Save My Soul (9 page)

"Typical bitches," I
whispered.

"What?" Mason grinned at
me.

I shook my head. "Nothing." I looked
around and found a stool with wheels on it. I started to sit
down.

Mason shook his head and pointed at
the cot. "Shoes and socks off."

I gave him one of my best looks; one
that plainly asked a person, "Really?"

He shrugged. "I could have you strip
down and put one of these on." He held up a hospital gown, complete
with missing backside. I hopped up on the cot without another word
and slipped my shoes and socks off.

He got something out of a drawer that
looked like a small metal gavel. One end was pointy and made of
metal, and the other end was rubber. He took my foot gently in his
hand, and with the other hand he ran the pointy end from heel to
toe. I shrieked and almost fell off the cot, but he caught me. He
was laughing as he helped me sit back up straight and then did the
same to the other foot. My reaction wasn't as bad that time because
I knew what was coming.

He used the rubber end of the
contraption to check my reflexes. "You're good. You can put those
back on, and then I'll check your vitals." He wrote on a chart as I
put my socks and shoes back on.

"Is that my chart?" I asked. He nodded
then laid it down. He picked up the blood pressure cuff and placed
it gently around my arm. I was looking at him the whole time, but
he was focusing on his task. He had to be really good at his job to
not get distracted by a woman he had a date with
tonight.

Oh shit, I'd forgotten I had to
cancel. He was so distracting. I looked up at him. He had to be a
decent person if he was a nurse, right? He cared about people. It
wasn't my fault that Rhyan couldn't find his guardian angel. He or
she may be on vacation for all I knew. I knew I needed to cancel,
but I just really, really didn't want to.

He had me breathe in and out several
times while he listened with his stethoscope. He placed it on my
back and listened to my lungs, then moved it to my chest and had me
breathe deeply again. My heart was beating normally at first, then
I thought about him with his shirt off the day before and it went
into overdrive.

He looked at my face and gave me a
strange look. "Are you all right?"

I nodded and turned my head, a little
embarrassed. "I was only thinking."

He smiled and put the stethoscope
around his neck. "I would like to be in your head and know what
you're thinking right now."

"I'm sure you would." I said a little
flirtatiously. He was already in my space so I leaned a little
closer. He seemed to realize what I wanted him to do, but he backed
up and wrote something in my chart instead of meeting me in the
middle. Well. That had been the first move I'd ever made on a guy
that had backfired.

"So, did you get anything accomplished
with Adam?"

I huffed. "He makes me so angry. I
swear I could bite through metal nails if I had any."

He chuckled. "It went that well, huh?
He kind of has that effect on people until you get to know him." He
seemed to realize that I wasn't in a joking mood. His expression
changed to concern and he rolled the stool over to the cot and sat
down. "Look, don't get discouraged. We'll think of
something."

I hopped down from the cot. "I don't
have time to get to know him. I only have six days
left."

He slowly blinked. "Do you really
think you only have six days left?"

My eyes grew wide. "I thought you
believed me."

He grabbed my hand. "I do…I do,
Kendra. It's just a lot to take in. I don't see why God would take
your life over this though. Do you understand what I'm
saying?"

I nodded. "It wasn't God I made the
deal with. It was Coen, and he tricked me. Not only will I die in
six days, well, actually five and a half, but I'll lose my soul,
too."

"Well, it sounds like Coen may have
made a deal with the Devil instead of God." He stood and hugged me.
"We'll get this figured out. I'll kick Adam's ass myself if I have
to."

I laughed through tears, and
nodded.

"I'll see you tonight, and I won't
leave until we come up with something." He tilted my head up by my
chin. "Okay?"

I knew I should break the date, but I
couldn't do it. He was going to help me find a way to convince Adam
I was telling the truth. I nodded my head and smiled. "I'll see you
tonight."

Mason walked me, past the two cackling
nurses, to the elevator. Of course they shut up the moment they saw
us. I looked at my watch when we stopped at the elevator. It was
11:45 a.m. Damn, there was no way I'd be able to get out of here
and out of the city in fifteen minutes. Truth be known, the traffic
was already at a standstill.

Mason picked up on my agitation and he
smiled. "You aren't going to get out of the city in time, are
you?"

I shook my head. "It doesn't look like
it."

He lifted my hand that he was still
holding and kissed my knuckles. I wanted more than that, but if
that was all I could have right now, so be it. What the hell was
wrong with me? I'd never acted this way before. "I'll see you at
6:30."

I hesitated and he caught it. I spoke
before he could. "I don't know how tonight will go between us
Mason, but with everything that's going on right now with Adam, and
my imminent death," I shrugged. "I have a lot of work to do in the
next couple of weeks, senior pictures and a few other things. I
just think after tonight, we need to wait until after I find out if
I am going to live or not. Now is not the time for me to get
distracted."

He ran the back of his fingers along
my cheek. "You're so beautiful."

I smiled as I blushed. "You're
distracting me, Mason."

"Not on purpose." He leaned in to
smell of my hair. "Mmmm, I think that you're the one distracting
me."

I was having trouble breathing. I
couldn't think straight with him standing this close to me. He
smelled so good. I think he was wearing Pleasures. Aven wore it
sometimes. It was one of my favorites. I threw his line back at
him. "Not on purpose."

I heard him breathe a soft laugh.
"I'll see you tonight and we'll get the Adam thing resolved. Then I
can distract you all I want, deal?"

I nodded. I definitely wanted to be
distracted by him when this all blew over. The elevator dinged and
I pulled away from him. When the doors opened, Adam was standing
there looking at us.

