Night Watch (Kendra Michaels #4)(2)

CHAPTER

1

Pepperdine University

Malibu, California “ANY QUESTIONS?”

Kendra Michaels looked out at the four-hundred-odd seminar participants at Pepperdine’s Elkins Auditorium. She’d just delivered her latest research paper at a conference on aging, and it had seemed to go well. She’d documented several success stories using music therapy to treat Alzheimer’s patients, but there was still resistance in the medical community. Not as much as there had been only a couple of years ago, when most academics still put her in the alternative-therapies woo-woo column.

She had helped move that needle, one study, one paper, one boring academic conference at a time.

Try not to go on autopilot, she told herself. Stay in the moment.

But how could she, when she knew that the man in the front row was obviously angry with his colleague about something. His pursed lips, narrowed eyes, and clenched fingers told the story as she watched him make small talk before the presentation. And how about that female brain surgeon who clearly hadn’t operated on anyone in months? And, sadly, probably wouldn’t again, if the slight tremor in her left hand was any indication.

Stay in the here and now. Answer the questions with crystal clarity and politeness even as condescending as some of them were. She’d show them.

She looked up toward the back of the auditorium.

She froze.

It couldn’t be.

A man stood in the doorway, partially silhouetted by the light from the corridor beyond. She couldn’t make out his facial features, but she didn’t need to.

His ramrod-straight posture, impeccably tailored suit, crossed arms, and slight tilt of the head told her all she needed to know.

Dr. Charles Waldridge was in the room.

How long had it been since she’d seen him? Four years, maybe five. And then it had only been an accidental meeting at a conference. She felt the usual rush of excitement and intimidation. Suddenly everyone in the room faded but the man in the doorway. No one on earth had changed her life more. Why was he even on this continent?

Concentrate.

Get through with the questions.

She finished the Q & A, and as the participants left the auditorium, Waldridge moved down the aisle toward her.

“Well done, Kendra.”

He spoke in his British accent that always sounded distinctly upper-crust to Kendra, though she knew he’d grown up in a working-class neighborhood in South London. Waldridge was in his late forties, and he had a few more lines and gray hairs since she’d last seen him. But his angular good looks hadn’t faded, and the added maturity only made his face more intriguing.

And there was that ever-present fierce and intelligent spark in his dark eyes that had held her captive since the first instant she had seen him.

She smiled and came toward him. “Dr. Waldridge…”

“Please.” He made a face. “I thought we’d moved far beyond that. Why do you keep forgetting? It’s Charles.”

“Charles … I can’t help it. I still have trouble being informal with you, dammit. You catch me off guard and I’m that starstruck kid again.” She gave him a quick hug. “I didn’t see your name on the attendee list.”

“Because I’m not an attendee. This is a bit out of my specialty, you know.”

“Don’t tell me you’re teaching here?”

“Hardly. I haven’t taught anywhere since I left St. Bartholomew’s.” He stared deep into her eyes. “Everything okay?”

His stare made her uncomfortable even though she knew he was looking at her clinically. She fought the urge to look away. “Yes. My eyes are fine. No cloudiness, no watering.”

“Good. Have you been examined lately?”

“About a year ago. Still almost twenty-twenty.”

“Excellent.” He looked from right to left and back again, then spoke softly. “Everything I could have hoped for, Kendra.”

“I didn’t think doctors made house calls anymore.”

He smiled. “Only for very special patients. And you’ll always be very special to me.”

Kendra finally forced herself to look away. She’d been born blind and spent her first twenty years in the darkness. She knew she’d still be there had it not been for Waldridge and his experimental stem-cell procedure. She was nineteen when her mother had seen mention of the Night Watch Project in academic journals and brought her, uninvited, to the front door of Saint Bartholomew’s Hospital in London. Her mother had ruthlessly browbeaten Waldridge and his staff until they agreed to see Kendra and eventually grant her a spot in their test group.

“It’s been over nine years,” she said. “But this all still feels new to me. I don’t take it for granted. I never will.”

“Sight, you mean?”

“Yes. I’m still making discoveries. All the time.”

“You have a wonderfully inquisitive mind, Kendra. You always have. I could tell the first time I met you.”

“So why aren’t you in England poking around in that lab? There are a lot of other people in this world who need your help.”

“Oh, it’s the eternal problem. Finances. Research is expensive. There are occasions I have to leave the lab, hat in hand. This time it has brought me to your shores. But when I learned you were here, I knew I had to come see you in action.”