Falling for Her Wounded Hero

by Marion Lennox

  ‘That’s how my life’s designed,’ he said. ‘That’s what happened to my mother. I won’t be responsible...’

  So that was that. Another irresponsible Blake.

  But she stood in the hallway and the space was a bit too narrow. His body was brushing against hers, and at every touch her nerve endings were sending sparks from her toes to her head and back again.

  Move on, she told herself harshly, and headed for the kitchen.

  She swung open the door and stopped.

  The kitchen table was covered with a simple gingham tablecloth. There was the plain cutlery Tom’s grandmother must have used, ancient bone-handled knives and forks. Plain crockery, mismatched, some of it cracked and worn.

  No flowers. No candles. A bowl of salad sat on the bench and it was a pretty ordinary bowl of salad. Lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers.

  The fire stove at the far end of the kitchen was sending out its gentle warmth. Apart from a gleaming microwave and modern toaster, this room looked like it hadn’t changed in a hundred years.

  She’d sat here in the days after Emily had died, with Hilda fussing around her and Tom checking in and out to make sure she was okay. She’d hardly noticed the kitchen then, but when she’d returned it had seemed...like coming home? Now it seemed to fold itself around her like a warm cloak. Tom was ushering her in, opening the refrigerator, producing two steaks in a bowl.

  ‘I’ve made a red wine marinade with an excellent shiraz,’ he told her. ‘I used half a bottle, which means there’s only two glasses left. One for me because that’s all I’m permitted. One for you because the last thing I want you to think is that I’m setting the scene for seduction. So, Tasha, steak and salad with me, or are you really intending to go hungry while I hop into both steaks?’ And then he grinned and raised an eyebrow in mock enquiry. ‘Dare you,’ he said. ‘Live dangerously. Steak and a glass of wine. What can possibly go wrong?’

  If only you knew, Tasha thought helplessly. Oh, Tom, if only you knew.

  But she had no choice. She sat and Tom produced an apron with a picture of a monster steak on the front.

  ‘It’s my recipe,’ he told her, tying his apron strings with a flourish, and she had to grin. The apron read:

  Rare: One Beer

  Medium: Two Beers

  Well Done: Three Beers

  It broke the ice and she found herself relaxing a little. The frying pan started to sizzle and Tom had a flash of gourmet inspiration and started frying onions. He added the steak and she was suddenly starving. The smell filled the room and she thought...

  Home is where the heart is?

  It was an insidious thought, a siren song. Tom had his back to her. He was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, and his T-shirt was a touch too tight. It stretched over his pecs, delineating a build that could send any woman’s heart rate up. His neck was sexy, too, she thought idly. It was a good neck. Broad. Strong. He hadn’t had a haircut for a while, so the line where his hair started wasn’t clearly defined. She could run her fingers up and trace...

  Um...not. She poured herself water and then headed for the refrigerator and found herself some ice. It’d be better to pour it over her head, she thought, but she was a sensible woman so she sat and drank it and then concentrated on marshalling her thoughts into some sort of disciplined order. By the time he put a plate of sizzling steak in front of her and sat before her with his, she almost had herself under control.

  And then he smiled and her control was shot to pieces again. He poured her wine and she tasted it and it was gorgeous. The night was gorgeous, the steak was gorgeous and Tom was even more gorgeous, and she thought what had this guy been thinking when he’d decided he needed candles and flowers?

  ‘How did you and Liselle go today?’ she asked, feeling a bit desperate, hoping to get the conversation to a level where she could operate without her hormones charging in and taking over.

  ‘We did fine motor skills with my left hand,’ he told her. ‘We put little pegs into little holes until I started going crazy. Then we moved onto the really exciting stuff—we played marbles. You wouldn’t believe the adrenalin rush.’

  She chuckled, but her heart twisted yet again. Since she’d arrived he hadn’t complained—not once. She knew his clumsiness was driving him crazy. She knew there were so many small things that he couldn’t do. Even now, cutting his steak was a challenge. His right hand was fine but his stiff left hand didn’t hold the way he needed to hold. There was a reason Hilda had left him so many casseroles.

