NICK’S intense gaze throughout dinner robbed Abby of her appetite. There was no reason to feel lousy about not sharing her plans with him. They barely knew each other, and certainly didn’t have that sort of close relationship.
This time together was just a brief interlude in their lives. In a few days, maybe a week at the most, they’d go their separate ways. Nick would return to whatever temporary base he called home and she’d finish out her stint at the Veterans’ Hospital then move to her new job in Florida.
A sense of desolation crept over her. Her plans to move had seemed like such a great idea. Her brothers had lived in different states. Nick had lived all over the world. He hadn’t been tied down by an overprotective family.
So why wasn’t she happier at the idea of going?
“You were stationed in Germany for a year, then?” Abe asked Nick. “How did you manage, without speaking the language?”
Nick shrugged as if embarrassed by all the attention to his past. “I picked up some of the language along the way. It’s not as hard as you might think.” Then he grimaced, and added, “Except for Chinese. Talk about a difficult language to figure out. The whole time in Beijing, I didn’t learn much more than the words for hello, goodbye and bathroom.”
Abby picked at her food, wishing the meal would end soon. Her parents listened to Nick with rapt attention. Strange, Shane had been so much a part of the family that her parents hadn’t acted as if him being around had been anything special. She found the way they fawned over Nick irritating.
Finally she stood up and began clearing the table.
“Anyone want dessert?” her mother asked.
“Thank you, but I’m full.” Nick smiled.
“Yeah,” Alec agreed. “Me, too.”
“Why don’t you go sit on the porch for a while? It’s a beautiful evening,” Abby encouraged her parents. “We’ll save your peach cobbler for later.”
Her parents headed outside and Alaina went in search of her children. Alec sat for a minute at the table, but when Nick stood and pitched in to help with the dishes, her brother made a quick escape. Apparently, his desire to keep an eye on Nick lost over the threat of having to wash dishes.
Nick’s movements were slow and stiff, making Abby wonder if he’d taken the medication they’d stopped to pick up.
His lopsided gait was definitely more pronounced as she followed him to the kitchen. She gave a mild snort. Yeah. Not likely.
“Where’s your pain medication?” she asked, setting down her load of dishes in the sink with a clatter.
Nick scowled at her. “I’m fine.” As if to prove it, he spun awkwardly around and went back to the dining room for more dishes.
Gnashing her teeth at his stubbornness, Abby began to rinse the glassware, then packed them in the dishwasher. When he returned, she took the stack of plates from his hands.
“You’re not fine, Nick. I don’t get it. What is the big deal with taking pain medication you so obviously need?”
“You’re right. You don’t get it at all.” His eyes flashed and she was taken aback by his anger.
“It’s all about your ego, isn’t it?” She jammed the dishes into the dishwasher with far more force than necessary. He was acting just like her brothers. “Heaven forbid you should give in to any weakness.”
She gasped when he spun her away from the dishwasher, and hauled her against his hard frame. Her pulse quickened with anticipation.
“No, it’s not about my ego.”
This close his gray-green eyes glittered with flecks of gold around his dilated pupils. She splayed her hands over his chest, the muscles taut beneath her fingertips. She wished she could touch his bare skin, even though she knew she was already playing with fire.
“Those pills create a foggy haze in my mind I detest. At least feeling the jagged edges of pain helps remind me I’m alive.” His gaze lingered on her mouth and his voice dropped low. “Reminds me that being here like this, with you and your family, isn’t a damn dream, that I won’t wake up to find myself strapped in some strange hospital bed.”
Shaken, she stared at him. What horrors he must have gone through. The unguarded emotion in his gaze called to her on a completely different level. Unable to help herself, Abby rose on tiptoe and pressed her lips against his. At first he seemed startled by her kiss, then in an instant he yanked her close and delved deep, as if he were a dying man given his last sip of water.
Then, just as abruptly, he pushed her away, his chest heaving as if he’d run ten miles. Without his arms supporting her, she stumbled back against the edge of the sink, dazed and wondering what had just happened.
“This isn’t smart. I have to go.” He limped away surprisingly fast and she couldn’t do anything except listen as he said thanks and bade her parents goodnight before he left.
She closed her eyes and rubbed a hand over her forehead. As much as she was sick and tired of his pull-me, push-me routine, one thing she could agree with.
Kissing him was not at all smart.
Abby worked a couple of night shifts, then was more than happy to have a few days off. On her second day off, however, the shrill ringing of the phone woke her. She opened one bleary eye to see the hour was barely six. As much as she wanted to bury her head under the pillow, there could only be one place calling so early.
She snagged the phone by the third ring. “Hello?”
“Abby? This is the night supervisor at the hospital. We had a sick call this morning, would you mind coming in?”
Heck, yeah, she minded, but bit back the automatic refusal. The extra money would come in handy when she moved. And she couldn’t bear to think of the patients suffering while the nurses worked short-handed. Repressing a sigh, she agreed. “Yes, but I might be a little late.”
