Needing Him

by Kennedy Fox

  “No, but I am your superior, so you will listen to my orders,” he barks.

  “So give me your phone then.” I hold my palm out, and when he eyes it like it’s going to bite him, I continue. “So I can give you my number. That way there’s no more miscommunication.” I give him a reassuring grin, knowing I have him backed into a corner to give it to me.

  “Fine.” He hands it over, and I add my contact information, then text myself, so I have his.

  “There.” I hand it back. “That wasn’t so hard, now was it?” I smirk, lowering my eyes to his crotch before gazing back up at him with a shit-eating grin.

  “Now hurry up so we can get this day over with.” He turns around and walks away before I can respond to his snide comment.

  What an ass.

  Now I don’t even feel bad for texting myself “I love cock” from his phone number.

  I take my sweet time, finishing another piece of licorice and rinsing my mouth with mouthwash before I make my way out of the locker room.

  “We have a lot to do today, so it’d be in your best interest to pay attention,” he tells me without looking in my direction. I walk next to him, and he’s walking faster than necessary, which seems to be a common occurrence. He’s much taller than I am, which means I have to walk twice as fast just to keep up.

  “Can you let me explain about last weekend, please?” I push, needing to get it out in the open, so we can move past it and be civilized since we have to work together.

  “We aren’t discussing this, Dr. Bell. I already told you that. Perhaps you need a hearing aid since you lack listening skills.”

  Gah! I want to throat punch him. He’s making it real hard to take the high road and be nice to him. Really hard.

  “For your information, I just had a full physical before my transfer, and my hearing is impeccable. My tolerance for assholes, on the other hand, is low.”

  He grunts in response, avoiding eye contact at every opportunity.

  “A trauma hospital is different than the ER you’re used to working in.” And, apparently, we’ve moved on to the next topic. “We get paged when a trauma is coming in—usually from an accident—and then everyone gets prepped and ready, so we aren’t wasting any time once they arrive. We’re the closest trauma hospital in a fifty-mile radius, which means we often get helicopters and ambulances rushing in at the same time. That means when you’re given a position, you stick with it and do your job.”

  He walks us into one of the trauma rooms that I’d already familiarized myself with yesterday. “Everything we need is in each of these trauma rooms, and it’s important they stay stocked. We’re fully staffed with trauma surgeons, respiratory specialists, radiologists, and technicians, so we don’t ever have to wait for someone to get here. That means the room fills up quick, and it’s our job to make sure everything runs smoothly.”

  “So you’re the one in charge, I take it?” Flashes of our night together and how he took charge plagues me, and before I can push the thoughts out of my head, I become flushed.

  He quirks a brow at my reaction but doesn’t mention it.

  “For now, yes. When Dr. Umbridge is here, he’s the lead point person and will be the one to direct the scene.”

  “Sounds straightforward.”

  “It gets crazy usually, so our job is to stabilize the patient and prep them for surgery if it’s needed. Stop any bleeding or administer any pain medications.”

  “Yes, I went to med school too.” I snort, annoyed he’s treating me like an intern who has never practiced medicine before.

  “This isn’t an easy job, Dr. Bell, so I’ll need you to be on your A game at all times.”

  “Well give me the chance to show you before you criticize me then.”

  I start to walk out, tired of hearing his bullshit, but I don’t get far before he yanks my arm and pulls me back. “This hospital is my whole life, and I don’t do well with change.”

  Looking up at him, I notice his pained expression. “Well, that almost sounded like an apology.”

  Before he can respond, our pagers go off. We both look down and reach for them.

  “Trauma coming in. Showtime.”

  He walks out, and I follow him into the triage where a bunch of nurses are already running around to get beds ready.

  “What’s the ETA?” Evan asks.

  “Six minutes,” Veronica answers.

  “What’s the situation?” I ask.

  “Four-car collision with five people being brought in. Three are stable as of right now, but two are unconscious,” she explains as she reads her notes. “One is a child.”

  My heart sinks every time I hear about a child being in an accident, and this time is no different.

