by Risk, Mona
Soon she sobered.
What if he tired of her and dated other women? She scowled at the aggravating but plausible eventuality. It might happen, considering his substantial experience at attracting women and slipping away from their eager arms.
“What’s wrong? Share with me.” He lifted a questioning eyebrow.
She puckered her mouth and squinted. “How long did you keep your latest girlfriend? And the one before?”
“Pardon?” Under furrowed brows, he considered her for a moment. “Have you been listening to more gossip? My entourage delights in exaggerating my reputation. The truth is I haven’t had any girlfriend for a long time. You probably heard I am a confirmed bachelor. The women I dated complained when I spent long hours at the hospital or worked on export deals for my wine during the weekends. They left me, and I never tried to keep them. You are different, Mary-Beth. I can’t let you go.”
Sincerity gleamed in his eyes.
One thing was sure, hiding from love out of fear of rejection hadn’t helped in the past. Sleeping in Yves’s arms was heaven and a risk she was willing to take.
She’d deal with new problems when the time came. With a flip of her hand, she dismissed all negative thoughts.
“You are free to do as you want, right?” His suggestive smile promised so much. “Why not enjoy life together?
“Together.” She relished the word and the feeling. “Yes,” she shouted in response. Her heart fizzed with happiness. The wind blew her hair back from her face and fluttered the horse’s mane. “Yes, I will stay,” she repeated to herself.
Hoof beats pounded behind her. “Yes? Mary-Beth?”
She’d reached the most important decision of her life. Right now she needed a dose and a half of passion with the man she’d always loved. She turned her head and glanced over her shoulder to reassure him. “I want—”
CHAPTER TWENTY
The mare swerved, bolted, and sent her flying from the saddle while a terrified furry ball raced across the track and scurried off into the woods. It all happened so quickly.
“Mary-Beth.” Horror speared Yves’s heart at the sight of the empty saddle. Mary-Beth hadn’t even screamed before she tumbled off and hit the ground. She lay flat on her stomach, sprawled over leaves and surface roots. Her arms crossed under her face as if she’d tried to protect her eyes when falling.
He stopped abruptly, leapt down, and ran to kneel by her side.
“Oh, mon Dieu. Ma chérie.” He touched her neck, feeling for a pulse. It was slow and irregular. She was alive, thank God. Merci, mon Dieu. Afraid to move her and hurt her spine, he carefully looked at her back and examined her with a feather light touch. His eyes widened as he noticed the red wetness on the ground.
Blood? His breath caught. She was bleeding. From where? He couldn’t see the cut.
“Mary-Beth, mon amour. Please don’t die on me.” He pulled his cell phone from his belt and called an ambulance. “I have a woman who fell from a horse in the forest. She’s bleeding.” He quickly gave directions. “Come as close as you can. We’ll have to carry her out to the fields.”
His gut wrenched with pain. He stared at her motionless form and prayed help would arrive fast. Obviously, the ambulance wouldn’t be able to maneuver through the woods or even the fields. Yves called Hubert. “Mary-Beth fell from the horse.” He indicated the place where Hubert should meet the ambulance. “Bring the paramedics and their stretcher on your Jeep. Bring Simon to handle the horses.”
His calls done, he checked his watch and sat on the ground, next to Mary-Beth, his pulse as erratic as hers. With shaking fingers, he gently cleaned her hair of leaves, dirt and splinters of wood, and bent to kiss her head.
“Chérie, please, don’t die on me.” A scalpel-sharp sting pierced his heart. “Mary-Beth, my darling. I have so many things to tell you. Don’t leave me,” he said, hoping she could hear him. He wished he could gather her in his arms and carry her out the forest, but it was too risky to move her. He could exacerbate her injuries.
He glanced at his watch again. His heartbeat ticked with the seconds. Louder. Only two minutes had passed.
“Ma chérie, help is on the way. The paramedics will be here soon. And Hubert too,” he gently explained as he caressed her hair and brought a lock to his lips. She would at least need stitches on her forehead and around her face to help her cuts heal fast and without scars.
