Topaz Heat (Christian Romance) (The Jewel Series) Read online

  Derrick looked straight up the imposing wall of rock in front of him and secured his backpack around his waist. He rolled his head on his neck and shifted his shoulders, shaking his arms and loosening up the muscles. Settling his gear comfortably, he stepped forward and started the climb.

  Up and over, finding purchase for his fingertips and toes and sweating as he pulled his body upward and upward. Thankful for the unwelcoming weather, he had the mountain to himself. Derrick gripped a slate outcrop with the fingers of his right hand and pulled himself up, finding a toehold on the wet rock. The wind picked up a bit, shooting a misty rain against his face. Angry at the slip of his tongue the night before, he barely felt it and just kept moving up the mountain, gradually finding purchase on the wet rock as he made slow progress.

  An hour later, he realized that he couldn’t feel the rock beneath his hand anymore. The cold had numbed his fingertips. Despite the riskiness of coming out alone in this weather in the first place, he wasn’t going to push his luck any further. He found a crevice in the small outcropping and stopped to put on a pair of gloves. He slipped his pack off his back and pulled out his thin cold-weather jacket. In each pocket, he had hand warmers, and he broke them open and shoved his hands into his pockets, immediately feeling the relief of the chemically generated heat.

  He sat with his back against the rock wall and leaned back on his heels, temporarily sheltered from the icy mist outside. He needed to head back down before this rain turned to sleet, but he decided to just take another moment, get a little warmer.

  Without the concentration of the climb, he thought back to the night before at Tony’s house. Hope, horror, humiliation – strong emotions waged a battle inside his chest. He had prayed for Sarah for so many years that as he delved into the prayer the night before, he forgot himself. While he was certain God appreciated that kind of dedicated focus, the slip of the tongue destroyed just about any dream of the kind of future he had always hoped to find in Sarah. Not that he really harbored too much confidence that she would eventually come around to at least liking him a little bit, but there had always been that slim, sliver of hope. Maybe just a small glimmer – but hope nonetheless.

  Derrick would never forget that first week with Tony. He would never forget appreciating the clean smell of the sheets and the warm room that greeted him when he got out of bed in the mornings, bitter cold ice and snow blanketing the city below him. He would always remember the shopping trip Maxine took him on, clothing him in good, brand new clothes – never before had he worn new shoes. Never had a pair of fleece-lined leather gloves warmed his hands.

  It took him a long time to quit expecting the Viscollis to stop all this bluffing and play their real hand. It took him a long time to realize their love was real, genuine, and his for the taking. Their faith gave him a life, and once he started trusting them, he started trusting the one they called God. Once he started trusting God, his life had significance, their love had meaning, and he recognized that he had a purpose. He fell in love with Sarah gradually, deeply, and truly.

  Late one Saturday night, he had stood in the kitchen of Tony’s penthouse apartment wearing nothing but cotton pajama pants and a white T-shirt while sipping ice water and making a tuna fish sandwich on toast. Sarah had walked in and studied him from head to toe like he was some kind of anomaly for which she couldn’t account.

  Very precocious in appearance at perhaps half his size and at least a foot shorter than he, she had not smiled. Instead, her honey golden eyes – eyes the color of the richest topaz – had looked large and somewhat critical behind her glasses.

  She wore an ankle length plaid skirt and a simple white blouse beneath a long sleeved button down sweater. She had an overnight bag slung over her shoulder. He remembered her reddish hair looking like it had a will of its own. “Hey,” He stuck a thumb in the direction of his chest. “Derrick. Derrick DiNunzio.”

  Derrick was years away from elocution lessons and speaking in full and grammatically correct sentences. By contrast, the girl before him spoke with a cultured diction and nearly perfect inflection, sounding rather more like a Cape Cod Kennedy than a South Boston nursing student. “I know who you are. I’m Sarah. What on earth are you eating? It smells like an outdoor dock market in here.”

  Derrick shrugged. “Just tuna. Want I should make you a sandwich?”

