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“Of course. I’ve worked with Doyle before.” Michael accepted his exile with grace.
Angela was a little more wary, as Eliza had never mentioned improving Michael’s residency chances as part of the dinner party’s agenda—smart girl. “Eliza. What are you planning?”
“Nothing much.” Eliza opened up Kayla’s closet. “What do you know about lehenga sarees?”
Chapter 18
Kayla sat downstairs in the living room, trying to nurse the small talk along. This was by far the worst dinner party ever.
Daniel was seething in a chair off to the side. He often came back from the daughter hand-off in ahorrible mood. She should have been clear with Eliza they needed to schedule it on a different weekend.
Then again, it was so rare that everyone was off at the same time. They might have waited two more years until they found another weekend.
Daniel had profusely apologized for the things he had said about Eliza during the firefighter funeral. Kayla understood he was unhappy and probably had permanent PTSD from the death of his son. He who had believed with enough money and resources, which he usually had, he could accomplish almost anything. But despite taking every precaution possible, he still lost his son and had been left permanently shaken to the core.
Kayla had hoped he’d change and that her background in the ICU,where she lost half her patients even though she had plenty of resources, would be a source of consolation for him.
Yet here he sat, radiating anger and frustration. Kayla opted to sit on the loveseat next to Michael on the opposite side of the room.
Fortunately, Stella was immune to Daniel’s bad mood, and the usually introverted Alex Cassidy was as enthusiastic about his daughter as Daniel was about Jenna.
“Here’s Alexis showing excellent head control.” Alex played a video of his two-month-old on his phone to Marcus Doyle, who was sharing the couch with him and Stella. “I believe she’s going to eliminate her Moro reflex early.”
Everyone cooed at the happy daddy, and Daniel said, “Jenna’s took almost eight months to go away after the time she spent on the ventilator.”
“The NICU is rough,” Marcus Doyle agreed. “It was hard to watch when my son was on CPAP for two weeks.”
“Oh, which one?” Stella asked, laying her head comfortably on Alex’s shoulder.
“Oliver. He’s my second,” Marcus said.
“I remember. He’s the handprint on your left hip,” Stella said.
Daniel grunted, but Alex Casserty didn’t even twitch at the reminder Marcus had been Stella’s lover and one of her possible baby daddies.
“He’s twelve now. I can’t believe it.” Marcus started scrolling through his phone. “Here he is.”
Kayla politely checked out a boy with auburn hair a few shades darker than Marcus’s and an abundance of freckles before sitting back down.
“Does he live nearby?” Raj Patel asked from his own chair nearby, not bothered by the recent departure of his date. He might have been quietly sending texts on and off during the downtime.
She wondered if he was messaging Nora and Barak. They had wisely vacated the premises after the Angela clothing malfunction.
“Over in Ashland, about an hour away. His mom works in an ER there, and her new husband does sales for Verizon.”
Again, Daniel made the noise. He couldn’t actually be annoyed that Marcus was married and divorced three times and had six kids. Daniel was divorced once with one kid, and his wife, whose name he refused to say, had remarried.
Kayla needed the subject changed immediately. “How is studying going for Step 2?”
“Stellar,” Raj enthused. “I opted to skip the family trip to India this summer so I could stay locked on. Internal medicine had better watch out.”
He and Michael exchanged wordless communication, making Kayla guess there was more to this story. Michael, clearly a good friend not wanting to stir the pot, didn’t add any commentary.
“I liked Step 2 better than Step 1. More clinical,” Stella agreed.
“Do you even remember Step 2?” Alex teased her, kissing her hair and setting down his phone to save more baby pictures for another day.
“Not particularly. Past drunk Stella took it,” she said. “I got a kick-ass score for my ENT residency. Must have known something, brainy boy.”
