by Janice Lynn
Dirk didn’t do couples. Just because she was pregnant it did not mean she expected that to change. Neither did she want it to change because of her pregnancy.
She wanted Dirk to care enough for her to want to be a couple with her. Because of her. Because of his feelings for her.
She wanted him to love her.
The young girl frowned. “Really? I’m surprised. You looked like you were having a good time together.”
That had been before they’d been interrupted and he’d said he wanted to just be friends. Before they’d known they were going to be parents. Before she’d realized Dirk was incapable of giving his heart to her.
“We were having a good time. As friends.”
“Oh.” The assistant didn’t look as if she knew what else to say.
“No problem,” she assured the girl, keeping an “it’s no big deal” smile on her face in the hope of waylaying more curiosity. Particularly in light of Dirk’s odd behavior since she’d clocked in. “Do you know if the X-ray reports are back on the fall patient in the next bay?”
Looking chastised, although Abby hadn’t meant her to, the girl nodded. “They are.”
No wonder the girl had thought they were a couple as they’d left in such a heated rush from the Christmas party and with the way Dirk had acted tonight.
She really was going to have it out with him the first private moment they got. Although they’d have to establish some type of relationship for the future, his overbearing, almost paternalistic attitude had to go. Besides, for now, Abby wanted a break from him. Later, after the holidays had passed, she’d figure out how she and Dirk could coexist in the world of parenthood.
“Hello, Mrs. Clifton,” she greeted her patient, a friendly smile pasted on her face in the hope of reassuring the woman. “Dr. Kelley will be by in a few minutes to give your X-ray results.” She pulled up the tests and flagged them for his attention. “How are you feeling?”
“Foolish.” The woman in her early sixties gestured to the arm she held very still. “I still can’t believe I slipped and did this.”
“Unfortunately, falls happen.” Abby lightly pinched each of the woman’s fingertips, observing how quickly the blanched skin returned to its natural pink color. Almost immediately. Excellent.
“I guess this will teach me to be more careful of ice.” The woman shifted, trying to get comfortable.
“Who knows, this might save you a much worse accident later down the line.” Abby checked the automatic blood-pressure cuff that was wrapped around the woman’s uninjured arm. One twenty-six over seventy-eight. Great. A normal reading.
The woman laughed lightly. “You’re one of those positive people who always sees the best in everything, aren’t you?”
“Usually.” Only she hadn’t been seeing the positive in her pregnancy. Only the negative. Only that her dreams for her future were undergoing a drastic transformation.
She was going to have a baby. A beautiful, precious baby that she and Dirk had made together. A baby to share her life with. To be a family with. To share Christmas with. Abby had never met anyone other than Dirk who she’d want to have a baby with. No one she’d want to share the rest of her Christmases with. Just Dirk.
If they weren’t meant to be more than friends, then she’d deal with that, would love and cherish their baby without letting Dirk break her heart. Somehow.
“Nurse?” Mrs. Clifton eyed her curiously.
Pulling her thoughts together, Abby smiled at the elderly lady. “Thank you.”
The woman’s forehead creased. “What for?”
“For reminding me that it’s much too wonderful a season to be down.”
Especially over something that so many women would consider a blessing. She’d been given a gift, an unexpected, unplanned-for gift, but a gift all the same.
Just because that gift hadn’t come at the time in her life she’d planned or in the way she’d hoped for didn’t make a baby any less of a blessing.
Yes, there was still that part of her that didn’t want this, wanted her and Dirk to have the opportunity to get to know each other without a pregnancy shadowing their every thought and word. She didn’t have that luxury.
She was going to be mother to Dirk’s child.
“Were you down?”
Abby considered the question. “Not really. I just wasn’t seeing the miracles of Christmas clearly.”
“Christmas is the best time of year, isn’t it?” Her patient’s gaze fell on her immobilized arm. “Only this year someone else will have to do the cooking because I suspect I’m not going to be doing much of anything.”
