Free Do Not Disturb by Christie Ridgway Page B

beautiful.
    Following her lead, he retrieved his chair, then sat back at the table and cradled his mug in his palms. What was he supposed to do now? Comfort her? He supposed he could tell her that Buddhists think the soul is not extinguished at death, but passed on like a candle flame to an unlit wick. That Hindus believe a person must die for them to discover their deathless, Supreme Self.
    But then again, maybe he should offer nothing. The Shoshone Indians said that grief was a landslide the griever had to work through alone, one rock at a time.After all, he’d been out of the advice game for five years, and inside him, some cautious, wise voice of his own warned that inviting discussion would only further upset the peace between them.
    He glanced up, and caught her swiping a trembling hand beneath her nose.
    That broke him.
    Grabbing up the pen and paper she always had on the table, he quickly blocked out the question. After all these years of self-selected silence, he could be pretty damn pithy with a pen. WHY SO UNHAPPY ?
    â€œI—” Beth broke off, swallowed. “I can’t stop thinking about the past. Oh, Judd, I hurt so much.”
    She hurt .
    He sucked in a sharp breath, and then another, her out-loud admission striking hard at the unprotected and tender belly of his heart. He rubbed his chest, trying to remind himself that the first of the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism was the universality of suffering. That he should be able to understand and accept her pain.
    But it was impossible, because another truth, maybe not as noble, but certainly as elementary, was suddenly staring him in the face. Breathe slow and deep, he told himself, because you’ll definitely have to understand and accept this .
    There would be no denying it, no turning back, that’s for certain. Not when he practiced wu wei —the Taoist art of letting nature take its course.
    And that course had led him to here, he saw now. To Beth. To the realization that he was in love with her.
    And nothing would ever, ever be the same again.
    Â 
    It was very late afternoon when Angel wound the curly telephone cord around her fingers. “Yeah, yeah. They took my laptop, my cell phone, everything.”
    At the other end of the line, her intern, Cara, was properly astounded.
    â€œBut I’ll survive,” Angel promised, keeping her voice low. Especially now that she’d discovered the deserted room marked “Infirmary” and its old-fashioned rotary telephone. She didn’t feel the least bit guilty about making the long-distance call either. For one thing, the charges were going on her credit card, and for another, she figured it had a medical purpose. Access to regular inoculations of Real World would keep her sane.
    â€œBut listen, Cara, I don’t have much time. I’ve been going through the files you sent down with me. But I need something else. I need you to mail me a package. No, not more research, not right now.” Angel lowered her voice to a whisper. “A jar of instant coffee, okay?”
    She rolled her eyes when Cara demanded she speak up. “Coffee. Instant coffee,” Angel said more loudly.
    A rustling down the corridor made her freeze. “Shh!” she hissed into the receiver, listening intently. After a few moments of unrelieved silence, she dared to go on.
    Turning her back to the door, she hunched her shoulders and cupped her hand over her mouth. “And Cara,” Angel said into the phone, “the issue with the story on Paul Roth hits the stands today. I want you to call Miss Marshall. You know, just to check on her.”
    Cara made some squeaky protest noises.
    â€œListen,” Angel replied sternly. “This isn’t an easy job. If you want to be a journalist, a good one, you have to ask the hard questions and you have to write the hard truths.”
    On the other end, the young woman responded a bit sharply that then you got to order your intern to