His Revenge Baby: 50 Loving States, Washington (36 page)

only cousin in my approximate age range.”

“Tell me again whose idea it was to share a suite with Suro’s crazy-ass family?” she whispered to her husband, now not so grateful for the in-laws No happily claimed even after discovering he and Suro weren’t actually related by blood.

No responded to his nephew in irritated Japanese. But he got out of bed, because the truth was, Lilli knew he didn’t want to miss this either.

THIS WAS NOT when or how Lilli expected to finally make it to Tokyo. Both No and Hayato had given up nearly all claim to Nakamura Worldwide, keeping nothing but their shares and last names after what happened with their father, and opting instead to start another co-venture with No’s eccentric billionaire best friend in Osaka. However, ironically enough, Go had opted to be the one to move to Japan and run that division along with Hayato, while No remained in Seattle with Lilli and Ruby and their rapidly expanding family.

But as she, No, their boys—four-year-old Dallas and one-year-old Montana—Suro, and his whole family, Go, and his whole family, plus Hayato took up an entire row at the arena Tokyo had built especially for these events, Lilli couldn’t think of a better way to finally make it to the capital of Japan.

And she yelled even louder than she had this morning in the overly crowded penthouse suite, when Ruby came jogging out with the rest of Team USA in a shiny red, white, and blue leotard.

A few rows below them, a woman—probably American—was missing the gymnastics team’s real-life entrance, so intent was she on watching the American feed of the games on her tablet. Lilli had already seen the highlight reel they kept running on their country’s first paraplegic gymnastics team member. So many times that she practically had it memorized. On the woman’s screen, they were at the part where they talked about how hard it had been for Ruby to get here. First, learning her routines on a prosthetic, specially designed by engineers for the non-profit wing of Go’s company, then having to relearn those routines all over again on a leg with no tech whatsoever, when the powers that be decided her prosthetic was “too bionic” to qualify her for the U.S. Gymnastics team. The highlight reel then segued into Ruby and No’s special relationship. How he and Lilli had legally adopted her when she was fifteen, and how she’d taken the Nakamura name.

Then came the interview moment that never failed to make Lilli tear up. “I was sad after they ruled I couldn’t compete with my GoRobotics SocietyLab leg, because I thought my Olympic dreams were dead. And you know, I was so angry,” Ruby told the interviewer in her now nearly accent-less English. “But my father told me, ‘your dream isn’t dead, you just have to want it more.’ And I believed him. He’s never lied to me or broken a promise. I trusted him, and now here I am.”

On the American woman’s screen, Ruby wiped tears away, but in real life, she looked nothing but determined as she took her rightful place among the other U.S.

Gymnastics team members.

Lilli looked over at her husband to see if he was as affected by this moment as she was.

No, however, simply held their one-year-old son in his arms, the light in his eyes the only indication of how hard he’d worked, how much money he’d paid to lawyers, how much time and energy he’d sacrificed to help Ruby achieve her dream.

But even his eyes could not remain dry an hour later when Ruby walked up to the edge of the mat for her floor routine—her last event of the summer games. As she always did before each event, she found her parents in the crowd. She smiled and waved to her American mother, before locking eyes with her Japanese father.

On cue, the cameras in a now familiar routine, parted ways to record the moment at all angles.

Ruby went first, grabbing the hilt of an invisible sword that still hung on the weapons wall of their Seattle home. She pulled the sword out of an invisible scabbard and raised it high. Her way of telling her adopted father she’d gotten this far and she wasn’t going to do anything less than kill it.

Then came No, pulling out his own invisible sword, telling her without words that he believed she would do nothing less.

Usually it ended there, but this was Ruby’s last event of the games, so this time, after No pulled his sword, the rest of them did, too. Lilli, Hayato, Go, Nyla, Suro, Tasha, and all the kids, too, down to the one-year-old in No’s arms, sing-chanting, “Soh-ord! Soh-ord!” as he waved his chubby arm in the air.

Later on when Ruby overshadowed the game’s actual gold medal winner, by becoming the first Olympian with a prosthetic to medal in gymnastics, they’d rerun this moment over and over again.

Ruby drawing her invisible sword, and No drawing his along with their entire row.

