The Doctor Meets Her Match
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Annie Claydon
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CHAPTER ONE
ABBY had five seconds to recover from the shock of seeing Nick again. Five heartbeats before his heavy eyelids fluttered open and he focussed on her. She could have done with ten at the very least.
The working clamour of the A and E department receded to the very edge of her consciousness. There was only Nick now, propped up on a trolley, one leg free of the cellular blanket that covered him, and his eyes dull with pain.
Somehow she got her legs to work and she took two steps forward into the cubicle and pulled the curtain shut behind her. Glancing at the A and E notes in the vain hope that somewhere there was another fireman with trauma to the knee who she was really supposed to be examining, she saw his name printed at the top. Nick Hunter. How on earth could she have missed that?
‘Abby?’
‘Nick.’ This was no good. She should be calm, in control, not red faced and staring at him as if she’d just seen a ghost. She wrenched her gaze from his dark, suede-soft eyes. ‘I’ve been called down from Orthopaedics to see you. I gather you’ve been waiting a while.’
‘They’re pretty busy with the guy I pulled out of that car. How is he? He didn’t look good…’
‘They’re working on him.’ Abby almost snapped at him, and she took a deep breath and started again. ‘I’ll see if I can find out for you. But first we need to get you sorted out.’
‘Okay. Thanks.’ He was watching her intently. Waiting for her next move.
What on earth was her next move? Nick wasn’t just a patient, he was a…what? Not a friend any more. He’d seen to that when he’d cut off all contact with her six months ago, not returning her calls and disappearing out of her life like a puff of smoke. He wasn’t a lover. He’d never been that, even if at one time Abby had wanted it, more than she now cared to admit.
He was a guy that she’d met at the swimming pool, got to know, along with the group he swam with, and then gone on a couple of casual dates with. That was all. Hardly a close personal relationship, although at the time it had felt a lot like it.
All the same, she had to put this onto a professional footing. Keep it there. ‘Right, then. A and E is very busy tonight and I’ve been called to see you as my speciality is orthopaedics…’ She licked her lips. He knew all that. ‘So, are you happy for me to examine you?’
He shrugged and Abby’s stomach twisted. She’d obviously made a lot more of this than it actually was. ‘Of course…’
‘Because I can get another doctor…’ Easier said than done at seven o’ clock on a Friday evening, when everyone else was either busy or had gone home, but she’d deal with that if she came to it. ‘We know each other, Nick. If you have any objection to me examining and treating you then you should say so now. It’s quite okay…’
‘I’d rather it was you, Abby.’ His gaze seemed to soften. ‘You’re better qualified than anyone here to treat a knee injury, and from the looks of it I’ll have to wait a while to see anyone else. I’m fine with it…as long as you are?’
He shot her a look that made her heart hurt. But she’d been down that road before and Abby wasn’t going to be seduced by his smile again. If he could get past what had happened, so should she. It had probably meant nothing to him anyway.
She concentrated on the facts. Act always in the patient’s best interests. Right now, it was clearly not in Nick’s best interests to wait another three hours for treatment, just because of what had gone on in her head six months ago. Nothing even remotely inappropriate had happened. She had to pull herself together and get on with her job. ‘So it’s just your knee, then. Nothing else?’
‘Just my knee. I think I’ve twisted it badly.’
‘How did it happen? You were underneath the car when you did it or did you fall?’
‘No, the frame of the car buckled as I was crawling back out from underneath it. Caught my knee here.’ He indicated an angry red haematoma.
‘Did you twist the leg at all?’ Keep it on this level. Details of his injury. His medical condition. They were a welcome barrier, standing between a woman and the man who had hurt her.
He grinned. ‘Probably. I was concentrating on moving as fast as I could at that point.’
Unwanted respect flared in Abby’s chest. Crawling into the tangled remains of a car to get someone out of the wreckage took a special kind of courage. ‘Okay, let me take a look at it. Tell me if I’m hurting you.’
Pulling a pair of surgical gloves from the dispenser, she gently probed the swelling around the knee, lifting it slightly to check the movement of the joint. His sharp intake of breath stopped her, and when she swung round she could see his fingers gripped tightly around the bars at the side of the bed.
‘I said tell me if it hurts, Nick. I’m not a mind reader.’
‘Right. Yeah, it hurts.’
‘And this?’
‘Yes.’
‘Okay. What’s this scar, here? It looks as if you’ve had some surgery.’
