by Lucy Ryder
“I don’t have a ‘thing’ for anyone and she doesn’t like to be called cute,” Ty snarled irritably, beginning to pull on his clothes. And he was not meeting Paige’s family, for God’s sake. Jeez Louise, they’d only known each other a few weeks and most of that time he’d managed to avoid her.
He most definitely did not have a “thing” for her. Or anyone else, for that matter.
He found a teeny little pair of baby-blue panties covered with white daisies and shoved them in his pocket because Paige didn’t need Nate looking at her underwear.
“We’re not a thing.” Nate’s expression was a mix of pity and amusement. “What?”
His friend shook his head. “You poor stupid sap. Look at you defending your lady and hiding her skivvies from your best friend.”
“She’s not my lady,” Ty denied quickly, and then winced at the knee-jerk response. And because he felt guilty he growled, “And you’re no longer my best friend.”
Nate looked unconcerned. “Then you won’t mind if I ask her out, because word is she’s a lot of fun.”
It took a couple of beats for Ty to process that but when he did, he rounded on Nate with a protesting snarl.
His ex-friend merely snorted. “Yeah, thought so,” he drawled. “You so have a thing for the cute doctor. Relax. The guys say that, as fun as she is, they don’t get to see her skivvies.” Ty’s shoulders tensed at the news that the coasties were discussing Paige. He was about to point out that Nate was gossiping like a little girl when his friend added, “Guess they’ll be interested to know she wears teeny blue ones covered with little white daisies.”
In the process of pulling his shirt over his head, Ty’s head snapped up to find his friend looking enormously entertained at his expense. “You do that,” he told Nate, “and I’ll kick your ass all the way to Canada and back.”
Instead of answering, the other man simply grinned and dumped the bag of food onto the entrance table while Ty finished yanking on his clothes.
It was only when they were on the boat, heading out into open water, that Nate called out as he steered into a large swell, “So, if Dr. Cutie isn’t your lady, what is she?”
Ty pretended not to hear. Besides, he didn’t know what Paige was other than sweet and sexy…oh, yeah, and hot. She was also smart and funny and surprisingly vulnerable beneath that sassy tough-girl exterior. And just thinking about how she looked when she came had him fumbling the ropes and cursing.
She wasn’t his lady, he insisted silently. She’d made that abundantly clear by sneaking out without saying goodbye. Yet something—he didn’t know what—wanted more than one night. More than—No, dammit, he snarled silently. I don’t want or need anything from—
“Look out!”
He looked up as the boom swung at his head, and ducked just in time to avoid being dumped into the icy ocean. He straightened and a voice in the back of his head warned, Excellent advice, buddy. You’d be smart to heed it.
*
When Paige knocked off work a few days later, clouds, dark and heavy, lashed the seaside town with rain while high seas pounded the shore.
Within seconds she was soaked and had to go scrambling around in the rising water to retrieve her keys, which had slipped from her cold fingers. When she finally got her car open, she sat shivering and dripping all over the interior, wondering if she should stay put or risk the drive home.
As promised, Harry had negotiated a good deal that hadn’t resulted in her selling a kidney or wiping out her savings; but the mechanic had warned Paige to be careful about driving in wet conditions until the engine had been completely overhauled.
She rolled her eyes. Yeah, right. She’d put it on her list right after the entry that said: Stop thinking about you know who.
Deciding to leave the decision up to Bertha, she turned the key and exhaled gustily when the engine turned over.
“Okay,” she muttered. “Home it is, then.”
The streets were deserted. Water gushed across the roads, turning them into fast-flowing rivers, and she was forced to grip the steering wheel when Bertha abruptly hydroplaned across an intersection. Now, instead of shivering with cold, she was shaking with terror and sucking in air like a vacuum cleaner.
She was halfway home when rain turned to sleet, pinging against her roof like tiny missiles that turned her windshield to slush and the road to an ice rink. By the time she parked in front of her house she was a wreck.