Helping reposition her pillow, Abby nodded her agreement. “I suspect you’re right. I hope you have your shopping finished.”
“Mercifully, yes. I’m one of those crazy women who gets up before dawn and does all my shopping on the day after Thanksgiving.” The woman chuckled self-derisively. “Fighting the crowds is a bit rough at times, but the bargain buys are worth the effort.”
“Aren’t they just the best? I do the same thing.”
Dirk stepped into the area, his face going pale.
Abby bit back a sigh. Did he really dislike Christmas so much that just hearing a discussion about shopping bothered him? How would she explain to her child that his or her father didn’t like Christmas?
Avoiding looking at him, Abby entered her nurse’s notes while Dirk went over the X-ray results with Mrs. Clifton, explaining that she needed to schedule an appointment with her primary care provider in addition to seeing the orthopedic surgeon the following day.
He left the room long enough to grab some patient education materials, flipped the pamphlet open to a page with a photo of magnified images of a normal bone and an osteoporotic one.
“Your arm broke more easily than it should have because your bones are thinning due to a condition called osteoporosis,” Dirk explained, pointing out the difference in the bones in the pictures. “This happens when the bones lose mass, weakening, leaving them in a state where it takes much less force to cause a fracture. Sometimes even something as simple as taking a step can cause the bones to crush in on themselves when the bones have weakened.”
“Crush in on themselves? The bones can break without me even falling?”
“Yes, it’s possible in osteoporosis, but falling or taking a hit is much more likely to be the culprit of a break.”
“I have this?”
“You do.” He nodded. “Have you ever been told you have osteoporosis?”
“At my last physical, my nurse practitioner mentioned that I should be taking calcium.” The woman gave a guilty shrug. “She tried to get me to go onto a medication to make my bones stronger.”
Dirk’s brow lifted. “Tried?”
The woman sighed, shrugged her good shoulder. “The medicine gave me bad indigestion so I only took a couple of doses.”
Dirk frowned. “Did you let her know you’d stopped taking the medication?”
She shook her head, careful not to disturb her arm. “No, I figured I’d discuss it with her at my next visit.” She gave him a thoughtful look. “If I’d been taking the medicine, would my bone have broken from falling tonight?”
“It’s impossible to know for sure,” Dirk replied. “Medications can add around ten percent back to the bone strength, which is a significant amount and can mean the difference between a break and no break.” He pointed to the X-rays again. “The medicine rebuilds those tiny connections, adding strength. With bones as thin as yours are, you do need to be on some type of bisphosphonate.”
“Putting up with a little heartburn would have been better than this.” She gestured to her immobilized arm.
“You should discuss your options with your nurse practitioner. There are a wide range of treatments for osteoporosis, including a once-a-year intravenous infusion of medication. With the IV method, you wouldn’t have to worry about taking a pill or having indigestion as that alternative would bypass that system and the side
effects of pills.”
The woman asked a few more questions which Dirk patiently answered. Watching him, watching his seemingly infinite patience when the woman became repetitious in her efforts to understand, gave Abby insight to Dirk. She’d witnessed his patience, his kindness, his caring time and again in the emergency room while he dealt with patients from all walks of life. Not once had he lost his temper or behaved unprofessionally.
She didn’t have to wonder if he’d been a good father. He had. Although, no doubt, with completing his residency, he’d probably been so busy that he’d missed out on more of his daughter’s short life than he’d have liked. Sandra Kelley had been a lucky woman to have Dirk’s love, to have had his baby, and experience the joys of pregnancy and motherhood with Dirk by her side, loving her.
Despite his aversion to Christmas, Dirk was a good man. The best Abby had ever met, really.
Honest, honorable, giving, strong in character.
Why didn’t he like Christmas? Did the holidays remind him of all he’d lost? Of Christmases he’d shared with his wife and young daughter?
Would she and their child forever live in the shadow of his former life? God, she prayed not, but deep down she wondered if that wouldn’t be the case.
