The Doctor's Surprise Bride

by Fiona McArthur

  ‘Kristy. I’m eight.’

  ‘I’m Eliza. I think you’ll make a great doctor or nurse one day, Kristy, the way you’ve looked after Mummy. Where’s Daddy?’

  ‘Daddy’s in the far paddock and Mummy said we had to go now. I left a note.’

  ‘That was clever and Mummy was right.’

  While she was talking, Eliza’s hands were busy. ‘This mask gives Mummy oxygen and makes the stronger asthma drug into a fine mist and that helps Mummy to breathe.’

  Eliza broke open the plastic ampoule, squirted the pre-mixed drug into the chamber of the nebulising mask and fitted the now misting mask over Mia’s face.

  She continued talking to the little girl but really she was talking to the frightened young woman beside her. ‘Inside Mummy’s lungs, all her little breathing tubes are blocking up with thick slime. This medicine helps the slime get thinner so Mummy can cough it out of the way and breathe better again, and the oxygen makes mummy feel better.’

  The little girl nodded and Eliza rested her hand on the woman’s shoulder. ‘Just close your eyes, Mia, and let the medication do the job.’ Eliza fitted the blood-pressure cuff around the woman’s arm and began to pump it up. ‘Do you have an asthma plan sheet and a spacer?’

  Mia shook her head tiredly and Eliza nodded. ‘We’ll talk about it later because I think it would help a lot in your case.’

  Eliza glanced at Mary. ‘She needs IV access, cortisone and probably IV salbutamol. Would you like to ring Dr Dancer to come around? I’ll pop a cannula in to save time.’

  Mary nodded and reached for the phone on the wall while Eliza swiftly prepared her equipment. ‘I’m going to put a little needle in Mummy’s arm. It looks like it would hurt but it’s really not much more than a mosquito bite. Mummy needs some other medicine that works really quickly if we put it in through the needle. Do you want to look away when I do it?’

  Kristy shook her head. ‘I’ll hold Mummy’s other hand.’

  ‘You have a wonderful daughter, Mia.’

  Mia nodded as she started to cough. Already her oxygen saturation had improved. Eliza glanced at Kristy to see if she was upset by her mother coughing.

  ‘So the slime in Mummy’s lungs is getting thinner, isn’t it Eliza?’

  ‘Yep.’ Eliza slid the cannula into Mia’s arm and taped it securely. Then she began to assemble the flask and line and draw up the drugs in preparation. ‘Next time Mummy’s fingers go this blue or she can’t talk, she’d better come in the ambulance because they can give her this medicine in the mask and put the needle in on the way to the doctor. Do you know how to ring an ambulance, Kristy?’

  Kristy nodded. ‘I ring 000, or 911 in America or 999 in England.’

  ‘Wow. Even I didn’t know that.’ Eliza felt like hugging the little girl. ‘Tell them Mummy can’t breathe and then answer all the questions.’

  When Jack arrived he could see that Eliza had everything under control. Mia could manage a few words, and after he approved the intravenous drugs Eliza had ready, Mia was stable enough to go by ambulance to Armidale, where she’d have to stay overnight, at the very least, for intensive observation.

  ‘Rhonda’s coming in as escort in the ambulance with you, Mia.’ Jack squeezed the young woman’s shoulder. ‘If all goes well, I’ll see if they’ll transfer you back to us here at Bellbrook tomorrow or the day after.’

  Mia’s husband arrived. Jack reaffirmed Mia would be better in Armidale, at least overnight, and after goodbyes Mr Summers took their daughter home.

  Jack watched Eliza clear the benches and restock the room in record time. He shook his head. Good was an understatement. He wasn’t sure he was used to someone telling him what he needed to give a patient, but he’d have to get over it. Eliza had certainly been instrumental in saving Mia’s condition from becoming perilous, and that was the important thing.

  He cleared his throat and wondered why the words stuck a little. ‘You did well, Eliza. Mia hasn’t had an attack that severe before.’

  Eliza stopped what she was doing and met his eyes. He watched her smile spread to her eyes at his compliment and he could feel himself responding. She was like a sunrise. Boom—explosion of light as she smiled. She blew him away again just like she had when he’d first met her.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said quietly. ‘So this is what a sleepy country town is like.’

