The Surgeon's Baby Bombshell
Page 9
* * *
Ian watched as a smile lit her lips. She was wearing a brighter shade of lipstick than she did at work, red and shiny, and he couldn’t help but be reminded of how full and soft her lips had been the night he had kissed her.
Right now the thought of kissing her had his blood heating up to a boil.
“Let’s find our seats so you can get off your feet,” he said.
They both took their places at their designated table and ordered drinks—though Frannie refused the champagne and took water instead. He thought she looked beautiful, dressed in a body-hugging dress that barely managed to be decent with its deep dip down toward her breasts and back. Her hair flowed down in rich mahogany curls, but it was her eyes, bright with excitement, that drew him in.
She was so different from the way he had assumed her to be. He’d assumed from the look of her that she was one of those overbearing psych doctors who wanted to talk about feelings and dissect everything you did, but she was not like that. She’d never pressed him about the grief he felt over the loss of his son, and nor had she tried to pry information out of him concerning his divorce.
He’d been fascinated as he’d watched the color in her face brighten at his compliments. It was definitely not the reaction he had been expecting. He’d thought all women loved to get compliments. Lydia had certainly enjoyed them...
No. He wouldn’t think about his ex-wife. Not here. Not tonight.
“Are you okay?” Frannie asked.
“Yes—sorry. Just a lot on my mind tonight,” he said.
“I understand. Everything has been so busy at the hospital, and now the holidays are about to start. Then in the New Year there’s Mardi Gras and all that madness.”
“You don’t like the holidays?” he asked.
“I love them—but there’s a lot of kids who won’t get to enjoy them. Not everyone has a family to spend them with.”
He thought of his house last year. He’d just moved in and hadn’t bothered with any decorations. He’d told himself that it was due to all the remodeling going on, but he knew that wasn’t the truth. He hadn’t had anyone to decorate it for.
He’d volunteered to work over the holidays last year, so that the other doctors on his rotation could spend time with their families, but that wasn’t the whole truth either. He hadn’t wanted to be alone with his memories.
Brian had been born just before Christmas, and at his first Christmas he’d done what every newborn did and slept through most of it. But Ian had made plans about the Christmas he would share with his son the next year.
By the next year Brian had been gone and so had his wife.
He’d spent the day with his parents and his brother, and his brother’s girlfriend of the moment. And, while he loved his family, he’d spent the whole day feeling out of place, like a third wheel.
Now he did the math and realized that the Christmas after this his and Frannie’s child would be around six months old—too young to understand what the holiday was all about.
How would they handle the holidays? Would they have to come up with a schedule for which days he could and couldn’t have the baby? Or would they be able to spend the day together, enjoying their child’s first Christmas?
He hadn’t known that Brian’s first Christmas would be his last—which was a blessing. He was glad that he had that day to remember.
The waiter arrived with their drinks and soon the tables around them began to fill.
“I know you think I was joking earlier, but the offer still stands. We could get married...” he said.
He looked down as his phone vibrated. “A school football team bus crash. Multiple injuries. ETA fifteen minutes. I’ve got to go,” he said, and he rose to head back to the ER.
“Me too,” she said.
“You don’t have to come. I’m sure your father can give you a ride home,” he said.
The ER would be crazy busy, and there would be no way to keep her from seeing how banged up and bloody these kids might be. It wouldn’t be good for either her or the baby to go through that stress and anxiety.
“I know I’m not a medical doctor, but those kids will be scared to death. I might not be able to sew up an injury, but I can help with the parents as they come in. This is just the kind of thing we were talking about. Some of these kids could turn out to be trauma patients, and they’ll be scared and alone without their parents. I’ll be seeing the ones that get admitted to the hospital anyway and this will give me a chance to make contact with them. I’m coming.”
“Come on, then,” he said.
* * *
They arrived in the emergency room at the hospital and found that they had only moments before the first of the ambulances would arrive. The staff were rushing about, carrying various supplies and pushing carts. As Ian walked over to where the ER doctors were giving orders Frannie saw her friend Lacey come out of one of the six trauma rooms that lined the halls.
Then one of the nurses let out a high-pitched wolf whistle and everyone stopped and stared at Frannie.
“I love the dress. Where have you been tonight—and does it have anything to do with Dr. Spencer coming into the ER wearing a tux?” Lacey asked. “Because if it does there’s going to have to be some sharing once these kids are taken care of—and I want to hear all the juicy bits.”
“Hey, Frannie, you’re looking smoking hot tonight!” said the nurse who’d let out the whistle. He was setting up monitors, and stopped to do some ogling.
“If you don’t have anything else to do, Billy, you can take another stretcher out to the ambulance bay,” said Ian, then turned to Frannie.
“The name’s Bill,” the nurse said as he went by Ian, and then turned to wink at her.
“Dr. Wentworth, if you’re going to hang around you might want to go change into something a little more appropriate,” Ian said as he walked back out the door.
She’d already noticed he’d lost his tux and now wore loose green scrubs from the operating room.