If that happened, how would she prevent that overshadowing their child’s well-being? Just the thought of their child being made to feel inferior made her neck muscles ache and her stomach clench.
She finished her notes, left the bay and entered the next, determined to stay on task. A patient she’d triaged had discovered a large amount of blood in their urine and had been having tremendous back pain. She’d put him into the bay, and initiated protocol hematuria labs.
When Dirk stepped out of the fractured arm patient’s bay, Abby caught him and without meeting his eyes gave him the stats on the patient. “Do you want to get a renal protocol CT scan?”
“Yes. Thanks.” When she started to walk away, he grabbed her wrist, causing her to turn to look at him. “You holding up okay? You’re not overdoing it, are you?”
That did it. She’d had enough of him interfering with her work.
“No.” She pulled her arm free, hoping no one noticed. “My back hurts. My feet hurt. I’m tired. My stomach hasn’t felt right in days. But the main reason I’m not holding up is you.”
His forehead wrinkled. “Me?”
“You’re driving me crazy. You’ve got to stop treating me differently than you were before, well, you know.”
His jaw worked back and forth slowly, as if he was trying to categorize her words and having difficulty knowing where to stick them. “I’m concerned.”
“I appreciate your concern, but work isn’t the place. I’ve got a job to do and if you keep making a difference, people are going to complain.”
“People?”
“Our coworkers.”
“I don’t care what anyone thinks, except you, Abby.”
He was saying all the right things, but Abby didn’t want to hear them, could only hear his “let’s just be friends” speech echoing through her head. She didn’t want or need his overbearing behavior.
In his “concern,” he was exposing her to her colleagues’ curiosity. Her volunteer friends suspecting she was pregnant was one thing. Her coworkers another matter entirely. Not that they wouldn’t know soon enough.
Everyone would know soon enough.
But she wanted a few weeks of having the knowledge to herself, to completely come to terms with her future plans prior to having to answer other people’s questions.
“Well, I do care.” It wasn’t asking too much for him to give her time to work through this in privacy. “A lot of my closest friends work here. I won’t have you undermining me.”
His gaze narrowed. “No one would say anything if you needed an extra break.”
Abby’s jaw dropped. “Why wouldn’t they?”
He looked away, guiltily, not answering her.
“Dirk?”
When his eyes met hers, a bit of arrogance she hadn‘t previously witnessed shone there. “I’m a doctor, Abby. If I give a nurse permission to take an extra break because I think she needs one, no one is going to deny that right.”
Oh, no. That so wasn’t going to happen. He’d do irreparable damage to her working environment. With a baby on the way, she needed her job.
“I can’t take extra breaks just because you think I should.” She paused, acutely aware they stood in the busy emergency room. No one was near them, but when Abby glanced around, the medical assistant was watching them curiously, a “yeah right, just friends” expression on her young face. “We can’t discuss this here. Just let me do my job, okay? That’s all I ask.”
“Abby—”
“Dr. Kelley,” an assistant interrupted, looking back and forth between them. “There’s a myocardial infarction patient on his way in. The ambulance is en route and should arrive in two minutes.”
Grateful for the interruption, Abby jumped into action. “I’ll get the renal protocol CT scan entered into the computer and have everything ready for the MI arrival.”
“Abby—”
“Take care of your patients, Dr. Kelley, and leave me alone. I can take care of myself and don’t need or want your friendship after all.” With that she spun on her heel and walked away from a man capable of breaking her heart.
When the paramedics rushed the man in, a team was ready in the emergency room to take over trying to save the man’s life.
Abby stayed busy for the rest of her shift, working straight through her break, grateful for the mental reprieve from her personal life due to the intensity of their patients’ needs.
Definitely meeting Danielle’s definition of brooding, Dirk never said another word outside anything to do with their patients. However, when he realized she’d not taken a break, not eaten, he’d disappeared and come back with a cup of yogurt, bottled water and an apple, thrust them toward her and walked away without uttering a single word.
His expression hadn’t been a pleased one. Actually, he’d looked irritated.