  Sarah had shuddered and her face had fallen in disgust. “Certainly not.”

  Her haughty tone nearly made him laugh aloud. Derrick had recently discovered a love for classic films. The teenage girl standing before him reminded him of a 1930s film noir movie matron, offended at the notion of this or that and uninhibited in communicating that offense to the world. He snapped his fingers. “Sarah. Right. Going to church with us tomorrow, yeah?”

  “I’m going to church with my half-sisters, yes. Why?” Her chin jutted out.

  Her arrogance made him want to tease her even more. He nodded and said, “Well, Sarah, it’s just peachy keen to meet ya.” He took an enormous bite of his tuna on toast and a spot of mayonnaise remained at the corner of his mouth as he chewed. With a cheek still full, he spoke, “I mean it. I’ll remember it always.”

  Sarah had spun around muttering the word, “Disgusting,” under her breath. Derrick had grinned, his teeth covered with tuna and bits of pickle, feeling nothing but mirth at the exchange as he watched her leave.

  From the first moment they met, that initial dynamic had set a tone for their relationship that had only escalated through the college years and the years that followed. Through all that time, no other woman ever compared to her. Sarah had a fire and she never backed down. She never abandoned her principles and she never once, in all the time he had known her, stepped down off her high horse. While everyone else seemed to coddle her or tolerate her attitude, Derrick did whatever he could to throw her off balance and relish her discomfiture.

  And he pined for her since the second they met.

  The grief he experienced at his mother’s death surprised him and nothing seemed to comfort him for weeks. Sarah continued to ignore him through the funeral and the days that followed.

  In prayer he came to a place of equilibrium where he no longer experienced any feelings. The world turned silver and black and white like the old movies he watched and his heart beat a hollow rhythm in his chest. He started working more than he ever had before – sixty, seventy, even eighty hour weeks just to drown out everything else around him.

  Tony, in his wisdom, sent Derrick away, with a new job, lots of new responsibilities, and new scenery. Derrick, knowing how much Sarah despised him, hoped that his absence would make her grow distant in his mind and, hopefully, his heart.

  She had not.

  He abided in her, prayed for her daily, and ultimately began to pray that God would soften her heart and let her feel the same way for him that he felt for her.

  Now she knew his secret – now the whole family knew. His heart gave a painful twist at that thought. Would they treat him differently? Would they see him as an interloper, a predator in their midst all these years? Would he still be accepted as one of them?

  He shifted and leaned forward, moving from a crouching on his heels position into a kneeling on his knees position. He felt he ought to talk to the One who got him into this mess in the first place. Hands still in his pockets to warm his numb fingertips, he bowed his head.

  “God, I’m trying to trust my future to You, but I’m finding myself at an impasse…” As he prayed, the cold bit his cheeks. The wind whipped violently around him and the mist froze to little hard pellets of ice. He felt very alone and a little bit afraid. A part of his mind wondered if this is how David had felt waiting to see which way Jonathan’s arrow would fall.

  Finishing the brief but emotional prayer with a steadfast, “Amen,” Derrick rose to his feet. He slapped his hands together and rubbed them hard, then stepped away from his temporary shelter and started, carefully, climbing back down the mountain face, racing the dropping
temperature, while on the icy rock slipping too often for peace of mind as he made his retreat.

  TONY met Derrick in the parking garage. He glanced into the back seat and spotted the climbing gear. His eyes shot angry daggers as Derrick pocketed his keys. “Tell me you weren’t out in this weather.”

  “I came back down as soon as it turned bad.” He stomped his feet and nodded toward the elevator. “Let’s go inside. The heater’s out in the car for some reason, and I’m freezing.”

  They rode up to the apartment in silence. Derrick kept his coat on, but shed his gloves and led Tony into the kitchen. He’d pre-loaded the coffee pot, so all he had to do was turn it on. Listening to the machine grind the beans and spit them into the basket made him already start to feel warmer.

  “So, that was quite intense last night,” Tony said without preamble.