“Thanks so much, Abby. You’re a lifesaver.” The night supervisor quickly hung up before she could change her mind.
A shower helped clear the sleepy fog from her brain. Thanks to Nick, sleep hadn’t come easily. In an effort to avoid dwelling on her irrational feelings for Nick, she’d tried to remember some of the happy times she’d had with Shane. But for some reason she’d had trouble picturing Shane’s image, until at midnight she’d crawled from her bed to dig out an old photo to help build a clearer picture in her mind.
Even then, most of her memories were centered around times they’d hung out as a family. Like when they’d all played tackle football the day after Thanksgiving. She, Shane and Adam had been on the same team. When Shane had lobbed a pass at her, she’d caught it for the winning touchdown. He’d run after her, nearly tackling her in the process of enveloping her in a big hug to celebrate.
Shane had been a known entity, but Nick wasn’t. Abby finished putting on her scrubs, then grabbed her stethoscope and headed outside to walk the few blocks to work. It had been distressing to realize how few times she and Shane had actually been alone. Truthfully, even the kiss he’d given her before leaving for Beijing was difficult to recall. Nick’s searing, demanding kisses were so different, so clearly vivid in her mind, overshadowing her memories of Shane.
A fact she didn’t like one bit. With a frown, she picked up her pace, knowing the later she was, the longer the night nurse would have to stay overtime.
Luckily hard work had the great advantage of distracting her from thoughts of Nick Tremayne.
Just before lunch, one of the floors called to give report on a patient who had been accepted as a rehab transfer. Abby volunteered to take the new admission and asked one of the patient care aides to get a room ready while she finished hanging an IV antibiotic.
The patient was rolled in a half-hour later. The floor nurse had informed her the patient was Gerald Fischer, a 73-year-old man recovering from an ischemic stroke, the type caused by a blood clot. Abby entered his room with a bright smile. “Good morning, Mr Fischer. How are you feeling?”
“Purple shoe. Shoe, purple shoe.”
What? His earnest, compelling gaze convinced her he wasn’t trying to be funny. She stepped closer, noticing how the pupil in his right eye was slightly larger than his left.
“Mr Fischer, squeeze my fingers with your hands.” Abby tried not to show her concern, but she was worried he’d extended his stroke. Or his stroke hadn’t resolved in the first place. How on earth had he been accepted for transfer?
He took her fingers and squeezed, but his right side was markedly weaker than his left. When she continued her assessment, she found he couldn’t move his right leg at all.
“I’m going to call the doctor, Mr Fischer. Don’t get out of bed by yourself, all right? Use this call-light here if you need something. I’ll be right back.”
Abby nabbed the patient care aide’s attention as she made her way to the nurses’ station. “Go and sit with Mr Fischer for a few minutes. His stroke symptoms are worse. Keep an eye on him while I call Dr Roland.”
This time, when she paged Roland, she added the numbers 911 to the front of the rehab extension. If the universal code for emergency didn’t get his attention, nothing would.
She took one of the unit’s portable phones with her back to Mr Fischer’s room, after instructing the unit secretary to forward Roland’s call.
Mr Fischer wasn’t any worse when she returned, but he was still babbling nonsense. She knew strokes with right-sided weakness often resulted in aphasia, a condition where the patient either couldn’t speak or could only repeat the same words over and over. Inside Mr Fischer’s head, he knew what he wanted to say, but because of the brain injury surrounding the stroke he couldn’t make his mouth speak the words.
She could only imagine how frustrated he must feel. “Mr Fischer, I called the doctor to come and evaluate you. Did your speech recently get worse? Squeeze my hand once for yes, twice for no.”
Giving only two non-speaking options was the best way to communicate with an aphasic patient. Mr Fischer squeezed her hand once.
She continued asking questions, trying to figure out exactly what had happened. If his stroke symptoms were so bad, why on earth had the floor transferred him? Surely he couldn’t tolerate three hours of therapy per day? She wasn’t a stroke expert, but she suspected he needed acute care and treatment.
Time was of the essence.
Her portable phone rang. She picked it up. “This is Abby.”
“Roland. You paged? Again?”
She ignored his biting sarcasm. “Yes, I’m here with Mr Fischer and I’m very concerned he may have extended his stroke. He’s aphasic, with a mild hand-grasp on the right compared to a strong hand-grasp on the left. He can’t lift his right leg at all and his pupils are unequal. His blood pressure is 162 over 90, pulse is 104, respirations at 16. He’s not running a fever.”
“He doesn’t sound that much worse than when I accepted his transfer,” Dr Roland commented. He spoke so fast, he slurred some of his words together.
He’d actually accepted this patient with the severity of these symptoms? She moved to the doorway, trying to get out of Mr Fischer’s earshot. “Dr Roland, Mr Fischer is not a candidate for rehab. I’m not even sure he can be safely cared for on a general floor. His neuro status isn’t close to being stable.”
“I’ll take care of it. And watch your tone, or I’ll write you up for insubordination,” he warned, before disconnecting the call.