  The moment extended and his smile broadened. She was gorgeous in an understated way and his diaphragm imploded again. Unconsciously he took a step forward towards her, as if it was the most natural thing in the world to want to be closer to her.

  Then she changed and the corners of her mouth drooped. The expression in her beautiful eyes grew distant and she broke eye contact as she looked away. The angry fairy wasn’t quite back but there were glimpses.

  Eliza spoke to the package she lifted into the cupboard. ‘Mia said she doesn’t have an asthma plan or a spacer. Are the plans not something you do here?’

  ‘Not really.’ Jack didn’t concentrate too much on what she was saying because he was wondering why she’d created such reserve and backed away from being friendly. He re-focussed on her question. ‘If someone becomes a moderate asthmatic, I usually send them to a specialist in Armidale or even the respiratory clinic in Newcastle, and the specialists do all that.’

  She twisted her neck and looked at him from under her brows. ‘I’ll have some forms sent from the Asthma Foundation. They’ll send us an info pack and a pad of plans that you could look at. I’ve helped generate plans before and believe they give the patient back control of their asthma. Spacers make it easier for the patient to take their Ventolin, especially during an attack.’

  Her tone was icy and he couldn’t help the drop in warmth in his own voice. It was almost as if she’d engineered the whole estrangement of their brief rapport. Something else was going on here, something ill-defined, and he didn’t like it, but he had to get back to his surgery. If she didn’t want him here, he could take a hint!

  ‘Thank you, Matron May. I’ve actually seen such plans and I know what a spacer is,’ Jack said dryly. ‘I’ll certainly consider your suggestion.’ He glanced at the door where Mary was an interested bystander. ‘I thought you were going home, Mary?’

  Mary raised placatory hands and bit back a smile. ‘I just need to finish the round I’ve started with Eliza. I’ll be gone soon.’

  ‘Well, I am gone,’ Jack muttered. ‘Matrons,’ he said mockingly, and inclined his head at Eliza. Then he took himself back to his surgery.

  Eliza watched him go. What on earth had got into her? Lecturing Jack! It wasn’t part of her job and she didn’t need to alienate her boss for the next eight weeks.

  And why was she thinking of him as Jack and not Dr Dancer?

  The problem was, the guy was too tall, too handsome and too sure of himself, and he made her feel all weak and feminine and things she’d promised she wasn’t going to feel again. What really worried her was whether coming here had been another bad decision. She’d made a few of those in her life.

  ‘I’m afraid I’ve put his back up,’ Eliza said.

  ‘You don’t look too upset about it. It won’t kill him to have someone not in awe of him.’ Mary changed the subject. ‘You seemed to find everything you needed for Mia easily.’

  Eliza glanced around at the now tidy room. Back to reality and escape from the distraction of Dr Jack Dancer. ‘You’ve stored everything in the most obvious place, Mary, and the labelling is fantastic. This is such a bonus. As an agency nurse, finding the equipment is the hardest part.’

  ‘I’ll bet.’ Mary tilted her head. ‘So how did you get into agency work? I bet a few hospitals would love to hire you full-time with your qualifications.’

  Eliza met Mary’s eyes. ‘It’s a new direction for me. I like being unattached. It gives me the choice to move when I want to.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ Mary said. ‘We’ll move on ourselves before Jack discovers me here on his next round.’ She smil
ed and swayed out of the room to waddle further down the hallway.

  ‘Where was I? Basically, you do five days a week, eight hours normal and four hours overtime, then you’re on call at night except for weekends. Think you can handle that?’

  ‘Fine by me.’ Eliza shook her head at Mary. ‘How on earth did you have time to fall pregnant?’

  Mary twinkled back. ‘My husband is the local fire captain, amongst other things, so we know there’s twenty-four hours in a day. We both enjoy being busy. He’s away at a conference at the moment.’

  Mary shrugged. ‘When Mick’s home he’s home and when he’s not I spend a lot of time here. We both like it that way. He used to be in the navy.’ She answered the question Eliza didn’t ask. ‘Mick will be home in a few days and stick around more when my baby is due.’

  ‘And if baby comes early?’ They both glanced down at Mary’s stomach.

