Dare to Live Read online

  I bent over slightly. “What about ice cream?”

  She shook her head, her pigtails swinging. “Cupcake, please.”

  The young girl behind the counter, who was dressed in a red uniform, removed the cupcake from the case before I could give her our order. “You can’t deny a pretty girl a cupcake.”

  I couldn’t. No one in the family could deny Raven much except maybe her mom, Ruby. She was strict with Raven on sweets. “They ruin your teeth,” she’d said many times to her daughter. They also gave Raven a sugar high, and at times, she would bounce off the walls with tons of energy. But I was her uncle, and uncles gave their nieces what they wanted, within reason, of course.

  The young brunette helping us asked, “And for you, sir?”

  “I’ll take a milk for my niece, and I’ll have a black coffee.” I didn’t go for the fancy coffee drinks. Black and strong was how I liked mine.

  I pulled out my wallet and paid. Once the bill was settled, I went to grab Raven’s hand, but she was gone. As I turned, a dark thought flickered through my head. Raven had been kidnapped once by a thug who’d had a beef with her mother, and in a busy place, no less. But the cafeteria wasn’t busy and had only six people sitting at tables that were scattered around the room.

  “She’s over in the corner,” the brunette said, seeing what must have been horror on my face.

  I spotted Raven standing at a table beside a lady who was picking apart a tissue as though she was plucking the petals off a flower. I faltered where I stood. I blinked what felt like a hundred times then set my sights on the lady in a flowered top.

  “You see her?” the cashier asked.

  Oh, I saw more than my niece. I muttered curses under my breath, swearing like a sailor because the lady in scrubs could have passed for Mandy. Then I shook off that notion. I had Mandy on the brain, especially just coming from the cemetery.

  Blowing out a quiet breath, I collected our food and said thank you to the cashier. As I crossed the room around tables, I kept my eye on the nurse, who was now smiling at something Raven was saying. If I weren’t so darn freaked out by the uncanny resemblance between her and Mandy, I might have been able to hear what Raven was saying.

  I set the food on the table beside my niece and the nurse, admiring the myriad of blond, red, and brown colors woven in her long hair.

  “Why are you crying?” Raven asked the woman.

  I squatted down by my niece’s side. “Let’s leave the lady alone.” I had the urge to run like the wind. For some odd reason, my palms were sweating. I hadn’t felt like this since Mandy.

  “She’s a nurse,” Raven said. “Her name is Jessie.”

  I couldn’t help but chuckle at my niece, but I dared not look at the pretty lady. I was afraid I would lose my shit since I’d been so emotional at Mandy’s gravesite, and I might do something as foolish as ask Jessie to marry me. Regardless, I couldn’t be rude. Whenever my mom cried, it ripped out my heart, and even though I didn’t know Jessie, I could feel her sorrow as though it were my own. No one should be sad. No one should be crying, and if so, someone should be there to console her or catch her when she falls.

  I slowly averted my gaze from Raven to Jessie, and when I did, a sense of relief washed over me, or more like that stabbing pain in my chest subsided to a dull ache. Up close, she didn’t look as much like Mandy as I’d first thought. Her chocolate eyes were darker, she had a pierced eyebrow, a tattoo of a skull on her right ring finger, and thick, full lips, top and bottom.

  “I’m sorry,” I said to Jessie. “Raven is a social butterfly.”

  Raven stuck her hands on her hips. “Hey, I’m a bumblebee, remember?”

  Jessie giggled, setting her chocolate-brown eyes on me. Holy hell. My knees went weak, my mouth went dry, and my heartbeat flew off the fucking charts. The last time I’d gotten that stomach-swirling, light-tingling feeling had been when I laid eyes on Mandy for the first time back in the ninth grade.

  “She’s a cutie pie,” Jessie gushed. “She looks just like you.”

  And my brother Kelton, and Raven’s daddy, Kross.

  Raven slid into a chair opposite Jessie as though she was settling in for a long conversation. “Uncle Kody is a triplet.”

  I rose to my full height. “Let’s give Jessie some space.”

  Jessie wrapped her long fingers around her coffee cup. “It’s okay. I need to get back to work.”

