Dinner last night was a blast even if I had to see Colby’s face across the farm’s table for the duration of the meal.

Phil started out by saying that he should be the one receiving the gifts because he’s the one who taught Ali how to give blow jobs. Keene, Ali’s significant other and father to their precious daughter, Kalie, looked like he swallowed something putrid. Over the loud laughter that broke out, Keene said to Ali, “I did not need to know that.”

Ali, utterly unperturbed by Phil’s opening play solely made to antagonize Keene more than to embarrass Ali, nodded at Cassidy, Keene’s biological sister. “On our first date, I warned you there were pictures of Phil teaching your sister about sex.”

Keene’s wide-eyed face resembled that of a panicked horse, and he looked like he was about to break out in a sweat. “And didn’t I say it was immaculate conception?”

The whole table broke up at their byplay. Especially Caleb and Cassidy, who exchanged a kiss so heated I expected Keene was going to grab the fire extinguisher to break it up.

“Jesus, do I have to lay down the law about this shit again? No sex at the table,” Keene grumbled. “It ruins my appetite.” Patting his washboard abs, Keene glared at Phil first—because everything is Phil’s fault—then at his sister and her husband, who has the disturbing honor of being his best friend.

Cassidy rolled her eyes at her older brother while Caleb threw him the middle finger.

Ali, never one to let Keene get away with too much crap, winked at me before dragging her fingers up Keene’s chest. She was so going to mess with him. “But what if I want sex at the table, baby?”

Keene’s head snapped around so fast, you’d think his neck would’ve broken. Keene’s cheeks were flagged in red, betraying his lust for the birthday girl. His flustered state was proven when he stood up less than five seconds later and announced, “Party’s over. Everyone get the fuck out.”

We all cracked up. And that was before the serious drinking began.

As I’m preparing for Bryan’s imminent arrival, I’m still laughing. I can’t wait to see the photos Holly was taking all night long. At one point, Charlie grabbed the camera from her and took some of just the Freeman siblings: Em with her arm wrapped around Phil’s waist, Phil’s arm wrapped around Cassidy’s chest, who was just in front of him. My arm draped over Em’s around Phil’s waist, Holly’s around me. Ali tucked next to Cassidy, in between me and Phil.

It was a picture of the six of us who fought and clawed our way from hell to become the premier wedding- and event-planning business in the Northeast. The six of who held no faith but the tender bonds we had with each other. We picked each other up, rebuilt ourselves, and molded a future from the pittance of scraps life saw fit to hand us.

Now look at us. Even as I stare uncertainly into my future, I would never trade a minute of the time I spent on this earth with my family. Phil and the girls? They’re my true family now. The people I’d go to war for and shed all the blood in my body to ensure darkness doesn’t touch them the way it once did.

And I’m doing that.

Scooping out the antipasto from Genoa into a bowl, I hear a car pull up in my driveway. When we built our personal homes on the farm, the firm regulation we had from Collyer’s Planning and Zoning was that we had to use the original foundations as our home sites. Ironically, mainly since I chose the location before things ever went down with Colby, my home is built on the site where a barn was originally.

Fate trying to tell me something, maybe? Fortunately, I love my home. Using the footprint from the original barn, the architect designed a stunning house with an enormous first-floor great room and a deck that overlooks the field of wildflowers interspersed with pine trees I often walk through when I need to escape the reality of my life. There’s nothing quite like losing myself in the scents of the meadow, of waning buttercups and lavender, and blooming goldenrod to remind me there’s a circle of life that started long before me and will continue long after I’m gone.

Glancing over at the wildflowers I gathered and arranged in the ceramic pitcher on my kitchen counter, I smile. I’m really a simple girl. Even in the South Carolina shit town where I was born and raised, I found my beauty in everyday things. It’s why I was so devastated when the men came into my room that warm summer night, after I had been walking along creeks in the low country. I wasn’t just taken and touched for someone else’s sick pleasure. I had my innocence stripped as well.

My granny would have taken her shotgun and put holes in some people before she’d have ever let me be carted off. I take comfort in knowing that. Since I don’t discuss my past outside the family, few know she’s why I became a baker. I wanted to honor her every day by recreating the smells so imprinted on my young brain as a child.

