The Baby Rescue

by Jessica Matthews

  Another crisis averted, she thought as she turned back to her patient’s mother and smiled. “He’ll only have to hold still for about thirty seconds, long enough for me to apply the Dermabond to the skin.”

  Relief filled Mrs Owens’s eyes. “Oh, thank goodness.”

  “The downside is that he may end up with a larger scar, but if he does, it won’t be noticeable under his chin. The choice is yours.”

  “There isn’t any doubt. The glue.”

  Nikki nodded to Lynette, who’d pushed a wheeled stainless-steel tray, which held more gauze, disinfectant and the wound glue, next to the bed.

  “I’m going to clean your cut,” she told the youngster, “and then I’m going to paste your skin back together so you’ll stop bleeding.”

  His lower lip trembled. “Will it hurt?”

  Nikki smiled. “It might tickle, but it won’t hurt.”

  He leaned against his mother’s chest, his small brow knitted as if bracing himself for the worst. A few minutes later, after being disinfected and Dermabonded, he was all smiles.

  “I didn’t feel a thing,” he boasted.

  Nikki smiled. “What did I tell you?”“

  How long will it last?” Mrs Owens asked.

  “The glue dries hard and will start flaking off in about a week, leaving healed skin behind,” Nikki explained. “So you won’t need to come back unless you notice a problem.”

  Mrs Owens appeared surprised. “Really?”

  “Oh, yes. It’s quite tough. They initially tested it on hockey players and if the glue can hold up under the abuse those guys take, it should hold up on Casey.” Nikki addressed the youngster again. “Now, I want you to open your mouth so I can look at your throat.”

  His blue eyes widened and he glanced wildly around the room until his gaze landed on Galen. “No shots. He promised.”

  “No shots,” Nikki repeated.

  Casey opened his mouth and Nikki quickly saw the red patches at the back of his throat. Before he could argue, she quickly rolled a cotton swab over the area. “So we can test for strep,” she told his mother before she handed it to Lynette. “We’ll have the results before you leave.”

  “That fast?”

  Nikki smiled. “It doesn’t take long. I’m also relatively sure they’ll be positive.”

  Mrs Owens frowned. “Does that mean…?” She glanced down at her son.

  “We’ll give a liquid antibiotic. He won’t bounce back as quickly as he would if we chose the other treatment, but we’ll do what we can to fight the infection.” She bent to Casey’s eye level. “How’s the arm?”

  “Hurts.”

  Nikki carefully examined his forearm, suspecting that it might be a severe sprain rather than a fracture. “I’m going to send you to Radiology so they can take pictures of your arm and wrist. Have you ever had your picture taken at the hospital before?”

  He shook his head, dislodging a few tears in the process.

  “These are special pictures that let us see inside you,” Nikki said, almost surprised that this was the daredevil’s first potentially broken bone. “And just like the pictures your mom and dad take, these won’t hurt. Can you hold still so the lady in X-ray can take them?”

  “Yeah.”

  “All right, then. Off you go. Would you like to walk or ride?”

  His eyes brightened. “Ride.”

  “OK. One wheelchair coming right up.”

  Lynette disappeared, then reappeared with a wheelchair. The pain in his arm, chin, and throat plainly forgotten at the prospect of this next experience, Casey’s eyes glittered with excitement.

  As Lynette wheeled him down the hall, accompanied by his mother, Nikki heard him ask, “Can we go fast?”

  She shook her head in amusement at Galen, who was leaning against the counter. “He’s definitely pure boy.”

  “I also predict many more visits.”

  As he straightened and flashed his familiar lazy smile, awareness shimmied down her spine. He wasn’t the first man to tower over her, but he was the only one who made her nerve endings dance with anticipation. It was mildly frustrating to realize that her response, not to mention his clean, woodsy aftershave, hadn’t changed over time.

  “I do, too. For a kid who worries about pain, he’s certainly fearless,” she said, determined to concentrate on her patient instead of Galen.