Open-mouthed, she stared at the phone in shock. Insubordination? For asking a doctor to come and see her patient?
“Unbelievable!” Abby resisted the urge to bang her phone against the wall, imaging she was aiming for Roland’s face. Taking a deep breath, she tried to remain calm. Roland had said he’d take care of things, but what did that mean? She hadn’t detected a sense of urgency in his voice and Mr Fischer didn’t have time to spare. She needed a plan B. Normally, only physicians could make referrals to other physicians, but she wasn’t above stretching the truth a bit to get care for her patient.
Marching to the nurses’ station, she asked Betty, the unit secretary, which doctor was on call for Neurology. Before she could change her mind, she placed a page to Dr Sue Glasner.
When the Dr Glasner called back moments later, Abby chose her words carefully. “I just got off the phone with Dr Roland, our rehab medical director, who is currently out of the hospital but making his way in. We have a patient with an ischemic stroke by the name of Mr Fischer. I don’t know if your stroke team has seen him, but we’re concerned he has extended his injury. Do you have time to come up and evaluate him?”
“Sure, I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.” The neurologist didn’t question her consult and Abby hung up with a sigh of relief. OK, technically, she hadn’t lied. And as long as someone came to see poor Mr Fischer, she didn’t care.
Although implying that Roland had consulted the neurologist had been wrong. She scowled at the computerized chart, making a note about the call to Dr Glasner.
“Abby? What’s wrong?”
She glanced up with a guilty look to find Nick standing beside her, wearing a white lab coat with a new Veterans’ Hospital ID tag. He’d apparently secured the temporary consultant position in record time. She hadn’t seen him since the dinner at her parents’ house and he looked incredible dressed in a shirt and tie. His smile was enough to steal her breath away. “Oh—nothing. Just one of my patients isn’t doing very well.”
“Which patient?”
“Mr Fischer in room 10.” When Nick headed in that direction, she picked up her scribbled notes about Mr Fischer and hurried after him. “Where are you going? I’ve already been in touch with Dr Glasner, the neurologist, she’s on her way to see him.”
“Excellent.” Nick didn’t even ask about Roland. Abby wasn’t sure if that was good or bad. “While we’re waiting I’ll do a consult on the patient myself.”
Nick slid into his physician role amazingly well. He began a thorough assessment on Mr Fischer and when Dr Glasner joined them shortly afterwards, they compared notes on what they’d found.
“Definitely has acute symptoms,” Nick told the pretty neurologist, who was petite, with straight dark hair that reached her jaw. A flicker of jealousy caught Abby off guard when the two of them stood close, hovering over the computer where Mr Fischer’s chart was stored, debating the plan of care.
Stop being an idiot. Just because they look so good together is no reason to barge between them like some psycho-woman.
“Abby, we need a CT scan of his head, stat.” Nick was looking at her oddly. “The order has been entered into the system, all we need is for someone to call down to Radiology.”
“Of course.” After giving herself a quick mental slap, she hurried out to the unit secretary to relay the request. Enough mooning over Nick. They had patients to take care of. “Betty? Call down to Radiology for an urgent CT of the head on Mr Fischer.”
“By whose order?” A snide voice behind her had her spinning around to face Roland. He was short, in his early fifties and weighed almost two hundred pounds. He also reeked of cigarette smoke and something else she couldn’t quite put her finger on. She’d always secretly debated how long he’d be in his position, considering he was a walking heart attack waiting to happen.
She raised a brow at the arrogant expression on his face. She remained calm, but lifted her chin so he wouldn’t mistake her even response for cowering. “Dr Glasner, the neurologist, and Dr Tremayne are in Mr Fischer’s room, examining him.”
“Why, you little witch.” Roland took a threatening step toward her, his hands balled into fists. She held her ground, but it wasn’t easy. “Didn’t I say I’d take care of it? You just couldn’t wait to go behind my back, could you?”
Betty watched their interaction with wide eyes. The other staff members within hearing distance turned to stare at them, too.
“If you’re referring to the way I arranged proper medical care for my patient, then, yes, I did.” Abby narrowed her gaze. “I didn’t tell them anything specific about you, though, so if you hurry, they’ll never know you weren’t planning to call a neurology consult.”
“Too late for that, I think.” Nick’s sharp tone nearly made her wince. For a guy who walked with a cane, he sure knew how to sneak around.
Roland didn’t take the hint, but swung around to face Nick. “Who in the hell are you?”
“Dr Nick Tremayne, rehab consultant on the unit. I’ve been up here for the past three days, but I guess we haven’t met.” Nick gave Roland an assessing look. “I think you owe Ms Monroe an apology.”
“I don’t need this crap. I have a patient to see.” Roland brushed past Nick, his action so abrupt Abby had the impression Roland had purposefully intended to knock Nick off balance. But Nick moved lightning fast and grabbed Roland’s arm.
“Mr Fischer is no longer your patient.” Nick’s tight smile was grim. “Dr Glasner has just taken over the patient’s care. And if you have an issue with that, I suggest you take it to the chief of staff.”