Page 17 of Hiding Rose
Chapter Five
The past week has been filled with interviews, background checks, and training. It’s surprising how quickly you can get people in place when everyone is motivated to achieve the same goal. I was working only part-time in the center now, with Winnie working part-time opposite the hours I worked. She refused to leave me to work full-time, so it was a good compromise while we trained the new staff. Quick thinking on my part had us applying to be a teaching center for the vocational college. Once a student finishes their studies, they need to complete eighty hours of supervised teaching in a licensed facility. If Kupid’s Play Castle is approved, we will have a steady source of assistants rotating through the center. Considering we will be open far more hours than most centers, we have plenty of opportunities for students to learn. I’m excited about the chance to be tied to the vocational college. It benefits them to have a reputable business to connect their students to, and it benefits us by giving us validation to parents and guests. We pay the students minimum wage, so our costs are considerably lower as well. We’re hoping in the process we’ll retain a few of the students as workers for the evening and weekend shifts.
Ellie and I hired two full-time teachers from the applicants we started with. Anai is twenty-four, but has been a teacher in an outside center for two years. She’s happy, bubbly, and the babies love her. We brought her in the first day to introduce her to the center, and after ten minutes she sat down on the floor and spent time with each child. She even made block towers with Bim, using hand massage to trick his little fingers into doing the tasks. She stayed the rest of the day, and came back the next day ready to go. Training her was nothing more than giving her the center’s rules and regulations, the basics of the facility, and the information on each child.
Kaleen is twenty-two and new to teaching, but with a four-year degree in early childhood special education, we were lucky to get her. She’s already talked with Lei and Niko about a plan to further Bim’s therapy and she’s only been here a week. She makes the kids happy whenever she’s in the room, and if a child is especially unhappy she cuddles, rocks, or carries them while cooing. You think she’s focused on only the child in her arms, but she’s always acutely aware of what’s going on in the rest of the room.
I couldn’t be happier with our choices and told Gideon we were lucky to get them both. Things were moving along quickly. They would move faster once I knew if we were adding an addition or using the rooms we have.
“Rosie, wait up,” called a voice and I stopped, swiveling to see Niko, Lei’s husband, jogging toward me. He came to Maui as a favor to Gideon to help them find the person after Lei, but he fell in love with her and never left. He works part-time for Gideon as his head of security. The rest of the time he works in Honolulu with the children’s hospital, making 3D braces for kids with limb disabilities. He’s also been working to find Jarrett since I arrived here.
“Hi, Niko, what’s up?” I asked, bracing the crutches on the floor to take some pressure off my leg.
He crooked a finger toward Lei’s small office, which was hidden behind the reception desk. I followed him into the room and he twisted the desk chair out for me to sit. He closed the door and sat across from me, his hands braced on his thighs.
“Is this about Jarrett?” I asked, fear spiraling in my belly. “Did you find him?”
He shook his head, his lips in a grim line. “Not yet. It’s like he’s fallen off the face of the earth. Maybe you shot him and he ran off and died somewhere.”
I shook my head. “No, not possible. There was a bullet in the wall from where my shot went wide before I passed out. There was only one other bullet missing from the gun they recovered, which is the one he put in my leg. He’s out there somewhere,” I insisted, my voice not as confident as I wanted. It wavered and shook every time I spoke of him. Last Friday I didn’t want to leave my apartment or my bed. I sat on the chair staring at the door for what seemed like hours, but I couldn’t bring myself to get up and walk out it. All I could think about was the baby I lost because its father was an animal. He or she would have been due on Friday, and I imagined what they might have looked like, how they would have felt in my arms, and how wonderful it would be to know I was a mommy. Kate and Winifred found me and, after an hour of crying, coaxing, and coffee, they convinced me spending time with the babies would help my heart heal.
My hand went to the necklace I wore. It was a small sterling silver angel, and the back was engraved with, ‘mommy of an angel’. There was a small garnet in the angel’s gown to signify January’s birthstone, the month my baby would have been born. Kate gave it to me Friday afternoon and I haven’t taken it off since. She doesn’t know how much it means to me to have someone acknowledge my child, instead of pretending he or she didn’t exist.