Cursing his apathy, his selfishness, his fears, he wrung his hands. If she hadn’t been mulling over his offer, she would have concentrated on the path. A disgusted groan escaped him. What offer? It was just a selfish request on his part. She might die because of him.
A familiar honk sounded in the silence of the forest. Help had arrived. Yves bolted to his feet. “Over here,” he shouted.
The Jeep jolted to a stop. Simon darted from the vehicle and gathered the horses while the paramedics jumped out the back with a stretcher. Yves led the two young men to Mary-Beth. They wrapped a collar around her neck and turned her on her back.
Yves gasped. His heart almost stopped.
A stick protruded from her chest. Blood oozed from the entry point. He gritted his teeth and fought the bile that rose in his throat.
With a superhuman effort, he sucked in a deep breath and concentrated on saving Mary-Beth. “Easy now.” The paramedics slid her on top of the stretcher and strapped her down to avoid any movement.
Fighting bare-knuckle with his anxiety, he issued orders. “Louis, sit in the back. We’ll hand you the stretcher.” Yves glanced at both paramedics and ascertained they understood his directives. “Ready? One, two, three, up with the stretcher. Slow-ly. Keep her immobile. Don’t jolt it at all.”
“Yes, Dr. Malroux.”
“George, sit next to Louis, in the back of the Jeep. I’m holding her with Louis. Can you take her from this side?”
“Yes, Dr. Malroux.”
Yves whipped out his cell phone and speed-dialed the cardiac surgeon’s number. “Julien, Dr. Drake fell from a horse. She’s bleeding. Prepare for emergency surgery right away. We are in the ambulance and on our way.”
Shoving his phone in his belt, he motioned Hubert away. “Move over. I’m the one driving.” He wouldn’t let his butler zoom at his usual crazy speed. “Are you holding on back there?”
He started the engine and drove as smoothly as possible. “God, please,” Yves mumbled under his breath. “Let us arrive in time.” When he stopped in front of the ambulance he exhaled his temporary relief. His eyes on Mary-Beth, he prayed they could reach the hospital before it was too late.
The paramedics moved the stretcher into the vehicle. They immediately applied oxygen and started an IV. One medic took her vital signs and placed her on the monitor while Yves watched from the door. As soon as he slipped in next to the driver, the ambulance sped along the open country road with siren wailing.
At the hospital, the trauma team waited with Carlos in the ER. The attending doctor ordered x-rays of her chest, arms, and hips. A short time later, Yves and the radiologist focused on the X-rays as they hung on the lighted screens.
“Malroux, this is more serious than we expected. She has a broken rib close to where the stick entered. And a broken hip,” the radiologist explained.
“Yes, but we can fix all that.” Stay positive. She will be fine.
“The stick only penetrated the external tissues,” the radiologist said as he assessed the ultrasound video. “Wait. There is a broken piece of bone here…” The specialist scowled as he marked the exact location of the bone.
The hair on the back of Yves’s neck stood on end. He scrutinized the bone adhering to the lower part of the heart cavity. The blood drained from his face. If a broken bone had touched the heart, Mary-Beth could bleed to death. Quickly. He swallowed and clutched the side of the monitor screen as he stared at the sonogram.
“It is embedded in the pleura. See, it didn’t penetrate the heart.” The radiologist pointed to the piece of bone while they all focus
ed on the ultrasound film.
Yves closed his eyes and mumbled, “Merci, mon Dieu.”
“We can disengage the rib without damage to the heart. But she has a pneumothorax,” Julien added. “I will insert a chest tube in the collapsed lung.”
“Go ahead. We can’t waste time,” Yves said, eager to start the surgeries that would save Mary-Beth. “We need to remove the stick and stop the bleeding.”
“Dr. Malroux, Dr. Julien, salle d’operation 3 is ready. Dr. Lebel, the orthopedist, and Roberto are already scrubbed,” Carlos announced.
“Let’s go.” Yves trotted alongside the stretcher and left at the door of the OR to change and scrub. Would he be able to do the surgery himself? He would never let any emotionally involved surgeon operate on a patient. But the patient was Mary-Beth, the woman so dear to him. He had to be in the OR and watch what was going on.