She hurried up the path to her front door on wobbly legs, only to discover that everything was in darkness. Clutching her shoulder bag as ice dripped off her nose, Paige fished out her house keys with stiff fingers…and sneaked a peek at the adjacent unit before she could stop herself.
She hadn’t seen Ty since “The Night”, as she’d dubbed it, and considering it would take her about a decade, maybe longer, to forget the way she’d thrown herself at him, she was quite happy to keep it that way.
She didn’t know what she’d expected but it wasn’t seeing the front door standing wide open. What the heck? She paused. Surely he hadn’t just walked out and forgotten to lock up? Or maybe he couldn’t because something bad had happened.
Hurrying across the space separating their front doors, Paige peered around the frame, half expecting someone to leap out and scare the bejesus out of her. When nothing happened, she sucked in an unsteady breath and ventured inside.
Dim light from the marina made its way through the sitting room sliding doors but other than a lot of dark shapes Paige hoped were just pieces of furniture, the place was empty.
Maybe. Hopefully.
“Ty?” she called, moving to the bottom of the stairs that led to the second floor. “Tyler?”
Not wanting to be like the brainless bimbo in a slasher movie, Paige retraced her steps thinking that maybe Ty had gone to check on the connection box. In that moment her worst nightmare—and all those horror movies she’d watched with Frankie—materialized as a huge hulking shadow, backlit by a raging storm, appeared in the doorway.
Paige opened her mouth to scream and a deep familiar voice demanded, “What the—? Paige?”
She gave a strangled gasp and lurched backwards. It was only when her butt hit the floor that she realized her legs had given way.
The next thing Ty was crouched over her. “Paige,” he demanded, reaching out to tuck dripping black strands behind her ear, “what the hell happened? Answer me, dammit. Where are you hurt?”
No way was she saying her butt. That would be mortifying, especially if he demanded to examine it. “Just p-peachy,” she finally gasped, her breath hitching on a giggle that bordered on hysteria. Great. Looking like a drowned, terrified rat was so not how she’d imagined their next meeting. “Y-you,” she babbled, wrapping her arms around her knees because she was suddenly shaking like she had dengue fever.
“Yeah. Me.” He frowned and wrapped his fingers around her wrist to check her pulse. When she continued to giggle helplessly he nudged her chin up to peer into her face.
The next instant his searching blue gaze had her trembling for another reason entirely. One that was as unwelcome as it was unsettling. For some reason she sat, frozen by the expression in his eyes, the heat pumping off his body and…and the memory of—Nope. So not going there.
“I’m fine,” she insisted, shoving his hand away and scrambling to her feet. She wrapped her arms around her body and edged away. “I’ll just… I saw your d-door open and thought…uh, never mind.” What she’d thought was ridiculous so she headed for the door, her teeth chattering from a combination of cold and reaction.
“Hey, wait up. Where are you going?”
“Since you’re okay, I’ll… I’ll… I need to go.” Far away. From the delicious heat pumping off his body and the dreams that had plagued her the past couple nights. Just thinking about them gave her a hot flash.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” he growled, pulling her back around and clearly having no problem facing her. But then he probably did this all the
time, she thought darkly.
“There’s no power. I was trying to fix the problem at the outside box but I can’t see what the hell I’m doing.” He disappeared for a minute and returned with a couple of towels. “This storm literally came out of nowhere,” he continued, running one towel over his hair and holding out the other. She took it and immediately buried her face in the thick terry cloth. “Just before the power went out the radio said the storm’s being driven by the collision of a warm front from California and a huge polar cell pushing its way south.”
Paige peered out into the icy storm and shivered as the wind sent sleet angling in under the porch roof. The only way she could make out the houses across the street was from the faint glow of lights through the gloom.
Moving to the end of the porch, she looked around the side of the house. Marina lights swung crazily in the gusting winds, and Paige could scarcely see the boats and yachts lurching around at their slips. What she couldn’t see was Harry’s lights.
