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“Your healthy cells and tissues are being attacked, Mr. Canali,” the doctor said. “Barks-Howard’s is a condition that, unfortunately, comes with a reduced life expectancy. Now, with proper care and treatment, you can probably hope for another ten years—”
Adriano got to his feet and walked out of the office.
He felt as if his head was in a cloud. Surely he had misunderstood. That doctor hadn’t just told him he had ten years to live. Ten years at the outside. Ten years was what he couldhopefor.
That couldn’t be right.
He was only thirty-six years old. Were they really saying he might not even live to see forty?
And if he did, then what? Dr. Bianchi had been clear about the fact that he couldn’t expect to resume his normal life. Things would have to be different for him.
It was just a cold!
He found himself wishing, insensibly, that he hadn’t been so determined to get a diagnosis. That he had just pushed through the misery he had been dealing with for the past few months. A part of him felt that if he had just left well enough alone, he wouldn’t have gotten this disease. That the symptoms would have just gone away on their own.
It couldn’t be real.
He wasn’t going to accept it.
Dr. Bianchi was wrong, that was all.
Adriano’s head cleared a little. Doctors made mistakes all the time. That’s all this was—a mistake. He would get a second opinion. In a few weeks, he would be laughing about this—and then he would make sure Dr. Bianchi was stripped of his license to practice medicine.
* * *
Two weeks and three doctors later, Adriano could no longer lie to himself about his diagnosis.
He lay in his bed with the Egyptian cotton sheets pulled all the way up to his chin. Every doctor he had been to had said the same thing—eat nutritious foods, take up an exercise program that isn’t too strenuous.They were all so sure that those things would help him live to the ripe old age of forty-five.
For Adriano, it wasn’t good enough.
He had never settled for less than perfect in his life. How could he compromise when it came to this?
Yet, every time he asked himself the question, he was confronted with the same answer. There was no choice. This disease was in his body. It was already killing him. He had been a ticking time bomb from the day he was born.
“Aren’t you getting out of bed, Mr. Canali?”
He turned his head to face the door. “I think you know I’m not, Tony.”
“The doctor says it’s important for you to remain active, to get plenty of sunlight and keep as much of your routine as possible.”
Adriano cursed and turned onto his side, away from his valet. “I could fire you, you know.”
“You could,” Tony agreed. “But no one else is going to be as honest with you as I will, Mr. Canali, and you know that. Someone needs to get you out of this bed. You might as well come downstairs. I’ve made you an egg-white omelet with spinach and tomato.”
“Tony, you know that isn’t how I like my omelets.”
Tony said nothing, but Adriano knew what he would have said. He’d gotten his hands on the diet recommendations Adriano had been given by the doctors. Every meal since Adriano’s diagnosis had been stuffed full of vegetables and lacking in anything delicious.
Sometimes Adriano wondered if there was even a point to living into old age anymore. He’d had to give up scotch and cigars too. Neither was something he indulged in that often—he’d felt it more important to keep himself fit and in good shape for running—but now that hecouldn’thave them, he wanted them.
And besides, he wasn’t supposed to run anymore either. His doctors had made a production of telling him what good exercise walking was, that it really wasn’t any different, but Adriano knew better. Anybody couldwalk. Running was a challenge, and you had to be dedicated in order to do it well.
Dedicated.
That was the word that had defined Adriano’s life so far. It was the reason for all of his success. He had always made sure to put in all his effort at everything he did. That was how he’d made his fortune developing his fitness tech empire. It was how he had run so many races. He had climbed to the top of the field in everything he had ever tried because he wasn’t the sort of person who had any quit in him.
He wasn’t going to quit on his life, he decided. He couldn’t.
