Take a Chance on Me
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Karen Rose Smith
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Chapter One
CEO Adam Bartlett rose to his feet.
The men and women sitting around the large mahogany table went silent, though Adam’s former college roommate and present partner, Dylan Montgomery, winked at him. Adam almost smiled. At twenty-seven, he and Dylan ran the software firm they’d started after college. Who could have guessed they’d be this successful…this rich…this respected?
Towering above his board of directors, Adam glanced down at the papers on the table before him. He didn’t actually need notes. “Good morning, everyone. I called this meeting to discuss the success of our latest product line. Our recent endeavors have produced another winner. Since most companies who have networks have jumped on the bandwagon—”
Unexpectedly, the door to the conference room swung open. His pretty brunette receptionist, Darlene, looked harried. Though she’d only been with Novel Programs, Unlimited, for a few months, she knew better than to interrupt his board meetings.
Now, however, she waved her hand toward his office suite down the hall. “I’m terribly sorry to interrupt you, Mr. Bartlett, but there’s a man out here who demanded he be shown to your office. He won’t take no for an answer. He insists this is a matter of life and death.”
Over the years, through his company’s meteoric rise, Adam had managed to stay out of the limelight and away from the public. “What’s his name?”
“Jared Cambry.”
The name wasn’t familiar unless Adam had met the man at a conference or a merger meeting. He looked over at Dylan, but Dylan shook his head indicating he didn’t recognize the name, either.
“He said he’s a lawyer,” Darlene added in a rush as if in her agitation she’d forgotten that important detail.
Adam pushed his hand through his thick brown hair, accepting the fact his day was going to take a sharp left turn onto a road he didn’t expect. To the board, he said, “Dylan will take over the meeting and keep me posted on everything you discuss. Hopefully I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
As sandy-haired Dylan took Adam’s place at the head of the table, Adam exited the room and started down the hall to his office. The door was ajar, and Adam spotted a man around his own six-two height pacing the room.
“Jared Cambry?” Adam asked, examining the man’s features, his dark-brown hair, thinking something about him seemed familiar. Though the lawyer appeared to be in his midforties, if the tension lines on his forehead persisted, he would age fast.
Cambry stared at Adam for a long moment. “Are you Adam Bartlett?”
“Yes. I only have a few minutes. I’m in the middle of a board meeting.”
“This could take more than a few minutes,” Cambry said wearily. “Can we sit down?”
“Mr. Cambry, I have a tight schedule today. If you’d like to make an appointment for later in the week—”
“This can’t wait. I need to talk to you now. My son is dying.” He stopped abruptly, then took a moment to compose himself.
Adam took a few steps deeper into the office, closer to Cambry. “I’m sorry about that, but I don’t understand what it has to do with me.”
When Cambry squared his shoulders, his expression became unreadable. “I’m your father.”
Everything inside of Adam went still. His adoptive mother had only told him his mother’s name had been Olivia and she’d been a teenager when he was born. When Adam had searched for further information after he’d turned eighteen, he’d discovered that a fire and power outage at Portland General and The Children’s Connection Adoption Center had wiped out hard drives that had stored confidential as well as necessary information.
Adam’s childhood with his adoptive family had not been a happy one. How he’d longed to find and know his real parents….
Hope nudged a frozen part of his heart open, but before he could ask any one of the myriad questions clicking through his head, before he could rejoice in the fact that he did indeed have a real father, Jared Cambry told Adam why he’d come.
“My son Mark has a rare blood disorder and needs a bone marrow transplant. His sister and brother aren’t a match. Your sister, Lissa, isn’t a match.”
“My sister?”
This time, obviously not caring whether or not Adam sat, Cambry sank down into the wine leather chair in front of Adam’s desk. “When I went searching for Olivia and her baby—” He stopped. “Maybe I should start at the beginning.”
Automatically Adam closed the door to his office, feeling as if his whole world had suddenly tilted. He wouldn’t be getting back to that board meeting, not until he learned every detail he possibly could about his background from Jared Cambry.
Unbuttoning his suit jacket, he sat on the corner of his desk and waited.
Cambry cut a look toward Adam, another out of the office building’s window, then his gaze came back to rest on Adam again. “To put it simply, I got a girl pregnant in high school. Her name was Olivia Maddison. When she told me she was pregnant, I—”
Shifting uncomfortably, he cleared his throat. “I came from a wealthy family, had plenty of money and offered it to her for an abortion. She wanted to have the baby. Then she told me to get out of her life because she intended to do without me or my money. After my family and I moved to Arizona, where I attended college, I contacted her, but she hung up on me. Around the baby’s due date, I tried to call again, but her phone had been disconnected and I couldn’t locate her.”
