ANDREW popped his head into the debriefing room. “Hey, I gotta head over to Trinity for our post-flight follow-up visits.”
As much as she wished for a window to peer into Reese’s mind to know what he was thinking, the idea of post-flight visits distracted her. “Could I do them?” Samantha asked. “I’d really like to see how some of our patients are faring.”
The paramedic hesitated. “There’s no reason you couldn’t, except the visits are part of my job, not yours.”
Samantha didn’t care whose job they were. Turning over the care of her patients was the hardest part of being a flight physician and she often wondered how her patients were doing long after she left them. “I don’t mind, honestly. And Kate showed me how to fill out the paperwork during training.”
Andrew shrugged and handed over the clipboard. “Go ahead, then, if you want to.”
“Thanks.” Sam glanced at the list of names. Jamie’s was top of the list. There were at least three other patients beside Jamie that needed to be checked on. She glanced at Reese. “Do you want to come along?”
He hesitated, then shook his head. “I think there’s some rule against giving pilots confidential medical information unless it’s directly related to the flight. Go on. I’ll wait here and watch Mitch check over the helicopter.”
“I’ll be back soon,” she promised.
“Just hustle back here if a call comes in,” Reese cautioned.
“I will.” Sam flashed him a quick smile, then grabbed her bulky Lifeline jacket and headed outside.
The trip to Trinity was short as the Lifeline hangar was strategically located nearby. While she walked, her thoughts dwelled on Reese. She really enjoyed flying with him; he was incredibly easy to work with. Of all the pilots, he was the most in tune with what was going on with the patient during transport.
Had she imagined that hint of sorrow in his eyes? She knew he wasn’t married, she’d heard the other female residents and the flight nurses talking about Reese in the early days of her training. He was always polite, but she noticed he didn’t flirt with the female staff.
Because he wasn’t interested? Last night, when he’d walked her to her apartment door, the heated awareness between them had been a palpable thing. She couldn’t have imagined the moment she’d thought he might kiss her. Yet she also knew better than anyone how not wanting to be interested was very different than actual indifference. After all, her emotions had a way of reacting without her permission.
Especially when it came to thinking about Reese.
At the information desk in the lobby of Trinity Medical Center, she asked for the room numbers of the patients she needed to see. Jamie was in the medical intensive care unit, so she decided to stop there first.
She found Jamie’s bedside without difficulty. Sam entered the room, then belatedly realized a male visitor was seated next to the patient’s bed.
“Oh, I’m sorry for intruding,” she apologized quickly. “I didn’t see you there. My name is Dr Samantha Kearn. I was the flight physician who helped transport Jamie down from Cedar Ridge.”
The man bent to press a kiss to Jamie’s forehead, then stood and extended his hand to greet her. “Pleased to meet you. I’m Gavin, Jamie’s husband. I want to thank you for bringing her to Trinity. Although she’s still very sick, the doctors here have been great. I think she’s finally starting to show signs of improvement.”
“I’m glad to hear it.” Samantha shook his hand, then peeked at the clipboard bearing the patient’s vital signs, grateful to note Jamie was indeed more stable. The patient’s husband remained standing, but he reached out and took his wife’s limp hand in his. She was touched by the pure devotion in Gavin’s gaze as it rested on his critically ill wife.
“So, how are you holding up?” she asked him. The poor guy appeared exhausted. “You need to take care of yourself, too, you know. You won’t do your wife any good by getting sick yourself.”
Gavin’s smile was lopsided. “You sound just like the nurses around here. They’re always telling me to get more rest.” His expression clouded as he gazed at his wife. “I don’t think I’ll be able to rest until Jamie is home with me where she belongs.”
Samantha blinked back empathetic tears. For a moment the sorrow in his eyes had reminded her of the fleeting expression on Reese’s face earlier. Poor Jamie and poor Gavin. Their love was obviously strong. She hoped for both of their sakes that Jamie would get better soon. “I understand. I’ll come back and check in on her again in a few days.”