‘I had an operation on the knee four years ago to repair torn cartilage.’
‘How did you do that?’
He managed to muster a grin and the temperature in the cubicle shot back up suddenly. ‘Put my foot through a floorboard in a burnt out building. I twisted the knee as I fell.’ Even here, even now, he was the best-looking man Abby had ever seen. Dark brown hair, cut short so that it spiked haphazardly when he ran his hand through it. A short, deep scar, running through his eyebrow, which was the one asymmetric feature of an otherwise stunningly handsome face.
‘I’ll see if I can find a record of that on our system. The operation was done here?’
He nodded, his lips quirking downwards then pressing together in a thin line.
‘Right, then.’ She scanned the notes quickly. ‘It says here that you were offered pain control in the ambulance and you turned it down. Would you like something now?’
‘No. I’m fine, thanks.’
He didn’t need to pretend he wasn’t in pain. She was a doctor, not a woman he needed to impress. ‘On a scale of one to ten…’
‘About one and a quarter.’ He didn’t even let her finish.
‘Really?’ She raised an eyebrow to make it clear that she didn’t believe him for a minute, and he ignored her. Abby had seen that kind of flat-out denial before but it was puzzling coming from Nick. She’d get back to that one later.
‘Okay, let me know if you change your mind and I can give you something that will make you much more comfortable.’ He nodded almost imperceptibly. ‘I’m going to send you for some X-rays, and I’ll come back and see you again when I’ve reviewed them.’ That would give Abby at least half an hour to gather her wits. Maybe more. Perhaps the next time she laid eyes on him, she’d be able to retain her composure a little better.
‘Thanks.’ He hesitated, as if something was bothering him. ‘I hope I’m not keeping you from going home. It must be gone seven o’clock.’
Twenty past. The charge nurse from A and E had called her just as she’d finished catching up on the week’s paperwork and had been about to leave. ‘Not a problem. That’s what I’m here for.’ It seemed that finally, despite all Abby’s promises to herself, she was going to be spending one more evening in Nick’s company.
By the time Nick’s X-rays were back, Abby had already found his notes on the computer and read them. And it gave her no pleasure whatsoever to find he was wrong. She took a deep breath before she made her way back to his bedside to deliver the bad news.
‘Hey, there.’ His smile was too broad. Slightly brittle.
‘How are you doing?’
‘Thought you might be able to tell me.’ He nodded at the large manila folder she carried.
‘Yeah.’ Abby sat down by his bedside. Whatever she felt about his behaviour towards her, she had to give him credit for his resilience. She knew how much pain he must be in, and it was searing through her. That trick of being able to insulate yourself from a patient’s pain didn’t seem to be working so well for her at the moment.
‘What’s the verdict, then?’
‘The X-rays show a hairline crack on your patella.’
He stared at her as if he didn’t understand, or perhaps he just wasn’t taking her word for it. Abby drew one of the X-rays out of the folder, holding it up to the strip light above his head. ‘Here, can you see?’
He shifted closer to her to look, and reached up, steadying her hand with his. His touch was still electric. The soft brush of his fingers against her wrist made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. ‘I can’t see anything.’
‘Right there.’ She indicated the line of the fracture, trying to ignore the fact that she was leaning over him. That she would be able to hear his heartbeat if she got any closer. ‘The good news is that it’s not displaced, so it should heal relatively quickly.’
‘I see.’ He squinted at the area she had indicated. ‘It doesn’t look too bad, then?’
Abby bit her tongue. Asking him whether that statement was based on medical knowledge or wishful thinking probably wasn’t appropriate. Neither was enjoying leaning over him. At the swimming pool it had been pretty much impossible not to notice Nick’s beautiful physique. Here it was irrelevant.
She straightened quickly. ‘Well, a fractured patella is never good. But it could have been a lot worse. From the looks of your knee there may well be some other damage, though, and I’m ordering an MRI scan to see what’s happening with the cartilage and to get a better view of the fracture.’
‘But if that’s okay…?’ He sat up straight on the trolley, as if their business was now finished and he could go. Abby fixed him with the sternest glare she could muster. This was her territory and she was in charge.
‘There’s still the matter of the crack on your patella. You’re going to need to rest it and wear a brace for four to six weeks.’
He ran his hand back through his hair in a gesture of frustration. ‘Four weeks?’