  He wouldn’t have tried eating steak in front of his myriad women friends, she thought with sudden intuition. But he was cutting his steak in front of her, and she knew by doing it he exposed a vulnerability he hated.

  And suddenly she felt herself close to tears.

  He was different, she thought. She’d categorised him as a Blake boy but maybe she was wrong. Maybe...

  The phone rang.

  ‘Steakus Interruptus,’ Tom said, and groaned and headed out to answer it.

  Two weeks ago Tasha would have cut him off but she was learning to back off. She’d learned not to rush to the phone to cut him off from trying to deal with everything himself. In turn, Tom accepted that most calls were Tasha’s responsibility. He’d come a long way, she thought. He’d finally accepted that if his body was to heal he had to face its current limitations.

  Now he turned to her, his face resigned.

  ‘House call,’ he told her. ‘Gut pain. I don’t know any more. Ron Wetherall. He’s a local real estate guru, a big man about town. He’s also a bombastic, loud-mouthed bully. He has a mouse of a wife—Iris. Rumour has it that she’s his punching bag and I’m sure rumour’s right, though I can never get her to admit it. Now he won’t tell her exactly what’s wrong. Seems he’s curled up on the bed, clutching his gut, demanding she ring the doctor. She says he’s demanding I be there in two minutes or less—he’s in agony.’

  Food poisoning? Bowel blockage? Renal colic? There was little to go on, Tasha thought. It could be anything.

  ‘I know he’d rather have me,’ Tom told her. ‘Macho doesn’t even begin to describe our Ron. A woman doctor will just about do his head in. Maybe you could drive me.’

  ‘You’re tired,’ she said. ‘Aren’t you?’

  And it was a measure of how far they’d come that he agreed. ‘Maybe it’s time for our macho Ron to accept that women are as skilled as men,’ he conceded. ‘Are you okay to go?’

  ‘After only one glass of wine?’ she said. ‘I can do it with my hands behind my back.’

  ‘Then call me if you need me,’ he told her, and she smiled at him and he smiled back. She headed out to get her jacket but she had to brush past him as she went.

  And she came so close...so incredibly close...to kissing him goodbye that when she reached the veranda it was all she could do not to run.

  * * *

  Iris Wetherall, as Tom had described, was a worried mouse of a woman. She opened the door with a hand to her face, but Tasha could see the beginnings of an ugly bruise under her eye. She ushered Tasha in with relief but Tasha hadn’t got two steps inside the door before an agonised moan filled the house. Two small King Charles spaniels put their paws over their heads and moaned in sympathy.

  ‘I don’t know what’s happening,’ Iris whispered. ‘I was mopping the kitchen floor. I... Something spilt.’ Her hand went to her eye again. ‘Ron went to bed and left me to clean but suddenly he started screaming. He’s partly undressed, hunched up on the bed, but he won’t let me near. He won’t say what’s wrong, just get the doc, get the doc. He’s upstairs.’

  Iris hardly had to lead her. All she had to do was follow the moans.

  The bedroom was vast. Actually, the whole house was vast, an ode to real-estate luxury surely almost unheard of in modest Cray Point. As she entered the bedroom Ta
sha had to stop and blink. Acres of white carpet. Vast French windows opening to a massive balcony with spotlights illuminating the swimming pool below. A bed that looked big enough to house a couple of families at a time, and the families wouldn’t need to be small. Plush, plush and more plush and in its midst was a florid, overweight man in his fifties, stripped to the waist, his bedcovers half pulled up to hide his nether regions. He was lying almost in a foetal position, moaning fit to die.

  ‘The doctor’s here,’ Iris quavered, and Ron managed to writhe around so he could see.

  ‘Thank God...’

  And then he saw Tasha and his yell almost split the night.

  ‘I said the doc, you stupid cow. I don’t want some woman. Get me the doc, now!’

  ‘I’m a doctor.’ Tasha was trying to assess what was happening. He was certainly in pain but he was almost apoplectic with rage and his yell had contained strength as well as fury. ‘You know Dr Blake’s been ill,’ Tasha told him. ‘I’ve taken over his house calls. Can you tell me what’s wrong?’

