by Sarah Morgan
‘I’m a doctor.’ She spoke quietly, knowing better than to joke or argue with him or enter into any conversation that wasn’t necessary. She could see that the man was very drunk and suspected that he was only too keen to pick a fight. ‘Now, if you’ll just sit him over here, I can take a look at his head.’
Without giving the man time to argue, she took charge and helped the injured man onto the couch in the first cubicle, half-drawing the curtain around him.
She looked at Charlotte. ‘Would you mind showing his friend the way to Reception so that he can give some details, please?’
Charlotte nodded, her eyes wide with admiration. ‘Of course.’
Jago said nothing. He just leaned broad shoulders against the wall, his eyes narrowed as he watched Katy.
Trying to hide how much his presence affected her, Katy reached for an ophthalmoscope to examine the patient’s eyes, but as she put a hand on the man’s head, he gave a groan and lurched towards her. She sidestepped neatly and he vomited over the floor.
Katy reached for a bowl and held it for the man while he retched and mumbled incoherently.
Charlotte, back from Reception, rolled her eyes in disgust. ‘It’s on your shoes,’ she muttered, and Katy shook her head dismissively.
‘I’ll sort that out later.’ She didn’t care about her shoes but she was seriously worried about her patient. Were the symptoms he was displaying the result of alcohol or the bang on the head he’d received? It was such a difficult decision.
If she admitted a patient who was perfectly healthy, she’d be wasting precious hospital resources. On the other hand, if she discharged him and his symptoms were the result of a serious head injury, she would have failed in her duty as a doctor.
Medicine had never seemed so complicated.
She knew that she could ask Jago for advice but she didn’t want to. He might take it as a sign of weakness on her part and she was determined to prove to him that she was more than capable of doing the job without constant supervision.
‘Can you hear me? Can you tell me your name?’
She spoke clearly and the man groaned and mumbled something unintelligible.
‘Do you know what day it is?’
She continued to question the man but was far from satisfied by the results.
Jago stepped closer to her. ‘He could just be very drunk,’ he said coolly, and she knew he was testing her again.
‘Or his symptoms could be the result of his head injury.’ She tried to ignore the explosion of heat that consumed her body as he moved closer still. Breathing in his warm, familiar, male scent, she felt her head swim.
‘So which is it, Dr Westerling?’
She made the mistake of looking at him and his eyes locked onto hers with the power and force of a missile attack.
The mood was suddenly electric and Katy found herself mesmerised by the look of raw, sexual intimacy in his eyes.
Suddenly her breathing was suspended and she struggled to find her voice.
‘I—I need to finish my examination before I can answer that question.’
He dealt her a slanting smile. The same smile that she’d found totally irresistible at the age of eighteen. ‘Then finish it, Doctor.’
Cursing her own weakness and the effect he had on her, Katy turned her attention back to the patient.
She asked more questions, checked the patient’s reflexes and only after completing an exhaustive examination did she make her decision.
‘I’m sending him for a CT scan and then I’m admitting him,’ she said firmly, and Jago lifted an eyebrow.
‘And why is that?’
‘He’s showing symptoms of a serious head injury. Headache, vomiting, disorientation. I’m not prepared to discharge him.’
Confident in her decision, Katy looked straight at him, her heart lifting as she saw the glimmer of respect in his dark eyes.
Finally.
After a week of concentrated hard work.
‘Good decision,’ he said smoothly. ‘Make the arrangements and then come to my office and we can talk about it further.’
Light-headed with relief that she’d done the right thing, Katy suddenly wanted to smile. He’d praised her. He thought she’d done a good job.
But there was no way she was going to his office.
The effect he had on her was just too powerful and if she couldn’t control her reactions she needed to avoid him.
She lifted her chin, her confidence increasing by the moment. She’d done a good job. ‘Can we talk about it tomorrow, please? I was supposed to be off duty an hour ago and I’m going out so I need to go and clean the vomit off my shoes and—’ her eyes challenged his and a small smile touched her mouth ‘—file my nails.’
And remind herself that dreaming of Jago was a fast route to a miserable life.
Jago looked taken aback. Then to her surprise he threw back his dark head and laughed. ‘Tomorrow will be fine.’ He turned to Charlotte, who was gaping at the scene being played out before her. ‘I’m out of here. If you need me, call my mobile.’
Charlotte watched him stride away and looked at her with awe. ‘Would someone mind telling me what’s going on here? You answered him back and he just laughed,’ she muttered, reaching for the notes so that she could make the arrangements for the CT scan. ‘And I can’t believe he let you deal with those drunks. I’ve never known him to act like that before. Normally he’s very protective of the female staff, to the point of chauvinism. I mean, we all ought to deal with the same patients but the truth is when you’re built like Jago you stand more chance with a violent drunk than someone who is built like you. I don’t know what he was playing at.’
Katy gave a weak smile. She knew exactly what he’d been playing at. He’d been waiting for her to fail.
He’d wanted her to fail since the day she’d started.
What she didn’t understand was why.
