Dianne Drake - His Motherless Little Twins

Once or twice, Bryce let out a little cry then settled down again. And once or twice her heart lurched. Under the best of circumstances, this was a difficult situation. These weren’t the best of circumstances, and she fretted about the outcome every inch of the way to the hospital.

“Are you competent?” she finally asked, not at all sorry to be so blunt. Truth was, she wanted to hear his voice, feel some reassurance that he could handle this situation and make everything right for the baby.

“Competent at what?”

“Your medical skills. Are you a good doctor?”

“I’ve been told that’s the case.” He twisted slightly in his seat to look at her. “But, then, everyone is entitled to his, or her, opinion, I suppose.”

“I suppose,” Dinah muttered. Something about this man put her in a very bad mood. Something about every man had put her in a bad mood lately, but this one in particular made her shiver. Shiver with anger was what it was, which she didn’t like one little bit. Didn’t like any reaction in her caused by any man. And didn’t trust herself enough to know the distinctions.

“Are you competent?” he asked in return, the slightest trace of a smile crinkling his lips.

She was going to ignore that smile. Totally ignore it and pretend she hadn’t even seen it. “Competent at what?”

“Being a nurse.”

“I’m not a nurse.” Keeping her voice noncommittal wasn’t easy, but she did it, and did it so well she nearly believed her own words. Still, those words hurt, and the wound still bled. “I’m a cook. Here to take over for my sister when she’s on maternity leave.”

“A cook with good skills in labor and delivery, as well as CPR. And you did a mighty fine job of getting that IV needle into a newborn, which is not easy, especially when the newborn is so sick. So, did they teach you those things in culinary school?”

He was smiling fully now. The man actually had the audacity to sit there and smile at her. But she was still going to ignore it. Had to be impervious…Couldn’t get distracted. “Did they teach you your bad manners in medical school?”

“If I apologized for the accident again, would that make things better between us?”

“Why do things have to be better between us?” she asked, then hastily added, “But you do owe me a sincere apology and not one that’s meant only to get you away from me as quickly as possible.”

“Look, I told you I was in a hurry. I’m sorry I hit you, sorry I ran off and left you there, but in case you haven’t noticed, the town is going crazy. We’re flooding, the areas below us are submerging, the hospital is full of people with nowhere to go, some of them have injuries. I had to get to the emergency department, and stopping for something that amounted to nothing was a waste of my time.”

“And I thought White Elk was going to be civil,” she snapped. Gripping the steering-wheel more from anger than nervousness, she kept her eyes fixed straight ahead. “But I was wrong.”

“No, you weren’t wrong. Had it been any other time, under any other circumstances, I would have stopped and given you that sincere apology. But you were…not a priority. Getting to the hospital was.”

OK, she understood that. And maybe he was right. No, he was right. And she was overreacting. Which she’d been accused of doing a lot of lately. “It’s been a bad day,” she conceded. A bad day, a worse week and an even worse month. And everything was still spiraling downward. “I should be the one apologizing to you.”

“No apologies necessary. And you’re right, it’s been a bad day for everyone.” He glanced down at his tiny patient. “But mostly for him.”

Suddenly, all the anger and frustration drained right out of her. Sick children had a way of putting everything else into proper perspective, had a way of bringing everything else around them to a grinding halt. “How’s he doing?”

“Struggling. But fighting. He’s one tough little boy. So, are you a friend of Gabby’s?”

“No, I only met her today, right before I helped deliver Bryce. But I’m Angela Blanchard’s sister. And I’m really here to take over for her in the kitchen.”

“Funny. I would have sworn you were a nurse. A damn good one, if I had to make a bet on it.”

“I was a pediatric nurse and, yes, I like to think I was a damn good one, but that’s in the past,” she said. “I burned out.” That wasn’t the truth, but it was an easy explanation and people didn’t question it.

“Sorry to hear that. Especially since you seem so…passionate about it. That’s medicine’s loss.”

He sounded genuinely sorry, which surprised her. When she’d tendered her resignation, no one had even tried talking her out of her decision to quit. Then, when she’d closed all those doors on her life and walked away, no one had been sorry to see her go. No one had even blinked. But by then she’d become an awkward moment for the man who was supposed to love her. He was an upwardly mobile doctor, she was a downwardly spiraling nurse he found quite easy to leave. You’re too emotional, Dinah. You overreacted. Got yourself too involved in something you had no business getting involved in. Maybe you should have stayed in cooking school.

But she believed Eric Ramsey sounded sorry she’d left nursing.

Except she didn’t trust herself to believe anything. Not anymore.

“YOU didn’t, by any chance, ever assist in a septostomy did you?” Eric asked, handing the baby over to the two nurses who’d run to greet them when they’d pulled up to White Elk Hospital’s front door.

“I’ve seen them done. And taken care of the patient afterwards. Why?”

“We’re short-staffed right now, and I could use you in the operating room if you’ve got the experience.”