  ‘No!’ It was a vicious yell, and he turned to his wife again. ‘Get her out. I don’t want any more stupid women. It’s your fault in the first place. Did I ask for new...?’ And then he caught himself. ‘Get out,’ he screamed. ‘Now.’

  And Tasha was starting to guess what was wrong. If she was right... Ouch.

  He did need help. There was no doubting his pain was real, but if he wouldn’t let her help...

  ‘I could call an ambulance,’ she said.

  ‘I don’t want an ambulance. They’ll take ages and women work those things now. Get Doc Blake!’

  ‘He isn’t on call.’

  ‘Get him,’ Ron shouted again.

  Tasha hesitated. What she’d like to do was walk away until he saw reason, but there was a chance this was a torsion, something that could mean long-term damage.

  ‘You understand Dr Blake is unwell himself,’ she said, playing for time.

  ‘I don’t care,’ he snarled.

  What had Tom’s assessment been? A bombastic, loud-mouthed bully.

  She could call Tom. If she was right in her guessed diagnosis, he might even enjoy it, she conceded, but there was no way she was simply caving to this man’s demands. A woman had some pride.

  ‘I could ask Tom to assist,’ she said, making herself sound doubtful.

  ‘Get him!’

  ‘Only in an assistant capacity,’ she said firmly. ‘On that understanding only.’

  ‘He’ll do what I tell him.’

  ‘Dear, don’t upset the doctor,’ Iris quavered, and Tasha gave her a pat on the shoulder.

  ‘I’m not upset,’ she told her. ‘If Ron doesn’t want me to help, then we’ll leave him be while we call for back-up.’

  * * *

  ‘Tom?’

  Tom answered on the first ring. He hated Tasha doing these calls without him but he had no choice. The deal was, though, that she call him the moment she was worried.

  ‘Problem?’

  ‘Who would know?’ she said softly. ‘It might be something serious or it may not. Mr Wetherall is currently clutching his privates, screaming in agony and telling every woman in sight—that’s Iris and me—where to go. Iris has the beginnings of a black eye. She looks like she’s just been struck. Ron won’t say what’s wrong but he’s demanding that you come. I’ve finally agreed to call you—but only in an assistant capacity.’

  ‘What do you think’s happening?’ Ron Wetherall was a beefy oaf, known for his unscrupulous business dealings as well as for his appalling treatment of his rather nice little wife. But if he was really ill...

  ‘He was undressing when it came on,’ Tasha said blandly. ‘Iris says he had no symptoms until then. He took off his shirt, then his shoes and socks and then started to remove his brand-new pants. That’s all the information I’ve been able to glean. He’s told me where to go in no uncertain terms when I asked to examine him, but based on the information...’

  And Tom was with her. ‘The dreaded zipper stick?’

  ‘That’s what I’m assuming. But I’m a girl, what would I know? And it could be something more serious. He’s being so obnoxious I could walk out but he could do some real damage.’

  ‘There are those in this town who’d enjoy a bit of real damage,’ Tom said thoughtfully. ‘But you’re right. It’d be negligent to leave him as he is.’

  ‘So you’ll come?’

  ‘Of course.’ He paused, thinking it through. ‘Tasha, I’ve been worried about Iris for some time. I’m sure she’s being assaulted but she won’t say. Two months ago I treated her for a broken cheekbone but all she’d say was that she’d fallen. She’s had broken bones before but he’s always with her when she comes in.’

  ‘She won’t talk about her eye now.’

  ‘So we have two patients.’ He hesitated and then came to a decision. ‘I’m thinking... If he’s really incapacitated then maybe we can use this situation to treat the two of them. Will you follow my lead?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Excellent,’ Tom told her. ‘I’ll call the taxi and be right with you.’

  * * *

  Tasha and Iris followed orders and got out of Ron’s sight. They drank tea in the kitchen and tried to settle the dogs, while overhead the air was filled with Ron’s obscenity-laden moans.

  Iris seemed more and more frightened. If this was zipper stick, Ron would need to take his fury out on someone at the end of this, Tasha thought, and she hoped Tom had a plan.

  Then Tom arrived—with back-up.