“Hmm... He’s right, Frannie. Here, I’ve got an extra set of scrubs in my locker,” said Lacey, and she handed Frannie her hospital badge with locker key attached.
By the time Frannie had returned from the locker room the trauma victims had started to arrive. Young patients on stretchers and in wheelchairs were being taken to the trauma rooms, while other rooms were already filled with patients.
As a nurse ran out of one of the trauma rooms, where she knew from experience the worst of the victims would be taken, a voice called out for help.
She knew that voice.
She headed into the room, hoping there would be a way she could be of some assistance to Ian.
It was the metallic scent that stopped her. Blood. So much blood. A trail of bright red led to the stretcher, where a young boy, pale and frightened, lay still as Ian examined the long cut across his wrist.
Ian looked up and frowned when she entered the room. “What are you doing in here?” he asked, his words hurried and sharp.
“I heard you call for help,” she said.
She stood frozen, her mind an empty hole, trying to process what she was seeing as she stared at the young boy’s arm, where blood still oozed from the deep laceration. She tried to look away, but was unable to get her eyes to obey.
“You can’t help. Not the way you are right now,” Ian said, then turned back to his patient’s arm as he continued to hold pressure.
“Are my parents here?” the boy asked, “Can I see my mom?”
Frannie forced her eyes back to the scared kid lying on the stretcher. He looked to be around fifteen—still too young to be able to handle this injury without his parents being with him. His dark eyes were filled with tears that threatened to spill, large with pain and fear. She followed his gaze to the floor as he stared down at the blood. His blood. Splashed all over the floor.
“I’m sure they’ve been told. As soon as Dr. Spencer finishes working on your arm I’ll go out to the waiting room and see if they’ve arrived. What’s your name?”
The boy winced as Ian adjusted his arm. “James,” he said, his breaths coming fast, his face getting paler.
She needed to keep him talking.
“I’m sorry you’re hurting, James,” Ian said. “The nurse will be back in just a moment and she’ll get you something to help with the pain.”
Frannie looked up at Ian and met his questioning eyes. She gave him a slight nod, then turned back to James. This wasn’t about her; it was about being there for this boy when he needed her. She needed to keep him talking, keep him focused on her questions for both their sakes.
“Can you tell me your parents’ names and say what they look like?”
“Manning—Joseph and Leah Manning,” the boy said. “Momma is darker than Daddy. Her hair’s short. My daddy is always trying to get her to grow it out, but she won’t.”
The nurse came back into the room and explained to James that she was giving him medicine through the intravenous line the emergency medical team had inserted before they had transferred him.
“Did you get in touch with the plastic surgeon on call?” Ian asked the nurse.
“He’s been paged. The unit secretary said she’d let us know as soon as he calls back.”
“Man, I don’t need plastic surgery,” James said, as he tried to lift his head off the stretcher. “That’s for old ladies who want to shrink up their wrinkles.”
Frannie moved closer and took his other hand, helping the nurse press him back on the stretcher. The nurse murmured her thanks, then moved up to reset the vitals machine.
“Plastic surgeons do a lot of things besides face lifts. You have some damage to the ligaments in your wrist. We’re going to take you to CT as soon as it’s available, just to make sure there isn’t any other damage. Do you hurt anywhere besides your arm?” Ian asked as he finished bandaging.
The loudspeaker in the room came on, announcing that the plastic surgeon was on the line and CT was ready.
“No, I’m good,” James said as he lifted his arm in its bandage. “Am I going to have a scar? My brothers will be so jealous.”
Frannie made a point of only looking at the bandage, not the blood-soaked sheet underneath it. But her rebellious eyes drifted down and her stomach rolled. She needed to get out of the room soon, before she lost everything she had eaten at dinner.
She fought through the worst of the nausea, then forced her stomach muscles to relax once it had passed. She felt a small sense of victory.
“I’m sure they will,” Frannie said, “but I’m sure the surgeon will try to keep the scarring to a minimum. Now, I’m going to step out and see if your parents are here while you go to CT.”
“And I’m going to talk with the plastic surgeon. We’ll let your parents in when you get back,” Ian said, then left the room.
Frannie kept her eyes on Ian’s back as she also left the room, fighting her instinct to look down. Even with all her training she couldn’t explain why she felt the need to look at the blood, even when it made her sick. She was like one of those rubbernecking drivers who slowed down in traffic so that they could gawk at an accident on the other side of the road.
She made it out through the door and took a deep breath of air, trying to wash the scent of blood out of her lungs. Walking past the other trauma rooms, she kept her eyes trained straight ahead.
She had been attending most of the traumas in the ER on a regular basis since her program had started, but she had mostly spent her time with the families of young victims, obtaining information that she could have passed on to the doctors, only entering the patients’ rooms after the patients had been stabilized.
With this number of pediatric patients the ER would be busy for hours, and she wanted to be there. She just wished she could be of more help than she was. She’d tried different treatments for her blood phobia, and none of them had worked for her. But she’d done okay with James tonight, and for now that was all that mattered.
