“Cheers,” he said, tipping his glass against hers. “The view in here is better than I’d been led to believe.” He leaned toward her. “You’re beautiful, but I expect you know that.”

She’d heard those words all her life. Usually they meant nothing to her, bounced off her like raindrops on a metal roof, but for some reason, in this room, with the holidays approaching, the compliment was exactly what she needed to hear. “How long are you in town for?”

“A week or so. I work for Virgin Entertainment.”

“Are you making that up?”

“No, really. It’s one of Richard Branson’s companies. We’re scouting U.S. locations for a Virgin Megastore.”

“I shudder to think what you sell.”

“How naughty of you. It’s a music store, for starters anyway.”

She sipped her drink, eyeing him over the salted rim, smiling. Kate was always telling her to get out more, to meet people. Just now, it seemed like damned fine advice. “Is your hotel nearby?”

PART THREE: THE NINETIES

Part Three

THE NINETIES

I’m Every Woman

it’s all in me

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER
NINETEEN

“Just knock me out. I mean it. If they won’t give me drugs, get a baseball bat and hit me. This breathing is bullsh—aagh!” Kate felt the pain twist through her insides and tear her apart.

Beside her Johnny was saying “Come on . . . ha ha ha . . . you can do it. Breathe ha . . . ha . . . like this. Remember our class? Focus. Visualize. D’you want that statue we—”

She grabbed him by the collar and yanked him close. “So help me God, if you mention breathing again I’m going to take you down. I want drugs—”

And it was back, wrenching, cutting, twisting through her until she cried out. For the first six hours she’d been pretty good. She’d focused and breathed and kissed her husband when he leaned down to her and thanked him when he pressed a cool wet rag to her forehead. In the second six hours she lost her natural sense of optimism. The relentless, gnawing pain was like some horrible creature biting away at her, leaving less and less.

By hour seventeen she was a flat-out, cast-iron bitch. Even the nurse came and went like Speed Racer.

“Come on, baby, breathe. It’s too late for drugs. You heard the doctor. It won’t be much longer.”

She noticed that even as he tried to soothe her, Johnny didn’t get too close. He was like some terrorized soldier in a minefield who’d just seen his best friend blown up. He was afraid to move at all.

“Where’s Mom?”

“I think she went down to call Tully again.”