  “Ah, but when you’re seeking a thrill, the potential for pain is at the back of your mind. He’ll learn.”

  “The hard way,” she predicted.

  “Probably. So what’s your answer?”

  Her mind drew a blank. “To what?”

  “Lunch.”

  “Casey is my lunch date.”

  “You’ll be finished with him in forty minutes, if that long. You’re officially closed until one-thirty.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I used to work in the MEC before I moved into the ER full time.” He glanced at his watch. “I figure that gives us about forty-five minutes to run down to the cafeteria.”

  “I shouldn’t…” she said slowly, tempted to accept and certain she’d be foolish if she did.

  After that fateful night when she’d thrown herself at him, she’d tweaked her work routine to avoid the inevitable awkward encounters. It had been easy because of all the distractions associated with ending their residencies—upcoming exams, evaluations, job interviews, and patients.

  The sheer size of St Luke’s, where it was rumored that a medical student had gone to Pathology with a specimen and had never been seen again, had also helped. Unfortunately, staying out of Galen’s way at Hope would be a lot more difficult. Her job description included covering the minor emergency clinic to free the ER for true emergencies and acting as Galen’s back-up whenever the ER became swamped. Yet, with conscious effort, she could manage to limit the time they spent together.

  She would.

  “Come on,” he coaxed. “They’re serving Philly steak sandwiches today, with lots of green peppers and mozzarella cheese. Exactly the way you liked them.”

  “You remember?” she asked, surprised.

  “Why wouldn’t I? I lost track of the number of times we stopped at the sub shop after our shift to eat. You never ordered anything else. So, what do you say?”

  She still hesitated. “I should review my afternoon patients’ charts.”

  “Thirty minutes,” he wheedled. “Surely you can spare that much time.”

  “I really can’t.”

  A thoughtful look crossed his face. “Still in your workaholic phase?”

  Working extra-long hours during those last few weeks had been her salvation and he’d clearly not forgotten.

  “Since when is being thorough a flaw?” she countered.

  His careful study nearly caused her to fidget. “It isn’t,” he said, “but you don’t need to prove yourself to anyone here. Your recommendations were faultless.”

  “And how would you know?”

  He grinned. “I asked. And added a few of my own.”

  Nikki wondered what he’d told his superiors, but sometimes ignorance was bliss. “Good recommendations don’t come by accident.”

  “True,” he admitted. “But skipping lunch on your first real day on duty isn’t smart. Don’t you know that your body burns more calories during times of stress?”

  She raised her chin defiantly. “Who said I was under stress?”

  He arched one eyebrow in his you-can’t-fool-me-because-I-know-better look. “Learning a new routine in a new facility, moving into new quarters, having your patient lock himself in the restroom, seeing old friends and remembering old…times.” He hesitated as he raised one eyebrow. “Aren’t they stressful events?”

  “Maybe a little,” she grudgingly admitted.

  “I rest my case.”

  “But—”

  “You should also know that you should eat when the opportunity arises. Hope City Hospital may not be as large as St Luke’s or have the daily volume, bu
t there’ll still be plenty of days when the aroma wafting out of the cafeteria will be the closest you’ll come to food.”

  His gentle warning chipped away at her resolve until it began to waver.

  “If it will make you feel better,” he added, “I’ll put a special note in your personnel file that you wanted to skip lunch out of dedication to duty, but I corrupted you. They’ll understand.”

  His grin was wide and so full of boyish charm that she chuckled. He was still as persistent and as persuasive as ever, and clearly his knack was well known. Perhaps it would be best if she agreed. Once this luncheon date was behind them, he’d no doubt go his way and she could go hers. She may have to help him out in the ER when things got hairy but, in a small town like Hope, how often would he have more patients than he could handle on his own?

  “All right. Thirty minutes.”