When we were trying to ensure our past couldn’t catch up with us, Charlie had asked me if I wanted to find any of my relatives. I looked at him and said if they could leave me to those monsters—my mother and father who sold their daughter as a sex slave to cover the cost of their drug habits—then no, I had no need for that kind of family. Even if they were blood kin to my granny.

I’ve never looked back. I never will. With the future so uncertain, I only have now.

Unclenching my jaw, I move the antipasto over to the table so Bryan and I can sit and talk. As I peek outside, I see a Mercedes pulling into my driveway and parking. When Bryan’s dark blond hair emerge from the car, I grin.

Despite the fact that he really is my Bearer of Doom, he’s become a close confidant. I suppose even when it’s Death who’s knocking at your door, you might as well invite them inside and give them respite because if they’re bothering you, they’re leaving other people you love alone. Granny would have been impressed with my manners.

With that morbid thought, I throw the door open. Leaning against the jamb, I wait for eyes hidden behind sunglasses to look toward me. “Did you bring me a gift? You know I love presents,” I call out.

Bryan scoffs. “You forget I’m not one of those people who pander to your every whim, Cori.”

I pout dramatically. “So not fair, Bryan. I’ve been mostly a good girl.” Scrubbing the toe of my Chuck against the floor, my long lashes flutter as the corners of my lips tip up in a smile.

“Yes, I can absolutely tell.” Bryan’s voice is sarcastic as he makes his way around the trunk of his car toward me. “That look on your face just screams reassurance to me.” He takes the stairs two at a time, and within seconds he’s standing in front of me, giving me a quick scan. I don’t know what my face gives away, but his raised eyebrow says, “Good, my ass. Let’s go inside.”

I roll my eyes at him before gesturing him through the door. Closing it, I can’t help but admire him. I mean, he is gorgeous, but I wonder why Bryan is wearing a full suit.

We’re just having lunch, right?

We’ve been exchanging banter back and forth, eating the delicacies Caleb procured for me from Genoa, when Bryan sets down his fork. “I have something important to tell you.” His hazel eyes are serious.

Setting down my fork with a thick piece of salami on it, I say, “I have something to tell you as well.”

“You first,” he insists.

I shake my head adamantly. “No, you came here for a reason. You first.” Call it instinct, but I have a feeling his news is going to impact what I have to share.

He lifts his glass of water. After taking a sip, he puts it down. “I’m leaving Hopkins, Cori. I know how hard it was for you to find a program you were happy with. I didn’t want you to be blindsided.”

I gape at him, my mind reeling. Finding Dr. Bryan Moser was like finding a man: it was an impossible probability. He not only cares about the surgical relationship with the people he operates on, he cares about them personally. Case in point is him sitting at my kitchen table eating antipasto, telling me this versus sending me a cold form letter to notify me of his departure. “Why? Where? When?” These fundamental questions are about all I can get out while I feel like my chances of survival are narrowing minute by minute.

He reaches up to loosen his tie and unbutton the top button of his dress shirt. “There are too many reasons to name, Cori, but I have an opportunity here to do some good with the neurosurgery and neurology department that I can’t do with an established program like the one at Hopkins.”

I’m floundering, reeling at what Bryan is telling me. Replaying it again, my brain latches onto one word. “Here?”

“Caught that, did you?” he asks softly. “Greenwich Hospital’s program is actually a branch of Yale-New Haven, but it needs someone strong in the driver’s seat.”

“And they just offered it to you?” I yell excitedly.

His arrogant smirk reminds me a lot of Keene’s at that moment. “Would I be here otherwise?”

I jump up from my chair and give an excited whoop.

“I guess I don’t need to worry about whether or not you’ll be coming with me as a patient?” he asks dryly.

“No, you do not! When is this happening?” God, to not have to deflect about why I’m hauling my ass to Baltimore is certainly going to lighten my list of concerns. I think my siblings were beginning to wonder if I was banging a Ravens football player.