Then Americans and Japanese throughout the stadium, spontaneously taking up the action, as the intro to Sleigh Bells’ “Crown on the Ground” began to play. Then came the clip of No and Ruby bowing to each other, right before…

Ruby turned back to the carpet and made history.

Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh!

No Nakamura waited so, so patiently for me to finally tell his story, and I can’t tell you how many times I cried while writing it down for you. Family is a subject I obviously love to write about, and it was just amazing to watch this one come together, despite the odds. Ruby is especially close to my heart. My first teenager, and it was a true honor to watch her become the young champion No knew she could be from the start.

Okay, okay, okay, Lilli has obviously rubbed off on me. Let me stop babbling and just say, I loved this story, and I will forever love the family that came out of it. I hope you did, too. If so, please consider leaving a review on Amazon, so that others might come to believe in the twin healing powers of family and love, too.

Either way, thank you so much for taking the time to read this epic story. I truly, duly

appreciate it.

So Much Love,

Theodora Taylor

P.S. — Why yes, Dr. Anita’s crazy sexy mystery of a romance is right after this one.

Yay! And feel free to grab up Suro’s burner of a story, HER PERFECT GIFT, for just $0.99

wherever fine e-books are sold!
Toop-Toop
!!!!

HIS FORBIDDEN BRIDE

Prologue

EVERYTHING in the world stops as I sail through the air. No gulls. No breeze.

The Pacific Ocean goes eerily silent beneath me, as if catching its breath before the drop. Then…SPLASH! My body hits the water with violent force; the anger of the man who threw me in it, powering my descent into its dark, gray depths.

Next comes the sensation of sinking, faster than I normally would without the added weight tied around my legs. Water overwhelms me, rushing into my ears, my screaming mouth, my eyes…I want to close them against the sting of the salt, but I can’t.

In those first few moments I lose control of my body. Instead of closing my eyes and gracefully accepting my fate, I thrash and struggle with my eyes open, seizure wide. I fight to get my head back above water, even though I know it’s useless. I can’t swim with both my hands and legs tied together, not to mention the heavy weight dragging me down. But I also can’t think clearly enough to comprehend how little chance I have of ever leaving this ocean alive.

So I thrash and scream, making a bad situation that much worse thanks to my body’s instinctive response to drowning. In three minutes or so, brain damage will set in and I’ll sink less fitfully towards my coming death. I might even relax a little, the hypoxia placing me in a trance-like state.

I was born and raised in California, but I never tried anything stronger than weed.

And I stopped doing that after I got into med school. I wonder for a moment what it will feel like to be blissed out on the heaviest of narcotics: my fast-approaching death.

Wonder and thrash. Wonder and scream useless bubbles.

Unfortunately, as far as untimely deaths go, drowning is just about one of the most brutal ways to die. Yes, eventually I’ll pass out from hypoxia, but before that happens will come the worst three to four minutes of my short life.

And as I die, all I can do is fight the inevitable and bear witness to my twenty-five years of life as they flash before my eyes.

Beginning with my first memories of my childhood in Compton. My mother’s church. Backyard barbecues in January. Dipping churros in vanilla ice cream at the Long Beach street fair. My insane middle school years…Chanel dying in her hospital bed…medical school…and finally my residency in West Virginia.

This is where the slide show of my short life ends all too soon after meeting the same blue-eyed man who, less than a minute ago, looked at me with such hatred…

right before he ordered me thrown overboard.

Chapter One

I DON’T THINK I’ve ever seen anything more heartbreaking and inspiring than eight of our cancer patients singing, “To Dream the Impossible Dream.”

“Yassss!” I tell them after I hit the last chord hard with my guitar pick. “You are going to make our department
so
much money from this YouTube video! Thank you!”

Most of the kids giggle, delighted—in spite of the grim circumstances—at the prospect of the internet fame that will come with being featured in one of my
Chemo
Kids Sing Broadway
videos.

But Ronnie Greenwell, the only black kid in the group of kids receiving chemo, raises her free hand. “I have a suggestion, Nitra…”

“No,” I answer, not caring that she’s in a wheelchair, or the only kid here who’s the same color as me. Mostly because she insists on calling me by my old nickname instead of Dr. Anitra like all the other chemo kids.