  ‘He’ll have to fly home quick smart!’

  Eliza shook her head at Mary’s calmness. ‘Mary, I think you’re Wonder Woman.’

  Mary shrugged. ‘I’ll be Bored Woman for the next few weeks. I wondered if you’d like to drop around in a day or so. I’m sure you’ll have questions and I’ll be dying to know how you settle in.’

  And that’s how country towns worked. Eliza knew that from past experience. It wasn’t what she’d planned when she’d hoped to keep a city-dweller’s distance from the townsfolk. She’d seen the effect of gossip and everyone knowing her business, but she couldn’t offend Mary. Bellbrook’s matron was too genuine.

  Trouble was the next thing would be an in-depth conversation with the publican’s wife when she went back to the hotel tonight. Then there’d be the corner shop purchases tomorrow and the visit to the post office, by which time everyone in the valley would be aware of her arrival, the car she drove and enough physical features to be picked out at a hundred paces.

  She’d better not do anything noteworthy or Jack Dancer, who seemed to be related to everyone, would be the first to hear about it.

  CHAPTER TWO

  BY LUNCHTIME Mary had departed to rest as ordered by her doctor.

  Eliza glanced around at the eight elderly patients seated at the dining table to eat their lunch. She’d handed out the medications and done a ward tidy with Vivian.

  If Eliza looked on the workload as just a normal ward with diverse patients, and not a whole hospital, there was nothing she hadn’t done before.

  By six-thirty that evening she’d found most things she could possibly need, had had in-depth conversations with all the inpatients, as well as read their medical records and helped with the evening meal.

  She’d glanced through the rosters to see how they worked and spent ten minutes on the phone to Julie, her friend at the nursing agency, to say she was settling in.

  Now all she had to do was a ward round with the distracting Dr Dancer and she’d be finished for the day.

  Eliza glanced at the clock again and drummed her fingers on the nurses’ station desk.

  He was late.

  She was getting more unsettled by the minute with a waiting-for-the-dentist kind of tension and Eliza wished he’d just arrive. Surely Dancer wasn’t so spectacular he’d turned her into a bundle of nerves?

  Apparently he was. When Jack breezed in he brought more devastation to her peace of mind than she needed. So much for saying her imagination had been over-active. His wavy black hair was tousled as if he’d been dragging distracted hands through it all day, and he’d even jammed a couple of curls behind his ears. That was when she noticed he had a tiny diamond in his right ear lobe. How on earth had she missed that this morning?

  ‘Ready for the round?’ He seemed very businesslike and Eliza allowed some of the tightness to ease from her shoulders. Businesslike sounded good. He’d want to get home, too. The brusquer the better, Eliza thought gratefully.

  ‘Let’s go.’ She picked up a notebook in case she needed to take notes.

  He glanced across at her briefly, and she saw he had dark chocolate eyes, not black, as she’d previously thought, a strange thing to notice when she was supposed to be immune.

  ‘So how was your day?’ Jack was brief and Eliza even briefer.

  ‘Fine.’ She picked up the pace to get the next few minutes over as quickly as possible. Noticing too many things about this man, Eliza, she thought grimly.

  ‘Are we racing again?’ Laughter in his voice and Eliza felt her face stiffen. Please, don’t let him be nice to me or flirt with me or in any way endear himself to me, she prayed. There was something about him that pierced her skin like a poison dart and was just as irritating. She was not playing man games any more.

  ‘I just know you’ll be emotionally scarred and unable to have a worthwhile relationship,’ she muttered.

  Jack stopped walking and Eliza carried on a few more steps before she realised she’d said what was on her mind out loud! She closed her eyes and then opened them again. Oh, boy!

  He tilted his head. ‘I’m sorry? What did you say?’

  She glanced down and then lifted her chin resolutely. ‘Sorry. Ignore that.’

  He looked stunned.

  She shrugged. ‘Look, I may seem mad, but I’ve had the worst run of luck with men and I’m still spinning from the last one. I seem to have a penchant for poor sods who have been a victim of some unscrupulous woman. They find me, I heal their poor broken hearts, and then they happily marry someone else. I usually get invited to the wedding. For some bizarre reason, I don’t want to play that game any more.’

