Caribbean Paradise, Miracle Family

by Julie Danvers

  * * *

  Theo hadn’t meant to get a job at the same clinic as Willow. The moment he stepped into the clinic and saw her, he was gripped with the fear that he might have made a terrible mistake. She’d told him she was a nurse, so it was a fair guess that she worked at one of the major medical centers on the island. But the past few days had been a whirlwind of job searching and house-hunting for Theo, and he’d never stopped to consider the possibility that he and Willow could end up working together.

  He’d inquired about a job at St. Victoria Hospital first. Their head oncologist, Dr. Burke, had explained that they didn’t have the budget for an additional oncologist, but had introduced him to Nate Edwards. Nate had been thrilled to meet Theo, and he was even more thrilled when he learned about the cancer research that Theo had been involved in. As the head oncologist at the Island Clinic wanted to reduce her hours before retirement, Nate offered Theo a position that would involve research and part-time clinical work at the clinic.

  At first, Theo had been hesitant about working at a clinic that catered to celebrities. But as Nate explained it, he’d also be expected to take on patients from St. Victoria Hospital when needed. And the research component of his job would allow him to create grant proposals and research trials that would expand the treatment offered by the hospital. Theo liked the idea of having ample time to do research and pro-bono work, and he also liked the clinic’s mission to ensure that no one was turned away, regardless of their ability to pay.

  But Willow’s presence was a complicating factor that he hadn’t accounted for. All of the excitement he’d felt at the thought of calling to tell her he’d found a job drained away the moment he saw her at the nurses’ station.

  “Theo!” Nate clapped him on the shoulder. “We were just talking about you. Come meet one of our best nurses.”

  “We’ve met,” said Willow, her clipped tones confirming Theo’s worst fears.

  “Really? How—” But at that moment, Nate was paged overhead to the trauma wing. “Duty calls. I’ll have to let you two catch up with each other on your own. We can touch base on the Santiago case later. And I want to hear about how you already know each other!” Nate flashed a grin and sped off.

  Theo took a deep breath and tried to smile at Willow. “That should be an interesting conversation. What should we tell him?”

  “Maybe first you can tell me what you’re doing here!”

  Theo gestured toward his white coat. “You said I needed to find a job. Well, here I am.”

  She closed her eyes, and Theo said, “Look, I understand. I had no idea that you worked here, and if I’d known, I would have turned the job down and figured out something else. But I think there’s a strong upside to this. You’re cautious about introducing me to Maisie because I’m essentially a stranger to both of you, right? But if we’re working together, I won’t be a stranger for very long. We’ll get to know one another in no time.”

  “Yes, but...that’s just it. You coming here...wanting to be in Maisie’s life...and now working at the same clinic—it’s just a lot to take in all at once. And you haven’t even tried to get in touch with me since last week.”

  Damn. Becca had been right; he should have called Willow sooner.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t want to bother you with too many updates before I had everything settled. And I wasn’t sure how often you’d want to hear from me. I didn’t want it to seem as though I was trying to force myself into your life. Although...” He waved his arm at the clinic. “I guess my plan to give you space didn’t work out the way I hoped it would.”

  She sighed. “It’s not your fault. I should have seen this coming. If I’d given it any thought, I would have realized that you were bound to end up here or at St. Victoria Hospital. I was just so shocked when you arrived that I didn’t even think of the chance that you could end up working here. But I would have appreciated some updates over the past week. When I didn’t hear from you, I thought you’d decided to leave.”

  He could feel his stomach roil in protest. Leave? When he’d barely begun to get to know his daughter? Willow didn’t know him at all.

  But then, that was the problem. The fact that Willow didn’t know anything about him was the biggest obstacle he faced in getting to know his daughter.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” he said. “And I promise that working here won’t interfere with our personal lives. I’m just here to do my job, and I’m sure you are, too.”

  She was about to respond, but at that moment, there was a burst of activity through the hospital’s main doors. A throng of reporters surrounded a woman in a wheelchair as she was being pushed into the clinic. Each reporter shouted their questions so loudly that it was impossible to hear any of them clearly. Cameras snapped and chaos erupted as the press was shooed away by medical staff, only to swarm back toward the woman in the wheelchair while members of her entourage tried to protect her. Amid it all, a small French bulldog ran in circles, barking wildly.

  Roni Santiago had arrived.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  WITHIN SECONDS, THE lobby of the clinic was packed with reporters, medical staff and members of Roni’s entourage. A TV news crew was attempting to set up a camera in one corner, ignoring the arguments of a nurse, and the woman pushing Roni’s wheelchair had to shove at reporters to keep them away.

  “Call security,” said Willow. Another nurse, who’d wisely decided to cower behind the nurses’ station, nodded and began dialing. Willow headed toward Roni, but not before a reporter stuck a microphone in front of her face. “Miss, what’s it like to have Roni herself at the Island Clinic? Are the rumors that she has a deadly, inoperable cancer true?”

  So much for maintaining Roni’s privacy. There was either a leak in Roni’s entourage, or someone from her previous treatment center had revealed her transfer to the Island Clinic. Either way, the press had followed her here, and now it would fall on the clinic staff to control the damage.