Jamie’s husband nodded and Samantha turned to leave. Next to Jamie’s name on the clipboard she wrote, “critical but stable.”
As she walked to the trauma ICU on the third floor, Samantha thought about her own marriage. She couldn’t imagine Denis being so supportive. But she could see Reese acting very much like Gavin had, completely devoted to his wife.
A woman would be lucky to be loved like that.
She shook off the flash of self-pity and glanced down at her clipboard. What was she thinking, to be jealous of a critically ill patient? So what if Denis hadn’t loved her? She had her health and her career. What more did she want? She should count her blessings.
In the trauma ICU, Sam was happy to discover how the patient who’d suffered a work-related injury, which had nearly amputated his arm, was doing well after thirty-one-hour surgery to reattach the limb. When she walked in, she found the trauma ICU nurses were packing up his supplies to move him to a regular room.
She spent a few minutes chatting with the grateful patient. She hadn’t transported him, but he remembered bits and pieces of the flight and wanted her to thank everyone who had taken care of him. She promised she would.
The last two patients on her list were already in general rooms, ready to be discharged within a few days. She jotted her notations beside their names on the clipboard and repressed the urge to go upstairs to see Jamie again. As a physician, Jamie’s complicated medical course intrigued her. Sam had chosen emergency medicine for the variety, but at times like this she wondered if critical care wouldn’t have been a better option. She wanted to do an in-depth chart review on Jamie’s case to see if there was anything they might have missed. Not that she didn’t trust the critical care team, because she did. Still, she liked taking all the signs and symptoms patients presented with and putting the puzzle pieces together until they fit into a diagnosis.
Samantha comforted herself with the knowledge Jamie was getting the best care possible. There wasn’t anything more she could do for her now.
Taking the stairs to the lobby level, she headed toward the front door. Her footsteps slowed when she saw a tall blond-haired man standing near the public phone area, talking on his cell phone. She sucked in a quick breath, straining to get a look at his face. At that moment he turned, and her heart dipped when she recognized him.
Denis. What on earth was he doing here? Sweat dampened her arms beneath her turtleneck sweater and she instinctively ducked behind a tall rubber tree plant, hiding from view.
Her hands began to shake and she clasped them together tightly. Why was her ex-husband here at Trinity? Was he following her? Even if he was, did it matter? She didn’t have anything to say to him.
No matter how hard he pleaded, she wasn’t ever going back.
Her eyes widened when she saw Denis turn and shake hands with a gray-haired physician wearing a white lab coat. She recognized Dr Ben Harris, her boss. Why on earth would her ex-husband be meeting with the medical director of the emergency department? Denis was a pharmaceutical sales rep, but Milwaukee wasn’t a part of his territory. Or at least it hadn’t been while they’d been married. He’d been based in Chicago.
Though things could have easily changed since their divorce.
Her pager went off and she read the display describing a request for an ICU-to-ICU transfer. Samantha didn’t want to see Denis, or talk to him, but duty won over the desire to hide. She tucked her chin into her coat, hiding behind the hood of her Lifeline jacket, and wove through the crowd to the front doors.
Outside she quickened her pace until she was almost running back to Lifeline. Reese and Andrew were waiting impatiently.
“Ready to go?” Reese asked.
“Yes.” Breathlessly, she tossed aside the clipboard and climbed into the helicopter, with Andrew close on her heels.
Once they had their helmets on and were connected to the communication system, Andrew tapped her knee to get her attention.
“How did the post-flight visits go?” he asked.
“Great. They went great.” She forced herself to smile, reminding herself Denis was a part of her past, not her future. He was a pharmaceutical sales rep and for all she knew, Trinity Medical Center was part of his new territory. She simply needed to get over it.
Sam waited for Reese to finish communicating with the paramedic base to find out their destination. “So, tell me about this transport.”
“Our patient is a thirty-three-year-old male who’d been snowmobiling near Two Rivers when he crashed into a tree. He lives here in Milwaukee and his family has requested he be transferred to Trinity. Apparently he has multiple fractures and will need extensive surgery and rehab, which they can’t supply up there.”