  “Okay, Claire and Landen, you’ll take the first unconscious patient to trauma room one with Dr. Moody. Veronica and Heather, you’re with me in trauma room two. Grant, Brooklyn, and Fiona—you’ll take the other three and assess their injuries first, then give Dr. Bell or me an update if you need a consult.” Evan gives instructions flawlessly and without missing a beat. He directs the nurses to their stations, and they scramble to prepare.

  Evan and I suit up in our surgical gowns, gloves, and masks, but before I can ask for help to tie me up, he’s behind me, knotting the ties around my neck and waist.

  “Thanks.”

  He only nods in response without making eye contact. I see Veronica is already tying him up, and that’s when I get the impression she’s his right-hand man. She always has his files ready for him, relays his messages, and I’m pretty sure she handed him a coffee yesterday afternoon.

  She’s his work wife.

  I giggle a little to myself at the term I’ve heard my dad use about one of his assistants. When you work in the hospital as much as we do, you’re married to the people you work with more than the actual people you’re married to.

  “Something funny?” He shoots daggers at me.

  “Are you seriously going to scold me for laughing to myself?”

  “This isn’t a laughing matter. We have a job to do.”

  I roll my eyes, but he walks off before he can see me. You’d think the guy didn’t just get laid last weekend or something by his bad attitude.

  The paramedics rush in just moments later, and the whole scene unfolds. Three stretchers are brought in with patients with minor injuries, and Evan directs them to the three nurses to assess them. An unconscious patient is brought into trauma room one, and when the last patient is rolled in, I follow Evan into trauma room two.

  “Transfer on three,” Evan orders before counting, and the nurses and I help him move the patient off the stretcher and onto the hospital bed.

  “Patient is a twenty-nine-year-old female and was the passenger when she got T-boned on her side. The driver said she smacked her head and couldn’t get her to wake up. BP was at ninety over seventy,” one of the paramedics tells us. Veronica is already hooking her up to the blood pressure cuff and heart rate tracker.

  “That blood pressure is too low,” Evan mutters, unwrapping his stethoscope from his neck and listening to her heart. “Her heartbeat is slow, and her breathing is unsteady. Bag her.”

  Moments later, Veronica hands me the equipment to manually ventilate her, and Evan watches as I push the tube down her throat and into her lungs. I’ve done this hundreds of times, but with his piercing eyes on me, I get nervous.

  “Dr. Bell…” His warning tone has my nerves on fire.

  “I’ve got it,” I say, attaching the bag to the mask and pumping.

  Once he checks for himself, I roll my eyes when his expression doesn’t change. He orders Veronica to check the head wound where blood is pooling, and Heather places an IV in the woman’s arm so she can administer medication.

  “She has a deep incision near her right temple. Going to clean it up and will probably need some stitches,” she tells Evan.

  “She might have some internal bleeding, so let’s get radiology in here to do some scans
while her breathing is stable.”

  Evan gets radiology within minutes since they’re in the next room. Once the X-rays are done and processed, we see she has a bleed in her spleen.

  “Ruptured spleen,” Evan confirms what I already knew.

  “Her abdomen must’ve been hit pretty hard,” I say, handing off the ventilator bag to Heather so I can look closer at the X-rays.

  “Or she wasn’t wearing a seat belt.” Evan’s body tenses, and his eyes go dark. His mood shifts, and I wonder what the hell just happened. “Veronica, she needs to be prepped for surgery. Page me when she’s in recovery,” he orders before facing me. “Stay with Veronica and help her prep the patient, then find me.”

  He walks off before I can respond.

  I do as he says and help Veronica while the trauma surgeon comes in all ready to go. We roll her down to the OR, and once she’s securely inside, Veronica and I walk out.

  “Good job, Dr. Bell,” she praises me, which takes me off guard a bit. I don’t even feel like I did that much, but I smile at her compliment.

  “Thanks. You too. You’re the superhero of nurses.” I smile.

  She blushes, a small smile gracing her lips. “Thanks, I love my job. Dr. Bishop makes it easy to do my job well.”

