“Sure.” He reached across and caressed her cheek. Andrew loved to drive. She always wondered why he hadn’t become a long-distance trucker. He loved that show about the crazy guys who drove big rigs across the ice. Back when they used to travel, he’d worn his trucker hat when he drove, pulling into sketchy trucker stops to get what he called the true flavor of America.

Instead, Andrew had settled for an office job he didn’t like very much. She often wondered if he did it because of her. After all, office jobs had medical benefits.

Cut the guilt crap, she thought. Just enjoy the day.

At the moment, Andrew was happy, and that was all that mattered.

She opened her pill bottle. She stared at the little white pill in her palm. Then she made a fist and closed her eyes. It could wait until they got home. First, a little nap.

When she awoke a short time later with stabbing pains in her chest, struggling to breathe, the idyllic day was officially over. Once again, her spine had turned into the Great Wall of Fire. She flailed in her seat, bolting upright, her eyes bulging out of her head, left hand over the center of her chest while her right pulled her collar from her throat.

I need air! I need air!

Andrew found a hospital on his GPS, flooring the accelerator, holding her hand and trying to be calm, but failing, while telling her to just breathe.

Chapter Eleven

The miracle of chest pains was that you never had to waste a single moment in the ER waiting room. Poor Andrew had been stuck filling out forms and going through the litany of her ailments, surgeries, and medications. Luckily, they had created a document that they stored on their phones for emergencies like this, so he didn’t have to try to do it all from memory.

Kate was kept overnight in a hospital that would pass for a walk-in clinic back home. Andrew slept in the car with Buttons. They were forty miles from the cottage and he didn’t want to leave her. He looked terrible when he came to her room that morning.

“How’s Buttons?”

“I fed him a sandwich from the vending machine. He Dutch-ovened me in the car all night. It’s safe to say he’s feeling more chipper than I am at the moment.” He sat on the edge of the bed and took her hands. “More importantly, how are you feeling?”

She was hooked up to a heart monitor, a couple of IVs dripping fluids in her veins. The beeping of the monitor had kept her up most of the night, despite her exhaustion. Hospitals were not a place to get rest. Kate squeezed his hand. “I’m much better.”

“No more pains?”

“Not since last night.”