Forty-eight hours. It sounded like a lifetime.

“Keep talking to him,” the doctor said. “This couldn’t hurt, yes?”

Kate nodded, stepping aside as the doctor moved to the bed and checked Johnny. He made a few notes on the chart and then left.

The minute he was gone, Tully took Kate by the shoulders, gave her a little shake. “We are not going to believe any bad stuff. Herr Doctor doesn’t know Johnny Ryan. We do. He promised to come home to you and Marah and he’s a man who keeps his promises.”

Tully’s mere presence buoyed Kate, kept her afloat. The strength that had been so quick to leave her came back. “You’d better listen to her, Johnny. You know what a bitch she can be when she’s wrong.”

For the next six hours they stayed there, beside his bed. Kate would talk for as long as she could; when she ran out of steam or started to cry, Tully would step in, picking up the conversation.

Somewhere in the middle of the night—Kate had no conception of what time it was—they went down to the empty cafeteria and bought food from vending machines and sat down at a table near the window.

Alone but for the empty tables, they stared at each other.

“What are you going to do about the press?”

Kate looked up. “What do you mean?”

Tully shrugged and sipped her coffee. “You saw the reporters out front. He’s a big story, Katie.”

“The nurse told me they tried to take pictures of him as he was being wheeled in. One reporter even tried to bribe one of the orderlies on the floor to get a picture of his bandaged face. Cockroaches. No offense.”

“None taken. And we’re not all that way, Katie.”

“He wouldn’t want them to know.”

“Are you kidding? He’s a journalist. He’d certainly advocate giving his colleagues—or at least one colleague—his story.”

“You think he wants the world to know that he might be blind or brain-damaged? How could he get work again? No way. This story stays contained until I know how he is.”

“They said he might be brain-damaged?”

“They took off a piece of his skull. What do you think?” Kate shuddered. “The world has no business looking under his bandages.”

“It’s news, Kate,” Tully said softly. “If you gave me an exclusive, I could protect you.”

“If it weren’t for the damn news, he wouldn’t be fighting for his life right now.”

“I’m not the only one who believes in it.”

It was a direct reminder of the thing Johnny and Tully shared, that bond which had always excluded Kate. She wanted to make a smart-ass remark, but she was too tired. She hadn’t slept well in weeks and every muscle and sinew in her body ached.