  “Our patients’ medical histories are confidential, and you need to leave, now,” said Willow, barely concealing the irritation in her voice.

  To her absolute shock, as she tried to move toward Roni, the reporter grabbed her arm in a tight grip and shouted, “Just a few more questions, please!” She tried to shake him off, but his grip was like a vise, and she nearly lost her balance trying to twist away from his grasp.

  Theo moved so quickly that she barely saw him. One moment the reporter had hold of her arm; the next, his microphone had clattered to the floor, and Theo was holding the reporter’s shoulder in a firm grip. Theo twisted the reporter’s arm behind his back and steered him away from Willow. The expression on Theo’s face was so furious that Willow wasn’t sure what might have happened next had a uniformed security guard not arrived to take hold of the reporter.

  More security officers arrived to herd the press back outside the clinic. Willow could see that Roni was barely conscious.

  “We need to take her back to an exam room immediately,” she muttered to Theo.

  “I’ll show you the way, if you can get us through this crowd.”

  Theo put one arm around Willow’s shoulders to protect her as he cleared a path through the crowd. She appreciated his tall frame, which provided shelter from the mob. As the security officers pressed the reporters back, Theo and Willow made their way to the woman who was pushing Roni’s wheelchair.

  “Are you family?” Theo asked her.

  “I’m her best friend. Siobhan.”

  “All right, you take the dog, I’ll take over wheelchair duty.” Theo and Willow guided Roni’s chair into an exam room as her friend picked up the French bulldog, which immediately stopped barking. Roni seemed as though she could barely lift her head, and as Willow began her examination, she could see that Roni was drifting in and out of consciousness.

  “How long has she been like this?” Theo asked Siobhan. Wil
low noticed that his voice was firm but calm, with no trace of the fury she’d seen in his expression a moment ago.

  “About fifteen minutes. We were talking on the plane, and then all of a sudden she just started...drifting off. I thought she was losing consciousness, but she comes around every couple of minutes or so. I can’t believe the press followed us here. The whole point of coming was to have some privacy.”

  “Security will get things under control,” Willow reassured her. “Roni will have the rest and privacy she needs.”

  From her wheelchair, Roni gave a low chuckle. “Thank God for that.”

  “Roni?” said Willow. “Can you hear us?” But Roni had once again dropped her head to her shoulder and closed her eyes.

  Willow nodded at Theo. “Mild seizures, possibly in response to high fever.”

  “Give me the history,” he said.

  “Latina woman in her early sixties, current diagnosis of breast cancer, recently started chemotherapy. No known allergies. Presents with seizures and possible high fever.” Willow checked her thermometer. “Temperature of one hundred and five. Seizures are persistent but seem to have slowed. Shall we order testing? It could be a seasonal flu, or a bacterial infection she picked up while traveling.”

  He paused. “She’s already started chemo?”

  Willow glanced at the chart. “According to her records, she started a few weeks ago. It looks as though she was about halfway through the first planned round of chemo before she decided to transfer her care here.”

  “Then let’s order the testing, but start her on a fever reducer and antibiotics right away.”

  Theo leaned in toward Roni’s wheelchair. “Roni?” he said gently. “Can you hear me?”

  Roni’s eyes fluttered open.

  “Roni, you most likely have a case of febrile neutropenia. That means your body is having a strong reaction to chemotherapy, and it hasn’t been making enough of the white blood cells you need to fight off a bacterial infection. The good news is that your friend got you here fast enough for us to start antibiotics within two hours of your fever, which means that you should begin feeling better right away.”

  “Sounds like I got here just in time,” Roni croaked.

  “Not a moment too soon,” Theo agreed, and Willow noticed again the way the corners of his mouth seemed to tug upward as he spoke. “We still need to wait for the test results to be sure, but we’re going to start the antibiotics right way. Odds are good you’ll be feeling better very soon.”

  Of course, Willow thought. Febrile neutropenia. No wonder Theo hadn’t wanted to wait for test results. Starting a patient on antibiotics within two hours of the outbreak of a fever could have a significant impact on treatment outcome. Thanks to Theo’s quick thinking, Roni was probably going to be fine.

  She considered what he’d said only a few moments ago—that working together might allow them to get to know one another more quickly. She still wasn’t certain of how she felt about that. But she was glad of the chance to see that Theo was a competent doctor. And although she was certain she could have handled the situation herself, she did appreciate the way he’d pulled that reporter off of her without a moment’s hesitation.

  So far, Theo had proved that he knew his field well, and that he had her back. She grudgingly admitted to herself that both of those were qualities she valued greatly among her coworkers.

  She just wished her stomach wouldn’t do flip-flops as she watched him write orders in Roni’s chart.

  “There’s a suite waiting for both of you, but we need to keep her in the exam room for a few hours of observation,” she said to Siobhan, trying to pull her focus back to her patient. “You’re welcome to stay with her until then.”

  “Can she keep the dog with her?” asked Siobhan.

  Willow hesitated. Dogs typically weren’t allowed in exam rooms, but Roni’s French Bulldog had settled down considerably, curling quietly into her lap. She smiled and touched a finger to her lips. “I suppose it’s fine. But keep it quiet.”

