I tipped it his way to get his attention. When he finally noticed, he paused, looking up at my face, then went back to reading. His eyebrows lifted as he opened his own notebook.
“And she doesn’t want Ten to know?” he wrote.
I grinned. “Exactly.”
“Don’t blame her. Do you think it’s a secret admirer?”
“That’s the general consensus.”
Quinn shook his head. “Wow.”
“I know. I wonder who—” My cell phone dinged from my book bag, making me jump.
I didn’t realize class had already started until everyone, including the professor, stopped to stare at me.
“Cell phones off, please.” The teacher sent me an irritated glower before he went right back to lecturing.
Sinking lower in my chair, I cringed. “Sorry.”
Fumbling to retrieve my phone and set it to silent, I checked the message first. It had to be from Cora. She was the only person who even knew I had a phone, much less what my number was.
Meet me in front of the library after this hour, was all she wrote.
I typed in a quick response, only to find Reese wiggling her fingers at me. “Ooh. I want your number,” she whispered, snagging my phone from my hand.
I didn’t get my phone back for the rest of art class. When Reese realized I only had one number in my address book, she and Caroline made it their mission to enter every number they thought I should have. They even confiscated Ten and Quinn’s phones to make sure we all had everyone’s numbers.
When I got it back at the end of the hour, I had a number for Reese, her boyfriend Mason, plus her cousin and cousin’s new fiancé, not to mention Caroline, her brother Noel, his girlfriend Aspen, and Ten and Quinn. They also thought it fitting that I have the number for the bar where every guy in their group worked.
In the span of an hour, I went from having one contact to having eleven. I felt good—accepted and even liked—as I skipped toward the library after class, hoping Cora didn’t make me late to biology with whatever she wanted to discuss.
Cora was already waiting for me, impatiently tapping her foot with her arms crossed over her chest. “What took you so long?”
I slowed my pace, my smile dropping. “Sorry. I just got out of class.”
She let out a disgusted sigh and rubbed the center of her forehead, before thrusting a folder at me. “Whatever. Here, just take this.”
I did, asking, “What is it?”
“It’s a half-assed schedule and checklist of everything you’ll need to do before the...” She paused and glanced around before leaning in closer and muttering, “the operation.”
I nodded and started to open it, but she slapped it back closed. “For God’s sake, don’t open it here.”
Holding in a sigh, I slipped it into my backpack. “Why didn’t you just wait to give it to me at home, then?”
“Because I won’t be home tonight. Or the rest of the weekend. Quinn and I are going away someplace special together.” She smiled saucily and wiggled her eyebrows. “I got it yesterday at my...treatment and forgot to get it to you last night before I went out, but your first test starts Monday, so...you need it now.”
I nodded, ignoring the pang in my chest at thinking of her and Quinn someplace alone and romantic together...all weekend—
“Wait.” I shook my head, confused. “What about your Saturday dialysis treatment?”
Cora gritted her teeth at me, probably upset that I’d said that word aloud in public, but I didn’t care. I didn’t want her to miss an appointment because she was going to be with someone who didn’t know what was happening to her.
“Will you relax? I can get away for a couple hours for shopping and a spa or something.”
Four or five hours was way longer than a few. I didn’t see how she could hide something like that from him all weekend long. I wondered if she even planned on attending the treatment.
Missing them had to be dangerous. They cleaned out her kidneys. If her kidneys stopped working, she’d die.
I remembered the call I’d overheard her making with her dad last night before she left for the evening. When she’d assured him the nurse he’d hired to help her out was still doing a fine job, I’d turned from the supper I was making at the stove and watched her tell Mr. Wilder she loved him before hanging up.
“What nurse?” I asked, taking the grilled salmon off the skillet and sliding it onto a plate.
“The nurse I paid to tell my dad she was keeping an eye on me.” She snagged the plate I’d just filled and moved to the table to start eating. “Seriously, you don’t think my parents let me live here alone with failing kidneys without making sure someone was looking out for me, did you?”