CHAPTER NINE
BY THE TIME Frannie had finished talking to all the patients and their families it was midnight, and she knew she was close to her limit. Fortunately most of the students’ injuries had been superficial, and all the kids were now on their way home with their families, but there were still a few waiting for admission and she’d wanted to wait to see them settled.
James had gone to surgery as soon as the plastic surgeon had arrived, and she had assured him that she would see him the next day. Ian had taken one of the other more seriously injured kids for surgery when the CT scan had shown a ruptured spleen.
Seeking a dose of caffeine to see her through the next couple of hours and then her drive home, Frannie headed to the staff lounge which, while not as plush as the doctors’ lounge, maintained a constantly brewing pot of coffee—especially on the night shift.
She’d just poured herself a small cup, dosed it with a good amount of sugar and cream and then sat down at a table when Ian walked in. He looked as tired as she felt. He’d changed back into his dress pants, but carried his jacket over his arm. His shirt was unbuttoned and the sleeves rolled up. He looked more like the man she had seen at his home—the one who wasn’t afraid to work with his hands...the one whose hands had touched her so gently, so intimately.
She felt a rush of heat that had nothing to do with the coffee she was drinking.
“How’d the surgery go?” she asked as he poured himself a cup of coffee.
“Good. No complications,” he said. “How are you doing? I thought you would have gotten a ride home by now.”
“There are a few kids still here. Most of them are going to be treated and then discharged. I just wanted to make sure I wasn’t needed anymore before I left,” she said as she got up to throw her empty cup away.
“Are you limping?” Ian asked as she walked the short distance to the trash can.
Her feet were killing her, and she knew she could blame it on the high heels she had been walking around in all night. Lacey had offered her a pair of extra shoes that she had in her locker, but with the size difference in their feet she’d known it wouldn’t be a good idea. She would have been as likely to fall in oversized shoes as she would in the heels.
“It’s the heels. I didn’t exactly dress for walking around the ER,” she said.
“Are you sure it’s not your knee?” he asked. “Let me see it,” he said as he reached down to grab her leg.
“No, it’s been weeks since I hurt my knee,” she said. “It’s fine. It’s my feet that are killing me. Four-inch heels are not made to run around the ER. I could use a good foot massage, though, if you’re offering.”
“Maybe...” he said. “I just want to stop by my office and check my schedule. With the number of patients we’ve seen tonight my rounds are going to take more time tomorrow.”
She heard some more staff members enter the room and quickly moved away from Ian. The last thing she needed was attention from her colleagues.
She’d worked hard to function in the ER tonight, trying her best to avoid the scent of blood that all the rooms had reeked of because most of the injuries had been cuts and scrapes. She’d been aware of the eyes that had followed her through the night, but though it had been hard she was pretty proud that she’d been able to do as much as she had—especially when Lacey had come up to her and given her an encouraging hug. It meant a lot that her friend had recognized the progress she had made.
* * *
They left the ER and headed up on the closest elevator to the floor that housed the doctors’ offices without either of them saying a word. Ian took a key from his badge
and opened his door, lights coming on automatically as they entered.
“Have a seat in one of the chairs,” he said, then walked over to hang the dress coat he still carried on the back of the door. “This won’t take but a minute.”
She looked pale against the brown leather of the chair. She’d worked hard in the ER and he knew she had been right about them needing her help.
“You did well tonight,” he said. “I know that had to be hard on you.”
But she had stayed there with him and helped, even though he knew her mind had probably been telling her to run.
“I did do well,” she said, a tired smile showing up on her face. “I can’t say it was easy, and I have no idea if I can do it another time, but I was able to do my job tonight and that was all that mattered.”
“I still don’t know how you manage to function here in the hospital without being around blood,” he said. After seeing her tonight he wanted to hunt down her father and ask him what he had been thinking, pushing Frannie to go into surgery. A blind man could see how impossible that would have been.
“That’s because you never think about it. If you had a problem with seeing blood you’d learn how to work around it.”
“If I had a problem with seeing blood I’d be out of a job,” he said.
“And maybe if I didn’t have a problem with seeing blood I’d have your job,” she said, then smiled at him again. “But maybe I wouldn’t. I don’t know what I would have done if I hadn’t had what my father calls my little problem, but I do know that I love what I’m doing now.”
Ian moved to sit behind his desk and looked at Frannie. He couldn’t imagine not wanting to be a surgeon. He’d wanted nothing else since he was a little boy. His mother claimed it had all started when she had bought him the Operation game when he was five, but he didn’t believe her.
“Is being a surgeon everything you thought it would be?” she asked. “Are you happy with your choice? With the almighty life of a surgeon?”
He thought of his life as it was now, then of how he had thought it would be. He enjoyed what he did. He was a fixer. He’d always been one to fix things. That was where he had gotten all the skills he was now using to renovate his house. He’d been the one his mom had called on to fix a faucet when his dad was out of town, and he had learned early about the satisfaction you received when you took something that was broken and turned it into something usable again.