  She was sure his eyes were glazing over but it was imperative she make this clear. ‘This may seem more than you need to know, but I am trying to explain my stupid comment.’

  He moved his lips a little but didn’t actually say a word. Eliza sighed. ‘Forget I spoke and we’ll do the ward round.’

  Jack felt as if someone had just popped a paper bag in his unsuspecting face. He’d known there was something odd about her. The chameleon fairy was mad and Mary was gone. What the heck were they going to do? He’d had a hell of a day already.

  After the dash out for Mia’s asthma attack, he’d returned to his office and realised today was the anniversary of the worst day of his life. He hadn’t been able to believe it had slipped his mind for a few hours.

  After he’d fought his way out of that depression, a desperate young couple, distant relatives on his mother’s side, had miscarried their second IVF baby. Then one of his uncles had come in for results on a mole he’d excised last week, and the specimen had proved to be a particularly vicious melanoma.

  Now this!

  The new fairy matron was a man-hating elf with issues.

  He heard her voice from a long way off. ‘It’s OK,’ she said. ‘Forget it.’

  He blinked, the hallway came into focus again, and he shelved her replacement problems for a minute. Deep breath, Jack, he suggested to himself.

  She was still talking as if nothing had happened. ‘You should have a look at Keith’s wound. I know he’s supposed to go home tomorrow but I believe he’s brewing an infection.’

  Jack blinked. He’d just play along with her until after the round. ‘Fine. I’ll look at that. How’s Keith’s temperature?’

  ‘Creeping up, and it spiked to thirty-nine this afternoon before it went down again.’

  Jack glanced at the chart the madwoman handed him from the end of Keith’s bed and he saw that she was right. Blast. They’d have to start intravenous antibiotics again because Keith had little reserve to fight infection after his brush with peritonitis.

  She’d pulled the curtains and had Keith supine in the bed with his shirt up before Jack could ask, and when she removed the dressing, tell-tale red streaks were inching away from Keith’s wound.

  He glanced at Keith’s face and realised his patient did look more unwell than this morning. ‘Sorry, Keith. No home until we sort this out.’

  Keith sighed with resignation. ‘Matron warned me it could be that way.’

>   Eliza spoke from beside his shoulder. ‘Do you want me to put an intravenous cannula in?’ Jack saw that she had the IV trolley waiting and she’d probably decided which antibiotics Keith should be on, too. Just who was the doctor here? He couldn’t help the bite in his voice. ‘Have you drawn it up as well?’

  He should have known she’d be immune.

  ‘Almost,’ she said. Was there a hint of laughter in her voice?

  Jack scowled. She went on, ‘What would you like him started on?’

  She had two choices there for him and they would have been first and second if he’d chosen them himself. What was wrong with him? He wanted her efficient. ‘We’ll go with the Ceftriaxone, but see if you can get a wound swab before the first dose.’

  She didn’t look at him and he couldn’t tell if she was smiling. ‘Did that earlier when I took today’s dressing off,’ she said, as she prepared the antibiotic before laying it down and assembling the cannulation equipment.

  ‘Shall I pop the cannula in?’ Eliza glanced at him.

  Jack almost said, I’ll do that thank you, but he changed his mind. ‘Let’s see how good you are,’ he said out loud. Nothing like a bit of pressure to put someone off. He knew from bitter experience that Keith’s veins were nowhere near the young bulging ones that Mia had. Matron May was too darned cocky.

  ‘Just a sting for a second, Keith,’ Eliza soothed as she slid the needle into an almost invisible vein with disgusting ease. She seemed to have three hands as she juggled cannulas, bungs and even took blood. ‘Did you want blood cultures?’ She taped the line securely and stood back. They both glanced at the antibiotic waiting to be injected.

  ‘Can I do this?’ He sounded petty and she made a strange sound that he hoped wasn’t her laughing at him. He normally wasn’t like this and he needed to get a grip. He looked at her to apologise but realised she was amused. Amused!

  Today had been anything but amusing. He didn’t say a word, just gave the antibiotic, wrote up the orders and patted Keith’s hand carefully. ‘Sorry, mate. You’ll probably be in for another couple of days yet.’