We first meet Leigh and Nick in Disaster Status, but Code Triage can be read as a standalone. Here is their backstory:
Leigh had married a restauranteur; a man with a nice, safe
job. Nick was a chef in his own
restaurant when they first met, however even then he was making plans to join
the police force. Leigh then found
herself living with the pressures of being married to a cop, which put a
tremendous amount of strain on their relationship. On the other hand, unbeknownst to Nick, Leigh
still carries a lot of baggage from her childhood – the kind of baggage that
makes her not believe in happily ever after.
Leigh spent the first few years of their marriage waiting for the other
shoe to drop; she was just waiting for their marriage to fall apart. Sadly, Leigh was never 100% committed to
forever. When Leigh found out she was
pregnant with a child she knew Nick desperately yearned for, she made the
decision not to tell Nick straight away.
Instead, she asked him to move out.
She wanted time and space to make sure that she wanted to stay married
to Nick for their sakes, and not just for the baby. It is during this separation that Nick’s best
friend died in the line of duty. Nick
did not have his wife to comfort him during this devastating time (and by
saying this I am by no means justifying what followed – I just think it is
important to realize the importance of always being the one person your space
can lean on). In the process of
comforting his friend’s sister, one night of too much wine led to Nick breaking
his marriage vows. It is clear from both
Nick and Samantha’s (the other woman's) later reflections that Nick was confused
and absolutely devastated the next morning (it is also clear by Sam’s later
actions that Nick is not the first married man she seduced, and trying
to get him drunk to get him in her bed seems to be her MO). Nick immediately came clean to Leigh about
his night with Sam, and this devastating news led to Leigh losing the baby Nick
never knew they had. She never told him
about the miscarriage; instead she filed for divorce.
What
Calvert did brilliantly here was
highlight that a story always has two sides.
I like it when things are black and white. Leigh and Nick’s story is not – there are a
whole lot of grey areas. Both of them
made very big mistakes that shook the fragile foundation of their marriage. This
book forced me out of my comfort zone and made me confront my feelings on a
very, very, very sensitive topic.
I have
never been personally affected by a cheating spouse, but it’s something that
breaks my heart every time without fail.
Calvert managed what no other
author has managed to do – she made me root for Leigh and Nick to get back
together. Usually I can’t get past the
cheating and I can’t warm up to the hero.
In this book I never hated
Nick – I hate what had happened, I hate what he did and I hate what it did to
his wife and his marriage, but I never hated him. In this case cheating
on his wife was truly a dreadful mistake he deeply regrets and not a deliberate act. I was truly invested in this story and I
desperately wanted Leigh and Nick to get back together. Their love for each other is very obvious and
very deep. They just had some major
obstacles to overcome.
I put off reading this book for so long because I simply knew it was going to shatter me. I started crying for Leigh and with Leigh in Disaster Status already, and this time around I started crying on Chapter 1! I read this book in one day. I literally could not stop once I had started; I was positively desperate to discover what happens. I read until about 3:00am, and when I got up the next morning, Code Triage was the first thing on my mind.
Code
Triage starts off with Nick’s greatest fear: Leigh and Sam
finally meet. Their jobs (police man,
doctor, social worker) collide and the three of them find themselves working
the same case. Nick helplessly watches
as the biggest mistake of his life breaks his wife’s heart all over again. Despite their separation, in the months since he cheated on Leigh he
hasn’t touched another woman, especially Sam (despite Sam’s best efforts). Determined to get Leigh to change her mind
about the divorce and give their marriage another chance, Nick has only one
week until the court date within which he must soften his wife’s broken
heart. He has his work cut out for him, but he can’t
give up on Leigh; he can’t lose her for good.
Slowly but surely Nick invades Leigh’s space and makes her confront her
true feelings for him. While she can’t
stand being in the same room with him, he knows that she still loves him every
bit as much as he loves her and that it is her heartbreak keeping them apart –
not lack of love.