  My stomach twists at her words, wondering if that means what I’m thinking. Does Veronica have a thing for Evan? I mean, I wouldn’t blame her in the least, but this is only my second shift, so who the hell knows.

  “It’s obvious you two make a great team. I envy that.”

  “We do. It’s nice.” She smiles wide, and that’s all the confirmation I need that she definitely has feelings for him.

  Once we’re back to the ER, I find Evan and wait for his next order. The other three patients are in beds and all stabilized with minor injuries. The other unconscious patient is a child, and I rush in to help once Evan calls for my assistance.

  “She’s crashing,” one of the nurses shouts, announcing the code.

  Evan grabs the crash cart, and I add the gel to the paddles before I charge it to three hundred, and he shouts, “Clear!”

  He shocks her chest, and her heart begins beating again. She’s so little; I’m relieved that we don’t have to do it again.

  “Bag her,” Dr. Moody orders.

  Veronica hands me the tube and supplies, but the tube is too big. “Her throat is too swollen.”

  “Here,” she says, handing me a smaller sized one.

  I’m quick to grab it and attempt it once again with no luck.

  “Veronica, take over for Dr. Bell.” Evan’s tone is cold and harsh.

  “I can do it,” I bite out, trying again, but the way he’s scolding me with his eyes has my nerves all over the place. I can do this in my sleep, so my frustration grows the longer it takes.

  “Veronica, now.”

  “I said I got it!” I shout, but it doesn’t matter because Veronica grabs the tube from me and pushes me out of her way. She manages to ease the tube down her throat and quickly attaches everything together.

  “Compress the bag.” Evan directs his order at me, keeping his eyes down as he assesses her other injuries that have already been checked. Veronica steps aside so I can take over ventilating. My blood is boiling, but I know I need to remain calm and indifferent right now.

  Six hours later, the ER is calm again, but that doesn’t mean my annoyance has died down. Evan continues his bossy demeanor, and I’m so irritated with myself that I let him get to me. I’ve done that procedure so many times in my career and have never had issues, but him watching me and shouting caused my nerves to get the best of me.

  I’m sitting in front of my locker, taking angry bites of my licorice when I hear the door behind me open. I immediately know it’s him when the hair on the back of my neck stands up, and I prepare myself for an ass chewing.

  “That’s a gross habit,” he starts, walking to his locker that I realize is next to mine.

  I snort at his first choice of words. “Eating?”

  He scoffs, digging around his bag. “That isn’t eating. It’s high in sodium and carbs and filled with corn syrup.”

  “Well, I could be a smoker. Or drinker.” I smirk. “Or I could—”

  “Or you could eat food that’ll help sustain your energy levels instead of falling asleep on the job.”

  “I did not fall asleep on the job!” I stand, appalled at his accusations.

  “Could’ve fooled me.”

  “Your screaming and shouting at me while I’m trying to do something isn’t how I work!”

  “You want to be an ER doctor at a trauma hospital?” he taunts, stepping right into my space. “Then act like it. There’s no time for emotions or your feelings to get hurt. You focus on the patient, and you get your shit done. Bagging is med school 101, so forgive me if I have my doubts about you, Dr. Bell.”

  We’re both breathing hard, and my heart races at an intense speed. Knowing what he looks like under those scrubs has my brain malfunctioning on a witty response. I want to grab his face and kiss the attitude right out of him, but I won’t let him win.

  “Though considering your last name, I expected more from you.”

  His words sting, and I know he said them to get under my skin, but I won’t give him the satisfaction that it hurt. I ignore him and pretend it doesn’t faze me at all.

  “Good night, Dr. Bishop. Hope you sleep well,” I say smugly, widening my smile before taking another bite of my licorice.

  I see the corner of his lips twitch, and the thought of driving him crazy the same way he does me makes me do a little victory dance in my head.

  “Sweet dreams, Dr. Bell.” He reaches for his bag, and before he turns, he grabs the half-eaten piece of licorice out of my hand and walks out.

  Bastard.

  Chapter Nine

  EVAN

  Blood is everywhere.

  On my hands.

  On my scrubs.

  On my skin.