When he looked away this time, Adam wondered what kind of man Jared Cambry was now. Did he still run from responsibility?
“Go on,” Adam prompted, needing to know the whole story.
“I didn’t get married until I was twenty-seven. Danielle and I had two kids, a boy and a girl, who came along eighteen months apart. Eight years after that, Danielle suddenly found herself pregnant again. That’s when we had Mark.”
Adam could see how Jared’s face lit up at the thought of his younger son.
“Mark was sunshine from the minute he was born, always had a smile on his face, got along with everybody. I’m not sure why—maybe because of my roots and my past—I felt drawn back to Portland about a year ago, moved my family and opened a law office here. We were building a new life…a great life. Mark liked T-ball and soccer and we gave him hockey equipment for his eighth birthday. But then one day, he passed out while he was playing soccer, and we rushed him to the hospital. We learned he had this rare blood disease and without a bone marrow transplant, he won’t make it past the age of ten.”
Jared stopped, then pulled himself together again and went on. “Danielle and I were tested. So were Mark’s sister and brother. None of us was a match. I couldn’t sleep, couldn’t concentrate on anything and then I remembered Olivia…and our baby.”
Adam couldn’t imagine any man forgetting that he had a child out in the world somewhere.
“I’d never told Danielle anything about her, but now Mark’s life depended on finding Olivia. Danielle agreed we had to do everything possible so I hired a private investigator. Searching newspapers, he found that Olivia and her mother had been in an accident and taken to Portland General Hospital. From obits, he found that Mrs. Maddison died immediately after the accident and Olivia passed on a few weeks later.”
Adam was beginning to get the gist of the search. “Your investigator went to Portland General?”
“Yes. But the hospital had suffered a fire and power outage that affected not only Portland General but The Children’s Connection Clinic attached to it. Most records from that time had been destroyed. We got a break when we found out The Children’s Connection personnel in recent years had taken time to input information from burned paper files and now they did have some sketchy information. We got bits and pieces—Olivia’s name and a partial list of expenses sent to the state.”
When Cambry rubbed his fingers back and forth across his temple, Adam could see this situation was hard on the man.
An instant later, Cambry continued, “We couldn’t tell exactly what info matched up. I had what I’d thought was your name—Adam Bartlite—but the address listed Valencia Vineyard about two hours outside of Portland. When I went there, I found Lissa who had been adopted by the Cartwrights. It turned out her birthday was the same one I had for you. With the obvious resemblance, you must be twins. Olivia was a twin—her sister died at birth.”
Not only a sister, but a twin. Adam tried to absorb that while he listened.
“Lissa was tested, but she’s not a match, either. We finally discovered your last name had been misspelled on the records. My private investigator tracked you down. And here I am.”
“Does Lissa still live at the vineyard?”
“She does, and she’s interested in meeting you. But she’s away on her honeymoon right now.” He glanced out the window again, then back at Adam. “I know the chief of staff at the hospital. We can have your testing done today if you agree. We’ll know in a week to ten days if you’re a match.”
Trying to digest all of it piece by piece, Adam kept the impact of the news deep inside. He was used to not showing his feelings. He was used to not sharing what he was thinking about anything but business.
That’s just the way it was.
He hated the idea of going back to the hospital where his adopted sister had died twenty years ago—the same hospital where doctors gave impersonal care to patients they didn’t think twice about. He avoided memories of that day whenever he could. Over the years he’d learned to eat right and exercise so he didn’t have to see doctors. Yet that could all change now if he agreed to do this.
Bringing out a handkerchief, Jared Cambry wiped his brow. He was sweating, and Adam understood why. “Did you say Mark is eight?”
“Yes. He’s at home right now. But if you’re a match and you agree to donate your bone marrow, he’ll have to be admitted to the hospital to be prepped and have chemo and possibly radiation before the transplant.”
Adam had been seven the day that the horse he loved had trampled his sister, the day his adoptive father had had the horse put down and Delia had died. At that age it had been close to impossible to understand life and death as well as hospital protocol. How could Cambry’s young son deal with the idea of a bone marrow transplant or face the possibility of dying?
No matter what Jared Cambry had done or not done in the past, Adam couldn’t know he had a half brother out there and not help him.
Looking Jared square in the eye, he decided, “Set up the testing and let’s see if I’m a match.”
When Christopher Chambers, Chief of Staff of Portland General Hospital, called Leigh Peters to his office, he told her, “I chose you because I knew you could handle this job of liaison well. You’re one of the best pediatric oncology nurses I have, and I need you to smooth the waters for Jared Cambry.”