Leigh
has not only given up on her husband, she has given up on God. He took away her husband and her child, and
Leigh is convinced that God doesn’t care about her. As Leigh is forced to daily face not only her
husband, but the other woman as well, she starts to think God hates her. Little could she have guessed that God is
truly working behind the scenes to save her marriage as well as her soul, and
to help her to finally start believing in unconditional, unwavering, forever
kind of love.
Nick
blames himself, not Sam, for what happened between them and he sees Sam as a
victim of his actions as well. Driven by
guilt Nick continues to be a part of Sam’s life and he continues to emotionally
support Sam and her young daughter in the absence of his deceased friend. Little could he guess the extremes Sam will
go to, to drive a wedge between Nick and Leigh.
Unbeknownst to Nick, while he is working to salvage Leigh’s trust, Sam
is working tirelessly to assault Leigh with taunts and insults, deliberately
contradicting Nick’s promises of love and fidelity, making Leigh doubt Nick’s
truthfulness and sincerity.
I
did not appreciate having to read
several sections from Sam’s point of view. I could not stand the woman. Not
since Julia in Francine Rivers’ The Mark of the Lion trilogy have I hated a character with such passion. I
did not enjoy experiencing Sam’s thoughts and manipulations. And what a
manipulator she is! The woman even
shamelessly uses her own child to manipulate Nick! Sam continually goes out of her way to hurt
Leigh time and time again. What’s even
worse than all her blatant attempts to, not only sink her claws into Nick, but
to make Leigh believe there was much more going on between Sam and Nick than
there ever could be, is the level of enjoyment Sam got out of deliberately destroying
someone’s marriage. She took so much
pleasure from watching her words and actions cut Leigh’s heart open. I could not bring myself to soften towards
this woman at all; not even after discovering why she is so desperate for the
love of a good man (being hurt by monsters does not give you an excuse to
become one). Despite Sam’s best efforts
to destroy Leigh’s heart, marriage and life overall, Leigh was able to not only
save Sam’s life but forgive her as well – I am not at all sure that I could do
the same. Perhaps that is something I
need to reflect on and work on.
As
Nick continues to pray for his wife, Leigh finally takes her dusty Bible off
the shelf and starts to re-evaluate her stance in the mess that has become her
life. Leigh realizes that God never left
her – she left Him. Leigh owns her
mistakes, faces her greatest fears and opens her heart to the possibility of a
love that lasts forever. As Leigh
finally embraces what Nick has always believed – that their marriage should be
built on a Christian foundation – Nick and Leigh might finally have a chance at
happily ever after.
The
best books in the world make you feel;
and boy did this book make me feel. It
made me step away from my rigid black-and-white-preference and examine the grey
areas I would honestly have preferred not to deal with. This book made me re-evaluate my stance on a
lot of things. It made me ponder, it
made me question, it made me consider points of view I never would have
considered before. It made me realise anew
the importance of protecting your spouse and nurturing your marriage. Considering the intensity of the affect this
book had on me and the emotional upheaval it put me through, Code
Triage quite simply has to be listed as one of my all-time favourites.
Product Information:
Title:
Code Triage
Series:
Mercy Hospital Book 3 (Standalone, but
best read after Critical Care and Disaster Status).
Author:
Candace Calvert
Publisher:
Tyndale House Publishers
Year:
2010
Pages: 374
ISBN-10: 1414325452
ISBN-10: 1414325452
ISBN-13:
978-1414325453
ASIN:
B0045I8B9A
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I'm completely honored by this in-depth review--sorry I caused you such turmoil, and yet glad the story resonated so deeply. I, too, often long for black and white, but I think God sometimes uses grey to teach us. Nick remains one of my favorite heroes to this day. His remorse, his hope, his ultimate happiness is an example of God's grace. Plus (smile) it was really fun for this author to indulge two other passions: horses and cooking. Thank you so much for your time in both reading and reviewing this book.
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