Lost and Found (Masters & Mercenaries: The Forgotten #2)(2)

The door came open again and a bleary-eyed intern stumbled out, pulling on his shirt. “But my pager didn’t go off.”

Melissa wasn’t taking no for an answer. “You’re needed in the ER. Better run, buddy.” She reached out and took Becca’s hand. “Come in here. We don’t need an audience.”

The door closed and the three of them were alone.

His eyes were steady as he looked down at her. “I didn’t want to interrupt your studies. Neither did your mother. Rebecca, this shouldn’t derail you. God, how can it not derail you? It’s derailing me. I love your mom. I love you, baby. I don’t know how to say it. I want to tell you that she’s sick and she’s going to get better.”

“But you can’t. She’s got Alzheimer’s. She’s young for it.” She might not have spent much time studying neurological conditions, but she knew this one. She knew the name of the disease that would kill her mother.

“It’s early onset,” Melissa agreed. “Only about five percent of patients get it this early. Your mom asked me to get some books for you to read. And there are a couple of classes you can take.”

She would feel better with a book in her hand. Things might make sense if she could understand what was happening in her mom’s head.

Becca went back over the last few years. How could she have missed it? Melissa would come over and stay the night sometimes when her father was on call. She would explain that she didn’t have anything better to do, and wasn’t it fun to have girl time?

She’d been making sure her mom didn’t hurt herself.

“Why is she in the hospital?” It was obvious they’d done a lot to keep this quiet.

“She took a hard fall down the stairs,” her father explained. “I think she forgot what she was doing and missed a step. They have to replace her hip. The disease has progressed to the dementia stage. It’s not bad yet, but I don’t know what to do. She’ll have to be in assisted living while she’s recovering.”

Bile threatened to boil over, the taste sickening in her throat. “You want to put her in a nursing home? I’ll take care of her. I’ll come home and do it. I’ve had enough training. What I don’t know, I can learn.”

She was a prodigy, after all. Oh, her father didn’t use that word around her. He claimed it wasn’t technically what she was. A genius-level IQ didn’t necessarily mean a prodigy. A prodigy was one who excelled in a certain area. Medicine wasn’t normally one of those areas, but she knew she could do it. She could certainly take care of her mother.

Her father once told her she was like a superhero, that she could be Super Doc if she tried hard enough. Saving lives in a single bound. She had no idea what a single bound had to do with anything, but her dad had been so happy as he’d said it, she’d pretended to understand his aged pop culture references.

He shook his head. “Absolutely not. You’re scheduled for a second summer session. You’ll be studying neurology. I thought that was apropos, and perhaps maybe it will help you understand what your mother is going through. You leave in two days.”

“No.” She couldn’t leave.

His jaw clenched. “I’m going to bring your mother home as soon as I can, but you shouldn’t see her like that.”

“She’s my mom. I love her. I should see her every way I can.” She stood up to him. They rarely fought, almost never because her father was a softy, but this was one fight she couldn’t lose. “I’ll take the classes here, but I’m staying home. I can help.”

Melissa was suddenly beside her. “And I’m taking a sabbatical.”

“We talked about this,” her dad began.

“Yes, we did. Sonja and I talked about this,” she admitted. “She doesn’t want me to give up my life, but taking care of people is my life. Now I have the chance to take care of one of the finest women I’ve ever met. Do you know the strength she’s given me? She got me through my divorce. She helped me walk away from an abusive bastard and find my strength. Now I’m going to give some of it back to her.”

Tears rolled down Becca’s cheeks and she took Melissa’s hand. “Me, too. If you send me away, I’ll come back and I’ll be by my mom’s side. I can do everything I need to do from home. You said I could be anything I wanted to be. I want to be a doctor. I want to help people. I’m going to start with my mother because you always said the best medicine is love.”

Her dad lost it. His clipboard dropped and he hit his knees, no longer able to control his grief.

Becca moved in, wrapping her arms around him, and oddly found comfort in knowing she could help.




Thirty minutes later, Melissa guided her to the door of her mom’s room. “You sure you don’t want me to go in with you?”

“I think Dad needs you more.” He was currently in the bathroom washing his face and trying to look professional. “Convince him to bring someone else in. He’s too emotional to be on call right now.”

Melissa nodded. “I will. I’ll order dinner for the two of you and I’ll stay here and watch your mom. Pizza okay?”

Anything would taste like cardboard. “Sure. Pepperoni and mushrooms, please. And thank you. Thanks for helping me convince him to let me stay.”