by Amy Andrews
But none of them had ever had such an impact on such a short acquaintance. Not even Paul. And they’d bored her so quickly too. They had been boys compared to Callum Craig. She doubted he had a boring bone in his body. In short, Callum Craig unsettled her. And that was to be avoided at all costs. She was moving on with her life—she didn’t need to complicate it by reaching for another attainable man.
A fleeting moonlight kiss at midnight from a stranger was one thing. She could hug it close, daydream about it and bring it out at night to relive over and over in her sleep. But when that man was a colleague? She had learnt the hard way not to mix work with her private life. What had happened in London had burnt her so badly she was sworn off men for life.
Particularly men with little boys.
Callum entered the ward on Thursday afternoon to attend his ward round. He spotted Hailey just as she was disappearing into the panroom. Again.
She was avoiding him.
OK, he got it. Her signals were coming across loud and clear. Back off. Not interested. Don’t even think about it.
She obviously regretted their midnight madness.
He wished the same could be said for him. It was, after all, the most sensible course of action. The very last thing he needed now was to develop a thing for a woman who wanted nothing to do with him.
His six years alone—coping with his wife’s death and a six-month-old baby and then struggling to raise Tom and get him through his illness, scared to death most of the time—seemed suddenly magnified. Maybe that was what happened? Maybe Hailey’s kiss had made him realise what a solitary life he led. Why else would his body be reacting so strongly to a woman who was so patently not interested?
Because he didn’t have the time or the wherewithal for any kind of a relationship. He’d spent the last six years protecting Tom, shielding him from the things life had thrown at him—the loss of his mother and a truly vile illness. He’d dropped the ball with Annie, he wouldn’t do the same with Tom.
But he didn’t have time for this hide-and-seek routine either. They were both adults and this state of affairs couldn’t continue. She couldn’t keep avoiding him for ever. They had to work together. They were two mature adults. Surely they could act that way?
He glanced at his watch. Five minutes before Yvonne was expecting him for rounds. He took a moment to collect his thoughts and pushed open the panroom door.
‘Afternoon, Hailey.’
Hailey started. She had her back to the door, checking the expiry dates on the various test sticks that were kept in the wall cupboard above the sink. Over the last few days she’d done a pretty decent inventory of the room’s contents. She turned around slowly, her heart rate tripping from a surge of adrenaline.
He looked divine. His stethoscope was slung casually around his neck and his shirt fitted his broad-shouldered frame to perfection. His tie today sported leaping leprechauns and his smile exuded charisma. She felt his pull despite the good three metres between them. ‘I think you took a wrong turn. Yvonne’s office is two doors down.’
Callum’s smile widened. ‘Nope. This is the right door. I was after you.’
Her heart slammed in her chest. ‘Me?’ she practically squeaked.
‘You’ve been kind of hard to pin down these last few days.’
‘Ah, yes…’ she said nervously. She dragged in a ragged breath, feeling like all the oxygen was being sucked out of the room. ‘A nurse’s work is never done,’ she said lamely, shaking the bottle of urine sticks, which she hadn’t realised she was holding, in his general direction.
‘Are you in Yvonne’s bad books? Have you been banished to the panroom for the term of your natural life?’
‘Er…no,’ she said, her dazzled brain cells trying to keep track of the conversation.
‘Ah. So you’re just avoiding me?’
Bingo! Hailey stared at him for a moment before turning back to the cupboard, horrified at the rise of heat in her cheeks. ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’ Her hand shook as she replaced the container.
Callum watched her as her fingers ran over the contents of the cupboard. ‘Hailey.’ Her fingers stilled but she didn’t answer him. ‘Hailey,’ he said again, moving closer.
Hailey turned around reluctantly and then immediately wished she hadn’t. He loomed in front of her and she was reminded of the ball all over again as she looked all the way up into his face. His very sexy face. If she’d thought his pull had been strong from across the room, it was nothing compared to his power close up.
