The hospital waiting room clock ticked as loudly as a time bomb.

Sarah counted each second—one Mississippi, two Mississippi—as the minute hand crawled toward the hour. Opposite her, Lucas slumped forward, knees on elbows, his eyes fixed on the scuffed linoleum between his boots. His knuckles were white where they clasped each other.

A door creaked open at the end of the hall. Both their heads sprang up, but it was just a nurse wheeling an older patient towards radiology. Sarah's shoulders slumped as the squealing wheels faded around the corner.

Lucas's throat roughed out as he swallowed hard. "Should be any minute now." His voice sounded scraped raw, though neither of them had spoken in nearly an hour.

Sarah nodded, her half-moon fingernail creases in her palms. Five days before, the biopsy. This morning, the MRI. Now they waited to hear from Dr. Mendes whether the mass in Sarah's breast was the horror they feared or—

The door opened once again.

This time, he.

Dr. Mendes appeared younger than the name he bore, his black hair streaked with gray, his white lab coat spotless in the fluorescent lights. Sarah's heart slammed against her ribcage as he walked toward them with a manila folder in his hand.

"Mr. and Mrs. Wilder?"

Lucas leapt to his feet so rapidly his chair groaned. Sarah remained frozen. Couldn't breathe. Air had grown as thick as syrup in her lungs.

The doctor sat next to her in the chair, his leg against hers. He opened the folder carefully—too carefully—revealing black-and-white images that might as well have been hieroglyphics.

Sarah's field of vision tightened. Off in the background, Lucas's hand came down on her shoulder, grasping her in place.

"First," Dr. Mendes announced, "it's obviously a tumor."

The word stole her breath. Sarah's stomach fell. Lucas's grip tightened.

"But—" The physician held up a finger, flipping to another page. "The biopsy shows it's benign. Completely noncancerous."

Silence.

Then Lucas made a sound like someone drowning and breaking surface—half cry, half gasp. Sarah's hands came up to her mouth as burning tears overflowed.

Dr. Mendes smiled sympathetically. "We'll have to remove it, of course, but this is not the bad news we feared."

Sarah couldn't talk. Couldn't think. The relief was just too overwhelming, like trying to drink from a firehose.

Lucas fell to his knees beside her chair, his head in her lap, his body trembling. Sarah encircled her hands in his hair—his gorgeous, unruly, loved hair—as the doctor continued to discuss next steps that now seemed manageable.

As Dr. Mendes left, promising to arrange the outpatient surgery, Sarah held Lucas's face in her hands. His eyes were red-rimmed, his stubble prickly against her palms.

"You're stuck with me, Wilder," she breathed.

Lucas tried to laugh out a reply, his forehead against hers. They stayed like this, both gasping each other's air, as people moved out of the waiting room into the hall.

Then, in the parking lot under the breathtaking blue sky, Lucas lingered beside their car. "Olivia." His voice cracked. "We can—she's at your mom's—"

Sarah understood. They'd dropped their daughter off this morning with forced smiles and crevice-deep hugs, apprehension a third passenger on the car. Now they could return with joy instead of grief.

Lucas struggled with his phone, his fingers still trembling. "I'll call," he said to her, then hesitated. "Unless you want to surprise her?"

Sarah remembered Olivia's face when they'd broken the news to her Mommy wasn't sick the bad kind. Remembered the years unfolding ahead of them—parent-teacher conferences and first heartaches and college drops-off and maybe someday, grandbabies.

A breeze blew through her hair, carrying the scent of freshly cut grass from the lawn bordering the hospital. A child's laughter sounded nearby.

Sarah took the phone from Lucas's trembling hand and tucked it into her pocket. "Let's go get our girl."

And walking hand in hand, they walked out to the car—to Olivia, to home, to the future they'd almost lost but now would be able to live.

Hope had won this time. And when Lucas's arms enveloped hers, Sarah knew—whatever battles lay ahead, they'd face them the same way.

Chapter 47: Trusting the J