Chambers was in his late fifties—tall, lean and gray-haired. Now he moved closer to the window and motioned to the hospital and annexes that made up Portland General’s complex. “Jared is a large contributor to Portland General and we want to help him as best we can. As I told you, his son’s full siblings aren’t a match and neither was Lissa Cartwright. Now he has hope again with another half sibling. I want you to handle everyone concerned with kid gloves to make the process flow as easily as possible for them. Our lab’s on alert to expedite matters as it did with Lissa Cartwright. Since you’ve dealt with Jared, his family and his son Mark on the boy’s previous hospitalization, you already have a rapport with them.”
“I understand, Dr. Chambers.” Leigh loved her work as an oncology nurse in pediatrics. Although her aspirations would lead her to med school in June, a dream her mother had instilled before she was out of diapers, Leigh enjoyed working with people, too. She felt honored that Dr. Chambers had singled her out to help with this family.
“The donor will be here in a few minutes. The transplant counselor will meet with him after today’s battery of tests. I want you to be his contact person. If at any time you need my input or authorization, call me, Leigh. Understand?”
She understood. She was supposed to grease the wheel and make sure Jared Cambry’s road wasn’t any harder than it had to be.
The chief of staff added, “I also want you to have someplace quiet where you can meet with Mark’s potential donor. The conference room next to my office is vacant.” He pulled a key from his pocket. “The file is already on the table there waiting for you. I don’t want Mr. Bartlett to have to wait.”
“Bartlett?” That name took Leigh back ten years. Certainly there had to be lots of Bartletts in the Portland area. Certainly it was no connection to Adam Bartlett, the young man she’d left ten years ago so she could have a future that was much better than her mother’s.
“I have a meeting out of the hospital now.” Chambers gave her a business card. “But here’s my cell phone number. Don’t hesitate to use it if Bartlett has any questions you can’t answer.”
Then Chambers walked to the elevator, and Leigh made her way to the conference room next door.
Purposely she turned her thoughts away from the past and what she’d left behind, to her future at Case Western University in Cleveland. Orientation started June fifth. She really should be more excited. Her lifetime goal was within her grasp. But she loved her work here and—
She opened the conference room door with her key and saw the file sitting on the conference table. She’d like to go through it thoroughly before Mr. Bartlett arrived. Leaving the door open, she crossed to the table, pulled out the chair and sat down to look at the file.
Her heart stopped. The name on the manilla folder was Adam Bartlett.
She’d no sooner flipped open the file than she heard footsteps in the corridor. Moments later, a tall, broad-shouldered man stepped inside.
Not just any man…Adam.
He froze when he saw her. His already serious face looked as if it had been carved from stone. “Leigh?” he asked as if he couldn’t believe his eyes.
As she stood, his gaze passed over her quickly but thoroughly—her blond hair tied back in a ponytail because it was more sedate and professional-looking that way, her blue pantsuit, her uniform in Pediatric Oncology. She often wore smocks when caring for the kids, smocks that danced with animals or Disney characters or were tie-dyed to bring more color into the ward, but she’d left all those in her locker for this meeting.
“Hi, Adam.” Flustered, she motioned to the table. “I just got your file. I didn’t realize who I’d be meeting today. You’re Jared Cambry’s son?”
After a moment’s hesitation, Adam shrugged. “Cambry insists that’s what The Children’s Connection Clinic’s records say. Apparently he had a private investigator looking for me. He just found me this morning.”
That surprised her. Jared must have really pulled strings to get Adam’s testing done today.
As the two of them stared at each other, Leigh easily recognized the boy Adam had been and realized she was even more attracted to the man he had become. His hair had been longer in high school. Today it was crisply cut in a no-nonsense businessman’s style. His shoulders were broader now and filled out the expensive material of his suit jacket. The tie was Armani, the trousers perfectly creased. His Italian leather loafers were so different from the worn-out sneakers he’d sported as a teenager. His whole demeanor shouted success, and a hundred questions danced on her tongue. But they weren’t here to discuss old times or to play catch up. Yet, she remembered how she’d left him….
His eyes, still so deeply green, had always mesmerized her. Reluctantly she broke eye contact and motioned to the table. “I haven’t had a chance to look through your file.”
“There can’t be much in it unless Cambry did a background check.”
Going over to one of the chairs, she opened the folder and sat down.
After a moment he chose the chair around the corner of the table from her. “I don’t understand why I’m meeting with you. Are you some type of patient advocate?” His gaze took in her uniform again, then returned to her face.