“We can get your next round of tests ordered for Greenwich. You’re due for them soon anyway,” Bryan informs me, breaking into my thoughts. “I’ll work out a month’s notice for Hopkins. By the time we get you scheduled and get the results, we’ll know what our next play is.” His words are full of confidence. He stabs a forkful of food and shoves it between his chiseled lips. Bryan begins talking about the new facility and staff and how my transition will work. But every word is like pressing on an open wound he knows nothing about because I haven’t told him my news yet.

Unable to listen to his calm voice anymore, I’m unusually quiet when I interrupt him. “I had an episode yesterday.”

“Excuse me?”

I open and close my mouth a few times, but I can’t repeat the words. Beseechingly, I finally whisper, “You heard me.”

Snapping into full doctor mode, I no longer have Bryan at my table. Now, Dr. Moser is sitting across from me. He snaps, “Describe it. Leave no detail out.’

Painstakingly, I do. I explain everything, like what I was doing right before, including baking Ali’s birthday cupcakes and my increased agitation level because Colby was in my kitchen. I watch his eyes narrow before he starts asking me questions he’s never asked in the five years I’ve been seeing him. Things like if I’d experienced any sort of numbness in any of my extremities or if I’d noticed any unexplained slurring of my speech. Was there any time where my facial muscles haven’t cooperated when I’ve tried to blink or smile?

Finally, unable to take it, I blurt out, “You think I had a stroke!”

Rubbing his thumb along his jaw, he replies, “Truthfully, I’m more concerned the tumor may have grown or shifted, and is putting pressure along your ICAs—internal cranial arteries. Are you still having all of your tests ordered through your primary care physician?”

The tumor may have grown. The tumor may have shifted. Those words keep repeating over and over in my head. I stare at Bryan, my eyes huge. “Excuse me?” I whisper. I’ve known for years this could not only be a possibility, but this could be the beginning of…

I had to stay in the now. It’s how I’ve lived my life, and I’ve done just fine.

“Cori, do you still go through your primary care to order your medical tests?” Bryan snaps at me. His patience is waning.

I nod slowly. I feel the oil, vinegar, and Italian spices churning in my stomach from lunch.

I think I’m going to be sick.

“I’m moving up your tests, but we’ll have them done here. I need new imaging. We’ll have copies sent to Hopkins so I can see them. I’ll order my staff to copy Dr. Braddock at Greenwich so they can start building your case file here.” Pulling out his cell phone, Bryan scrolls through his contacts. He presses a button to engage the call and meets my eyes. “Derek? Bryan Moser. The patient I was discussing with you earlier? Yes, she’s on board with switching her program to Greenwich. We need to get her in for testing next week though. She’s had a mild escalation of symptoms I’m not encouraged by.” Bryan turns his head away and begins talking in medical jargon that involves a lot of codes.

I’m still stuck on the part where he said he wasn’t encouraged. Shoving away from the table, I walk to the doors leading to my back deck.

Wrapping my arms around myself, I move directly into the wildflowers outside, where their imperfect beauty that withstands the bitter winter and the brutality of the summer.

What if I never feel them against my skin again?

What if I never see my family again? What if I can’t hold the kids?

What if I never walk again? Drive a car? Decorate a cake?

What if I can’t see or speak or hear? What if I can’t touch, or feel someone’s touch?

What if…what if I die? I’ve always known it’s a possibility, but now it’s more like a probability.

What if all the pride I was taught to have doesn’t do me a damn bit of good when I can’t breathe because the darkness has decided it’s time to wrap me in its cloak and mock me with laughter as

I suffer, immobile and terrified?

For the first time since they told me that long-ago day at UConn, brokenhearted and bruised, tears flow from my eyes. Why aren’t I meant to live a happy life?

My spirit is finally broken. I don’t realize when Bryan comes up behind me. “We’ve got this, Cori. You’re not going to give in, not when I can fix this.”

“Okay,” I whisper, defeat thick in my voice.

“Okay,” he says, confidence lacing his.

And for a long time, we just stand there with his hands on my shoulders, amid my field of wildflowers, both of us thinking very different things about the same issue.

My life.