“I do have the experience,” she said hesitantly. Her preference would have been helping the volunteer crews who were busy sandbagging the hospital, trying to keep the flood waters back from it. That was something she could do, something that wouldn’t remind her of how much she ached for a career that hurt her so deeply.

“Then I need your experience. Normally, I’d have another doctor in there, but he’s driving Gabby and your sister to the hospital right now, and everybody else is tied up. I can grab our nurse practitioner, Fallon, and she’s competent in surgery, but her skills are more needed in co-ordinating everything else that’s going on. So if you know your way around the operating room…”

He actually wanted her in surgery? She was flattered, but she’d walked away from being a nurse. Not because she didn’t care, but because she cared too much. By rights, she should have turned him down and under most other circumstances she would have. But there was a baby who needed her… another baby…

“Please assist me. I have a very sick little boy who needs surgery, but if all my qualified staff are busy elsewhere, his surgery may have to be put off until we have the right combination of people free. You know what that could mean.”

Yes, she did know. When he put it that way, what was she supposed to do? How could she walk away from Bryce the way everybody had walked away from little Molly? “OK, I was more than a staff nurse. I was the head pediatric trauma nurse in my hospital. Just in case you want to know, or check my qualifications.”

“You wear your qualifications for everybody to see,” he said. “And I’m a pretty good judge of that.”

Better judge than she was. Once upon a time she wouldn’t have hesitated. Now she wasn’t sure. “Where do I scrub in?” she asked on a disheartened sigh.

Eric pointed her in the direction of the surgery. “What’s your name, by the way?”

“None of your business,” she snapped. If he knew her name, it got personal, and she wasn’t doing personal again. Personal hurt. It devastated. And she was tired of the pain.

Eric laughed. “When you scrub, I’d suggest you use cold water. Might cool you down a little.”

Well, he generally didn’t like his women so feisty. Lord knew, nothing about Patricia had been feisty. She’d been the model of cool, calm composure in everything. Always smiling, always happy, Patricia had been perfect. Maybe too perfect for the likes of him. But this woman…she was spunky, boisterous, argumentative, and in just an hour or so of knowing her, she’d raised her voice to him more than his wife had in all the years they’d been together.

Yet there was something about her that wouldn’t let him look away. Drawn like a moth to the flame…that’s the thought that kept running through his head. But didn’t the moth usually get burned to a crisp?

This woman was all fire. Get too close and you were sure to get burned. But she was on his mind anyway, and it had nothing to do with his expectations of a pediatric trauma nurse, and everything to do with feelings he’d vowed he’d never let happen. He’d had a perfect marriage once. Anything else would fall short.

Besides, he had two little daughters to consider. In his life, they mattered more than anything else and the thought of putting them through a life-changing adjustment scared him. They were good the way they were…all three of them. Very good.

His thoughts were interrupted by the arrival of Neil Ranard, desperate for news about Gabby’s son.

“You look bothered,” Neil Ranard said, as Eric scrubbed. “Is it about Bryce?”

Eric shook his head, but didn’t answer right away, because what bothered him was the disloyalty he was suddenly feeling, thinking about the beautiful nurse the way he was. He had no business looking at another woman, and the wedding band on his left ring finger was a shining testament to that. “No, he’s stable right now. Doing pretty well last time I checked. The good news is that once we’ve done this first procedure he should be stable enough to be transferred to get the help we simply can’t provide here.”

“Gabby and I have every faith in your abilities, Eric. Neither of us would want anyone else helping Bryce right now.”

“I’ll do my very best not to let you down.”

“I know you will. So if you’re not too worried about Bryce right now, what is bugging you? Hold on, this wouldn’t be about working with Dinah Corday, would it?”

This time he didn’t bother shaking his head, as the guilt was beginning to consume him. Because, yes, it was about Dinah – so that was her name! She intrigued him. And she was sexy as hell. Something he had no right noticing.

“Well, she’s a looker,” Neil conceded. “And even though we’ve only worked together once, she’s one of the best nurses I’ve ever dealt with. So, which of those two qualities is distracting you? Because it’s got to be one of them, since you don’t know anything else about her.”

“I’m not distracted,” Eric snapped. “I’m concentrating, and you’re breaking my concentration.”

Neil laughed. “I think your concentration was broken before I came in here, and it’s got nothing to do with anything medical.”

“It’s not what you think,” Eric denied. “I don’t have time, and you know that. Between my job, and my rescue duties, and especially with the twins…” He shook his head as he backed away from the sink, arms up, water dripping down to his elbows. “I don’t have time, no matter how much she…or any other woman…breaks my concentration. So I’m not going to let it happen, simple as that.”

“Look, Eric. I know you were totally devoted to Patricia, but she’s been gone for five years, and I don’t think she would have wanted you putting yourself through this. She would have wanted you to be happy again. To find a new life for yourself…something in addition to your work. And that would include finding someone else to share that life. But you haven’t even taken a woman out for a simple dinner, have you?”