Nights in Rodanthe by Nicholas Sparks

promise.”
    Adrienne caught a glimpse of Paul’s smile as she went on.
    “And unless we get someone else this weekend—and I’m not expecting anyone else with the storm unless they get stranded,” she
     said, “we can eat whenever you’d like. Normally, Jean serves breakfast at eight and dinner is at seven, but if you’re busy
     then, just let me know and we can eat whenever. Or I can make you something that you could take with you.”
    “Thanks.”
    She paused, her mind searching for anything else to say.
    “Oh, one more thing. Before you use the phone, you should know it’s only set up to make local calls. If you want to dial long
     distance, you’ll have to use a calling card or call collect, and you’ll have to go through the operator.”
    “Okay.”
    She hesitated in the doorway. “Anything else you need to know?”
    “I think that just about covers it. Except, of course, for the obvious.”
    “What’s that?”
    “You haven’t told me your name yet.”
    She set the key on the chest of drawers beside the door and smiled. “I’m Adrienne. Adrienne Willis.”
    Paul crossed the room, and surprising her, he offered his hand.
    “Nice to meet you, Adrienne.”

Six

    P aul had come to Rodanthe at the request of Robert Torrelson, and as he unpacked a few items from the duffel bag and placed
     them in the drawers, he wondered again what Robert wanted to say to him or if he expected Paul to do most of the talking.
    Jill Torrelson had come to him because she had a meningioma. A benign cyst, it wasn’t a life-threatening ailment, but it was
     unsightly, to say the least. The meningioma was on the right side of her face, extending from the bridge of her nose and over
     the cheek, forming a bulbous purple mass, punctuated by scars where it had ulcerated over the years. Paul had operated on
     dozens of patients with meningiomas, and he’d received many letters from those who had undergone the operation, expressing
     how thankful they were for what he’d done.
    He’d gone over it a thousand times, and he still didn’t know why she’d died. Nor, it seemed, could science provide the answer.
     The autopsy on Jill was inconclusive, and the cause of death had not been determined. At first, they assumed she’d had an
     embolism of some sort, but they could find no evidence of it. After that, they focused on the idea that she’d had an allergic
     reaction to the anesthesia or postsurgical medication, but those were eventually ruled out as well. So was negligence on Paul’s
     part; the surgery had gone off without a hitch, and a close examination by the coroner had found nothing out of the ordinary
     with the procedure or anything that might have been even tangentially responsible for her death.
    The videotape had confirmed it. Because the meningioma was considered typical, the procedure had been videotaped by the hospital
     for potential use in instruction by the faculty. Afterward, it had been reviewed by the surgical board of the hospital and
     three additional surgeons from out of state. Again, nothing was found to be amiss.
    There were some medical conditions mentioned in the report. Jill Torrelson was overweight and her arteries had thickened;
     in time, she may have needed a coronary bypass. She had diabetes and, as a lifelong smoker, the beginnings of emphysema, though
     again, neither of these conditions seemed life-threatening at present, and neither adequately explained what had happened.
    Jill Torrelson, it seemed, had died for no reason at all, as if God had simply called her home.
    Like so many others in his situation, Robert Torrelson had filed a wrongful-death suit. The lawsuit named Paul, the hospital,
     and the anesthesiologist as defendants. Paul, like most surgeons, was covered by malpractice insurance. As was customary,
     he was instructed not to speak to Robert Torrelson without an attorney present and even then only if he was being deposed
     and Robert Torrelson happened to be in the