All Or Nothing (The Alpha Brotherhood #2)(28)
Author: Catherine Mann

“My dad told me I could make it all up to him by connecting him with the families of my new friends.” He steered around a pack of dwarf goats in the road. “Why don’t we talk about your dad instead, Jayne?”

He guided the car back on the road again, leading them closer to the long stucco building, surrounded by smaller outbuildings. The slight detour off the road jounced her in the seat, hard, almost as if he’d deliberately bounced her around.

She held up her hands in surrender. “Okay, message received.”

Her husband wasn’t as open to talking this morning, but she wouldn’t give up. She would simply wait for a better opening while they spent their day at… Not a school at all.

He’d driven her to a medical clinic.

Nine

Conrad watched his wife, curious as to what she would think of the clinic he’d built. Because yes, he’d built it as a tribute to her and the light she’d brought to his world. Regardless of how their marriage had broken up in the end, his four years with her were the best in his life.

She asked him all those questions about his father and the arrest, looking for ways to exonerate him because she had such a generous and forgiving heart. But she didn’t seem to grasp he’d done the crime. He was guilty of a serious wrong, no justification.

His life now had to be devoted to a very narrow path of making things right. The small hospital was a part of that thanks to a mission to the region nearly four years ago that had left a mark on him. He’d been aiding in an investigation tracing heroin traffic through a casino in South Africa, the trail leading him up the coast. He wasn’t an agent so much as a facilitator to lend effective covers and information about people in his wealthy world. They’d taken down the kingpin in that case, but Conrad hadn’t felt the rush of victory.

Not that time.

His nights had been haunted by visions of the Agberos, street children and teens also known as “area boys.” They were loosely organized gangs forced into crime. And no matter how many kingpins Conrad took out, another would slide into place. There was no Salvatore to look after those boys, to change their lives with a do-over.

Conrad opened Jayne’s car door, her reaction so damn important to him right now that his chest went tight with each drag of air. Lines of patients filed into the door, locals wearing anything from jeans and

T-shirts to colorful local cloths wrapped in a timeless way. They were here for anything from vaccinations to prenatal care to HIV/AIDS treatment.

The most gut-wrenching of all? The ones here for both prenatal care and HIV treatment. There was a desperate need here and he couldn’t help everyone, but one at a time, he was doing his damnedest.

He wasn’t a Salvatore sort, but he could at least give these kids some relief in their lives. He could make sure they grew up healthy, and those that couldn’t would have a fighting chance against the HIV devastating so many lives in Africa.

Jayne placed her hand in his and stepped out of the SUV. “Interesting choice for an outing.”

“I thought since you’re a nurse, you would like to see the facility.”

“It’s so much more than I would have expected in such a rural community.”

“It feeds into the population of three villages, and there are patients who drive in from even farther.”

She shaded her eyes against the sun, turning for the full three-hundred-and-sixty-degree view of everything from the one-story building to storage buildings. The place even had a playground, currently packed with young kids playing a loosely organized game of soccer, kicking up a cloud of dust around them. A brindle dog bounded along with them, jumping and racing for the ball, reminding him of little Mimi.

Patients arrived in cars and on foot, some wearing westernized clothes and others in brightly colored native wear. A delivery truck and ambulance were parked off to the side. Not brand-spanking-new, but well maintained.

They’d accomplished a lot here in a few short years.

He pointed to the doctor pushing through the front double doors. Conrad had given the doc a call to be on the lookout for them. “And here’s our guide. Dr. Rowan Boothe.”

Another former Salvatore protégé.

Jayne halted Conrad with a hand on his arm. “Is it okay if we just wander around? I don’t want to get in anyone’s way or disrupt anyone’s routine.”

The doctor stopped at the end of the walkway, stethoscope around his neck, hands in the pockets of his lab coat.

“Ma’am, don’t worry about the tour. He owns the place.” Boothe said it in a way that didn’t sound like a compliment.

Not a surprise.

He and Boothe hadn’t been friends—far from it. From day one, the sanctimonious do-gooder had kept to himself. Getting a read off him had been tough. On the one hand, he’d picked fights and then on the other, Boothe damn near martyred himself working community service hours.

The doc didn’t much like Conrad, and Conrad didn’t blame him. Conrad had given Boothe hell over his do-gooder attitude. But Conrad couldn’t deny the guy’s skill and his dedication. Boothe was the perfect fit for this place, and probably even a better fit for Jayne.

Damn.

Where the hell had that come from?

Suddenly it mattered too much to him that Jayne approve of the clinic. He was starting to want her to see him as the good guy and that was dangerous ground.

Damn it all to hell. He needed distance, or before he knew it, she would start asking more questions, probing around in his past for an honorability that just wasn’t there.

“Jayne, you’re in good hands here. I’m going to tend to some business.”

* * *

Jayne’s head was spinning as fast as the test tubes in the centrifuge. Her slip-on loafers squeaked along the pristine tile floors as she turned to follow Dr. Boothe into the corridor, her tour almost complete.

One wing held a thirty-bed hospital and the other wing housed a clinic. Not overly large, but all top-of-the-line and designed for efficiency. The antibacterial scent saturated each breath she took, the familiarity of the environment wrapping her in comfort.

She’d expected Conrad to romance her today. That’s what Conrad did, big gifts and trips. He remembered her preferences from cream-filled pastries to Italian opera.

But this? He’d always seemed to think her nursing was just a job and she’d followed his lead, figuring someone else needed the job she would have taken up. She’d had plenty of money as his wife… But God, after six months, she’d become restless and by the end of the first year, she’d missed her job so much her teeth ached.