By the time he entered the OR, the nurses had cut away Mary-Beth’s clothes and prepped her for surgery. She was already under anesthesia.
Yves thought he could remove the stick once they opened her chest. The moment he held the scalpel to make the incision in her skin, his hand shook. “Julien, you cut. I will assist you.”
“Understood.” His colleague nodded solemnly. “She is your resident.”
Yves wasn’t hiding his feelings anymore. He wanted the whole world to know how much he cared about her. “A very dear resident.”
The gasps echoed around the room as a dozen pair of eyes stared at him. A hum of hushed words whizzed behind him. “In that case, you shouldn’t even be in this room. Get out,” Julien ordered.
“No way.” His eyes narrowed on his friend, warning him not to contradict him.
“That dear?” Julien winked and nodded. “Well, then don’t distract me. Step back.”
Yves didn’t answer. No force on earth could get him away from Mary-Beth. The surgeon made an incision across the front of her chest and around the stick. Yves swallowed hard, clutched the side of the operation table, and held his breath while Julien operated on her chest cavity.
Julien confirmed the stick didn’t penetrate deep. “The bleeding inside her chest is from the broken rib. Dr. Lopez, Dr. Marcoli, suction.” Yves released a sigh of relief as Julien grabbed the stick with forceps and pulled it out in one swift motion. “Good. It’s done. Suction and irrigation,” he ordered the residents.
“Malroux, you want to inspect?” Under his mask, Julien’s voice had an ironic edge.
Yves didn’t let it intimidate him. He lowered the magnifying lens over his eyes and bent to look at the thoracic area. “Good. Next, the broken bone from the rib. I will do it.” Yves was calm now, determined to save Mary-Beth. Moving this piece of rib required an excellent general surgeon. He was the one.
His colleague nodded, understanding his feelings. “Just pull it out.”
Yves felt the piece of rib with his finger. The jagged head was not embedded deeply. He grabbed it with forceps and gently extracted it. If she didn’t make it, he’d never forgive himself. He should have discussed his feelings with her and acknowledged the incredible love that swelled his chest and scared the hell out of him.
“Dr. Lebel, your turn. I’ll stitch her face later. Julien, stay around until we’re done with the thoracic cage.”
“Of course.”
“The fractured rib will heal on its own since you removed the broken piece,” the orthopedic surgeon said. “I’ll nail her hip now.” They worked deep into the night to finish the surgeries.
Yves closed the cuts on her face with minute stitches. For nothing in the world, would he allow himself or anyone to mar the features he loved so much.
By midnight, he thanked his lucky stars that no further complications arose. A nurse rolled Mary-Beth to the recovery room.
“She’s weak and still not out of danger.” His gaze fixed on the door, Yves tossed his mask and gloves in a wastebasket.
“She’s young and healthy. Her odds are good. Malroux,” Julien paused for a second. “I’m sorry about what happened to Dr. Drake. I didn’t know you and her… It may be the wrong time, but I want to say you’ve made an excellent choice.”
Yves’s shoulders slumped. Would she want him when she recovered? “I just hope it’s not too late.”
To think she’d resented him before coming to France. Now she’d have good reasons. A mending heart, broken rib and hip, maybe a limp. Mon Dieu, how he hated himself for not telling her how much he loved her.
“Come on, man. Don’t look so devastated. Things will improve. Give her time to recover. Soon you’ll both forget this nightmare.” Julien clapped Yves on the shoulder. “We haven’t had a wedding in Marancourt for a long time. Don’t worry I’ll cover for you while you stay at her bedside.”
“Thank you for everything.”
A wedding in the little church of Marancourt? A picture of Mary-Beth in a white dress and long veil, holding his arm, made him smile, but his smile faded to a grimace and his throat filled with an acid taste as an image of Rose-Anne tortured his spirit.
Had the Malroux de Marancourt ever seen a happy marriage? He shouldn’t have messed with Mary-Beth. He had caused her fall.
His heart heavy, he changed into clean scrubs and headed back to the recovery room where he checked her BP, pulse and oxygen rate on the heart monitor. Thank to Julien’s offer, Yves would dedicate every minute of his time to Mary-Beth and wouldn’t worry about neglecting his other patients. He sat in a recliner beside her bed and waited for her to open her eyes.
