Drake shook his head. "I can't imagine what Maureen told him about me. Probably thinks I'm Hannibal Lecter."
"He only knows Maureen's side of the story, Drake."
He sighed and released me when the elevator reached the lobby and the doors opened. "I was a dick, Kate," he said, taking my hand as we left the elevator and walked through the lobby to the street. "I freely admit that. She had every right to divorce me. I was an absent husband."
I took in a deep breath and nodded. "You did as well as you knew how at the time."
"I promise I won't be absent with you," he said and squeezed my hand. "I've learned about myself and about relationships since then. I don't want to be that man anymore."
"You aren't."
He smiled softly at that and stopped. "Sweet sweet Ms. Bennet," he said and brushed his fingers over my lips. "How lucky I am to have found you."
We embraced once more and went out into a cold Manhattan winter's night.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
We drove down the snowy streets in silence. I took Drake's hand, waiting until he felt like talking. As I watched the passing scenery, I noticed that we weren't going back towards his apartment in Chelsea, but instead down 8th Avenue.
It was 'our place'. Where we first really became a couple.
"You want to go to 8th Avenue?"
He nodded but didn't say anything. I bit my lip, not wanting to question him about it. He'd say why if he felt like it. Still, I was curious. I liked his apartment and planned on using it as a studio of sorts before we left for Africa. It felt as if he was really letting me 'in' by taking me there – into his life.
"I think of 8th Avenue as our place," he said quietly, mirroring my own thoughts. "My apartment is me as I was before you. I'm different now. Frankly, I'd like to sell the Chelsea apartment and for us to move into 8th Avenue or get our own place when we come back from Africa."
"Will you still be able to go? I mean, with the transplant…"
He shook his head. "I'll contact the head of the Neurosurgery program and let him know what's up. I may not be a match, but if I am, the procedures will take about four weeks. I'll have to cancel my slate, have someone else do my surgeries, but we can still go once I know Liam's OK, if I am a match. I wouldn’t start teaching until March anyway." He pulled into a park and lock parking ga
rage and found a spot. When he got out, he came around to my side and opened the door for me. I'd become used to his gentlemanly ways and let him.
He took my arm and we walked down the stairs to the ground level.
"I hope to hell that I'm a match. He's so young and frail and this cancer is very aggressive."
I cleared my throat, a bit overcome with emotion. "You'll have to stay for a while, see how he does."
He nodded. "I hope you don't mind. We just may have time to get your malaria meds all up to date before we go."
"Of course I don't mind." We entered the street, arm in arm, and we walked the block and a half to his building. "What's involved in the transplant?"
He opened the front entry door for me and held it as I went through. "Testing to see if my HLA is a match for Liam's, and then if I'm a match, they'll have two options. They can give me a drug called Filgrastim to increase my blood stem cells and then harvest them from my blood using a machine that separates white from red blood cells, or they can go into my marrow surgically and take it out."
"Is it painful?"
"Filgrastim makes you really achy and tired for a few days before the donation because your marrow is producing more stem cells than normal. There's a recovery time after they harvest your cells. A week or so. Taking marrow directly out of the bone causes discomfort, but it's bearable with painkillers."
"How do they decide?" I asked as we climbed the stairs to his apartment.
"That's up to the oncologist but it's easier to do the peripheral collection."
He opened the door to the apartment and I was taken once more by the scent of the place and how much it made me think of the happy times we'd spent there together. Tonight would not be one of those times, but I'd try to comfort Drake as best I could, however he wanted me to comfort him.
"How do they do the procedure?"
He took my coat and hung it in the closet while I shucked off my boots. "They'll have me lie on a bed, cover me with warm blankets. They take blood out of one arm, run it through a machine that separates out the stem cells, and then re-infuse it in the other arm."