“We’re going to do everything we can to make sure he will be,” I said. “He’s conscious, which is a good thing, and it doesn’t look like he’s had any trauma to his head.” I paused, feeling my way carefully down Wiley’s sides to check for broken ribs. “He’ll need stitches, but my biggest concern is that he might have broken bones and/or internal bleeding, so Paula and I are going to take him in the back for a bit and run some tests, okay? You can stay right here. One of us will be out to talk with you as soon as we can.”
Gretchen nodded, Paula lifted Wiley into her arms, and we both made our way to the lab, where we quickly performed the necessary procedures. The ultrasound was negative for bleeding, but the X-ray did show a hairline fracture of his proximal tibia on his left hind leg, so Paula prepped the operating room, and I administered Wiley a strong sedative. Once the anesthesia had kicked in, I had Paula go and update Gretchen. When she returned, she assisted in setting the break and stitching up his wound.
“I take it Chandi rescheduled the last few appointments I had this afternoon?” I asked as Paula handed me the sterile bandage to set on top of Wiley’s newly shaven side. The cut was deep, but not so much that I was concerned about its ability to properly heal.
“She did,” Paula said. “Once you’re finished here, you’re done for the day. She also said to tell you that that Natalie woman called again.”
The muscles in my gut spasmed. That would be the second call in a week—the second time a woman named Natalie Clark had left only her phone number, never saying what it was that she needed to speak with me about. It wasn’t the first time over the years that I’d encountered a woman with the same first name as one of my daughters, but something about the fact that this woman wasn’t one of my clients and that she refused to tell Chandi why she was calling set me on edge.
“She’s probably just trying to sell me something,” I said to Paula. But even as I spoke, I knew this wasn’t true. The phone number Natalie Clark had left had a 206 area code, which meant she lived in Seattle. Could it be her? I wondered. Could it be my younger girl has come to find me? The thought filled me with terror; it shook me to my core. The girl I’d been when I gave my children up didn’t exist anymore—she seemed like another person’s ghost. I’d worked so hard to forget her, to focus on everything I’d managed to gain instead of all I’d lost. To become a successful, stable, happy woman. For the most part, the life I’d built with Evan and our dogs was so peaceful, so perfect, the idea of disrupting it made me feel wobbly and loose, as though the ground beneath me might melt away.
“Probably,” Paula said.
I gave her a quick smile before carefully detaching the face mask from Wiley’s muzzle. His eyes were closed and his heartbeat was slow and steady, but before I asked Paula to move him to the large cage we used for dogs recovering from surgery, I shot a strong dose of painkiller into his IV.
“Time for the cone of shame,” Paula said, and I chuckled. We put a soft plastic device around his neck, which was meant to prevent Wiley from chewing at the stitches I’d just put in his side.
An hour later, after I’d reassured Gretchen that Wiley would live to chase another cat and made sure that he came out of anesthesia without vomiting or suffering a seizure, I returned to my office to go over my schedule. This was something I always did before I went home—to mentally prepare for my next day’s appointments, and make sure I left room for any emergencies that might come through the door.
I sat down at my desk, which like everything else in my life, I kept as tidy as possible. I glanced down at the small stack of messages Chandi had taken for me while I was in surgery with Wiley, and the one from Natalie Clark was right on top. I ran my finger over the phone number, wondering if I should plug it into an online reverse directory and see if I could find out more about the woman who had called. Giving the wireless mouse next to my computer a little shake to bring the screen out of hibernation mode, I opened up a search engine and typed the number in. But before I hit return, my head began to spin.
Oh, god, I thought. Not again. The last time I’d had a serious panic attack was when Trixie died. She’d lived to be sixteen, well past the life expectancy for a dog her size, and had drifted off in her sleep in the middle of a warm August night. When I found her, cold and unmoving on her bed the next morning, I’d dropped to my knees and begun to wail, even as my lungs seemed to shrink and my breath became something I had to pursue.
“Babe,” Evan had said, jumping up from his side of the bed and racing over to where I knelt. “What’s wrong?”
I couldn’t speak. I only slid my arms beneath Trixie’s limp body and pulled her to my chest. I buried my face in her fur, sobbing so hard it felt as though my rib cage might shatter.