  “Good.” He looked inordinately pleased with himself. “I’ll see you in the cafeteria at twelve forty-five. If you’re not there by twelve-fifty, I’m coming to get you.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll be there,” she said.

  He gave her a jaunty salute, then disappeared down the hallway, whistling a jolly, but unrecognizable tune.

  Nikki watched him go, wondering if she would be strong enough to avoid falling under his spell once again.

  CHAPTER TWO

  GALEN strolled back to the ER, cautiously optimistic. Actually, he was more than optimistic. He was determined to succeed at straightening out the problems between himself and Nikki, and he had his colleague, Jared Tremaine, to thank for inadvertently pushing him in this direction.

  If Jared hadn’t asked him to befriend Annie and if Galen hadn’t admitted that, although he liked the paramedic, the sparks weren’t there, he would never have reached this particular point in his life.

  Immediately after that conversation, an image of Nikki Lawrence, with her tawny long hair, dark eyes and gentle smile, had popped into his head and refused to budge.

  She was the real reason as to why, at thirty-one, he didn’t have a wifely prospect in sight.

  No one else compared to the woman who had made him laugh, made him angry, and made him think he could conquer the world singlehandedly. And from extensive firsthand experience, he knew that no one else had made him feel as if they could generate enough energy to blast a space shuttle into orbit.

  When she’d tried to seduce him, he’d been pleasantly surprised and extremely willing, until his good sense had overridden his hormones.

  They’d been together for their entire residency, although it hadn’t been until their third year that Galen had become aware of her as a woman rather than a fellow student and colleague. He could have acted on his impulses, but he’d been afraid to ruin the one constant in his life—Nikki’s friendship.

  He might have risked it if his friendship with her cousin Calvin hadn’t also been at stake. Cal had been a college roommate and their friendship had flourished in spite of them being complete opposites, with Galen being the more daring of the two.

  Cal had moved into geology while he’d pursued medicine, but they still stayed in contact. When he’d been accepted to St Luke’s for his residency in emergency medicine, Cal had immediately informed him that his cousin Nikki had been selected as well. Her brothers had subsequently asked, via Cal, if Galen would mind steering her away from any unsavory characters who might take advantage of her sensitive nature. He hadn’t wanted the job, but hadn’t been able to refuse.

  Over time, he got to know her and it became obvious that she was someone who deserved a man capable of giving her promises and white picket fences, not someone like him who didn’t want anything more than a one-or two-night stand.

  After his father had deserted them when he was six and his only sister ran away ten years later, he simply hadn’t been interested in making promises, especially ones that he felt were highly unlikely to be kept—like love, honor, and cherish until death do us part—which was why he didn’t date anyone more than a handful of times.

  All of which made it impossible to have an affair with Nikki because it would have lumped him in the same category of unscrupulous jerks he was supposed to guard her against.

  At odd moments, though, he imagined what it would be like if he was the guy she was meant to have, but he knew himself well enough to know that he couldn’t give her the emotional ties she required any more than he could perform brain surgery. Like it or not, he was his father’s son. His mother had always reminded him of how handsome he’d become, just like his father, but in Galen’s mind, he’d feared that their similarities were more than skin-deep.

  But he’d changed this past year—more specifically, the past six months. He’d grown weary of the dating scene and was finally willing to risk going after something more permanent. The problem was, the only woman he truly wanted was Nikki. As a locum who traveled extensively, she was nearly impossible to reach.

  Before he could plan a strategy, Hope City Hospital landed in dire straits and fate offered a helping hand. They needed a temporary ER physician while Jared recovered from his injuries in the plane crash that had hurt two others and killed one.

  He pulled as many strings as he could with his own administration to contact Nikki’s agency, although he knew their chances of contracting her were slim. Locums were in great demand and their facility too desperate to be choosy. Yet it didn’t stop him from taking the precaution of leaving his name out of the negotiations. If she still harbored hard feelings toward him, he didn’t want to give her any grounds to refuse.

  He’d never been more relieved than when they received the official word. Nikki was coming.