  “That’s certainly a word.” Derrick pulled two mugs from the cupboard and set them on the counter next to the coffee maker. He moved to the refrigerator and dug around inside, pulling out the makings of a turkey sandwich.

  “Good thing you were there with her.”

  Releasing a breath, Derrick set the sandwich makings on the counter and leaned his hands against it. “I agree. I think I was supposed to be there.”

  The only sign Tony gave that he understood the deeper meaning was a slight purse of his lips. “Barry took her home after you left.”

  Derrick closed his eyes. “Tony…”

  He felt the slap of his friend, of his brother’s hand, against his shoulder. “Do you think for a minute that your feelings were not already known?”

  Relief flooded his chest, choked his throat. He cleared his throat and opened his eyes, busying his hands with the twist tie on the bag of bread. “I thought I hid my feelings pretty well.”

  “Big giant pining brown eyes cannot be hidden.”

  Laughter bubbled up from the tightness in his chest, loosening the tension. “Okay. Okay.” He pulled out two slices of bread and raised his eyebrow quizzically at Tony. At his nod, he pulled out another two. “Why didn’t Sarah see it?”

  “Derrick, for years and years, Sarah didn’t see the love her own sisters had for her. God is still working on her.”

  Derrick pondered that. Then his hands abandoned their mundane efforts. “Tony, is this what it’s like for Jesus? Does He just love us and love us from the time we are born and we disappoint Him over and over and just shun His love – and He never stops? He just never stops loving us even when we push Him away over and over again?”

  Tony’s fingers tightened on the younger man’s shoulders. “Can you imagine how much it pains Him?”

  Derrick felt tears threatening. “I don’t have to imagine.” His head hung and he changed the subject. “She knows, now. How many times have I baited her and teased her for no good reason? Just trying to get a rise out of her so she would think about me for the rest of the day. I’ve been so childish.”

  Tony grinned. “The good thing is that now there is at least a reason for her animosity toward you.”

  Derrick laughed again, knowing that Tony spoke the truth.

  CHAPTER 10

  SARAH tried to focus on the chart in front of her, but her mind kept wandering. So much at one time. For three days now, she had thrown herself into work, working overtime, extra shifts – anything to keep from thinking. She didn't want to think about her dad. She didn't want to think about her past. And she certainly didn't want to think about Derrick.

  "Nurse!"

  She whipped her head up and focused on an older woman. Mrs. Martinez. Her eyes were wild. "Ayudame, por favor. Mi hija!"

  She knew enough Spanish to get by in this hospital with partial ease. She threw down her pen and ran to the room where Victoria Martinez lay curled into a fetal position. She clutched a bed pan, obviously feeling very sick to her stomach.

  Sarah touched her shoulder and was surprised at the heat on her skin. She felt the young girl's muscles contract and rubbed Victoria's back as her body dry heaved.

  "Have you been sick already?" Sarah asked, opening a drawer to get the thermometer.

  "Si," Victoria said. "My little brother was sick two days ago. I have been sick since last night." She opened her mouth to take the thermometer. In seconds it gave a reading of 101.6. Victoria gasped and gripped her stomach.

  Sarah glanced at the contractions readout coming out from the machine next to the bed. A pretty hard contraction hit the seventeen-year-old. She felt so bad for her. Labor was bad enough, but labor with a stomach flu would just be miserable. "Let me go call the doctor," Sarah said, holding her hand up to her ear like a phone. "Teléfono médico."

  Zofran in her system, Victoria started feeling a little better, though very weak. She lay back with her eyes closed, opening them only to grab her stomach and moan with each passing contraction. The anesthesiologist finally arrived and Sarah groaned inwardly when it was Dr. Benson.

  She intended to call him out about the weekend jaunt with his wife up to New York, but her father's death had interrupted her personal life to such an extent that she hadn't even thought of Dennis Benson the entire time. In fact, he had slipped her mind to such a degree that she hadn't thought of him until just this moment.

  "Nurse Thomas," he said by way of greeting.

  "Doctor."