  “Don’t leave,” Raven whined.

  Jessie sniffled. “Sorry. My break is over. I have to take care of patients.”

  Setting her hands on the table, Raven interlocked her fingers. “Will you take care of my nana? Her name is Eleanor Maxwell.”

  Jessie slanted her pretty gaze at me.

  Again, my knees wobbled. “My mom was rushed in earlier for chest pains.”

  “I don’t work in the emergency room, but I have a friend who does,” Jessie said.

  “You really don’t have to go.” Some force of nature was drawing me to her like magnets to metal.

  She gave me another groin-throbbing smile. “Sorry. I do.” Then she glided over to the trash can, deposited her tissue and coffee cup, and left.

  I dropped into her warm chair, completely dumbfounded that in a matter of minutes, my body had gone through several emotions—shock, a lightheaded feeling, fear, and the urge to take away her sadness. Out of all that, fear resonated the loudest. Of all the women I’d dated over the years, none—not one—had made my heart flip out like Jessie had a moment ago, and that alone made me pause.

  I blew out two quiet breaths as I reached over to the other table and grabbed our food. “Here’s your cupcake.”

  Raven dove into the chocolate goodie while I opened her milk. Then I took a sip of my coffee, hoping the caffeine would calm my nerves. My mom was in the hospital, today was the anniversary of Mandy’s death, and I had just met a woman—a very curvy, buxom, beautiful, and sad woman—who I wanted to know more about. But I couldn’t go there. I couldn’t risk my heart only for God to take her away from me.

  Dr. Davis had counseled me on such thoughts. “You can’t live believing anyone you love will die.”

  It was hard to believe otherwise when darkness and despair were the norms in my family. My sister had died. Mandy had died. My mom had spent time in a mental health facility. At times, my mom’s despair had nearly been enough to kill me and the rest of my family.

  Concentrate on your music career instead of wallowing in the past. I was trying to develop a positive attitude, to look forward and not back. But I was having a hard time. My goal was to sign with a record label. I’d sent CDs of my songs to various record producers, only to be told they weren’t interested in my music. I had yet to hear from several others. Mr. Robinson, who was a big-time record producer and the father of Kade’s girl, Lacey, had advised me to be patient. At one point, I’d considered applying to Berklee College of Music, and that option was still viable. I knew trying to kick-start a music career without any credentials behind me might be tough, but I wanted to try to make it on my own. I wasn’t into sitting in a classroom all day, either.

  “Uncle Kody,” Raven said, bringing me back to reality.

  “Yes, bumblebee?”

  Her bottom lip trembled. “I want to go see Nana.”

  “Good idea.” I was dying to see my mom too, but I wasn’t sure if the doctor would let us in.

  I cleaned Raven’s face, gathered our half-eaten food, and deposited everything in the trash can. Once we were in the hall, I lifted Raven in my arms.

  “Can we find Jessie too?” Raven asked.

  I chuckled. “Nana first.”

  The little girl had to be in my head. Even though my heart wasn’t ready to test the waters, I’d been thinking that very thing.

  Chapter 2

  Jessie

  Standing in front of the mirror in the ladies’ room not far from the cafeteria, I took deep breaths in and out. I’d lied to the gorgeous man and his niece when I’d said I had to
get back to work. I couldn’t bear their kindness. Not only that, I’d been crying, and as I glanced at myself in the bathroom mirror, I knew I’d made the right choice to get the hell out of the cafeteria as fast as I could. I looked like crap.

  I wetted my hands and combed my hair with my fingers to tame the frizziness. Then I dabbed some water on my puffy, red eyes.

  It’s going to be okay. It’s going to be okay.

  That one line was on repeat in my head and had been since I was ten, even more so today. I should have just gone home and hidden forever. But then I would have left Dr. Gibbs in a bind, and that wouldn’t have been right.

  I removed a hairband from the pocket of my scrubs and twisted my long hair up on the top of my head. I wiped the remnants of mascara from beneath my brown eyes, but I couldn’t do anything to take away the redness around my pupils. I swallowed thickly, willing the tears to go away. I was a blundering mess.

