Fated Love Read online

  Sax reached up for the other soda Jude held out and gave her a blazing smile. “Thanks, babe.”

  “Everything okay?” Jude rested one hand on Sax’s shoulder and caressed her softly with the unmindful intimacy of longtime lovers.

  “Yep. Quinn is going to be good as new.” Sax took a long pull of her soda. “Before the year is out, she ought to be back operating, back where she belongs.”

  Back where she belongs? Honor’s stomach rolled again, this time with a new kind of alarm. Back here, in New York?

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  “Hi,” Honor said softly as she leaned down to kiss Quinn gently on the mouth. “How do you feel?”

  “I’m fine.” Quinn, the only patient in the recovery room, was propped up on the stretcher with several pillows behind her back. She smiled and reached for Honor’s hand. “I more or less slept through the procedure, although I remember watching the fluoroscope when Wisnicki was placing the new leads.”

  “Are you having any pain?”

  “No. He went through the old incision to change the battery pack, so there’s very little discomfort. I should be out of here in fifteen minutes or so.”

  “Has anyone talked to you yet?”

  “You mean about the current state of my heart?” Quinn squeezed Honor’s fingers. She was still reeling from the impact of the news. “Yeah. Caroli was here just now and gave me a rundown. He said there’s a good chance I won’t need the defibrillator in another six months.”

  “I’m so happy for you, baby.” Honor brushed her fingers through Quinn’s hair. “That’s the best news.”

  “I’m happy for us,” Quinn said quietly, her eyes fixed on Honor’s face. “I don’t want you to worry about me all the time, and I don’t want you to be cheated out of anything you deserve.”

  Honor frowned, her eyes darkening. “I didn’t expect you to come along, Quinn. I didn’t expect to love anyone the way I love you. And I certainly never dreamed of anyone making me feel the way you do.”

  “Honor—”

  “No, let me finish,” Honor chided gently. “I love you. You make me terribly happy. I could never feel cheated because of having you in my life. When I think of the future now, I see you. And it’s wonderful.”

  “I love you so much.” Quinn’s voice was husky.

  “Ditto, Dr. Maguire.” Honor blinked away tears and smiled. “Sinclair says you’ll be operating again soon, too. Did she tell you that?”

  Quinn shrugged. “Yes, but for the time being, I have a job.” Then she grinned, blue eyes sparkling. “And since I have a thing for my boss, I’m not in a big hurry to switch.”

  “Well,” Honor murmured, “since your boss has a thing for you, too, that’s good to hear.” She took a breath to be sure her voice was steady. “When the time comes, maybe you’ll consider a position at PMC in the surgery department.”

  “If not there, someplace in Philadelphia will need a trauma surgeon.” Quinn regarded Honor intently. “Because I have no plans to leave.”

  Honor kissed her again. “Even better.”

  “Would you mind calling Arly on your cell phone so I can talk to her?” Quinn glanced toward the other side of the room where the recovery room nurse sat writing notes in her chart. “I’m the only patient in here, so I don’t think we’ll disrupt anything critical with it.”

  “Oh, no,” Honor laughed. “Except if we happen to interfere with the telemetry to that monitor you’re wearing, Saxon Sinclair will be in here pounding on your chest before I have a chance to explain.”

  Quinn grinned. “I trust you to handle her.”

  “Thank you,” Honor said dryly. “Even so, I’ll use the phone in the waiting area in a few minutes and tell Arly that you’ll call her as soon as you can. Okay?”

  “Okay.” Quinn leaned her head back against the pillows. “Then how about checking the Amtrak schedule to see if we can get a train back to Philadelphia tonight.”

  “Jude invited us to stay here in Manhattan tonight with them,” Honor replied. “I think we should. That way you can get a good night’s sleep before we travel.”

  “I don’t want to miss one of Phyllis’s breakfasts.” Quinn lifted Honor’s hand and kissed her fingers gently. “And I want to see Arly.”

  “Most people would jump at the chance to spend a night in New York City without their children, you know,” Honor pointed out with another laugh. It wasn’t until she had said the words that she realized how easily she had begun to think of them as a family. She searched Quinn’s face and found the calm certainty there that she loved so much.

  “Give me a year or so, and maybe I’ll feel that way, too. Maybe.” Quinn locked eyes with Honor. “I was kind of hoping I could count on having the next fifty or sixty with you.”

  “Make it seventy, and you’ve got a deal.”

  Quinn reached up and brushed a single tear from Honor’s cheek. “Done.”

  “Did you just propose?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good, because I just accepted.” Still holding Quinn’s hand tightly, Honor unclipped the cell phone from her belt and flipped open the cover. After she punched in the number, she found Quinn’s eyes again and said softly, “Let’s hope this doesn’t set off any alarms.”

  “I think we’re safe,” Quinn whispered.

  “Phyllis?” Honor watched the steady rhythm of Quinn’s heart as it traced across the monitor above the bed. “Tell Arly she can stay up late tonight. Quinn and I are coming home.”

  The End

  About The Author

  Radclyffe is the author of numerous best-selling lesbian romances (Safe Harbor and its sequel Beyond the Breakwater, Innocent Hearts, Love’s Melody Lost, Love’s Tender Warriors, Tomorrow’s Promise, Passion’s Bright Fury, Love’s Masquerade, and shadowland), as well as two romance/intrigue series: the Honor series (Above All, Honor revised edition, Honor Bound, Love & Honor, and Honor Guards) and the Justice series (Shield of Justice, the prequel A Matter of Trust, In Pursuit of Justice, and Justice in the Shadows).

  A 2003/2004 recipient of the Alice B. award for her body of work, she lives with her partner, Lee, in Philadelphia, PA, where she both writes and practices surgery full-time. She states, “I began reading lesbian fiction at the age of twelve when I found a copy of Ann Bannon’s Beebo Brinker. Not long after, I began collecting every book with lesbian content I could find. The new titles come much faster now than they did in the decades when a new book or two every year felt like a gift, but I still treasure every single one. These works are our history and our legacy, and I am proud to contribute in some small way to those archives.”

  Her upcoming works include Change of Pace: Erotic Interludes, an “all Radclyffe” erotica collection (2004), a selection in Infinite Pleasures: a lesbian erotica anthology, eds. Seaman and Dunne (2004), Milk of Human Kindness, ed. Lori Lake (2004), an anthology of lesbian authors writing about mothers and daughters, Distant Shores, Silent Thunder, the next in the Provincetown Tales (2005), and the next in the Justice series, Justice Served (2005)

  Look for information about these and other Radclyffe works at www.boldstrokesbooks.com and www.radfic.com