Part of her had wanted to toss the items at the back of his retreating, arrogant head. He deserved a good wake-up thwack. How dared he be so high-handed? Just because she was pregnant it did not give him the right to dictate what she should and shouldn’t do. He’d said he just wanted to be friends, giving up any potential right to have a say in her life.
She was her own woman, could do this on her own, would forge a good life for her and her baby.
Abby desperately clung to that thought as a shield against the hurt Dirk’s rejection had caused.
Clung to her mounting anger at his hot-cold attitude to prevent more pain from seeping through and jabbing at her vulnerable heart.
CHAPTER NINE
IF ABBY didn’t open her door soon, Dirk was going to jemmy the lock. Or break down the door.
Was this his fourth round of knocks or his fifth?
Where was she?
Finally, he heard a scratching at the other side of the door. At least Mistletoe was up and about. Abby should be, too. If she’d gone home and gone to bed, she’d have had a good eight hours.
Was she okay? She’d looked so tired and pale when she’d left the hospital and hadn’t acted like her normal self. He’d been tied up with a patient when she’d clocked out, hadn’t been able to believe she’d left without telling him she was going.
As if she was truly angry with him. He’d have understood anger on the day they’d found out she was pregnant, would have understood if she’d beat his chest with her fists, but last night? Hell, he’d made a conscious effort to take care of her, to let her know he planned to be there for her and their baby even if the mere thought gave him hives. Didn’t she understand how difficult this was for him? How hard he was trying?
The lock clicked, and the door swung open. Abby squinted, putting her hand up to block the fading sunlight filtering onto the porch. “Dirk? What are you doing here?”
“You
look awful.”
Standing in her doorway wearing baggy sweats, her hair wild, dark shadows bruising her eyes, Abby did look awful. Like she hadn’t gone to bed after leaving work.
“Nice to see you, too,” she mumbled. Her cat rubbing against her leg, meowing, she moved aside for Dirk to enter.
Carrying a bag of groceries he’d brought because he seriously doubted she was taking care of herself, he stepped into her foyer. He eyed her more closely, taking in the pallor of her skin, the redness in her eyes. “Did you volunteer somewhere after work this morning?”
She shut her front door, turned to face him. “You’re not my boss. Not outside the emergency room. If I want to volunteer somewhere, I can.”
“Which means you did.” He let out an exasperated sigh, assessing her like a bug under a magnifying glass. “Why didn’t you tell me? I would have gone with you.”
“Have you considered that maybe I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want you to go?” She yawned, stretched her arms over her head, raising the shapeless sweat shirt up to expose a tiny sliver of ivory skin.
“No, I haven’t considered that. Why wouldn’t you want my help?” Forcing his gaze away from that glimpse of flesh, Dirk swallowed, shifted the groceries in his arms. How could he be looking at her one minute, thinking how tired she looked and wanting to throttle her for not taking better care of herself and the next be fighting the desire to pull that sweatshirt over her head to expose a whole lot more of her delectable body?
“Go away, Dirk,” she continued, gratefully oblivious to the effect her stretch had had on his body and mind.
“No.” After a few minutes of lying in his bed, thinking about Abby and her uncharacteristic snippiness, he had crashed into a dreamless sleep and awakened with only one thought. Seeing Abby, making sure she was okay. “You need someone to look after you.”
“I can look after myself just fine.” Her lower lip puckered in an almost pout.
His gaze zeroed in on that full bottom lip. He wanted to kiss her. To take her in his arms and kiss her until she sighed in contentment.
“Since when?” Dirk fought wincing at how brusque his tone was. Just because he was fighting sexual awareness he shouldn’t be feeling when she looked exhausted, it didn’t mean she’d understand that’s what was causing his irritation. What was it about the woman that drove him so physically crazy? Taking a deep breath, he tried again in a calmer tone. “You pulled an exhausting twelve-hour shift, Abby. What was so important that you couldn’t have rested first? Something to do with Christmas again?”