“But you ain’t even heard the question!” she protests, keeping her overly thin arm in the air.

“I don’t have to. The answer’s always no,” I inform her, before returning my attention to lining up my fingers on my guitar. “Okay, everybody, let’s do this song one more time, then we’re done for the day.”

“I’m just saying,” Ronnie continues as if I didn’t already shut her down. “I think we should switch it up! That girl who sang ‘Fight Song’ on the internet—”

“Already did it,” I remind her. “I’m telling you, Ronnie, Broadway is where it’s at.

People loved when we did ‘Defying Gravity’ last month.”

Ronnie sucks on her teeth, a suspicious adult in a child’s sickly body. “You just saying that because you like that old-ass music. I’m telling you we’d get so many more hits if we…”

Moving her oxygen cable out of the way, Ronnie unexpectedly springs from her seat and launches into a wheezy rendition of “Watch Me Whip.”

Apparently her enthusiasm is catching, because the rest of the makeshift choir joins in with her. Most of the kids jerk side to side in their seats, but a few of the stronger ones jump up and start throwing each arm out before waving their left arms over their heads.

I try to put on my best stern look. I mean, I am a doctor after all. Even if my
Chemo

Kids Sing Broadway
video series is a tad unorthodox as far as hospital fundraising activities go. But those clips bring in money for our shoestring Pediatric Oncology department, which at this point is barely more than a pipedream with one senior Pediatric resident (me), one attending—who is also responsible for any pediatric cases that come into any other part of the hospital, including the ER—and a couple of oncology nurses to oversee chemo for a kids-only hour in the lounge on Monday and Thursday mornings.

Right now, I can feel the glares of those nurses, who are quite understandably afraid of things like ports getting dislodged while the children dance. And then there are the even fiercer glares of parents, who don’t want to deal with tired and cranky kids later on, along with the after-effects of chemo.

But c’mon! “Watch Me Whip” is such a great song. Steadfastly ignoring all the glares from the adults in the room, I get to my feet and dance with the kids. I improvise a few chords on my guitar and drum on its body with my hand to give Ronnie an underlying beat. And for a moment, we forget our roles, and the various cancers the kids are battling, and the maybe/maybe-not life saving chemo as we dance and sing like maniacs.

That is until Ronnie sinks back into her orange and gray recliner, overcome by a fit of coughing, and the exertion it took to not only get out of her chair, but also to sing and dance to the popular Silento song.

I set aside my guitar and rush over to her along with one of the oncology nurses.

“See, this is why we have to do old Broadway songs,” I tell her as I check her vitals, and the nurse re-adjusts her oxygen.

Ronnie wheezes and laughs. Like a girl with a rare form of leukemia that so far hasn’t responded to any of the treatments her mother’s threadbare insurance covers.

Like a girl who knows she most likely won’t be around much longer, and has to take all the opportunities she can to whip and nae nae, even if it requires everything she has.

Our rehearsals are always a free-floating thing lasting anywhere from fifteen minutes to an hour, depending on the kids’ energy levels. Today we made it to forty minutes, and despite Ronnie’s episode, I feel good about our progress as I head toward the lounge door with my guitar.

But just as I’m leaving, a voice calls out, “Y’all should’ve done ‘Free Bird!’”

I stop short and look up to find a tall man with the bluest eyes I’ve ever seen standing to the side of the lounge doorway.

The hospital chemo lounge is on the first floor, and we often get lookie-loos, especially if they’re fellow chemo patients—adults scheduled for therapy right after the kids-only hour is up. But lookie-loos don’t usually make song requests.

And this guy definitely doesn’t look like he’s here for chemo. For one thing, he’s wearing a full set of UWV/Mercy Hospital sweats, which we certainly wouldn’t give to outpatients here for chemo treatment.

Also, he looks…broken.

He’s on Lofstrand crutches—the ones with the arm cuffs attached to provide more stability and comfort than the old school axillary crutches—and wearing a full boot on his right leg. So a fracture of some sort, and the doctors want him to keep his weight off of it. Another trauma—not cancer—sign: his longish, honey blond waves have been