had been afraid of all along—a complication. How could this woman, this doctor, tell her with such simplicity that Kasper’s heart, the very thing that kept him alive, was possibly deformed? The soul of her was disgusted by the passive behavior, and yet at the same time Emilia understood it. She had taken a class on grieving families herself, that first term of grad school, learning how to break bad new
s to families gently and keep your composure while remaining compassionate, words to use and not to use. Would Emilia hear those words herself sometime soon? What if Kasper’s condition became worse? She was certain she couldn’t bear losing him so suddenly—or losing him at all.

  ***

  Instantly, he knew he was not where he should be. The fact that something had gone wrong was secondary, only accompanied by a pounding in his skull and face respectively and the feel of his heartbeat against his left eye. It took a great deal of time before Kasper could gather his thoughts, but once he did he cursed at Dr. Taylor, his entire staff, and Aasif—who clearly had not followed his instructions lest he should be at home right now, in his own bed, and not this wretchedly uncomfortable hospital one.

  Despite his position, it was easy for Kasper to figure out that he was indeed in a hospital. The stiff tubes of flowing oxygen in his nostrils and the distinct scent of disinfectant gave that away even though he couldn’t yet open his eyes, a side effect of the anesthesia, he suspected. Because of it, Kasper spent more time in that in-between world than he would have liked, shuffling through memories he could not quite grasp, both good and bad. There was also the sound of voices he was almost sure could not be real.

  More powerful than anything was a stifling feeling that reached out for him. Apathetic and bland, it was a strangely powerful force that Kasper felt the need to fight against, though he had little strength to do so. And without knowing why, and though it had no visible body, he wanted to tell the force of Emilia, of how much he loved her and of how they needed one another, of all the things he wanted to do for her. The foolish girl even wanted to have a child with him! With him! But if the force took him away, there would be none of that, and as grateful as Kasper was for the short happiness he had experienced, he had always been a greedy man, and he wanted more—more joy, more love, more Emilia.