“He’s stable, then?”
“Relatively speaking. He’s suffered a serious head injury and apparently he’s a smoker so his lungs aren’t in the greatest shape.”
Samantha nodded in understanding. “Reese? How long is the flight to Two Rivers?”
“At least an hour and a half.” His deep voice rumbled through her headset. “Settle in for a long ride.”
A flash of disappointment speared her heart. She normally didn’t mind long flights, but in this case she’d have preferred to sit up front with Reese.
Settling back against the seat, she stared outside. Their route was taking them over Lake Michigan. Two Rivers was located close to the coast and there was nothing but water for as far as she could see beneath them.
Twenty minutes into their ninety-minute flight, Samantha realized the air was full of snow. She leaned forward, peering out the window.
“Reese? What’s with all the snow?” she asked.
“Lake effect. When the cold air meets the warmer water, the result is wet snow. I’m heading farther inland to try to avoid the worst of it. We should be fine.”
Samantha tried to relax, but she couldn’t help remembering how it had been weather like this that had caused the ice to form on the chopper blades. She trusted Reese implicitly, and reminded herself that worrying was useless.
An abrupt dip of the helicopter had her clutching the armrests for support.
“Everyone all right back there?” Reese’s voice immediately came through her headset.
“We’re fine.” Samantha glanced out the window to see thick snow. “More lake-effect snow?”
“It’s getting worse and the wind has kicked up dramatically. If we can’t escape the worst of it by flying inland, we may have to abort.” Reese’s voice was grim.
Oh, boy. Samantha drew a deep breath. Never had she been in a situation where they’d had to abort a flight, but the erratic up and down movements of the helicopter were such that she wasn’t about to complain. Thank heavens she didn’t get airsick—at least, not that she knew of. This wasn’t exactly the time she wanted to test the theory, though. “Roger. Let us know if there’s something we need to do.”
“Nothing right now. Just hang tight.”
She was hanging tight. Sam tried to comfort herself with the knowledge that their patient was stable at Two Rivers and if they didn’t get there to pick him up today, there was always the chance they could try again the next morning when the weather settled down.
Peering out the window, she couldn’t see any sign of the lake or, for that matter, the shoreline. How on earth was Reese flying? Between the wind and the snow, she couldn’t imagine this was any better than flying in fog.
Reese communicated with the base while she and Andrew listened. Finally, after what seemed like an hour but in reality was probably only another ten minutes, Reese made the decision to turn back.
“Base, we need to abort this flight. Visibility has dropped to below ten feet. I can’t proceed safely with the wind gusts tossing us around up here like a kite.”
“Roger, Lifeline, we’ll notify the hospital in Two Rivers. They can either arrange for ground transport or we can try again in the morning.”
“Ten-four.”
Sam could tell Reese didn’t like calling a halt to the transport but, looking outside, she couldn’t blame him for his decision. Especially not with the wind. The safety straps of her harness dug into her shoulders and the helicopter dipped roughly again.
As much as she wanted to be able to help the patient who still needed to be transported, Sam couldn’t deny she would be very glad to get both of her feet back on stable ground. If they managed to land in one piece, she was going to give Reese a big hug.
Reese’s hands were slick with sweat around the stick as he finally landed the helicopter on the Lifeline helipad. For a moment he closed his eyes in relief. They’d made it. There had been several moments there when he’d had his doubts. The storm he’d read about wasn’t due in until tomorrow night, but the weather over the Great Lakes was always dicey. The lake-effect snow along with the high winds had been a double whammy.
He shut down the chopper, then climbed out. Samantha and Andrew were already standing there, waiting for him. He pulled off his helmet, prepared for Samantha’s wrath, when she suddenly threw her arms around his shoulders and hugged him tight.
Stunned, he didn’t react quickly enough to hug her back before she stepped away. “What was that for?”
Her smile was bright and maybe a little brittle. “For getting us home safely.”