  As they left the exam room together, Theo said, “Wow. Is it typically like this, with the press?”

  “Actually, it’s extremely rare. We all take discretion very seriously here. My guess is that someone on Roni’s team leaked the information that she was coming. It may not even have been an intentional leak. Some of our patients get so much scrutiny from the press that a careless word, dropped at the wrong time, can tip off the news media to things they aren’t supposed to know. Fortunately, we do have excellent security personnel. They’re very good at keeping the sharks away. As are you apparently. I want to thank you for helping me out with the reporter back there.”

  His eyes grew stormy again, and for a moment she thought she saw a trace of the anger that had clouded his face earlier. But it quickly passed as he said, “The important thing is that you’re all right.” He searched her face carefully. “You are all right, aren’t you?”

  “I’m perfectly fine.” Despite herself, she rubbed her arm. It did still hurt a bit. The reporter’s grip had been firmer than she’d realized. She hoped she wasn’t going to have a bruise.

  Theo frowned. “If they’re going to be that bold, we should talk to Nate about increasing security for the staff as well as for Roni.”

  “Certainly, if it makes you feel better. But I know Nate. He won’t tolerate an intrusion into a patient’s privacy without swift action.” And then, in spite of herself, she laughed as she remembered her own first week at the Island Clinic, just over a year ago. “If you think that was bad, you should have been here last year. We had an entire K-pop group.”

  “K-pop?”

  “Korean pop music. Picture five teenage boys, all on the verge of international stardom. Some of the dance moves they do are pretty complex, and apparently they’d been attempting an illegal pyramid formation on a high stage that collapsed, resulting in multiple compound fractures. Their manager didn’t want word getting out that they’d been practicing moves banned in Korea, so he had them flown here for absolute privacy.”

  “But word got out they were here?”

  “Through no fault of ours. One of the boys posted a picture of the view from his room online, and a fan from the island realized he was probably somewhere on St. Victoria. It’s a small island, and with every woman under twenty on the lookout—well, it was only a matter of time before they determined by process of elimination that the band members were here.”

  “It was bad, huh?”

  “Never underestimate the detective work of teenage girls. Every young woman on the island started trying to get a glimpse of them at the clinic. One of them actually succeeded by disguising herself as a delivery driver. But don’t worry. After a while you’ll see that these kinds of incidents are really extremely rare.”

  “I see. So...does this mean you’ve come around to the idea of us working together?”

  She told her stomach to stop doing flip-flops. “I suppose it won’t hurt to give it a try. You made a good call with Roni back there. And I liked how you discussed her treatment with her.”

  “How’s that?”

  “You told her that the odds were good that she would feel better soon, but you didn’t make any false promises. You were confident, without overselling or twisting the truth.”

  He nodded. “That’s important with cancer patients. Everything’s about what the odds are. You have to talk about chances, rather than promises. And you have to talk about statistics without making a person feel like one.”

  She was certain he was speaking from his experience as a patient. How important it must be to him, she realized, to be able to use his firsthand knowledge of how it felt to have cancer to help his patients.

  Nate’s words from earlier that morning came back to her: I think you’re going to like Theo Moore. She wondered if that could possibly turn out to be true.

  She brok
e from her reverie to notice that he was staring at her.

  “What is it?” she asked. She looked at her nurse’s coat, trying to see if she’d spilled coffee somewhere.

  “It’s just...” He took a deep breath, and his words came rapidly, as though he were forcing himself to push them out. “Speaking of statistics. I was wondering. What are the odds you might have dinner with me later this week?”

  For one brief, wild moment, she almost thought that Theo was asking her out on a date. But then she realized that couldn’t possibly be the case. Given the circumstances between the two of them, a date was out of the question.

  Still, it couldn’t hurt to clarify. “When you say, ‘have dinner with me,’ what exactly do you have in mind?”

  He gave her a quizzical look. “Well, I suppose by ‘have dinner,’ I’m anticipating that there’d be food involved, most likely eaten in the evening, and the ‘with me’ part implies that it’d be the two of us, eating that food together.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Yes, but it’s just dinner, right? It’s not...a date?”

  “Oh, no, not at all,” he said without any hesitation. “I hope it didn’t sound as though I was suggesting a date. Especially considering our situation. My priority is getting to know Maisie, after all.”

  She blushed. Of course he hadn’t intended to suggest a date. He’d traveled four thousand miles and uprooted his life for the chance at being involved with his daughter; the last thing any reasonable man in his situation would do was put everything at risk with romantic entanglements. And she had no reason to believe he was attracted to her.

  She was glad he couldn’t read her thoughts, because in spite of the fact that she knew perfectly well that it would be a mistake to date Theo, her spirits had plummeted when he’d explained he was asking her to dinner with no romantic intentions whatsoever. While she wished he hadn’t jumped to clarify his lack of interest in her quite so quickly, it was probably fortunate that his intentions were strictly platonic. She was too busy, and the risks were far too high. Life was complicated enough without adding heartbreak. Not to mention how confusing things could be for Maisie. Even if Theo had been interested in her, he’d have been off-limits to Willow for that reason alone.