A pleasant warmth spread through her veins. His reasons didn’t really matter. She hadn’t failed. She’d managed fine, she knew she had. She’d made all the right clinical decisions and she hadn’t needed his help.
She straightened her slim shoulders and gave a small smile, suddenly feeling more confident.
He’d tested her and she’d passed with flying colours.
So now what would happen?
Jago closed the door of his office and ran long fingers through his cropped hair.
What the hell was the matter with him?
He’d sent a woman to deal with a bunch of drunks.
And not just any woman, he’d sent Katy. Katy, who was about as robust as a spring flower.
What had he been thinking of?
But he knew the answer to that, of course.
He’d been trying to prove that she couldn’t cope with the rigours of practising medicine in the A and E department. He’d been trying to scare her away.
Because he didn’t want her here, on his territory, looking at him with those wide violet-blue eyes.
Just thinking of her exceptionally beautiful, heart-shaped face made him harden in an instinctive and powerful male reaction, and he gave an exclamation of disgust.
Hadn’t he learned anything? Was he really that basic that he could forget everything just to satisfy the most primitive of male urges?
What was it about Katy Westerling? True, she was astonishingly beautiful but he met beautiful women all the time and they didn’t make him abandon his usual caution towards members of the opposite sex.
He had to keep reminding himself that she wasn’t what she seemed.
That the innocent aura that aroused a man’s most fiercely protective instincts was actually just an act.
His hands tightened into fists and his hard jaw clenched as he remembered the photographs her father had shown him.
She might have been a virgin when he’d first slept with her, but less than four weeks later she’d slept with another man.
I love you, Jago.
Remembering th
e incredibly intimate pictures he’d seen, he growled low in his throat and strolled across to the window of his office which looked out on the ambulance bay.
It was eleven years ago, he reminded himself. And eleven years was a long time. Enough to change a person, and Katy had obviously changed.
The old Katy had been deliciously shy and tongue-tied but the Katy he’d seen in action today was very different from the girl he’d made love to so long ago. Far from buckling under the challenge he’d set her, she’d coped well.
In fact, she’d handled those drunks with an admirable level of skill and tact. There had been every sign that they could have become violent at any minute but she’d reacted with textbook efficiency and had successfully defused any suggestion of aggression on the part of the patient and his friends.
She’d behaved as though she’d been operating totally within her comfort zone, which didn’t make a scrap of sense. When would Katy Westerling, with her over-privileged, protected upbringing, ever have been exposed to drunk, violent men?
His dark brows locked in a frown as he puzzled over her complete lack of concern. She hadn’t even seemed to notice the danger. But some deep-seated instinct told him that she had been all too aware and had known exactly how to cope with it. She’d stood up to them and she’d stood up to him.
He allowed himself a brief smile of admiration as he remembered her gutsy response to his command that she meet him in his office.
She’d remembered his caustic remark about her filing her nails and she’d thrown it back at him.
No, Katy had definitely changed. She’d dropped the innocent act—and they both knew that it had been nothing more than an act—and she was showing a level of courage that frankly surprised him. There were still hints of the feminine fragility that she’d shown at eighteen, but he sensed a strength and determination that hadn’t been there before.
Suddenly he was intrigued.
And he was also impressed. He’d seen numerous colleagues make the mistake of dismissing a patient who was drunk. She hadn’t made that mistake. Even when the patient had vomited on what he assumed to be a frighteningly expensive pair of shoes, she hadn’t allowed it to cloud her decision-making.
She was a good doctor.
And he had to face the fact that the reason he was being so hard on her had absolutely nothing to do with her clinical abilities and everything to do with his own emotions.
Katy was nearly at the end of her shift the following day when a call came through requesting a medical team to attend an accident.
‘They’ve got a man trapped in a car and they’re worried about his leg. I’m the duty consultant so it’s mine,’ Jago said immediately, reaching for high-visibility jackets and the equipment they’d need at the roadside. ‘I’ll take Charlotte and Katy.’
Katy felt the adrenaline rush through her veins.
She knew that immediate care—tending to the patient at the scene of the accident—was very different from looking after someone in the A and E department where they were surrounded by equipment.
Was he expecting her to take the lead as he had with the drunken head-injury patient the previous day?
‘I’m taking you as an observer,’ he said smoothly, evidently reading her mind, ‘and an extra pair of hands if we need one. I’ll be right by your side all the time.’
And she was supposed to find that reassuring?
But Katy didn’t have time to reflect on Jago’s reasons for taking her because they were soon in the car, travelling at high speed towards the scene of the accident.
The roads were slick with rain and Jago drove fast but carefully, the powerful headlights cutting through the darkness.
They arrived to find the fire crew cutting one of the occupants of the car out of the vehicle.
Jago retrieved several rucksacks from the car and checked that she was wearing the correct protective clothing.
The darkness and the foul weather were clearly hampering the rescue efforts.
Responding to a shout from one of the paramedics, Katy hurried across to one of the stretchers.
‘We’ve got him on a spinal board and he’s conscious but his leg’s a mess. It needs attention before we transfer him.’ The paramedics addressed her directly and Katy looked frantically around for Jago but he was speaking to a member of the fire crew.
