Emergency: Nurse in Need

by Laura Iding

  Finally a weary female doctor, wearing faded blue scrubs and looking far too young to be a surgeon, came into the waiting room. "Detective Grant Sullivan?"

  Grant jumped up from his seat. "Yes? Is Serena going to be all right?"

  The young doctor held out her hand and introduced herself. "I'm Dr. Burns, I assisted the trauma team during the operation. Your fiancée suffered some serious internal bleeding, which took us a while to get under control. Luckily, the bullet missed most of her spleen, although we did repair a small laceration there, along with other various repairs of her small intestine. The angle was such that we were able to save her kidney. We're going to send her to the intensive care unit for the rest of the night because of the high risk of infection. Overall, her condition is serious but stable."

  Grant closed his eyes for a moment, hardly daring to believe that Serena would survive. Then he pinned the tiny doctor with a hopeful look. "When can I see her?"

  The woman shrugged, favoring him with a weary smile. "The nurses are getting her settled in now, they'll call you when you can come in. You can spend a little time with her, but then you should get some rest."

  "Thank you." Grant watched as the young surgeon left the room.

  True to her word, Dana came to get Grant about fifteen minutes later. "She's still out of it," Dana warned him. "She probably won't even know that you're there."

  Grant didn't agree. Personal experience had taught him otherwise. "She'll know I'm there," he told Dana with heartfelt conviction. "Somehow, deep inside, she'll know."

  The intensive care unit appeared very different from a visitor's point of view. There was a hustle and bustle of activity going on everywhere. The nurses were busy in their respective patients' rooms and he remembered how confidently Serena had moved through the routine of patient care. She dealt with the intimidating equipment like a pro. He stopped in the doorway to Serena's room, struck by how fragile she looked lying there beneath the monitoring equipment. Dana held his arm in a soothing gesture, quietly explaining everything to him.

  Grant took a few tentative steps into the room, crossing over to the side of her bed. As if sensing his need for privacy, Dana left him alone.

  Pulling up a chair, he sat as close to her as he could get, taking Serena's hand in his. When he began to speak, his voice sounded rusty from disuse.

  "Serena, I'm here, and the doctors told me that you're going to be just fine." He bent his head, pressing his mouth to the back of her hand. The unfamiliar sensation of tears pricked his eyes.

  "God, Serena, I was so scared. When you jumped out in front of Rico, my heart stopped. I thought for sure that punk had killed you." Grant swallowed hard. "I don't know how to tell you this, Serena, but I love you. And I'm scared, because I know you're the best thing to come into my life, but all I seem to do is cause you pain. Not just this physical pain, which is bad enough, but the emotional pain of being who I am and what I do for a living."

  Grant didn't know if he was making any sense. Since Serena hadn't moved, he didn't think it mattered. From his own experience, the sound of a human voice was more important than the actual words. "Serena. I love you so much." And in that moment, Grant knew what he had to do.

  Serena was the most important person in his life. His job was only that, a job. He'd already given eight years to the force, he could quit or transfer to something else.

  He had to prove how much he loved her. He only prayed his decision wasn't too late.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  The nurses left him alone with Serena for nearly an hour. Grant didn't want to leave her side, but he still needed to fetch Rico. He was surprised the kid hadn't already been discovered. At any moment he expected Security to come looking for him, demanding he retrieve the boy.

  Up on the third floor, he found Rico sleeping in the chair, his head still resting next to Marta. As he paused in the doorway, a nurse came up behind him.

  "I wondered how that child got in here." She kept her voice low as to not wake them, but her eyes were full of disapproval, "He looks pretty young, no more than eleven or twelve. Don't you know he should be home in bed?''

  "Yeah, but he lives with his sister who just happens to be the patient." Grant shrugged. "I don't think it's wise to let him stay home alone."

  "Of course not." Horrified, she glared at him. "Isn't there anyone else he could stay with?"