  I had to assist Dr. Gibbs with an appendectomy he was performing that afternoon, so I would have plenty of time that evening to cry and wallow. I was about to smooth on some gloss, when my phone danced across the counter with a text from my best friend, Roxanne. Where are you?

  I typed in, ladies room down from the cafeteria.

  The minute she barreled in, I would sob like a baby. She knew I was waiting on my DNA test results. I shouldn’t have taken the phone call from my gynecologist that morning during a break. I should have waited until the next day when I was off work and had time to curl up in bed with the bad news.

  The door flew open, and Roxanne rushed in as if there were a fire. “Well, are you avoiding me? What did the doc say?” Her manicured eyebrows drew down. But when we locked eyes through the mirror, tears immediately brimmed in her yellowish-brown eyes.

  Before I could say a word, her arms were around me, and I was sobbing like a baby against her large breasts, inhaling the fresh-scented laundry detergent on her scrubs. Roxanne was my best friend. She had been since grade school. We’d done everything together, even nursing school, although we didn’t work in the same department at the hospital. She was an ER nurse, and I was a surgical nurse.

  She levered back. “I’m so sorry. So, BRCA1 or 2?”

  I held up one finger. “One.” Which sucked because testing positive for the mutated breast cancer gene in general was life changing, but having the mutated BRCA1 gene was harder to treat, at least according to everything I’d read on the topic.

  Tears cascaded down Roxanne’s chubby face. “You’re too young to be dealing with this crap.”

  I couldn’t agree more. At the age of twenty-five, I should be out partying, dating, and having sex. Well, dating certainly was off the agenda now, and really, finding a steady guy was off the table. Not that I was looking, but a man wouldn’t want to get serious with a girl, knowing she could have her breasts removed. Not only that, it was hard to date, anyway. I was the primary caregiver for my brother, Lowell. Therefore, I had to work, pay bills, cook, clean, grocery shop, and make sure the house was in order, which left no time for myself.

  I swiped a paper towel from the holder above the sink. “I shouldn’t be that surprised since my mom and grandmother both died from breast cancer. But you know, when you’re the one facing the test results, it hit home harder than I expected.”

  She ducked into a bathroom stall and came out with toilet paper. “The difference, Jessie, is that you don’t have breast cancer. You can get ahead of this beforehand. Who’s to say you would develop a mass in either breast. We’ve researched the stats on this. Sure, your chances are much greater than someone who doesn’t have the mutation, but no one can predict that you will develop breast cancer.”

  I puffed out my cheeks. “I know, but I have a fifty-five to sixty-five percent chance of developing breast cancer and a thirty-nine percent chance of developing ovarian cancer. I can’t ignore that.” I shuddered. “I wanted to have kids, breastfeed, be a complete woman.”

  Roxanne grasped the sides of my arms. “Hey. You’re a beautiful woman, with or without breasts. You don’t have to make any decisions right now.”

  “But if I have the surgery, I’ll never be able to get naked with a guy again.” I couldn’t face any guy if I didn’t have my breasts, regardless of implants. I just wouldn’t feel like me, or sexy, or pretty, or confident.

  “Nonsense. The right guy won’t care that you won’t have breasts, or real ones, anyway.”

  “Men love breasts,” I said.

  With the toilet paper, she patted her eyes. “Your decision isn’t about what men will think. It’s about you and the potential of breast cancer.”

  I understood what she was saying. But it still didn’t make me feel better.

  “What are the next steps?” she asked.

  I sighed heavily, the sound echoing. “I have to discuss my options with a genetic counselor, which I set up for next Monday.” I splashed water on my face then cleared away more smudges of mascara. As I did, I couldn’t help but remember Kody and how he must’ve seen me with raccoon eyes. “By the way, a lady was brought into the emergency room, an Eleanor Maxwell. Are you aware of her condition?”

  She tucked a strand of her short brown hair behind her ear as she examined her own face. “Yeah, Dr. Basset ordered an EKG. I haven’t seen the results. Why? Do you know her?”