  He had a huge surgical case and he had company. Brenda bustled in behind him, carrying surgical scrubs encased in plastic wraps and her own nursing case. She was followed by Karen, the taxi driver, carrying an oxygen canister big enough to fuel an elephant. Tasha tried to take it from her—Tom, plus the district nurse, plus the local taxi driver were all heading for the sick room—but Karen shook her head.

  ‘Doc wants me to carry it,’ she said. ‘I spend my life hauling luggage. No sweat.’

  ‘Straight up to the bedroom,’ Tom ordered. ‘I’m not sure what we’re facing but Dr Raymond suspects it’s serious so we need to get things moving. Dr Raymond, could you come into the bedroom, please? And Iris, too? If this is a surgical procedure we need you to sign consent forms. Karen, could you stay? Karen was a nurse before she and her husband took over the taxi company,’ he explained to Tasha. ‘We’ve used her before when we’ve had to do emergency surgical procedures. She’s great.’

  And then he reached Ron’s bedside and all at once he turned into the Tom Tasha knew. Gentleness itself. ‘Hi, Ron. You have a problem? We’re here to help and we’ll get the pain under control as fast as we can. Let’s see what’s happening.’

  Let’s see. Let us see. Plural.

  There were now five people and two dogs in Ron’s bedroom, and Ron was staring wildly up at the assortment of people around his bed. His eyes were almost popping out of his head.

  ‘Get these people out of here!’

  ‘You know I can’t do that,’ Tom said soothingly. ‘I have to assume it’s not a minor problem or you would have let Dr Raymond deal with it. And with your request for no ambulance we’ve come prepared for anything.’

  ‘No,’ Ron screamed, and Tom sighed.

  ‘We may need a sedative, Nurse,’ he told Brenda. ‘Could you administer five milligrams of diazepam, intramuscularly. Karen, would you mind helping? Tasha, I’ll get you to hold his hips. Karen, if you could hold that arm? We’ll twist him around so he’s facing upwards and I can see what we’re dealing with. Okay, on my count. Three, two...one...’

  And before he knew it, Ron was on his back and Brenda was slipping in the intramuscular sedative.

  And they could all see what the problem was.

&nbs
p; One penis. One zipper. Inextricably entwined.

  Tom grimaced. ‘You know, you really should have let Dr Raymond deal with this,’ he said gently. ‘Swelling around the entrapped tissue makes this procedure more difficult. We need a penile block. Brenda, could you administer...?’

  ‘Certainly, Doctor,’ Brenda said.

  ‘You do it,’ Ron screamed and Tom shook his head.

  ‘Maybe Dr Raymond could have managed by herself if you’d agreed to let her examine you,’ he told him. ‘But we’ve gone past that now. Iris, do you have cooking oil? Excellent. Brenda, can we have a plastic sheet from your bag? Let’s move, people. Ron, the sedation will be taking hold any minute. Just try your best to relax until it does.’

  * * *

  Tasha could only watch in admiration. Tom had the situation under complete control.

  Once the sedative took hold and they could get a clear idea of how bad the problem was, cooking oil might solve the problem without any other intervention, she thought. The pain was easing but Ron was still breathing fire. He was demanding—expecting—a quick surgical fix, but to his chagrin Tom simply poured cooking oil over everything in sight and told him to stay where he was while the oil had a chance to penetrate.

  ‘It’s important you stay still,’ he told him. ‘The oil may well take half an hour to soften everything around it. Would you like Iris to stay with you? Or Brenda? No? Then I suggest we all retire to the kitchen. Call us if there’s any change.’

  So, much to Ron’s fury, they ended up around the kitchen table again. Iris tentatively produced a bottle of wine, which Tom and Tasha refused because they were on duty but which Karen had no qualms in accepting. And Brenda had one too because, as she said, she was only a little bit on duty. Iris watched them drink, and then suddenly poured one for herself.

  She drank it too fast, and then Tom poured her another. He was watching her with sympathy. He was waiting, Tasha thought. What’s he doing?

  There was a little small talk. The moans upstairs were decreasing as the drugs took hold.

  Iris was relaxing.