  It’s all I can see. The deep red, almost black hue is warm.

  I try to wipe it away, but the blood stays. It always does.

  The painful, semi-unconscious moans from the woman on the gurney fill my ears. Her body is completely broken, and I try my damnedest to save her. She can’t die. Not yet. Not now. The swelling has already taken over, and the light purple bruises cover her body. The cuts on her arms, legs, and face are so deep that all I want to do is kill the motherfucker who did this to her. She tried to avoid the head-on collision, but it was too late. The man who chose to fucking drink and drive should be the one lying here, fighting to breathe, fighting to live. Instead, he’s belligerent in another room, cursing and accusing someone of crashing into him. From the corner of my eye, I see the police standing outside the door. I hope the bastard rots in hell for this.

  When I look down at her, she’s almost unrecognizable. Blood mats her hair, and all she does is moan out in pain. The sound is deafening, one that’ll haunt me for years to come. This woman is someone’s daughter, sister, friend, and as I study her, I can’t help but question why bad things happen to good people.

  As her life dangles from a fragile thread, all I know is I have to do something. I have to try. She needs more blood; she’s losing it too quickly, and I know deep down she’s too far gone. Regardless, I refuse to give up hope that I can save her. Medical miracles have happened. One can happen now.

  I try to speak and move, but I can’t, even though time is of the essence. Her chances are slim and dwindling, but we have to try to save her because that’s what we do. I open my mouth to speak, to scream, but nothing comes out. I try to move, but it’s as if I’m standing in glue, stuck to the eggshell colored floor of the hospital, and everything is silent. For the first time in the emergency room, I feel helpless.

  I wake up in a panic, and it takes me a minute to realize I’m in the hospital and had fallen asleep again. The day has been slow, so I snuck off and found an empty, quiet room where I could close my eyes. Mistake number
one. The fucking nightmares always come back. No matter how much I’ve tried to push it away, some things can’t be unseen. Stress and sleep deprivation encourage the horrors I’ve witnessed over the years to haunt me in my sleep. I scrub my hands over my face, trying to get a grip on reality while trying to think of something else.

  Being an emergency room doctor at a trauma hospital isn’t easy. If it were, there’d be more people signing up for this profession. It takes a certain type of person to choose this life, and the things I’ve seen would make a grown man cry. Hell, I have. I became a doctor to save lives and to make a difference even though it’s impossible to save everyone who comes in. It’s a hard pill to swallow.

  I stand and stretch, then walk down the hall until I’m in the break room. Though my shift ends in fifteen minutes, I need coffee before I drive home. Of course, the coffeepot is empty, so I make some. Leaning against the counter, I watch the fresh coffee brew and hope to God the caffeine works quickly because I need it. After working seven days straight and staying later than I wanted a few days this week, I’m exhausted and worn out.

  As soon as the coffee finishes dripping, Emily enters, but her face is glued to her phone. As soon as she notices me, she shoves it into her pocket.

  “Dr. Bishop.” The rudeness in her tone isn’t lost on me. Before I can grab the handle of the pot, she beats me to it. She gets a cup, fills it full, then adds a shit ton of sugar and cream.

  “Want some coffee with that?” I ask, looking at her light brown liquid.

  After I pour myself a cup, I let it steam for a minute, then take my time drinking it black. When I was an intern, there wasn’t much time for all the froufrou sugar and creamer shit. Coffee was a necessity and time was limited, so we got in and out of the break room in less than a minute. I almost felt like I was in hyperdrive with how fast everything happened after med school.

  She smiles then takes a sip, overexaggerating how good it tastes. “You’re always so judgy.”

  Just as I’m about to say something, Emily’s cell rings. She pulls it from her pocket with a huge smile, and she answers it. Her face lights up, and I’m curious as to who she’s talking to. I almost wonder if she has someone back in Houston, a boyfriend she failed to mention. It has me questioning our night together, and why she lied about her name. Then again, I’ve had way too much fun shutting her down each time she tries to explain herself. I’d like to think she’s not the cheating, one-night stand type. Some things are better left unknown.