General Travis patted her back. “I’m sorry, Captain.”
She nodded, and managed to keep the tears at bay.
This was why she kept people at distance, why she never let anyone in. Because in an instant they could be taken from you. They left. They died.
Kainan had wormed his way in past her defenses and now he was gone.
She was alone.
Completely alone.
She should have known better. She was meant to be alone.
It was easier that way.
A year later, Toronto
REAGAN WALKED THROUGH the halls of the hospital in a daze. There wasn’t enough coffee in the world to wake her up. It had been a long shift at the hospital and then her infant son had a bad night. The cot in her son’s hospital room in the pediatric critical care unit wasn’t exactly comfortable, and she could use a break to go home and have a shower.
The problem was there was no one to give her a break.
It was just her and Peter in the world.
A year ago she’d spent an unforgettable night in Kainan’s arms. A night that she would cherish forever. Then he’d gone to the front lines and died for his country.
She’d come back to her life in Toronto, empty and alone.
Although it had turned out she was not completely alone, because her one night with Kainan had resulted in pregnancy.
It was the best gift.
A piece of Kainan.
A child.
Someone to love.
And she wasn’t going to make Peter feel like a mistake, the way her parents had made her feel.
Nothing she’d ever done had pleased them.
Her father had never wanted kids. When her mother had got pregnant with Reagan he’d stuck around, but he had always been distant. Over time, her mother had come to resent her for causing such distance in her marriage.
There had been times when she’d got shreds of love and affection from her mother, but it they had been few and far between.
She’d thought maybe being grandparents would soften her parents’ hearts.
She’d been wrong.
When she’d told her mother about the situation—about the baby and the father dying—her mother’s response had been heartless. Painful.
“Get rid of the problem, Reagan. You can’t raise a baby on your own.”
“I’m not getting rid of the baby, Mother.”
“Then what do you want from me, Reagan?”
Honestly, she didn’t know. Some part of her had hoped her mother would change, but she should have known better.
Reagan had always been a burden to them. And her getting pregnant overseas on a mission was just another disappointment for her parents. They were even more disappointed that she’d kept the baby.
As soon as Reagan had found out she was pregnant she’d vowed that she’d protect Peter. She’d give him the love she had never had, the compassion she had to learn by herself.
No one would hurt Peter. Ever.
Her parents had never cared about her. They’d only taken care of her because they were legally obligated to do so.
“I’ve never run from my mistakes, Reagan. That’s why I took care of you. At the time, abortion wasn’t an option.”
Reagan was a mistake. It hurt to hear it time and time again.
She focused on the lukewarm coffee she was drinking.
A baby had never been in her plan, but she was responsible for her actions. There were plenty of single parents out there, going it alone. And she would do the same. She would never let Peter feel as if he was an obligation or a mistake.
But what should have been one of the most joyous days of her life, when Peter was born, had quickly turned into her worst nightmare.
In all her years as an intern and then a resident in hospital, and then her time in the field with the Canadian military, serving as a trauma surgeon during natural disasters and being tossed into the fray of war zones, she’d seen many sick children. Critically ill children. It had always been a deep-rooted fear of hers that one day, if she ever had a child, something might happen to that child.
She had never been able to handle the thought of it.
And then it had happened.
She’d had Peter.
“Let me see him!” she’d cried, relieved that the birth was over.
Only none of the doctors had answered her. Marisa, her OB/GYN, hadn’t looked at her. It was in that moment that Reagan had realized the baby wasn’t crying. There wasn’t a sound coming from him at all.
“What’s wrong?” Reagan had asked.
She’d craned her neck as Marisa had turned back to her, watching the pediatrician on call with her baby in his hands, blue-grey and barely moving.
It had only been a couple of hours later when she’d learned that her baby had cardiomyopathy and would be staying in the hospital indefinitely. The only reminder of her and Kainan’s time together was placed on the list for UNOS and would be staying there while he waited for a new heart.
The nursery she had so painstakingly started to prepare in her small apartment before his birth was still unused, and she hadn’t been able to look at it the few fleeting times she’d managed to get home.
Don’t think about it—and don’t think about Kainan.
Even a year since his death often Kainan crept into her thoughts because Peter looked like him so much. And she couldn’t help but wonder what it would have been like had Kainan lived.
Reagan had had a couple of relationships before Kainan, but they’d failed because of her—because she couldn’t trust. At the back of her mind she was terrified she’d disappoint, that she’d never be good enough and her heart would be broken. Again.
It was better this way.
She was better off alone.
“Reagan, you look like you didn’t get a wink of sleep!”
Reagan rubbed her tired, sore eyes and saw the Chief of Surgery leaning over the central desk, where he’d been studying a chart.
Michael McNeil had been so understanding. He’d trained her as a resident, and encouraged her into the Canadian Armed Forces to expand her skills, and since she’d announced her pregnancy and Peter’s birth he’d been accommodating, knowing she needed to work. Right now he was looking at her with pity. Like most people. She hated pity.
“We need better cots on the NICU floor,” she mumbled, stifling a yawn.
“Are you going to be able to work with this new doctor?” he asked.
Reagan nodded. She needed this job. It was more pay, and not so much time spent doing surgical rounds. Right now she couldn’t do a lot of surgery. A call about a heart might come in at any time, and she needed to be near Peter.
Peter was all she had.
She really needed sleep, but right now she needed work more. It kept her sane. And she was looking forward to this new job. It was more flexible.
“Yeah,