A surge of protectiveness caught him unawares. Having his life in danger was bad enough, but risking Samantha’s life was inconceivable. He swallowed hard and wished his hands would stop shaking.
Their shift was nearly over. Reese verified with the base they were only in red flying conditions for calls around the lakeshore. Inland calls were still a viable option.
As they split up to file their respective reports, Reese wished for time alone with Samantha to see how she was doing. The turbulent flight must have bothered her more than she’d admitted for her to hug him like that. He couldn’t afford to think her spontaneous gesture was anything more than relief.
His stomach rumbled with hunger as their lunch had been nothing more than a quick sandwich. Was Samantha hungry, too?
He was surprised by the urge to ask her out for dinner. Reese didn’t date other Lifeline staff. Didn’t date at all, in fact. Over the year since the crash, he’d never wanted to. His heart belonged to Valerie.
Until now. Why this sudden desire to spend time with Samantha? He could tell himself he only wanted to make sure she was okay, but that would be a lie. Oh, he did care about her state of mind, but that wasn’t all. The hug had awakened every nerve ending in his body. He longed to hold her close, to stroke every inch of her creamy skin. To see if she tasted nearly as good as she looked.
After their debriefing to the next shift, Samantha prepared to leave. He quickened his pace to catch up to her, but she beat him to her car.
“Samantha, wait,” he called, as she opened the driver’s door.
She raised a brow. “What’s the matter?”
He tucked his bare hands in the pockets of his jacket, protecting them from the cold. “I thought maybe we could get something to eat. Lunch wasn’t much, if you recall.” That’s right, keep it simple. Friendly. This didn’t have to be a date.
“Oh, er, I don’t think so. But thanks for asking.” She dipped her head but he noticed a slight blush tinged her cheeks. “See you later, Reese.”
“Sure. Later.” For a moment he stood there and watched her as she slid behind the wheel and dutifully put on her seat belt. Since they both lived in the same complex, he decided to follow her home. He quickly climbed into his truck before she could leave without him.
Only she didn’t. When he realized there was something wrong, he left the warm interior of his truck to brave the cold. He tapped on her window. “What’s wrong?”
She reluctantly opened the door. “My car won’t start.” Frustration laced her tone.
“Battery?” he suggested, poking his head inside. He could problem-solve helicopter engines much easier than car engines. And it was too cold to stand out here for long. “Did you leave a light on?”
“I don’t think so. Could be my battery needs to be replaced, though. I think my mechanic mentioned something to that effect last year.” Samantha curled her fists. “I’ll have to call a tow truck.”
“Why don’t you let me take you home?” Reese quickly offered. Why jump-start her car when he could spend time with her instead? “Then we’ll see about your car.”
She didn’t want to go with him, that much was obvious. Samantha stared out through the windshield for so long he had to stamp his feet to keep his toes from freezing in the chilly air. Maybe he should have simply fetched his jumper cables. Car trouble wasn’t the end of the world. This was just a friendly offer to help and he was about to say so when she finally nodded.
“Sure. I guess you can take me home.”
Clearly she didn’t like the idea of leaving her car, and while he sympathized with her plight he couldn’t help pushing his luck. “And dinner? I mean, hey, we need to eat, right?”
With a wry grin she eyed him suspiciously. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you sabotaged my car on purpose.”
His eyes widened in horror. “I didn’t!”
She laughed at his reaction. “I know. All right, dinner, too.”
Hot damn. Reese couldn’t prevent a huge grin spreading over his features. Maybe he was a fool, but he hadn’t looked forward to spending time with a beautiful woman in what seemed like forever. Ignoring the warning signals bleeping urgently in his brain, he opened her door and offered his hand. She hesitated only for a moment, a motion so slight he would have missed it if he hadn’t been so in tune with her every nuance.
Then she placed her ungloved hand in his. He liked the feel of her small, strong, very capable hand. Awed by her trust, he slowly drew her to her feet. In that moment, he knew his fate was sealed.
He could no longer stay away from Samantha any more than he could give up flying.