‘Four to six weeks. That’s pretty much how long a bone takes to mend.’ Abby bit her lip. Enough sarcasm. He was in pain here, and she knew how much Nick loved his job. The least she could do was show him a bit of understanding. ‘I’m sorry, but you won’t be fit enough to go back to work for a while.’
‘How long?’
‘I can’t tell for sure at this point. I’m going to refer you on for an early appointment with a colleague who specialises in injuries of this kind. By the time you see him, we should have managed to get some of this swelling down and the MRI results will be available. He’ll be able to tell you much more.’
‘Yes. Of course.’ He took a deep breath. ‘Thanks for everything, Abby. Can I go now?’
He really didn’t want to be around her. She could tell from the way he was focussing past her, on something just over her right shoulder. He’d do anything but look her in the eye.
That was fine. Abby didn’t much want to be around Nick either but that wasn’t the point of this particular exercise. She was a doctor and he was a patient. If she reminded herself of that enough times, she’d get it in the end. ‘Not yet. I need to sort out a suitable knee brace for you, along with some painkillers and anti-inflammatory drugs.’ She fixed him with a stern look. ‘Stay there, I’ll be back shortly.’
Abby didn’t wait for his answer. Making for the curtain, which covered the entrance to the cubicle, she yanked it firmly closed and caught the charge nurse’s eye. If he attempted to run out on her this time, he’d find that the A and E staff were more than a match for him.
Abby was in a class all of her own when she did stern. Nick tried not to think about that, and concentrated on all the reasons why continuing their relationship had been a seriously bad idea. Why he’d been right to walk away before the shimmer in her light blue eyes, the little quirk of her mouth when she’d smiled, had pulled him spiralling out of control. Even now it was tough work to resist her.
Not that she was doing a great deal of smiling this evening. She didn’t seem to be having much trouble with resisting him either. She’d drawn back so quickly when he’d touched her that he’d wondered whether an apology was in order. Common sense was yet another thing he had to award her ten out of ten for.
He pulled himself up into a sitting position and swung his good leg over the edge of the trolley. So far so good. Kind of. He gripped his injured leg and tried to move it and pain seared from his calf to his thigh. Not such a good idea. Nick reached for his jacket, which was over the back of the chair where his clothes were folded, managing to pull his phone from the pocket with the tips of his fingers.
When he switched it on, there were two missed calls, and a text. Off duty in ten. Be there in half an hour. Nick looked at his watch. Sam would be arriving in fifteen minutes and, with any luck, by that time Nick would be dressed and ready to go.
‘It’ll be a lot easier with this. And you’re supposed to keep that switched off.’
Nick’s gaze jerked upwards from the small screen on his phone and found Abby’s half-amused grimace. ‘What will?’
‘Your escape.’ She shrugged, walking to his bedside and propping the pair of elbow crutches she carried against the chair. ‘Swing your leg back onto the bed while I sort this knee brace out.’
She fiddled for a while with the ugly-looking contraption, rolling her eyes and grinning when the Velcro straps tangled themselves together and stuck fast. Nick added kindness to the list of her virtues. Even though he’d treated her badly, there was no trace of reproach in her attitude towards him.
‘Just relax and let me move your leg. I’ll try not to hurt you too much.’ She gently took hold of his leg and Nick braced himself for the pain, letting out an involuntary breath when it wasn’t half as bad as when he’d tried to move it himself.
‘There.’ She carefully fastened the brace and stood back, reviewing her handiwork. ‘How does that feel?’
‘Better. Thanks, it feels much better with the support.’ Nick had been concentrating on the gentle warmth of her fingers, the way her corn-coloured plait of hair threatened to slip forward over her shoulder when she bent forward. Her scent, which seemed to be more than just the astringent, soapy smell of the other doctors and nurses here. They were far more potent than the drugs he’d refused.
‘Good. I’ve set it at an angle to keep your knee bent, and you should leave it like that until you see my colleague. Don’t put any weight on the leg for the time being, and it’ll help if you use cushions to support it when you’re sitting or lying down.’ She paused, seemingly deep in thought. ‘Let’s see if we can’t get you back onto your feet.’
At last! Nick sat up and she helped him swing his leg over the side of the trolley. ‘Lean on my shoulder if you need to.’
He couldn’t think of anything more comforting at that moment than to take advantage of her offer. ‘Thanks, but I’m okay.’ Levering himself upwards with his arms, he put one foot to the floor and stood up slowly.
