Read Online Good Intentions (Welcome to Paradise) (Volume 2) by S. L. Scott - Free Book Online
Authors: S. L. Scott
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familiar.”
My dad turns back to the nurse after signing the paperwork.
She tells Sunny she can go and the group starts walking out the door. I start to walk, but pause, unsettled by the clerk’s familiarity with me. My name is trashed in Hawaii, the Ashford name filling the papers and becoming gossip fodder. Usually that doesn’t weigh on me much, my own life feeling protected among my group of friends and hangouts where I’m not judged by my sins. But her eyes told me the lies behind her words. She definitely knows my name and now I’m curious to know why.
Needing answers, I turn back and approach the desk again. “May I speak with you?”
The older nurse in the chair raises her eyebrows at the younger clerk and smiles. The nurse must think I’m flirting with the clerk.
She straightens her scrubs, and says, “Sure,” with a heavy gulp. “It’s time for my break anyway.”
When she walks out from behind the counter, she leads me outside. “I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“That means you know something about me. Please tell me.”
She steps to the corner of the building. An ashtray pushed up against the building indicates this is where the medical staff smoke. She pulls a pack of cigarettes and a lighter from her pocket and lights up.
I watch with trepidation, wondering why she knows me or more specifically, of me. She blows out a big puff of smoke and begins. “I could lose my job for telling you confidential information, but I ran across a file the other day. That’s why I was surprised to hear your name.”
“A file with my name in it?”
She nods. “It was Lani Kalei’s file.”
Exasperation drops my shoulders, and I say, “Yeah, that. I’m sure my name is all over her file.”
She looks around, making sure no other eyes are on us before she speaks again. “I have full access to patient records. I also read the papers after the accident. Lani’s record is sealed, marked confidential. But three days ago, the newly renovated files department opened and we had to re-file all of the old ones into the new department. That file was among twenty others that were re-classified. We had to create a new folder for it because the judge’s request to seal the Kalei file expired three months ago.”
“You mean it’s public?”
“No. No medical file is public, but it’s accessible with the right permissions in place and I’ve seen it since I had to re-organize it. As I said, I could get fired for telling you this, but I know the battle you’ve fought with the press. They made you out to be her killer, but you aren’t.”
“I couldn’t save her,” I say, my head shaking. “I tried though. I tried so hard.”
“You couldn’t have saved her.”
“I should have.”
“I’ve seen the damage this has done to you publicly and I can only imagine how it has affected you privately, so I’m gonna get to the point. Lani Kalei didn’t die from drowning. I saw her death certificate. She had a small tear in one of her heart valves and that is listed as the cause of death. The doctor-on-call’s final diagnosis was clearly written. She didn’t drown.”
“What? I was told…” I close my eyes as my mind drifts back into the darkness of those fatal hours.
“If she had drowned, I believe your CPR tactics would’ve saved her. But, the autopsy report shows the tear had grown, causing the blood to flow backward into her aortic valve and that’s what actually killed her. I think it was just bad timing that she was surfing.”
“What?” My dad’s voice startles us both.
The clerk stubs her cigarette out in the ashtray, visibly shaken as if she’s been busted.
Murphy bumps me from the side as he takes a protective stance next to me.
She stutters as she starts to explain for all of us to hear. “I mean even if Lani would’ve been sitting on a couch watching a movie, she would’ve died that day.” She shifts nervously. “Both she and her family were aware of the tear prior to
My dad turns back to the nurse after signing the paperwork.
She tells Sunny she can go and the group starts walking out the door. I start to walk, but pause, unsettled by the clerk’s familiarity with me. My name is trashed in Hawaii, the Ashford name filling the papers and becoming gossip fodder. Usually that doesn’t weigh on me much, my own life feeling protected among my group of friends and hangouts where I’m not judged by my sins. But her eyes told me the lies behind her words. She definitely knows my name and now I’m curious to know why.
Needing answers, I turn back and approach the desk again. “May I speak with you?”
The older nurse in the chair raises her eyebrows at the younger clerk and smiles. The nurse must think I’m flirting with the clerk.
She straightens her scrubs, and says, “Sure,” with a heavy gulp. “It’s time for my break anyway.”
When she walks out from behind the counter, she leads me outside. “I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“That means you know something about me. Please tell me.”
She steps to the corner of the building. An ashtray pushed up against the building indicates this is where the medical staff smoke. She pulls a pack of cigarettes and a lighter from her pocket and lights up.
I watch with trepidation, wondering why she knows me or more specifically, of me. She blows out a big puff of smoke and begins. “I could lose my job for telling you confidential information, but I ran across a file the other day. That’s why I was surprised to hear your name.”
“A file with my name in it?”
She nods. “It was Lani Kalei’s file.”
Exasperation drops my shoulders, and I say, “Yeah, that. I’m sure my name is all over her file.”
She looks around, making sure no other eyes are on us before she speaks again. “I have full access to patient records. I also read the papers after the accident. Lani’s record is sealed, marked confidential. But three days ago, the newly renovated files department opened and we had to re-file all of the old ones into the new department. That file was among twenty others that were re-classified. We had to create a new folder for it because the judge’s request to seal the Kalei file expired three months ago.”
“You mean it’s public?”
“No. No medical file is public, but it’s accessible with the right permissions in place and I’ve seen it since I had to re-organize it. As I said, I could get fired for telling you this, but I know the battle you’ve fought with the press. They made you out to be her killer, but you aren’t.”
“I couldn’t save her,” I say, my head shaking. “I tried though. I tried so hard.”
“You couldn’t have saved her.”
“I should have.”
“I’ve seen the damage this has done to you publicly and I can only imagine how it has affected you privately, so I’m gonna get to the point. Lani Kalei didn’t die from drowning. I saw her death certificate. She had a small tear in one of her heart valves and that is listed as the cause of death. The doctor-on-call’s final diagnosis was clearly written. She didn’t drown.”
“What? I was told…” I close my eyes as my mind drifts back into the darkness of those fatal hours.
“If she had drowned, I believe your CPR tactics would’ve saved her. But, the autopsy report shows the tear had grown, causing the blood to flow backward into her aortic valve and that’s what actually killed her. I think it was just bad timing that she was surfing.”
“What?” My dad’s voice startles us both.
The clerk stubs her cigarette out in the ashtray, visibly shaken as if she’s been busted.
Murphy bumps me from the side as he takes a protective stance next to me.
She stutters as she starts to explain for all of us to hear. “I mean even if Lani would’ve been sitting on a couch watching a movie, she would’ve died that day.” She shifts nervously. “Both she and her family were aware of the tear prior to
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