He nodded at Mason.
"Mason,"

Mason nodded back and flashed those
pearly whites. "Dr. Chamberlain,"

Adam looked back at me and sighed.
"I'd like to finish our conversation if that's all right with you,
Ms. Larkin." I heard shuffling and I looked back at the nurse's
desk. The two brunettes were no longer cackling hens. They were
running around like chickens with their heads cut off. I rolled my
eyes and looked back at Adam. I was still irritated with him, but
at least he was willing to talk to me.

I looked back at Mason and he let go
of my hand. "You want me to go with you?"

"No, I think I can handle him all by
myself." I said as I stepped into the elevator beside
Adam.

"I had no doubts, Kendra." He smiled
and the doors closed, shutting me inside the small box with the guy
who was in total control of my fate.

We didn't go back up to the fourth
floor like I thought that we would. He had hit the "G" button in
the elevator, and the doors opened to the garage.

I expected to walk up to a Corvette or
Porsche, they seemed like the kind of vehicle a doctor would drive,
but he surprised me when he unlocked a bright red 1967 Ford Shelby
Mustang GT500. I may be a photographer, but cars have always been
something I've taken an interest in.

I let out a low whistle, and he looked
up at me. There was still no smile on his face. Man, he was going
to be hard to save. I thought as he unlocked my door from the
inside. I got in. I wasn't worried about him killing me and hauling
my body off to bury it in the woods somewhere. Mason and two other
nurses had seen me leave with him. I really didn't think I could
count on the hens, but I was counting on Mason.

"So…where're you taking me during
lunch rush hour? You do know that it will take us forever to get
there, and then get back." He didn't respond so I looked at my
watch. It was straight up twelve o'clock.

He pulled out of the garage and took a
right. He turned left down an alley and then turned right again at
the end. We were close to the older part of the city now, and
traffic wasn't nearly as bad here. He continued in that direction,
and soon we were completely out of town, heading north.

The radio was off, and I couldn't hear
anything but the soft purring of the big engine. He wanted to
finish the conversation, but he wasn't talking at all, just
driving. Maybe I should start. "So…where are you taking me?" I
asked again. A few moments passed and he didn't say anything. I
slumped back in my seat and looked out the window.

About fifteen miles north of the city,
he turned down a gravel road. He did just as I expected he would
do, the car was doing only a little more than idling. At least he
took care of what he had. I could see a big hill and a long line of
trees up ahead.

We finally reached the top of the hill
and, before my eyes was one of the biggest graveyards that I'd ever
seen. I knew then that my assumption must've been correct about his
family being dead. Crap! How was I supposed to deal with this? I'd
never lost anyone close to me. I even still had both sets of
grandparents. The only thing I had ever really lost was my gold
fish when I was seven. I hadn't taken it well, so I didn't get
another pet again until I found Hercules. Actually, I should say
Hercules found me. He showed up at my front door when he was no
older than six or seven weeks old. I didn't know how he got there,
but it was love at first sight.

I spoke in my head and
hoped he was listening.
"Rhyan, help me.
How do I deal with this? What should I tell him?"
I didn't get a response, but I really wasn't
expecting one. They were counting on me to do this. If they could
have done it, it would have already been done by now, and I
wouldn't be fearing for my life.

Adam stopped the car in the middle of
the cemetery and killed the engine. He opened his door and got out.
He stood there a moment, then bent at the waist and glared in at
me. "Are you coming?"

I glared back at him for a moment,
then opened my door and got out. It was hot already, and there were
very few shade trees nearby.

He walked, and I followed him. We
didn't have to go far before he stopped and looked down. I didn't
want to look down, but I did. There were three beautiful
tombstones, one big one and two smaller ones. The largest had two
names on it; Daniel Lee Chamberlain and Sylvia Ann Chamberlain. The
dates they were born were different, but the dates that they were
laid to rest were the same. It read at the bottom: In Loving Memory
a Husband and Father a Wife and Mother.

The stone beside that one was a
single, and the date of rest was the same as her parents. Heather
Lynn Chamberlain's name was written in stone. "An angel taken too
soon," her stone read. She had been only seventeen on the day or
night that she and her parents perished.

I felt him watching me, waiting to see
some kind of reaction. What did he want to see? I finally moved on
to the last headstone. I don't know what I expected, but it wasn't
this. I guess I expected Adam's plot to be bought and paid for,
with his name and birth date carved, but missing the final letters
and numbers that would let a passer-by know when the man in the
ground had died. It wasn't what I expected at all, and I knew it
must have been showing on my face.

I stared at the stone for a long time.
Now I understood why Adam wouldn't want to believe. How, if there
was a God, could he take a thirteen-year-old boy's whole family
away from him? I had always heard that God wouldn't put more on you
than you could stand. How strong would a child have to be to endure
this kind of misery? I stared down at the last tombstone. I
realized I was sobbing, and knew then that I had been doing it for
a while. Benjamin Lee Chamberlain was the name on the third
headstone. I hadn't expected this because I didn't see any pictures
of another sibling on Adam's desk. Then I read the date through my
tears. Adam's baby brother had only been two days old.

"Oh my God," I sobbed around the lump
in my throat, and then fell to my knees. I still believed in God,
and I knew that he wasn't the cause of this obvious accident. But
how would a thirteen-year-old boy feel about everything he loved
being ripped from his life? He was a big brother for only two days.
Had he even gotten to hold him?

I looked up at Adam through my
tears.

"I don't want your sympathy," he said
quietly.

What else did I have to give
him?