Around six in the morning, Yves woke from his doze. Had he heard a moan? He leapt off his chair and leaned over her. “Mary-Beth?”
She turned her head toward him, her eyes still closed.
Yves pulled out his stethoscope, listened to her heart and lungs. Her pulse was slow, as expected after her long anesthesia. Thank God, her BP was normal. He caressed her cheek. Was it too hot? Or were his hands unusually cold? He touched his palm to her forehead. She was hot.
He called a nurse to take her temperature. She stuck a thermometer in Mary-Beth’s ear. “38O Centigrade.”
“Too high. She’s developed an infection. Get blood counts.”
Julien came to check on her.
“She’s coming around,” Yves said. “I want her in ICU for a few days.”
“Absolutely. Did you check her?”
“Yes, but, please, do it again. She has a fever.”
“Not good. It could be from the surgeries, or an infection from the dirt on the stick or on her face.”
“I asked for a blood analysis, but I’ll up her antibiotic dosage right away.” Yves raked his fingers through his hair.
“Good. Now, you should get some rest.”
“Don’t worry about me. I had a few hours of sleep in that chair.” His eyes fixed on his precious patient, Yves sat back in the recliner and pledged not to leave Mary-Beth until she recovered.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Mary-Beth slowly emerged from a deep slumber. Her eyelids felt heavy, as if they’d been stuck together with crazy glue. Too tired to open them, she squirmed. It hurt so much. She cringed and brought a hand to her chest. A stabbing pain held her immobile. Carefully she reached up to rub the painful area and winced. Her fingers touched gauze stretched over her breasts.
With tremendous effort she raised her eyelids, enough to let in a thin beam of pale light. Where was she?
The hospital. Of course, she was always at the hospital. She worked there every day.
She closed her eyes, exhausted by the effort. Something in the back of her head told her it was unprofessional to sleep at the hospital. How could she doze on duty? She’d better get back to work right away. She tried to move. An iron grip crushed over her back or rather her hip. She whimpered and grasped her side. Another dressing here. Damn it. Had someone cut her in pieces and tied her into a coffin? She screeched and flung her arms to get up, to run away.
“Mary-Beth, mon amour. It’s okay. You are going to be fine.�
� Yves’s voice reached her through the daze.
She tried to talk to him, to beg him to help her. No sounds came from her throat. And she still couldn’t open her eyes. Terrified, she rolled her head from side to side and felt tears wet her cheeks. A finger softly caressed her face. “I am here, my love. You will be fine.” His soft voice lulled her. She relaxed and drifted.
****
“It has been five days since Mary-Beth’s fall. How is she doing?” Hubert asked Yves from the door of the intensive care unit after studying her face. The whiteness of the sheets and covers extended to her neck and cheeks. Her hair was pulled back from her sunken eyes and the sutures on her forehead.
“She had complications, high fever and delirium. Today her fever dropped a little bit, but she hasn’t awakened yet.” Yves gazed at her lovely features so ghostly pale at the moment.
“I am sure she will soon.”
A nurse came to draw blood from Mary-Beth’s arm. Hubert greeted her with a wide smile. “Bonjour, Beatrice. Don’t suck out all her blood.”
“Don’t worry. I am very careful.” She pulled two vials of blood without Mary-Beth batting an eye. “Shall I see you tomorrow, Hubert?” Beatrice asked in a subdued voice Yves had never heard her use in the past.
“Of course, ma chère. I will pick you up at six sharp for dinner.”
Beatrice injected more antibiotics in the IV line. “Au-revoir. I hope she feels better soon, Dr. Malroux.”
After the nurse left, Yves raised sarcastic eyebrows at Hubert’s besotted expression. “You two are dating? You couldn’t stand her when you were in the hospital.”
“She is so beautiful and she cooks so well. Did you notice how she’s lost weight to please me?”
Yves frowned and shook his head. “I don’t think she has changed, but if you think so…”
“My boy, I think I am in love.”
Look at Hubert. “In love with the woman you called a vampire a month ago?”
“I will probably marry her soon.”