“Are we the only ones without power?”
She leaned out further and would have taken off in the wind if Ty hadn’t grabbed the back of her scrubs and hauled her back.
“Get back from there before you get soaked,” he growled. “And I think so. Although…now that you mention it I think the Andersen house was in darkness. Is Harry away somewhere? Or is their house also on this circuit?”
Really worried now, Paige nibbled on her thumbnail. “I’m going to check on him,” she announced, a bad feeling cramping her belly.
“I’ll go,” Ty began, but Paige shoved the towel at him and hurried down the stairs. She heard him curse and mutter something about stubborn females as she ran into the street. She barely felt the additional moisture, only swiping irritably at the bits of sleet dripping into her eyes as she raised a hand to knock on Harry’s door.
By the time she realized no one was going to answer, Ty was a large comforting presence beside her, trying the handle while she peered in through the panes beside the door.
“Don’t panic,” he said gruffly. “I’m sure he’s okay. Maybe he fell asleep in front of the TV.”
“It’s not like him,” she murmured, her stomach cramping again at the thought of something happening to the old man. In the eight months he’d been her neighbor she’d come to love the retired widower like a grandfather.
She couldn’t bear it if anything happened to him.
Shaking now from more than cold, Paige hurried round the house to the stairs leading to the deck. The wood was slick with ice and she nearly took a header into Harry’s window box.
Pushing open the sliding door with shaking hands, she was both relieved and frightened when she found it unlocked and the house dark and silent.
“Harry? Mr. Andersen, it’s Paige. Are you okay?” Please be okay, she prayed frantically, hoping he’d be sitting in his chair, startled out of sleep.
What she found had her heart squeezing in her chest. “Harry?” She rushed over to where he lay in a heap on the floor, dropping to her knees beside him. “Harry, can you hear me?”
CHAPTER NINE
“BE CAREFUL,” TY WARNED, coming up behind her. “Don’t turn him over until you know what you’re dealing with. I’ll call emergency and unlock the front door.”
She nodded, unable to talk past the huge lump in her throat as she slid her fingers beneath Harry’s jaw. She found a pulse and went weak with relief. Thank God. He was alive, although his pulse was way too fast and all over the place.
“He’s alive,” she called out, and heard Ty murmur something. When he reappeared in the doorway, she continued, “I’ve got a pulse but he’s in A fib with brief periods of PSVT. I’m going to turn him over and start compressions. How long till the EMTs get here?”
His face was set in unreadable lines. “We’re on our own,” he said, dropping to his haunches and helping roll the old man onto his back. “There’s been a pile-up on the highway so they may take a while.”
Paige’s heart squeezed at the news. Even in the torchlight, she could see the ashen tinge to Harry’s weather-toughened skin. Her hands shook as she checked his pupil reaction. She’d never had to perform emergency procedures on someone she knew or loved.
She placed the heel of her bottom hand on Harry’s sternum and laced her fingers. “How long?”
“Ten…fifteen minutes…an hour…they can’t tell.” Her heart dropped. Ty must have seen something in her face because he reached out and placed a hand over hers. It was warm and firm and she had to fight against the urge to cling to it. But clinging meant you expected the person to always be there and Paige had learned early that was never the case.
“Just keep doing what you’re doing,” Ty said. “Where’s your emergency kit?”
Without breaking rhythm, she lifted her head and their eyes caught and held. His were steady and calm.
“In the upstairs spare bedroom. My keys are—”
But Ty was already gone and by the time he returned she’d had time to examine Harry more carefully in the torchlight. All the signs pointed to dehydration. Low electrolytes could easily have triggered atrial fibrillation, especially if he had an underlying condition. She wasn’t certain what had caused him to lose consciousness but the first order of business was to get a sinus rhythm back.
They could deal with everything else later.
Sucking in a shaky breath, Paige sent up a prayer that the AMTs arrived in time to help him. She couldn’t…just couldn’t bear to lose him too. Not now.