  Grant thought about Serena lying in the trauma ICU down the hall. She'd take the boy in a heartbeat. No matter how much he wanted to stay here close to Serena, he knew taking temporary custody of Rico was the right thing to do. Grant nodded. "Yeah, he can come home with me."

  "I don't know." Now the nurse chewed her lip nervously. "Are you related to him? If you're not his guardian..."

  "I'm a cop." At least, officially he was still a cop. The captain hadn't fired him, not yet anyway. The last time he'd checked, the captain had suffered another heart attack and was right now in the cardiac cath lab, having a procedure done to reopen the arteries in his heart. He fished his badge out of his pocket and presented it to the nurse. "Detective Sullivan, ma'am. Rico knows me. I promise he'll be safe."

  The nurse pursed her lips then finally nodded. "I guess the boy can go home with you. Sheesh, I hope I don't get in trouble over this. I mean, how did I manage to get stuck with this problem? The kid wasn't even here when I started my shift." She plowed her fingers through her hair in a gesture of exasperation. "I hope you'll bring him back to see his sister tomorrow. Visiting hours start at eleven a.m."

  "I will," Grant promised.

  "Good. Now scat, before I change my mind."

  Grant gently roused the boy . Rico blinked at him. "Huh?"

  "We have to go home." He glanced at his watch. "It's almost two in the morning. We'll head back to my place to get some sleep. We can come back tomorrow."

  Rico frowned as if troubled by this news. "I don't wanna go to your place. I wanna go home."

  Grant sighed. He could understand Rico's apprehension but what were his options? He didn't have a key to Serena's apartment, much less to Rico's.

  "Rico knows how to get in," Marta whispered from the bed.

  Grant raised his brow. He hadn't realized Marta was awake. He turned back to Rico. "You do?"

  "Yeah." The boy nodded earnestly.

  "Let's go." Grant gestured to the door.

  Rico gave his sister one last hug, then turned to go with Grant. They walked together through the eerily quiet hospital corridors. Grant thought about Serena, lying in the ICU, connected to seemingly endless wires and tubes.

  He prayed that she would wake up soon. Now that he'd made his decision to change his career, he wanted to let her know. This time, he'd propose again completely understanding her very real fears.

  How else would he convince her to give them another chance?

  Serena gradually awoke to familiar sounds, although something wasn't quite right. Struggling to get the sleep from her eyes, she brought the room into focus.

  She was in the hospital. Nothing so unusual about that. Except that she was seeing the room from the wrong angle.

  From the unhealthy side of a hospital bed.

  Appalled, she grabbed the side rail and pulled herself upright. Her stomach muscles screamed in protest and she gasped. The monitor over her head triple-beeped in alarm. She was a patient? In the trauma ICU?

  How had that happened?

  Two nurses rushed in. "Serena, what are you doing? You disconnected your monitor leads. You need to lie back and relax."

  "What happened?" Serena's throat felt as if it were on fire. Dear God, if this was what Grant had gone through when he'd been shot, she hadn't given him nearly enough credit. Her stomach really hurt.

  "You don't remember?" The nurses exchanged worried glances.

  Serena closed her eyes. The memories floated in. She'd chased after Rico. Asked the ED clerk to call Grant, then had gone straight to the park, looking for Rico.

  Without trying to sneak up on them
, she'd stumbled upon Rico, bravely facing a pack of Hombres all by his skinny self. At first she'd been angry, shouting at them.

  Then she'd seen the gun. Raising her hands to show she hadn't been armed, she'd tried to reason with them. Tried to point out the reasons the Hombres should let them go.

  But there had been no reasoning with the leader, who'd screamed at Rico, calling him a traitor. There had been no mistaking the crazed gleam in his eye. Maybe he'd been pumped up on drugs, she hadn't known for sure. All she'd known had been that he wouldn't hesitate to shoot Rico. She'd reacted instinctively, diving toward the boy. The sharp, blazing pain had robbed her of breath. She opened her eyes.

  "I remember. The kid shot me. Is Rico all right?"

