The Woman with the Cure by Lynn Cullen

Author:Lynn Cullen [Cullen, Lynn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2023-02-21T00:00:00+00:00

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Viola came into the bedroom after checking on the boys one last time.

Eugene was down to his T-shirt and shorts. “Why did you bring up that man who died?” He pulled back the bedspread, then climbed under, the coral tufts of chenille rippling. “That is a sore subject.”

She put her glass of water on the nightstand.

He saw her face. “Look, I’m sorry. But if I’m ever going to get out of the basement and into the lab more, I can’t be offending Dr. Horstmann.”

“She didn’t look offended. Anyway, she’s not even a full professor. She can’t help you! She can’t even help herself.”

Viola slipped under the covers next to him. It occurred to her that Dr. Horstmann was trying to find her way up, too. So many were trying to move up—Dr. Horstmann, Eugene, her, even that woman with the dolled-up twins. Everyone was so busy trying to pitch themselves up out of the soup, they couldn’t see the person flailing next to them.

Eugene folded his hands on the chenille-tufted mountain of his chest. “I’m glad I have some way of fighting polio. Whatever it takes to kill the beast that took our Linda.” His head scraped across his pillow as he turned to look at her. “You know I can’t rest until I do.”

The old wound flared up so sharply that it took her breath. She saw Linda’s terrified eyes—her little Linda, still so tender, so innocent. Oh, those eyes, those eyes. Even having two more children after she’d left them had done nothing to lessen the pain.

Eugene turned back to stare at the ceiling.

That man, thinking he could conquer polio by being an animal keeper! He might as well be bailing out a sinking ship with a teaspoon.

She studied his profile, its familiar contours so dear to her. Yet was he so outrageous, believing himself to be in the fight? At least he was doing something, something dangerous, something that few men ever would or could do, something that smashed his heart into pieces in the process, for their Linda. Eugene Oakley was the bravest man she knew.

She nestled up close to him. He looked down, then swung his arm around her. “What’re you doing?”

“That Chicken Divan recipe was weak,” she said. “Don’t you think it lacked a pinch of cayenne?”

“Is that all you got to say?”

She put her hands to the prickly flesh on his jaw, then brought his face to hers. “You know it isn’t.”

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