‘God, you’re tiny,’ Callum said, distracted by their height disparity. Maybe it had been the moonlight but he didn’t remember her being so far down.
Hailey snorted. ‘No, I’m short. There’s a difference.’ She had lost weight over the last year, the effects of what had happened overseas shadowing all areas of her life. But Hailey doubted that her generous curves were under any real threat of fading away.
‘How tall are you?’
‘Five foot neat.’
No wonder he felt like he was towering over her. At four inches over six feet—he did! He kind of liked it, though. It made him want to tuck her under his wing. ‘Wow. That is short.’
Hailey’s breath caught at his light teasing tone and the smile that took his features from sexy to the next level. Whatever the hell that was. Sublime? ‘Don’t let it fool you. I came top in my self-defence class.’
Callum laughed. ‘Really?’
Hailey drew herself up as high as she could and jutted her chin out. ‘Really.’
Callum quashed his smile. ‘I’ll have to remember that.’
Hailey placed a hand on his chest and pushed him gently away until he was a full arm’s length from her. ‘Just you see that you do.’
Callum saw the look of steel harden her soft brown eyes. ‘Look, Hailey, I’m guessing the whole New Year’s Eve thing is kind of freaking you out. I’m sorry. I promise I don’t usually go around kissing women I don’t know.’ Hell, these days he just didn’t kiss women—period.
Sorry? He was sorry? For what? For freaking her out or kissing her in the first place? She shouldn’t feel miffed. But she did. ‘You’re apologising for kissing me?’ Good. That was good. Wasn’t it?
‘No. Absolutely not.’ The actual kiss may have been no more than a peck but the way it was still zinging through his body it may as well have been a full-on, open-mouthed smacker. Callum hadn’t felt such ardent desire since Annie. It felt good to have that rush again. That buzz in his blood. He certainly wasn’t going to apoligise for it. ‘I’d do it again. No hesitation.’
She swallowed. ‘Oh.’
Of course he hadn’t meant right now but her lips had parted on that last word and her face was turned up, her mouth looking very inviting indeed. What would it be like to indulge in more than a chaste, oh-so-close-to-her-mouth kiss?
He took a step back. They were in a panroom, for crying out loud! At work! He cleared his throat. ‘Anyway. My point is…’ he said, groping around his brain for the point he was trying to articulate. ‘The point is, it happened. I don’t think we need to let it affect our working together. Let’s just chalk it up to a bit of moonlight madness and get on with it. OK? I don’t want you ducking in and out of rooms, avoiding me, ad infinitum. It won’t happen again.’
‘You just said you’d do it again,’ she pointed out, her brain still stuck back at that part of the conversation.
‘I meant that night. I’d do it all over again the same way. I couldn’t think of a better ending to a New Year’s Eve ball than kissing a girl with sparkly legs.’
Hailey smiled despite her mind still being foggy with his nearness. ‘It can’t happen again,’ she said firmly.
Callum frowned. ‘You didn’t like it?’
‘No, I…’
He smiled. ‘Ah. You did like it?’
Hailey crossed her arms and gave him a hard glare. She barely knew him and yet already he could tie her in knots! ‘Don’t be putting words in my mouth, Dr Craig.�
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‘Ooh.’ He laughed at her frown. ‘You liked it a lot.’
Hailey felt her temper rise as heat flared in her cheeks again. She daren’t admit just how much she had liked the brief touch of his mouth. ‘It was a peck on the cheek,’ she said disparagingly. ‘My brother-in-law could have given it to me.’
Callum raised an eyebrow. ‘Is that a challenge? Is that your way of asking for something…more?’
The remaining oxygen evaporated and her eyes were drawn inexplicably to his mouth. More? How could something so wrong seem so…tantalising? A couple of years ago she’d have leapt at him. That mouth would have been on hers in a flash. But she just wasn’t that girl any more.
‘You need to get this straight,’ she said, deliberately dragging her eyes away from his lips. ‘I’m not in the market for a…an affair, and even if I was, which I’m not,’ she emphasised again, ‘I don’t get involved with colleagues.’