Which meant it was up to her.
A blanket was covering the injured man and Katy lifted it gently, feeling the colour drain out of her face as she saw the extent of the man’s injuries. The leg was severely deformed and she felt a cold rush of panic in her chest. Where should she start? She could see that there was an open fracture, with part of the bone exposed to the air, as well as a severe laceration. She knew that it was important to cover it to try and prevent infection but the leg was so badly damaged that she was afraid of making the damage worse.
Aware that she was well outside her own realms of experience, she looked over her shoulder for Jago and to her relief he was there, his powerful presence reassuring in the chaos of the accident.
‘What have we got?’
Unlike her, his expression didn’t flicker as he saw the state of the man’s leg. He merely pulled on a pair of sterile gloves, and turned to the nearest paramedic and quietly listed the equipment he needed.
Katy took a deep breath to steady her stomach and those sharp dark eyes settled on her face.
‘Are you OK?’ He frowned sharply as he scanned her pale face. ‘You can wait in the car if you like.’
And give him more ammunition for accusing her of not being able to cope? No way!
‘I’m fine,’ Katy replied sickly, hoping that he couldn’t see just how much she was shaking.
‘As long as you’re sure.’ His voice was surprisingly gentle. ‘If you change your mind, let me know.’
The rain had plastered his jet-black hair to his face and trickled off the dark stubble on his hard jaw.
He was breathtakingly handsome and very much in control of the situation.
Which was a relief because she felt completely and totally out of her depth.
He kept his voice low, explaining what he was doing as he worked. And he worked quickly.
‘Normally we wouldn’t handle the injured part without splinting,’ he told her after they’d given the man drugs to control the pain, ‘but in this case there’s severe deformity and the blood supply is compromised.’
‘So that could damage the soft tissues?’
‘Exactly. A good blood supply is vital to limb survival. So in this case I’m going to apply gentle traction to restore the alignment of the bones. Then we’ll splint.’
Katy blinked in surprise as one of the paramedics took a Polaroid photograph of the wound before covering it with a sterile dressing.
‘Why did he do that?’ She spoke in a low voice even though the patient was drifting in and out of consciousness, barely aware of what was happening.
‘Because exposing the wound again in the A and E department will increase the risk of infection, so if we can we take a photo at the roadside before we cover it,’ Jago explained. ‘No one will disturb the dressing now until this chap reaches Theatre.’
Katy watched while he reduced the fracture and then checked the pulses in the limb.
‘OK.’ He glanced up at the paramedics and ran a hand over his face to clear his vision, his thick, dark lashes clumped together in the rain. ‘I need a long leg splint.’
They produced one immediately and Jago immobilised the leg with help from Katy and one of the paramedics.
‘Splinting the leg will help control the pain but we need to get him to hospital fast. Blood loss from limb wounds and internal bleeding from fractures contribute to shock so we need to resuscitate him carefully.’ His eyes flickered to Katy. ‘Don’t forget that blood loss from open fractures can be two or three times greater than that from closed fractures.’
Katy listened, taking in everything he was saying, totally in awe of his amazing ca
lm and the amount of knowledge he displayed.
He seemed totally indifferent to the rain and darkness, acting with the same degree of supreme self-confidence that he displayed in the well-equipped A and E department.
He was talking again. ‘One of the advantages of attending the scene of the accident is that you get a real picture of what happened and that helps you assess the possible injuries.’
She was eager to learn from him and for a brief moment their past history was forgotten, the tension between them easing as they concentrated on the patient. ‘And that’s why you always question the paramedics about whether the patient was a passenger or the driver?’
Jago nodded, his attention fixed on the patient. ‘It’s important to know whether they were in the vehicle or a pedestrian. Whether they were restrained by a seat belt. The direction of impact and the degree of damage to the car.’
‘So if you know that someone was thrown from a vehicle—’
‘Then you know that you’re dealing with potentially fatal injuries,’ he slotted in, nodding to the paramedics to indicate that they could load the patient into the ambulance. ‘It’s one of the reasons we always make you undress trauma patients in the A and E department. You never know what injuries may be hiding and clinical signs may be subtle, particularly in the unconscious patient.’
He directed operations as the patient was carefully lifted into the ambulance and then sprang into the vehicle, his movements swift and athletic.
‘You and Charlotte bring the car. I’ll see you back in A and E.’
She turned back to the car feeling a huge range of emotions. On the one hand she felt that she’d learned a lot but on the other she felt helpless and cross with herself, knowing that she hadn’t dealt with the situation well.
The truth was, she’d been horrified by the extent of the injuries she’d seen and too panicked to know where to begin.
Was that normal?
Had other doctors found themselves in the same situation?
Charlotte walked up to her, carrying some equipment. ‘Slick, isn’t he?’
Katy helped her lift it into the boot of the car. ‘He’s very confident.’
‘Well, that’s because he knows what he’s doing.’ Charlotte slammed the boot shut. ‘He’s ferociously intelligent and he never loses his cool.’