Page 35 of The Number of Love
We?He darted a glance at Margot De Wilde and her dark eyes. She made no correction, but then, she wouldn’t, would she? Not now. She just wouldn’t come back if she didn’t want to.
Dot was already on her feet, chasing after an as-yet-nameless nurse who was passing by the door. “Nurse! Excuse me!”
Drake dug his fingers in again in the effort to keep his face clear of pain for Margot De Wilde’s sake.
She shifted, and for a moment he thought she’d get up and chase after Dot. But no. She slid over to Dot’s chair and leaned down. Actually leaned down, closer to him, until the scent of lemons met his nose.
Then she said, “You’re an idiot, Drake Elton.”
He was too tired to so much as lift his head from the pillow it had fallen back against. “Am I?” She could well be on to something. Surely only an idiot would be more concerned with how he appeared to a veritable stranger than with his actual condition.
“You told the admiral that your sister is emotionally fragile.”
His eyes had drooped, but he forced them fully open now. “I don’t believe I ever used those exact words.”
“They were the ones he used with me, and I daresay they got at the heart of whatever your exact words were. And if you think that about her, you’re an idiot.”
Her eyes positively burned. Her cheeks had a pretty flush to them. But somehow he had a feeling that if he said so, she’d slap him. And he wasn’t exactly in prime condition for such a response. So he settled for a tight-lipped smile that she probably interpreted as condescending. “I appreciate that you feel the need to champion her. But I’ve known my sister a fair bit longer than you have.”
“I think she doesn’tneeda champion. Going out every day when it’s so difficult—that is bravery, Lieutenant. That is strength.” Now she stood. No emotion clouded her face—she probably kept it off with ratios and proportions and rates and angles—but those eyes still snapped beautifully. “You of all people should know that.” Pushing the chairs back to make room, she stalked into the aisle and out the door.
Drake let his eyes slide closed and tried not to smile.
A moment later, Dot’s step sounded, along with a second set. And Dot’s voice hissed in his ear. “What did you say to her? She was upset.”
She could tell, beyond all that careful control? Theymustbe friends. Drake peeled his eyes open. “Didn’t say anything.” Much.
She scowled at him. “Be kind to her, Drake—her mother just died on Wednesday, very unexpectedly.”
“What?” He jerked, winced, hissed with the pain, and made no objection when Nurse Anonymous elbowed Dot aside to help him lie down. Why hadn’t she said something sooner? Or why hadn’t he been able to tell that something so massive had just struck? Or, better still, why had Margot De Wilde even come here today, so soon after such tragedy? As the nurse settled him, he ground out between his teeth, “I wasn’t unkind. I wouldn’t be. She’s your friend.”
But she wasn’t like Ada, that was for sure. Margot De Wilde wasn’t the sort of friend he’d be kind to but avoid whenever he could. No, Margot De Wilde was a different sort of friend altogether.
Dot huffed and came around to the other side of his cot. “All right.I won’t badger you.” She leaned down, kissed his cheek once more. “Rest well andgetwell. Do you understand me? I’ll tolerate nothing less than a full recovery.”
Her words were so strong, so brave—like Margot claimedshewas—but he saw the shadows in her eyes. The ones that saidYou can’t die too.And if Margotdidn’tsee those ... maybeshewas the idiot.
Perhaps he’d tell her so sometime. And see what her ratios did for her then.
11
Emptiness surrounded her. Somehow it wove through the usual chatter of the room, snuck in behind thethunkof the pneumatic tubes, edged out the scratching of pens and pencils, the clicks and clacks anddingsof the typewriters. So much busyness.
But empty. Margot squeezed her eyes shut, but that only amplified the problem. Her desk wasn’t empty. The room wasn’t empty. The building wasn’t empty. But that part of her own mind where it never had been before ...thatwas all silent, echoing darkness.
Like a grave. She blinked her eyes open again and just stared at the half-blank page before her. Instead of the neat columns of numbers and decrypted words she’d written down, she saw that gaping black hole into which they’d lowered Maman last week.
“Herheart,” Lukas had said last night. That’s what the doctor had decided it must have been. He’d never detected any problems with it before, but the cold she’d caught, the fever she was probably running, could have exacerbated an unknown condition.
But that couldn’t be, and she’d said as much to her brother. “That’s how Papa died.” Why she had to remind him of this, she didn’t know. Shouldn’t he have seen the obvious when the doctor said such nonsense? “It’s highly unlikely that Maman would have died of the same condition. Do you know what the chance of that is?”
Her brother had sighed, his face going hard. “Is the chance zero?”
“Of course not, but—”
“Then it does not matter, does it? Even if there is only a five percent chance, then that means it happens occasionally. And it did. It happened now. For whatever reason, however unlikely, they are both gone, and from the same malady.”
“No.” She’d said it last night over dinner. She thought it again now over her stalled work. Perhaps it had made sense that Papa’s heart had failed him—he was not in prime physical condition. She could recognize that now. Hours at a desk had taken their toll, and he wasn’t exactly trim. But Maman was different. Maman was nearly militant about taking her exercise. Maman never overindulged—and seldom indulged at all these days—on sweets. Maman’s heart ought to have been in perfect condition.