  This time he hoped their story would have a different ending. With both of them living in a town with the same name, how could it be otherwise?

  “What’s going to be different?” Fern Pyle, an experienced ER nurse in her fifties, fell into step beside him.

  Dragged out of his thoughts, Galen smoothly shifted gears. “Nothing. Just talking to myself.”

  “You’re too young to start doing that,” she teased.

  “Age is just a state of mind.”

  “In that case, I’m definitely too old to be working here,” she retorted. “I came to tell you that an entire family of six with severe gastroenteritis has arrived.”

  “Let me guess. They went to a picnic at the park.”

  “You’re close. It was a family reunion.”

  He groaned. “How many attended this reunion?”

  “I didn’t ask.”

  He heaved a sigh. Six could easily become five times that number. His luncheon plans faded around the edges. “Ah, the joys of summer. ’Tis the season for food poisoning.”

  “Yeah, well, we’re also getting a possible drug overdose and a broken collarbone, both by ambulance. ETA is ten minutes. Tops.”

  He shook his head. “I can’t leave you guys alone for a minute. The ER was quiet before I went to the MEC.”

  Fern shrugged. “What can I say? It’s the nature of the beast. Can you handle everyone or do you want us to call for back-up?”

  The drug overdose was the most pressing and had the greatest potential for demanding a physician’s sole attention. His plans for a quiet lunch in the cafeteria completely disappeared.

  “Call Nik, er, Dr Lawrence,” he said. “She can handle the collarbone after she finishes with her patient in the MEC.”

  “And the family?”

  “They’ll have to wait for whoever becomes available first.”

  Fern sped off toward the phone on the nurses’ desk, but Galen stopped her. “Pick up two Philly steak sandwiches from the cafeteria for me, would you?”

  “Two?”

  “Two,” he stated.

  “Starving, are you?”

  He grinned. “Always.”

  She glanced at her watch. “They usually run out by now.”

  “Try.”

  “OK,” she said, sounding doubtful. “But do you really think you’ll have
time to eat?”

  He grinned. Lunch had been merely an excuse to be with Nikki and as long as that happened, he didn’t care what he ate, or when. “I’ll make time,” he said firmly. “A person should never neglect what’s important.”

  Nikki sent Casey Owens and his mother on their way, glad that the rest of their visit had passed uneventfully. He’d suffered a buckle fracture, not a sprain as she’d suspected, so Nikki had put a cast on his arm and told them to return in six weeks. Wryly, she wished her next encounter with Galen was six weeks from now, rather than fifteen minutes.

  If only she didn’t remember that night as if it had happened yesterday…

  She’d been studying hard and feeling overwhelmed as she’d reviewed notes that had suddenly seemed as if she’d never seen them before. The more tired she’d become, the more frantic she’d felt until Galen had walked into her apartment. She’d poured out her fears and he’d tried to comfort and encourage her, but she’d realized in the middle of his consoling hug that their careers would soon take them in different directions. They’d end up exchanging letters, phone calls and emails until eventually the busyness of their separate lives would send their friendship into the mists of memory.

  The time to reveal her feelings for him had come. She simply hadn’t been able to pass up this opportunity.

  She’d tugged his shirt out of his pants and proceeded to pour out her years of loving him into a single kiss. He’d been more than willing until they’d shed nearly all their clothes. Then, without warning, he’d called an abrupt halt.

  She was using him, he told her—using him as a means to temporarily forget her insecurities. He couldn’t take what she offered when she wasn’t thinking clearly.

  He also went on to spout something about honor and promises made to her cousin, but she’d stopped listening. She’d never felt more exposed, both emotionally and physically, as she did at that moment.

  After he slipped away, the shame of what she’d done, what she’d attempted to do, subsequently ruined their friendship. Oh, they apologized to each other and on the surface, acted as if the incident had never happened, but pretending didn’t take away her embarrassment or boost her self-esteem.