“No, not in the way you mean. I’m an oncology nurse and usually work with the kids. I suppose that’s one of the reasons Dr. Chambers chose me to walk you through this. I can explain any aspects of the testing and the transplant, though a transplant counselor will do most of that. But I’m supposed to act as a liaison for you and Mr. Cambry—with the hospital, with the lab, with the doctors—to make sure everything gets done as quickly as possible.”
“I see. Cambry told me he’s a corporate attorney. I don’t know that much about him except that he left the firm in Phoenix to open a branch here in Portland not so long ago. If this hospital is giving him his own personal liaison, I imagine he contributed to it already.”
Leigh felt herself blushing and knew there was no reason for it. “I can’t really discuss benefactors of this hospital with you.”
“No, I guess you can’t, not and be a good liaison.”
She sensed a cynicism in Adam’s attitude, and then she remembered. Actually she’d never forgotten, she’d just put it to the back of her mind. “You don’t think much of hospitals and medical personnel.”
Leaning back slightly, he agreed. “That’s right. That hasn’t changed. In fact, this is the first I’ve stepped into a hospital since the day Delia died.”
Leigh ached for the boy who had lost his horse, his best friend in the world at age seven, as well as his sister in the same day.
“How is your family?” she asked gently because she felt as if she should. She’d visited the Bartlett farm a few times while she and Adam were dating. She’d seen the strain between him and Owen Bartlett, had felt the distance between him and his adoptive mother and the two sisters who had been first in their parent’s hearts, especially after they’d lost Delia.
“Owen died two years ago.”
“I’m terribly sorry.” Then she asked a question she knew was none of her business. But she was curious about what had happened to Adam. “Had things gotten any better between you and your dad before he died?”
Silence swirled around the room until finally Adam replied, “How could they get any better, Leigh? Owen Bartlett adopted me because he wanted a boy who could do the chores and take over the farm some day. He and my mom never considered me their real son. You know after Delia got trampled by Lancer, they blamed me for her death.”
He stopped abruptly, then continued, “Long before Owen died, I made arrangements for someone to manage the farm for him and to do the heavy work. It gave my mom an easier life, too, and I think she appreciates that. Sharon still lives there with her, but Rena went to Australia on a trip and never came back. She’s living in the Outback with a sheep rancher and Mom says she’s happy.”
Leaning forward, he motioned toward his file. “But I’m not here to talk about the past, and I’m sure you want to get on with this, too. I think Cambry said there would be special orders there for all the testing I’m to have done today.”
Politely Adam had filled her in and now he wanted to get on with the job at hand, a life-saving job. She couldn’t believe she’d detoured from that. Still…seeing him again—
Mark Cambry came first.
Glancing over the information on Adam, she saw it was indeed scanty. “Before you can get started with the testing, we have to go over the intake form. Then I’ll explain what they’re going to do in the lab. You’ll also have a chest X-ray, and I see there’s an appointment for you at three with Dr. Mason for a physical.”
Adam took his cell phone out of his inside jacket pocket. “I didn’t realize I was going to be here most of the day. Before I go to the lab, I need to make a call.”
She reached for his cell phone before he pressed Enter. “You can’t use that in here—not in the hospital.”
Her hand had clasped his. His skin was warm and taut, the back of his large hand, hair roughened. Licks of fire shot up her arm as her gaze met his. She thought she saw a flicker of something old and wild there.
Pulling away from her clasp, Adam slipped the phone back into his pocket. “That’s damn inconvenient.”
She motioned to the phone on the credenza. “You’re welcome to use that. Press eight for an outside line. If you need privacy, I can step outside.”
“I don’t need privacy. I’m just going to clear my schedule.”
Clear his schedule of what? she wondered, then caught herself. The job of liaison wasn’t to poke into Adam Bartlett’s business or his life and she had to remember that.
However, during the intake session she found out exactly what Adam was doing now. She’d given him a few minutes to fill out basic information on the form. Under Occupation, he’d written—CEO of Novel Programs, Unlimited. Novel Programs, Unlimited, was a software firm that had made its mark in the United States. But whenever she saw a clip about it, the article was about product development or the latest software program. She remembered the name Dylan Montgomery being associated with it, but not Adam’s name.
When she went over the information with him, she asked, “How long have you been with Novel Programs, Unlimited?”
“Did I miss filling in a blank?” he asked.
“No,” she replied, not feeling as self-conscious this time. After all, she wasn’t going to pretend as if she hadn’t known him, hadn’t dated him for three months, hadn’t fallen in love and given him up for a dream that had seemed bigger and more important. “I just wondered.”