‘Good. That’s good.’ She reached for the crutches, extending one to almost its full height, and gave it to him. ‘Yes, that looks about right.’ She adjusted the other and suddenly Nick was free. Able to move around again.
‘Walk up and down a bit.’ She watched carefully as he took a few tentative steps, leaning on the crutches, and nodded in approval. ‘That looks fine. Is it comfortable?’
‘Yes. The brace is a little tight.’
‘It needs to be. As the swelling goes down, you should tighten it a little so it feels snug. Without cutting off the circulation to your foot, that is.’ A sudden grin, which was quashed almost immediately, made Nick’s head swim slightly. His own body was producing powerful endorphins in response to that lopsided, shining smile of hers, and he could do nothing to stop it.
‘Thanks. Can I get dressed now?’
The words had an almost instant effect on her. She backed away. ‘Do you need someone to help you? I can send someone in.’
‘I’m fine.’ Nick grinned to himself as she disappeared out of the cubicle. Maybe he should have thought of that one sooner.
The A and E nurse had cut the leg of his trousers to get them off and it was easy enough to slip them back on again. Discarding the flimsy hospital gown and pulling on his shirt, Nick struggled with getting his sock onto his injured leg and decided to carry his boot. A quick phone call elicited the information that Sam was outside, trying to find a parking space.
‘Right.’ The curtain had twitched slightly, indicating that she’d checked first to make sure he was dressed, before she breezed back into his cubicle. ‘I’ve got a leaflet here, to give you some guidelines on how to manage the leg.’ She proffered a printed sheet and Nick took it. Next to one of the items she had drawn a star and written a few notes. Even her handwriting was bewitching. Nick wondered briefly whether it was possible to be seduced by someone’s handwriting, before folding the sheet and putting it into his jacket pocket.
‘Thanks. I appreciate all you’ve done, Abby.’ It was time for him to leave. Before she got around to the prescription she held in her hand. Before he got too used to the light that seemed to shine from her and gravitated towards it, like a moth whose wings had already been burned by the flame.
‘Oh, no, you don’t.’ She was quicker than he was at the moment, and blocked his path. ‘Sit down for a moment. I’ve had a colleague write you a prescription for something to control your pain.’
She was keeping him well and truly at arm’s length. Somehow the fact that she’d got someone else to write the prescription rankled more than anything. As if she was trying to wipe him from every corner of her life. Nick wondered if she’d been hurt as badly as he had by what had happened between them.
‘I don’t need it.’ The words sounded harsh and ungrateful. ‘Thanks, Abby, but I don’t want it. Sam’ll be here to pick me up any minute.’
‘Sam!’ She jumped like a startled fawn, flushing slightly. She did remember, then. The leisurely Sunday morning breakfasts after training when Sam and the half-dozen others at the table had faded into blurred insignificance, and there had only been Nick and Abby. The reckless slide into dinner and the cinema. He’d fallen for her hard and fast, before sanity had taken hold and convinced him to draw back.
She pulled herself together with impressive speed. ‘He’ll have to wait, then, we’re not finished yet. You should have something to control the pain and bring the inflammation down. I really can’t recommend that you be discharged without it…’
‘Then I’ll discharge myself.’
The conversation had finally degenerated into a game of chicken. Whose nerve was going to break first. In the end, no one broke. Sam’s light touch on Abby’s shoulder made her jump again and she whirled round to face him.
‘Abby. Where have you been? Long time no see…’ Nick directed his most ferocious glare in Sam’s direction and Sam got the message. ‘So how’s he doing, then?’
She pursed her lips as if she was considering the question and Nick broke in. ‘We’re done here.’
‘Really?’ Sam gave Abby a quizzical look and she frowned.
‘No. Not really. Nick…’
In between him and Sam, she suddenly looked small. Vulnerable. Staring up at them with what looked like frightened defiance in her eyes. The urge to protect her leaked into Nick’s aching bones, almost before he realised that the only thing Abby needed protecting from was him.
He slid past her, brushing against her as he went. ‘I’m sorry.’ He was sorry for everything. The way he’d left her without a word of explanation six months ago. How he was leaving things between them now. But if she knew his reasons she’d be the first to want him gone. ‘Thanks for all you’ve done.’
The words stuck in his throat because he knew they weren’t enough. But they were all he could give her and he lunged forward on his crutches. He heard her exclamation of frustration behind him and Nick made for the exit doors without looking back.
