While I Couldn't Breathe, He Was With Her novel · Chapter 21 of 24

Chapter 21: Calvin Walks In

Kirsten's POV

Calvin pushed through the kitchen doors without a word, and I followed him.

The ballroom was warm and gold, and on the stage Polly had just lifted her tissue to her eyes.

"He raised me," she was saying. "He gave up everything for me. If he could see this room..."

Calvin walked into the aisle between the tables.

He was still in the rented black jacket, and he did not hurry.

A woman near the back turned her head and saw him, and she stopped breathing.

The sound moved through the room table by table, a murmur and then a scrape of chairs, and the man at the microphone stopped talking.

Polly looked up.

"I'm right here," Calvin said, in a voice that carried to the stage. "You can ask him yourself."

Nobody spoke.

The easel with his portrait stood a few feet from his shoulder.

He glanced at it, and then at the donors.

"Calvin Ostrow," he said. "Forest ranger, Carbon River district. I was told I died last month."

A man dropped a fork, and it rang on a plate.

Nolan was on his feet at the head table.

"This is a stunt," he said. "Security."

"It isn't," said a voice from the third row.

The surgeon had stood up with his napkin still in his hand.

He was gray in the face, but he did not sit.

"Most of you know me," he said. "I treat the Haskins family's hearts. A month ago I was asked to say I was operating on Mr. Ostrow." He turned his head toward Nolan. "There was no operation. There was never an Ostrow on my table."

The murmur broke into noise.

I saw Nolan look at the surgeon, then at Calvin, then at the portrait, and his hand closed on the back of his chair.

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