He’d need a calcium channel blocker and her main worry was blood pooling in his heart. If it began clotting, he could die before they got him to the ER.
Within minutes Ty was back, tossing a package at her.
“Find a vein,” he instructed tersely, pulling out a bag of Ringer’s lactate. “He needs liquids ASAP. I found some anti-diarrhea meds on the counter. Probably caught the enterovirus going around and tried to treat it himself.”
That sounded like Harry, but Paige blamed herself for not keeping closer tabs on him. She’d been so preoccupied with avoiding Ty and pretending her life wasn’t unravelling like a pair of cheap pantyhose that she’d barely been home or even thought to check on Harry the past week.
And now he could die.
Hands shaking, she tried to find a vein, finally applying a tourniquet and quickly inserting the needle when one appeared. She attached the cannula and slapped an adhesive dressing over the area to stabilize it while Ty awkwardly hooked the bag one-handed to the back of the chair.
“No CCBs,” he said gruffly, rising to his feet to look around the kitchen. “Without channel blockers we need some electrolytes.”
“Try the cupboards,” Paige suggested, resuming chest compressions. “I know Epsom salts isn’t ideal but he uses them for his plants. We need some dextrose too so check the cupboard beside the stove. Maybe there’s something there or in the bathroom that we can use.”
Ty rummaged around in the cupboards, grunting with disappointment each time he found nothing. He finally headed off to the bathroom, calling out a minute later that he’d found something.
Paige flashed a nervous look at the kitchen clock, wondering how long Harry had been unconscious. They’d been there nearly seven minutes already and still no sign of the EMTs.
Ty reappeared, holding a container, and went straight to the kitchen cupboard. He took out a cup and rinsed it with water from the kettle before dumping contents from the container into the cup. He added a few drops of kettle water and reached into the overhead cabinet for a bottle of honey.
He added a drop to the mixture and gently mixed it.
“Mag chloride and five percent glucose,” he growled. “We’ll repeat it every half-hour till the EMTs get here.” He thrust the cup at her. “I’ll take over compressions while you inject this into the line.”
“Ty…” With his cast he wouldn’t be able to perform CPR properly.
“I can’t handle a syringe one-handed,” he snapped, and Paige to
ok the cup from him. “I can’t do a damn thing one-handed.”
She couldn’t help noticing that he’d once again retreated behind an invisible wall, just as he had that afternoon on the mountain.
It felt like an age since she’d overheard him telling Nate that he might not be able to resume his surgical career. But even if that was true, he could still consult in other ways…especially with all his medical knowledge and skill. He couldn’t just waste it—people needed him.
“You’re more than a surgeon,” she said abruptly, and when he looked up, she nearly bobbled the cup at his shuttered expression and chilly eyes, as if she was a stranger who’d overstepped her mark. A muscle flexed in his jaw and the tension in the room ratcheted skyward until he turned away.
Okay. Clearly that was an unwelcome subject.
Furious with herself for getting all girly and hurt like they were an item, she turned her back on him and concentrated on getting the solution into a syringe. Harry she could help, Ty, it seemed…not so much.
She injected the solution right into the cannula port and altered the flow rate then dropped to her haunches. She made to take over but Ty brushed her aside with a brusque, “Call again.”
Grinding her teeth together, she rose and snatched his cell off the table. “I didn’t ask,” she reminded him furiously. “You could just as easily have gone on ignoring everyone and everything the way you like. Besides, you came here to be alone, remember? I didn’t ask for anything from you.”
Without looking at her, he said coolly, “No. You wouldn’t, would you?”
Stunned by the accusation, she demanded, “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means that Paige Carlyle likes everyone to believe she can handle things just fine on her own.”
She opened her mouth to tell him that she’d been forced to handle everything from the age of fifteen when she heard a siren. She snapped her mouth closed and rushed to open the front door just as her friend dashed up the stairs.