After sitting there for a long moment, he laid his pen on the table. “I used that scholarship I won at the Computer Science Fair to go to Stanford. My roommate and I developed programs we felt were unique. We started our company in college and went public the summer after we graduated. The rest is history, as they say.”
“Dylan Montgomery was your roommate?”
“Yes, he was. He doesn’t mind posing for pictures and talking to reporters, as well as being chief financial officer.”
“On the other hand, you don’t like any of that,” she guessed, remembering the quiet and sometimes remote teenager he’d been.
“I like publicity almost as much as I like hospitals and doctors.”
“The doctor you overheard after your sister died—”
“Was an unfeeling son of a bitch. His exact words were, ‘We shouldn’t have wasted our time on her. I knew she was gone when they brought her in.’ Even a seven-year-old could understand exactly what that meant.”
“You’re still bitter.”
“No, Leigh. I just know where I can place my trust and where I can’t. I’m only here today because there’s an outside chance that I can help save Mark Cambry’s life. So let’s get to it, okay?”
Old hurt crept over Leigh’s heart and she ached to clear the air between them. She needed to tell him why she’d broken off their relationship so long ago. She needed to try to make him understand.
Yet she couldn’t do that now. It was time to give him a capsulized version of the transplant process and then escort him to the lab. She’d be checking on his progress throughout the day and maybe when he was finished…
From the file folder she took out a sheaf of papers and placed them before him. “Let me explain what’s going to happen next.”
Leigh kept the rest of their session impersonal and then she acted as the guide she was supposed to be a half hour later as they walked down the hall to the elevator.
Adam cut her a glance. “I can find the lab on my own.”
“I have no doubt of that but this is my job for today, so let me do it.”
Silence reverberated between them as they waited for the elevator.
Finally Adam asked, “You said you work with kids?”
“Yes, and I love it. I’m going to miss it when I leave for med school in June.”
That brought his gaze to her face. “Where are you going?”
“Case Western in Cleveland.”
The elevator doors swished open. After they stepped inside, silence reigned again until they walked down the first-floor hall to the laboratory door.
Leigh handed Adam three sets of papers. “Just give these to the receptionist. She’ll buzz me when you’re finished. Normally we hold off on the X-ray and the physical until the results come back, but Mr. Cambry is paying for all this, and if you’re a match, he wants you ready to go.”
“No, he won’t be paying for this. I will.”
“But my notes state—”
“I don’t care what your notes state. Make sure you see to it that they’re changed. My name goes to billing for these tests.”
His jaw was set, his tone resolute. She could see this was important to him and something on which he wouldn’t compromise. But she’d have to speak to Dr. Chambers about it and see how he wanted to handle the situation. For now she just nodded.
Adam opened the laboratory door and went inside.
Three hours later, Leigh met Adam in Dr. Mason’s office after his physical had been completed. She suspected being here, letting doctors poke and prod him, had been more difficult than she could ever imagine. After they’d dated a few weeks, he’d told her how his parents had brought him to the hospital the day that Delia was rushed here in the ambulance, how he’d seen a trauma team impersonally work on Delia, how they’d attached her to tubes, put her on a ventilator. To a child, that all had to be terrifying. He’d seen all the personnel as unfeeling, mechanical, uncaring. Then when he’d heard that doctor’s comments—
His face was grim now as he shrugged into his suit jacket again, then glanced at his watch.
“Still hoping to get some work in today?” she asked. She’d hoped they could have a cup of coffee together, and she could explain why she’d written him that note ten years ago.
“I have a conference call in fifteen minutes, but I’ll be able to take it in the car.”
Some of the offices led directly outside and now she walked with Adam as he opened the door and stepped into the beginning-of-March breeze. The sun was shining brightly today.
He took a deep breath, held his face up to its heat and then gave a sigh. “I don’t know how you work in that place. It’s so…”
“Clean?” she asked, hoping to coax a small smile from him.
Although the grim expression was gone now, he still didn’t smile. “That wasn’t quite the word I was searching for.”
For some reason she felt she had to change his mind about this hospital and what she did. “Mark’s a wonderful little boy, Adam. I cared for him during his last hospitalization. If you’re a match, and if we can do the transplant, this will become a life-saving place. Can you think about that?”
At her question, she thought she saw an old tenderness come back into Adam’s green eyes. She thought she felt a warmth that at one time had made her believe she belonged in a new place…made her feel as if she weren’t alone.
“I will think about that,” he said.
Then Adam Bartlett headed for the parking garage, and Leigh wondered if he’d ever give her the chance to explain why she’d left him so long ago.