“I’ll keep searching, Rosie. Gideon and I won’t stop until we find him. If you haven’t noticed, he and I don’t give up easily,” he said, winking once.
Now there was an understatement if I ever heard one. When Lei was in trouble, it was Niko who figured out the people who were after her were tied to her parents’ death, and his father. It took a near drowning, a gun fight, an exploding yacht, and a few nights on a deserted island for Niko to uncover the truth. Now their little family is a huge part of Kupid’s Arrow.
“I know you won’t, and I trust you’ll do everything you can, but promise me you’ll make it the lowest priority. You have a ton of other commitments. Lei and Bim need you, too.”
He nodded. “It’s no problem. I work on it at night once Bim is in bed and when Lei is working or resting with him. Now, I brought you here for a reason and I don’t want you to get mad.”
“Oh boy,” I sighed. “What did Kate ask you to talk to me about now?” I asked.
He held his hands up and waved them. “No, she didn’t put me up to this. Interestingly enough, Sawyer is the one who approached me about it.”
“Sawyer? What is this about, Niko?” I asked perplexed.
“This is about you, or rather your leg,” he said pointing at my left leg. “I’ve noticed how your foot is slowly rotating outward and it’s making it hard for you to walk with the crutches. Sawyer has noticed too, and he’s worried because you’re in pain all the time. He asked if I had a way to keep the leg from twisting any further until you can be seen by the doctor.”
I glanced down at the offending foot. “I think it has something to do with the nerve damage, but I can’t get in to see the new doctor until next month. I’m dealing with it the best I can. Sawyer? I’m still not sure why he would approach you.” The night in my apartment when he kissed me flooded my memory. Maybe the kiss, and his desire for more, had something to do with it.
He smiled sadly and nodded, laying his hand on my arm. “I know you are, and you’re doing a great job, but I want to help you. The only condition is, I’m not a doctor, so it’s temporary and you do need to keep your appointment in Honolulu.”
I cocked my head to the left, working out in my mind what he was saying. “Of course, it’s a given. How do you think you can help?”
He reached for a briefcase and laid it on the desk, flipping open the lid. “I want to scan your leg and design a brace on the 3D printer to hold your foot in a more natural position. All you have to do is sit and let me take the measurements. I’ll send it to my lab tech in Honolulu to be made. He’ll send it back here in a few days and we’ll try it on. The material is a polymer plastic, which means I can heat it up, push out areas, cut down areas, or do whatever adjustments need to be made here without it going back to Honolulu.”
I looked down at my foot and back to him. “You’d do that for me?” I asked stunned. “I—I never thought of using a brace to hold the leg in position. Do you think it will hurt less?”
He did the so-so hand motion. “We won’t know until we try it, but my patients usually tell me it doesn’t fatigue as easily, because the brace is doing the work for the damaged nerves and muscles. Obviously, I don’t want you to wear it forever, only until you see the doctor and he can make a determination on the best course of treatment. It’s a stopgap measure to get you through and make you a little bit more comfortable. I would want you to wear it only when you’re up and about. At home keep it off, do your exercises and anything else you’ve been doing the past months.”
I laughed sarcastically. “Sure, as if those have helped at all. The damn thing is getting worse instead of better. I don’t see how it could hurt to keep the leg straight. If nothing else, it might make my hip feel better and spasm less, right?”
He nodded, an encouraging smile on his face. “If the muscles don’t have to do all the work to keep it straight, they won’t spasm as much. It will give you a more natural gait too, which will align your body and take stress off your larger joints.”
“How does it work? Like how do I wear it?” I asked.
“It will look exactly like Bim’s braces. Small, white, held on by Velcro, and slips inside your shoe. There are straps around the calf and one across the top of the foot. Dress shoes will be difficult, but I don’t think you wear those much anyway.”