  "I don't know who Rico is, but you were the only victim that I know of brought in from the scene. The trauma team performed surgery and the doctors were able to resect a portion of your small bowel and repair a spleen laceration. The angle of the shot was such that there was minimal damage. You were very lucky, Serena."

  Funny, she didn't feel all that lucky. Every breath hurt and her throat felt like coarse sandpaper, but she forced herself to ask. "Grant?"

  "Yeah, Dana mentioned something about your cop friend being here last night. But I called the waiting room when I got in and he wasn't there."

  Serena closed her eyes. She vaguely remembered hearing his voice, telling her to hang on and begging her not to leave him like this. In her foggy dream, he'd told her that he loved her. Had he really meant it? She didn't know. Obviously, Grant wasn't here now. She wasn't sure if that was a good thing or a bad one. Either way, she felt like hell. Probably better he didn't see her like this.

  "Water?"

  "Ice chips," the nurse corrected. "You should know the routine by now."

  She did but, good heavens, she wanted water in the worst way. She eyed the tiny medicine cup filled with ice chips. Would her nurse accept a bribe? Say twenty bucks for a glass of water? Doubtful, but worth a try.

  "Here's the ice chips. You also need to do your coughing and deep-breathing exercises."

  Serena did her best, trying to ignore the shaft of pain that stabbed her belly. Boy, the next time she made one of her patients cough and deep-breathe, she was going to be far more sympathetic. The exercises hurt like the dickens.

  "Serena, Grant is here."

  Her eyes widened in panic. "No, don't let him in."

  "What?" Confused, the nurse stared at her. "I thought you just asked about him?''

  She had, but now that she was more awake she knew she didn't want Grant seeing her like this. There was a tube in her nose that went down to her stomach and another tube in her bladder. Her hair was a tangled mess and she needed a toothbrush. She resembled the wicked witch of the west. No way did she want Grant to come in. Bad enough that the people she worked with on a regular basis had to see her like this.

  "No. Just tell him I'm fine, but I don't want to see him." She rubbed a hand over her aching belly incision.

  "If you're sure." The nurse regarded her doubtfully.

  Serena took another ice chip, savoring the coolness against her parched throat. "I'm sure. Tell him I'll call him in a few days."

  The nurse hurried away to do her bidding. Serena pushed away the wave of uncertainty that gripped her. Grant's feelings might be hurt, but in the end this was for the best. Grant was a fixer. He lived to solve problems, which was why he was such a great detective. Seeing her lying helpless in the hospital would only muddy the issues between them. He'd feel responsible for her. He'd give up his chance at a normal life with Loren and Ben if he thought she needed him.

  Time to stop leaning on Grant, she admonished herself. Time to stand on her own two feet. Maybe she mourned the loss of having Grant beside her, but the practical side of her nature demanded that life get back to normal and as soon as possible.

  She'd already cleaned out Daniel's room by herself, donating the items to a nearby women's shelter. Surely she could handle this.

  When the team came to do rounds, Serena discovered they planned to send her out to a private room on the general surgical floor. She should have been relieved by the news that she must be getting better. But the hours dragged by slowly and she couldn't keep her thoughts from dwelling on Grant. Had he gone back to work? Was he angry or secretly relieved when she'd refused to let him visit?

  After she'd been moved to a new room, Dana was her first visitor. Her friend greeted her with a cheerful hello, then frowning when she glanced around her room.

  "Where's your bodyguard?" she wanted to know. When Serena gave her a blank look, Dana went on to elaborate. "Tall, broad-shouldered, sandy brown hair, handsome? You know, the cop?"

  Neither one of them was prepared when Serena suddenly burst into tears at the innocent question. Dana's eyes widened in alarm, and she went to place a comforting arm around Serena's shoulders.

  "Serena, .what's wrong?" Dana couldn't hide her confusion.

  "Nothing. Everything." Serena sniffled loudly as she tried to stem the flow of tears that streamed down her cheeks. "I told Grant to go away. I didn't want him to see me with all the wires and tubes." She sighed and blew her nose loudly, mindful of the soreness from the tube that had been removed an hour earlier. "I'm so confused, Dana. What if he's only here out of guilt?"