  I shook my head. “I met her son, Kody, and her granddaughter, Raven, in the cafeteria.” Of all days to meet a man who, for a brief moment, made me forget my problems. But gorgeous men had no place in my life, especially with what I could be facing in the future.

  “Mm,” she said. “Raven is a pretty name. She doesn’t happen to be a little girl with black pigtails, big blue eyes, and in the arms of the most handsome guy walking the halls of the hospital?”

  I gnawed on my lip. “That’s them.”

  She plucked her lipstick out of the pocket of her scrubs then applied the red color over her top and bottom lips. “You met him?”

  I half smiled. “Tears and all.”

  She gave me a mischievous grin. “You know what we need? A night out to have a good time. No talk about cancer and mutated genes and anything else that’s depressing. It’s open mic at The Cave on Saturday. You can try your hand at one of your songs, and we can drink and dance.”

  My mouth dropped open. “I’ve told you a million times. I’m not getting up on that stage.” I sang at home in the comfort of my own living room or when I was tinkering with motorcycle engines in the shop Lowell and I owned, thanks in part to our father, who’d passed when I was ten years old. But to get up in front of a crowd… I would probably puke.

  “Jessie.” My name fell off her lips and cracked against the tiled floor. “It’s time you start doing things for yourself and no one else. Besides, I’m not pushing a guy on you. I’m telling you to let loose. You know singing relieves the stress for you, and I love your voice. Maybe Mr. Robinson will too.”

  Roxanne and I had been to The Cave on an open-mic night a few months back. The owner, Mr. Robinson, was a big-time record producer who had bought the teenybopper club from the previous owner then revamped and remodeled the place.

  She pressed her hands together in prayer. “Come on. I want to do something fun, and we haven’t in a long time.”

  Normally, she and I were pulling double shifts on weekends, and this was the first weekend in two months that both of us weren’t scheduled to work. I did need to take my mind off my problems, although I could get into catching up on my Netflix shows.

  I slumped my shoulders. “Okay, but no singing.”

  She smiled so wide, my heart opened up. Other than my brother, she was my only family. “Good, but please reconsider singing.”

  She was right. Singing did take away my stress, but so did riding my motorcycle. “I’ll think about it.”

  She clapped like a little girl who had just gotten her way. “Maybe we’ll find some cute guys there too, like that Kody guy. Is he married? Is Raven his daughter?”

  I washed
my hands, thinking back to the brief conversation I’d had with Kody and Raven. I didn’t see a ring on his finger, although some men didn’t wear wedding rings. “I think Raven called him ‘Uncle.’ She mentioned something about him being a triplet too.”

  Roxanne’s face brightened. “Triplet.” She placed a hand over her heart. “My wet dream has always been twins or triplets.”

  We both laughed, and boy, did it feel good.

  “Look, don’t be causing trouble.”

  She reared back. “Who? Me?”

  I rolled my eyes. Roxanne could be an instigator. In high school, she’d tried to set me up with the quarterback, who I’d had a crush on. He’d been dreamy with his wild blond curls and dark-blue eyes. But the quarterback had been an asshole. All he’d wanted from me was a quick lay, and I wasn’t about to give him my virginity only to be called a slut among his friends.

  Roxanne tossed her toilet paper in the trash. “I’m not going to do anything.”

  “Says the woman who loves to set people up like Gayle. You know, the woman you work with in the ER.”

  The door opened, and an elderly woman ambled in as Roxanne and I left.

  “Gayle liked that dude who came in after taking too much Viagra.”

  I snorted. “No, she didn’t. She liked his penis. That was it.”

  We both busted out laughing again, and a sense of relief washed over me, just for a moment.

  We came to a halt at the elevators. I was going up, and she wasn’t.

  She gave me a tight hug. “I love you, girl.”

  I hugged her back with all I had, tears threatening once again. “I love you. I can’t go through this without you.” I had my brother, but as a guy, he wouldn’t understand the feelings coursing through me about the possibility of losing my breasts. The same could have been said if he were to lose his penis. I couldn’t have possibly begun to sympathize on his level.

  Roxanne hustled down the hall toward the ER. As I waited for the elevator doors to open, that husky voice that seemed to be embedded in my psyche called my name. “Jessie.”