New York, May 23 (ANI): Natalie Cole underwent a life-saving kidney transplant surgery in Los Angeles and returned to her ailing sister’s bed, only to learn she had passed away.

The 59-year-old singer had been with her dying sister, Carol “Cookie” Cole when she received an urgent call from medics, saying that a kidney had been arranged from a deceased organ donor and that she would have to undergo surgery immediately.

And as the eight-time Grammy Award-winner, who has been suffering from kidney failure, caused by the hepatitis C she contracted during her time as an intravenous heroin user, was receiving the life-saving transplant after a few hours, her elder sister left the world.

“Natalie was there with her at her bedside at 4 in the morning on Monday, and she got a phone call from her doctors that a kidney was ready for her,” the New York Post quoted Natalie’s younger sister, Timolin Cole, as saying.

“She said, ‘What do you mean? I can’t deal with that right now! I’m here with my dying sister!’ And they said to her, ‘No, ma’am. We’ve got to do it now. You’ve got to be at Cedars-Sinai in two hours.’

“I told her, ‘Natalie, this is God’s gift, and you’ve got to go now. Cookie would want this for you,’” she added.

Timolin continued: “This is all so surreal, and it is devastating.

“Our sister Cookie hadn’t been to a doctor in 30 years, and last week she went in and they found a cancerous spot on her lung. They had wanted to start chemo right away, but Cookie said no.”

Natalie’s publicist called the family’s life-and-death parallels “a tragic coincidence.” (ANI)