  "Serena, for Pete's sake! He'd already seen you with all the wires and tubes. I watched that man hover over you last night. He stayed at your bedside talking to you until his voice was hoarse." Dana placed her hands on her hips, shaking her head in disgust. "Wake up, Serena. That guy is head over heels in love with you."

  "He spoke to me last night after I was out of surgery?" Serena stared at her friend in horror. She remembered Grant's voice but had thought that he'd only been with her in the park, not here in the hospital as well. "Oh, my God, he saw me with a nasogastric tube hanging out of my nose? That's even worse than I thought. No wonder he feels sorry for me."

  Dana's lips twitched and she bit down hard on her lip to keep from laughing. The tactic didn't work, though, and a giggle escaped.

  "That's not funny!" Serena said defensively.

  "Yes. Oh, yes, it is." Dana was now laughing so hard she had to hold onto the bed rail to keep from falling to the floor.

  Serena was not amused. "Dana, you're supposed to be my friend."

  "Serena, I am your friend," Dana chided gently. "But you're not making any sense. The feelings between you and Grant aren't going to disappear for no reason. He's not going to be put off by a stupid tube. You saw him in worse shape after he was wounded, didn't you?"

  Serena frowned. "But that's different. I'm a nurse. I'm used to seeing things like that every day."

  "And he's a cop. I bet he sees much worse." The laughter faded from Dana's voice. "Rena, you need to talk to him. You and Grant have been through a lot over these past few days. Important relationships don't come easy."

  Those were almost the same words Mrs. Eichstadt had used. Serena sighed. "There's not much hope in rekindling our relationship. The other night, when I stared at that psycho kid with the gun, I really understood what Grant faces every day. Staying with me would destroy him. And if I let him leave his career for me, a part of his soul would shrivel up and die." She remembered the passion in his voice when he'd recounted the tale of his sister's disappearance. "He needs to be a cop just as much as I need someone who will be there for me. There's nothing we can do to change the most elemental part of ourselves. Nothing will make this work."

  "Just talk to him," Dana begged. "Be honest and talk to him. Tell him what you're feeling."

  Serena's shoulders slumped. "Yes. You're right. I haven't always been honest with him. I never told him the truth about Daniel. But I have explained my feelings to him before. Somehow I need to be strong enough to let him go."

  "Should I call him for you?" Dana laid her hand on the phone.

  "No, they're going to take me to Radiology in a few minutes." Serena wasn't sure if she was grateful or resentf
ul for the forced reprieve of facing Grant. Resigned, she lifted her chin. "I'll call him when I get back."

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  The trip to Radiology for a chest X-ray was uneventful. Serena called Grant but there was no answer at his place. Instead of leaving a message, she decided to try again later. She closed her eyes and dozed until a knock at her door woke her up.

  Struggling to sit, she called, "Come in."

  Grant strode into her room, his expression serious. Rico came in beside him, glancing anxiously at her. Serena smoothed a hand over her hair, silently grateful she'd at least been able to take a shower earlier that day.

  "Serena." Grant nodded in her direction. "Hope you don't mind, but Rico wanted to see you."

  Rico wanted to see her? Why? Puzzled, she glanced between the two of them. "Uh, no, I don't mind. How are you, Rico?"

  His brown eyes watched her anxiously and he took several steps toward her, then paused and thrust his hands into the front pockets of his pants.

  "Come here, Rico." Serena flashed him a warm smile. "Don't I at least get a hug?"

  He nodded and quickly rushed toward her. Serena reached over the edge of her hospital bed to envelop him in a huge hug. Rico's arms tightened spasmodically around her as he returned the gesture. She sucked in a silent gasp when the sutures on her abdominal incision pulled.

  "Why did you do it?'' Rico asked in a low voice. "Why did you jump out in front of me?"

  Serena was momentarily taken aback by his question. She glanced over at Grant who still stood in the doorway, as if unsure of his welcome. The expression in his smoky gray eyes was enigmatic.