Her Off Off Broadway career had gone nowhere with Ivan. He had a thousand explanations and excuses, and begged her not to give up and be a commercial hack like her parents. He had nothing but contempt for what Abby’s mother wrote, no matter how successful she was. He felt that Abby had a much greater, purer talent, and he pleaded with her to hold out. So far she had. But at twenty-nine, she had nothing to show for it. And her parents felt sorry for her, and were sadly aware of how naïve she was.
Ivan left the theater early that night to meet with the partner of the backer he had met the night before. And Abby was relieved that there had been no sign of Daphne. Abby acted as house manager for him, and handled everything, as she always did. She got home at midnight, after everyone had gone to bed. The loft was quiet. And Ivan sent her a text message before she went to bed. He told her that he loved her. Everything seemed to be back on track with them again. Abby wasn’t worried about Daphne—she was just the conduit to the money they needed for the theater. And Ivan loved her. Abby was enormously relieved. That was all that mattered. The rest would fall into place sooner or later. All she had to do was keep believing in herself, and trust him, just as he said.
Chapter 5
Alex Scott went looking for Sasha in labor and delivery shortly before noon on Tuesday. He asked for her at the nurses’ station, and they told him she was finishing a C-section, and they estimated she’d be out in half an hour—she had already closed and the patient was going to recovery in a few minutes. He came back half an hour later and saw her heading for the nurses’ desk with a satisfied expression. Everything had gone well. He met up with her just before she got to the desk.
“Busy morning?” he asked pleasantly. He was happy to see her, and his own caseload was light that day. They’d had no big emergencies so far, and several of their patients from the day before had been moved to the healthy baby nursery.
“It’s been pretty civilized,” Sasha said easily. She had no one in labor at that precise moment, only patients she had already delivered, and the ones from the day before. It was a momentary lull. She had two patients on bed rest for early labor, and they had sent several moms and babies home.
“Let’s make a run for it then, before it gets crazy,” Alex suggested, about their lunch date. “You still want to eat in the cafeteria? We could try one of the nearby delis if you want something edible.”
“It would probably shock my system. I live on cafeteria food. And the minute we go anywhere decent, we’ll both have an emergency as soon as we sit down. It always happens to me if I try to eat anywhere when I’m on duty.” Usually she had no time to eat at all, except a PowerBar she kept in her pocket, and she looked it. She had a slim figure, and was no bigger than her model sister, who worked out every day and dieted ferociously.
They took the elevator to the cafeteria a minute later, making small talk about the food. She helped herself to yogurt, a salad, and a fruit plate, and then added a large chocolate chip cookie, while Alex got a hot meal. They found a quiet table near the window, so they could see the outside world. She noticed him looking at her intently as she set her plates on the table with the Diet Coke she’d picked up on the way.
“Are you on a diet?” he asked with curiosity.
“No, my sister always was, growing up. She trained me not to eat anything she liked so she wouldn’t want it. It’s pathetic, but I still eat that way. She hates fruit and vegetables and would live on doughnuts and cookies if she could,” Sasha grinned at him, and he laughed. She had an easy way about her, and seemed comfortable in her own skin, at the hospital at least. “She’s a model,” Sasha added for good measure.
“You could be too,” he said admiringly. She seemed to have no sense of her looks and wasn’t stuck up the way most pretty women were. He’d been burned by his fondness for beauties over the years. Sasha was a whole different breed, a woman with a brain, who was brilliant at what she did.
“Not if I want to stay sane,” Sasha said about being a model. “Although I guess what we do isn’t so sane either, but at least we don’t have to do it in a bikini standing in the snow, or a fur coat in summer, in seven-inch heels. Modeling isn’t as easy as it looks and I get to wear flat shoes.” She smiled at him across the table.
“Where are you from?” He could hear the faintest hint of an accent, but he wasn’t sure what it was.
“Atlanta. I moved here to go to NYU, and stayed for medical school. I was lucky I got in. I like it here.”
“Me too. I’m from Chicago. It’s a nice city. I miss it.” He didn’t tell her he’d gone to Yale undergrad, and Harvard medical school. It always sounded like bragging to him. His father and brother had gone to Harvard too. “Chicago is a little gentler than New York.”
“My mother is originally from here. She’s a lawyer,” Sasha said simply, and he nodded.
“So is mine—antitrust law. She loves it, but it never sounded like much fun to me. She wants to be a judge one day. She’d be good at it.”
“Mine is a divorce lawyer,” Sasha said quietly, not wanting to admit how difficult she was. “What made you go to medical school?” she asked him. She was enjoying talking to him. She almost never stopped for lunch, or had time for a social moment with her colleagues.
“My father is a cardiologist, and my brother is an orthopedic surgeon. It just seemed obvious to me. What about you?”
“I always wanted to be a doctor, even when I was a kid. I just didn’t know what specialty. I think infertility and high-risk OB is it for me. Especially now, there’s so much high risk with older mothers, and infertility seems like a very rewarding field, when it works. I love what I do.”
“Me too. I think I’ll go into straight pediatrics, though. Neonatal ICU is fascinating, but I’d rather deal with less high-risk kids.” He asked her where she lived, and she told him about the loft in Hell’s Kitchen.
“I’ve lived there for five years. I have three roommates. They’ve kind of become my family, since I hardly ever get home, and my own family has been pretty disjointed since my parents’ divorce when I was twenty-five. You think you’re all grown up then, but it hit us pretty hard. My father is remarried and has two little girls, and my mom isn’t. She lives for her work.” He said he had a furnished studio apartment a block from the hospital that he used to sleep and nothing else. The apartment she had described in Hell’s Kitchen sounded great to him, especially if it provided a community of people she cared about, which appeared to be the case. Her eyes lit up warmly when she talked about her roommates and their siblings and significant others. It sounded like just what she said, a family of choice.
His own biological family sounded more run-of-the-mill than hers. His parents were still married. He had a brother who was four years older than he, and was thirty-six and still single. They still all got together for vacations and holidays since neither son was married, and they enjoyed spending time together. He didn’t get that sense from her, although she offered no details. But she looked tense when she spoke of her parents, particularly her mother, and she said she had no desire to go back to Atlanta for work, and wanted to stay in New York. She was happy here. Alex said he hadn’t made his mind up, if he wanted to go back to Chicago to join a practice there, or stay in New York. Chicago was an easier city to live in, except for the weather, and he liked the idea of being close to his family, but Chicago was a short hop by plane if he stayed in New York. He went home for weekends whenever he could.