Callum could see the determination in the jut of her chin and her steady brown gaze. He could also see something else. A quick flash of pain before she shuttered it. ‘Is that a standard policy for you or a once-bitten kind of thing?’
Hailey’s breath caught in her throat and her mind stuttered to a halt for a brief second. Had that been a wild guess or had she given something away? She forced herself to casually check her watch while she ordered her scattered thoughts. ‘Don’t you have rounds?’
Hmm. A chink. Hailey had definitely been burned. Big time if he wasn’t mistaken. Callum regarded her for a few seconds. Well so had he and he wasn’t keen to put himself in a position of vulnerability again either. He nodded. ‘So we’re OK now?’
Hailey nodded too. Anything to get him out of the room. It seemed to have shrunk considerably since he’d entered. ‘Of course.’
‘It’s behind us?’
‘Absolutely.’
‘Forgotten?’
‘There was no kiss.’
Callum smiled. ‘Kiss? What kiss?’
Hailey smiled back at him. He touched his fingers to his forehead in a mock salute as he slowly backed out of the room. She sagged against the sink. If only it was as easy as that.
The phone was ringing when Hailey ventured out of the panroom a few minutes later. Callum’s team had gathered in the nurses’ station. They were ignoring the phone. Tina, the ward clerk, had left for the day.
Hailey looked at the medical officers. Callum, a registrar, two residents and two med students. ‘No, it’s OK,’ she said, half bemused, half annoyed. ‘I’ll get the phone.’ It never ceased to amaze her how immune to ringing medical staff were.
‘Hi, kids’ ward, Hailey speaking.’
‘Hi, Hailey.’
‘Yvonne?’ What was 2B’s NUM doing, ringing her? She should be here.
‘Can you do Callum’s round? I’m caught up in this funding meeting and I need to stay because they’re discussing our equipment allocation.’
Hailey sighed, resigned to her fate. She glanced at Callum and met his calm grey gaze. OK, she wasn’t going to avoid him any more but that didn’t mean she wanted to spend any extra time with him. ‘Sure,’ she said averting her gaze. ‘Is Dad there?’
‘He’s chairing it.’
Hailey’s father, John Winters, was the Brisbane General’s medical director. He spent his entire day in meetings such as these. ‘Blow him a kiss for me,’ she said, then hung up the phone.
‘Looks like you got me, folks,’ she said, addressing the entourage. She risked another glance at Callum. A small smile was playing on that very fascinating mouth. ‘Let’s get this show on the road.’
2B was a twenty-bed ward. In an ideal world eight beds were allocated to surgical patients, eight to medical patients and four formed a high-dependency bay for those children that needed closer monitoring. Of course, the balance was often weighted more heavily one way or the other which caused all kinds of administration headaches.
But that was the nature of hospitals and as far as nursing their patients went, Hailey couldn’t give a fig about the medical/surgical mix—they were all sick kids.
She pushed the chart trolley from bed to bed as each patient and their progress was discussed. She hadn’t done a round with Callum before and was most impressed with his unique mix of professionalism, thoroughness and quirky bedside manner. He developed a quick rapport with the parents and wasn’t afraid to take the time with the kids to touch them and try and elicit a smile or two.
Hailey had been on too many ward rounds that were rushed and left the parents with more questions than answers. Callum didn’t operate that way. He seemed genuinely interested, concerned and willing to listen. He also engaged his entire team, med students included, teaching as he went, and it was obvious they liked and respected him.
He was careful to include her as well, seeking her opinion, consulting her about decisions, making it nigh on impossible not to interact with him. She’d hoped the round would be quick and painless but she’d been wrong. She was more aware of him than ever now she’d seen the professional side of him.
The truth was, even after thirty minutes, she had to grudgingly admit she admired the hell out of him. An irresistible mix when the kiss-that-never-happened still loomed large in her consciousness. Damn it all. This was a man she could like.