  After that, they both tended to the patient. Once the epidural was in place and the IV dripping, Sarah followed him from the room.

  "I'm sorry to hear about your father," he said by way of preamble.

  "Yes, all your phone calls, cards, and flowers were so encouraging," Sarah said sarcastically.

  He put his hands in the pockets of his white coat. "I've been meaning to call you," he said warmly, leaning his shoulder against the wall.

  Sarah cocked her head, as if studying him from a new angle. He looked like a plastic Ken doll. He had his perfectly sculpted hair sprayed into place. His fake tan looked wrong in Boston in October. The perfect starchiness of his clothing just added to the air of plastic facade. She wondered how she had ever found him attractive. She wondered how that saccharine charm had ever appealed to her. "What would your wife say to that, I wonder?" Sarah asked.

  "My wife? I'm not sure I understand."

  Sarah crossed her arms over her chest. "Listen, Doctor Benson. I have to work with you. But that's the end of our relationship. I don't really understand what you thought you would get from me, but go look elsewhere. Take your wife on another romantic weekend to New York. Or find some other nurse to butter up and deceive. It's not going to be me."

  He visibly flinched back when she mentioned New York. His reaction alone informed her that Derrick had spoken truthfully, though she hadn't really doubted him. As much as she wished he had been mistaken, Derrick never forgot a name or a face and he had never lied to her. She knew that much about him.

  She left the doctor leaning against the wall and went back to work. She made the notations she needed to make in the Martinez chart, answered a call from another room, and glanced at the clock. All of her patients were in good places right now, so she decided to go ahead and take her dinner break.

  With an apple in one hand and her small purse-sized Bible in the other, she went to the hospital chapel and decided she would spend her hour regaining some focus.

  SARAH spread her Sunday School material on the table in front of her. Freshly showered after working out with an exercise DVD, she swallowed half a bottle of water before sitting down to study the material. She hadn't led the class in weeks. When she read the e-mail from a friend who had been substituting for her asking if she should plan to teach the class this week, Sarah realized how much she missed her class, and her students. She realized how much she needed that back in her life right now.

  Her table sat in the corner of her kitchen, looking out into the back yard. Ice rain pummeled the neighbor's swing set. Sarah looked out into the gray wet, worried about how dangerous the roads would be by nightfall, thankful she didn't have to work ton
ight. She wondered if there would even be church in the morning to teach.

  The tea pot on the stove whistled and she flicked the burner off as she poured herself a cup of spearmint tea. Food didn't sound good to her. She figured she was way too tired to eat. Maybe after preparing her lesson, she could curl up on the couch with Jane Austen and hide from the real world for a few hours.

  As she put together a lesson on positive body image, she got caught up in the research on college age eating disorders, suicide attempts, and emotional health matters as they related to a media driven world that projected a false god of ideal body shape. She thought of the eighteen girls in her class and wondered how many of them fell into the statistics she read. Her stomach rolled at the thought of purging meals, cutting skin, and anguish over normal, healthy weight.

  A light sweat covered her body as she took another sip of spearmint tea, remembering how Maxine used to obsess about eating and exercising until Barry took her under his wing and taught her the healthy way to balance exercise with diet and fitness. She wondered if she could get her brother-in-law to come lecture her class about how to do it the right way.

  Her stomach rolled again, making it hard to swallow her tea. Sarah suddenly realized the physical discomfort she felt might not have as much to do with her emotional reaction to the state of the world today as with the gastroenteritis suffered by her young patient, Victoria Martinez, two days ago.

  She tossed her pencil down and pushed away from the table. As she rushed from the kitchen to the bathroom, one hand over her stomach, one hand over her mouth, she was certain she had diagnosed herself correctly.

  SARAH felt certain she was going to die. She didn't think her body would take the violent dry heaving another time. Yet even as she thought that, she felt her stomach muscles rolling and felt the cold sweat break out all over her body. She laid half on and half off the couch, clutching the mop bucket she'd brought in with her. As her body wracked with the effort to dispel absolutely nothing from her stomach, her doorbell rang.