Karen Smith - The Bracelet

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Epilogue

“You’ve got to tell Sean and Kat what happened over there!” Laura Malone couldn’t keep her voice calm, couldn’t keep fear from beating against her chest, couldn’t alleviate the turmoil in her husband’s eyes.

After yanking off his tie, Brady tossed it on top of his desk. “Sean’s going to believe what he wants anyway. He doesn’t listen to anything I say. He hasn’t for years.”

Eighteen now, Sean admired his father. Yet in a way, that was the reason they disagreed as often as they did. Sean felt he couldn’t live up to his dad’s expectations. Kat? Kat adored her dad and would listen to any explanation he gave.

“If you don’t talk to them, they’ll hear the reporters spin the story. It might even make the eleven o’clock news. Sean could hear about it at baseball practice. Kat’s been upstairs with her headphones on since she got home from school and is oblivious for the moment. But as soon as she comes down, she’ll see the news vans and have questions.” At fourteen, their daughter was always full of questions.

Anxiety and worry had arrived on the Malone doorstep with the evening paper. Laura couldn’t believe the local reporter had dug into Brady’s service records and then snooped until he’d found someone to talk to him. She couldn’t believe he’d unearthed the details of what had happened to her husband thirty-seven years ago. Just because Brady would soon be honored with the York, Pennsylvania, Millennium Club’s Man of the Year Award….

He was such a tall man, such a strong man, usually so full of energy, his blue eyes so intense and clear. As she studied her husband of thirty-three years, she realized he’d taken control of his emotions as he always had. He’d withdrawn and was hiding them from her.

He looked so tired. When he’d returned home from the office, he’d found the news vans outside and the newspaper article he didn’t want to deal with.

Their phone rang insistently. More reporters. Probably Brady’s sister. They’d had Easter dinner with her like a normal family yesterday. Today…

“The reporters can do what they want, say what they want, spin what they want.” Apparently Brady wasn’t able to check all of his anger. It edged every word. “The past is in the past.”

That had been her husband’s mantra for years. She’d never agreed. But she’d gone along because she loved him…because she wanted their marriage to be solid…because she understood why he wouldn’t want to dig the past up. “I’m afraid that with all this Sean will start drinking again. We think he’s stopped. But do we really know?”

Brady’s angular face was tight with strain as he ran his hand through his black hair. “Sean’s ready to live his own life. You worry too much about him.”

Her voice rose in spite of her efforts to keep calm. “Maybe you don’t worry enough! You think grounding him when he gets out of hand is all the attention he needs.”

She hated fighting with Brady. Arguments during their marriage had been rare. But lately, they were at odds more often, especially over the kids.

“Sean needs to learn how to handle life on his own,” Brady protested. “Once he goes to college—”

“Then you won’t have to deal with him. Maybe if you did…if you faced the kids learning about what happened in Vietnam—”

As Brady turned away from her, she thought he was putting up his guard again. She thought he was going to shut down, walk away and—

Brady’s palm went to his chest. One shoulder sagged and he collapsed onto the carpet.

“Brady! Brady,” she called as if she expected him to lever himself off the floor and be fine. Then reality struck. She ran to him and fell on her knees beside him, shouting for their daughter.

But it wasn’t Kat who appeared at the door. It was Sean, in his baseball uniform. His face was almost as pale as Brady’s.

He rushed to his dad. “What’s wrong with him?”

“I think he’s having a heart attack.” Shaking off her panic, Laura felt light-headed. This man was her love…her life. She couldn’t lose him. She couldn’t.

Brady’s face turned gray as sweat beaded his brow.

Strands of light brown hair escaped Laura’s ponytail and brushed her cheeks as she laid her hand on her husband’s chest. “Brady? Brady! Can you hear me?”

He wasn’t breathing.

She almost panicked. Then she knew what she had to do. She directed Sean, “Help me—you know CPR.”

She tilted Brady’s head back and listened, desperate to hear breaths. She heard none. Checking for a pulse, she found none.

“I’ve never worked on a real person.” Her son’s voice shook.

Pinching Brady’s nose, she covered his mouth with hers and blew until his chest rose, then checked for a pulse again. She still didn’t feel one. “Start the compressions.”

Sean knelt beside his father and did what he’d learned in a summer safety class.

After Laura administered two breaths, she stared at Brady, hoping for signs of life. Tears burned in her eyes as she thought about their argument.

“What’s going on? I heard you yell—” Kat froze as she saw her father collapsed in front of the bookshelves.

“Call 911,” Sean shouted at her. “Dad’s having a heart attack. Call them now!”

She stood immobilized.

Watching Brady’s chest rise and fall, monitoring Sean’s compressions, ready to give measured breaths again, Laura fought for calm and said, “Kat, pick up the phone and call 911.”

As Kat crossed to the desk, Laura breathed into her husband, knowing she loved him as much as life itself. She would do anything in her power to save him.

Brady’s heart attack was her fault. Her fault.

As guilt ate at Laura, she knew she had to be strong for Sean and Kat. She couldn’t cry. But her abhorrence of hospitals had her trembling inside. This waiting room for the cardiac intensive care unit was supposed to be an oasis in the midst of mayhem. Outside of its walls there were shiny tile floors, glass cubicles, nurses clad in scrubs and patients the staff couldn’t save.

Her first encounter with York General Hospital had come when she was twelve. Her parents had suffered a terrible automobile accident and they’d been brought here. They’d both died a few days apart. Early in her marriage to Brady, three miscarriages had been confirmed here. Their child who’d died of SIDS had been autopsied here.

She’d thought she’d learned to steel herself when she walked into the bright atrium lobby, trying to wrap a protective layer around herself—some kind of barrier that would remove her from everything that was going on behind the doors, on upper floors, in operating rooms. But even as recently as last year, when she’d brought Kat to the E.R. after a skateboarding accident, she’d known she could never protect herself from what happened in this building. It had only taken her fifty-eight years to learn that.

Worried sick about Brady, waiting to hear from the cardiologist, she glanced at Sean and Kat, who were seated on the long sofa, still in shock and silent.

A white-coated doctor finally strode into the room. “Mrs. Malone?”

She realized so many of the doctors she saw in this time of her life were younger than she was. This one appeared to be in his forties. His brown hair, parted to one side, dipped boyishly over his brow. However, when she looked into his gray eyes, she saw the maturity he needed to do what he did.