The surgical bays were full of the morning’s ENT list. Several tonsillectomies, some with adenoids as well and others with grommets. The surgeons would be in to see them later but Callum took the time to check all was well with them.
The medical bays sported a mix of conditions. From their frequent flyer, Lucy, with cystic fibrosis, to Troy, an eight-year-old cerebral palsy patient with pneumonia, and an adventurous three-year-old, Jake, who had petted a possum and ended up with a bitten arm for his trouble. The wound had developed cellulitis, necessitating intravenous antibiotics.
‘Hello, Jake,’ Callum greeted as they stopped at the three-year-old’s bedside. ‘I heard you wrestled a lion the other day.’
Jake giggled and looked at his mother, who smiled at Callum. ‘No, it was a crocodile, wasn’t it, Jakey?’
Jake giggled again.
‘Is it OK if I have a look at where this croc got you?’ Callum grinned.
Jake nodded shyly and held out his bandaged arm. The other arm was wrapped up too, to secure the IV. Hailey reached out to remove the dressing but Callum had already started unwinding it. She was so used to doing things like this for doctors that it was a nice change to come across one who could do his own dirty work.
‘Ah, now, see here,’ Callum said to his students as he revealed the wound. ‘This is a classic case of cellulitis. A central wound and a reddened area of skin surrounding it where the subcutaneous tissues have been inflamed. And see,’ Callum said, pointing to the perfectly formed outer edge of the angry-looking area, ‘the definite demarcation line where the inflammation halts.’
The students peered closer and nodded.
‘How big was that croc, Jake?’ Callum asked. ‘That’s an impressive wound.’
‘He was this big,’ Jake said, his eyes almost as wide as his outstretched arm span, getting into the swing of the game.
The team laughed. Hailey was still smiling when Callum rewound the bandage. Their gazes met and Callum winked at her. Her smile slipped. The memory of how he had done exactly that on the balcony taunted her and the strange fluttery sensation it had caused in the pit of her stomach returned.
‘He’s going to need longer on the antibiotics,’ Callum said, addressing Jake’s mother. ‘We’ll review the wound every day but I wouldn’t count on being out of here for at least two more days.’
The team waited for Callum to wash his hands and then moved on to the four-bedded high-dependency bay, directly opposite the nurses’ station, which currently housed only three patients.
There was twelve-month-old Henry, an ex-prem baby with a trachy tube for his floppy airway. His mother usually managed him at home but Henry had developed a respiratory infection and had
become quite sick very rapidly, ending up in ICU for a week. He was on the mend now and was due for discharge some time in the next few days.
In the next bed Tristan, a very healthy-looking four-year-old was sitting up, watching television with his father. He was being monitored after ingestion of four of his grandmother’s blood-pressure tablets. He was in hospital as a precaution only and, barring any unexpected adverse reaction, would be discharged tomorrow.
Tahlia, a very cute newborn diabetic, was kicking up a ruckus. She’d also been a transfer from ICU. She would be with them for some time while her parents learned how to manage the condition.
‘Can you hold her while I go and get her bottle?’ Rosemary, the junior nurse who’d been allocated the bay for the shift, asked Hailey.
Hailey nodded and took the swaddled infant. Tahlia, well used to being picked up after her four weeks in hospital, settled instantly. Hailey held her while the round continued.
‘You’re a natural,’ Callum murmured as he brushed past her to wash his hands.
Hailey looked down into Tahlia’s blue gaze and realised she’d been subconsciously swaying. Well, yes, she was a paeds nurse after all. And prior to that she’d been a midwife. So, yes, she was good with kids.
But she wasn’t the same nurse who had gone away to London. What had happened there had taught her to keep her emotional distance. Made her wary of getting too involved with her patients. Once she may have been a natural. Now she was just doing her job.
Rosemary came back and Hailey handed Tahlia over gratefully. The round ended and Hailey scurried away to let the other nurses know the relevant changes pertaining to their patients and then sat to document the decisions from the round in each patient’s chart.