Just a very messed-up one.
Could she do it? Standing rigid on the kerb, she watched him check the straps, watched him smile at the tiny baby he was offering to try and love. And she knew that if for nothing other than Declan, she had to give this a try, had to put her heart on the line and try to trust this man all over again.
And if it worked, if Daniel really could prove that he’d changed, that he was someone she could trust, then she’d tell him the truth.
Despite the warm evening, Louise shivered at her monumental decision, drenched with panic as he calmly walked over to her.
‘In the spirit of our new-found openness…’ Daniel’s hand reached up, stroked a strand of hair the wind had blown behind her ear and for a second longer let his finger graze her cheek. ‘I should tell you that you look amazing tonight.’
‘Next Thursday…’ Not the most eloquent of responses, but as his eyes darted with hope she knew he understood. ‘We’ll have dinner—you bring the food!’
‘Next Thursday?’ Daniel checked, smiling but clearly bewildered, not because he’d been invited to dinner and told to bring the food—he knew from days of old that Louise never cooked! No, clearly he was confused as to the rather long time delay. But Louise just nodded. She certainly wasn’t going to tell him that if she ate nothing, drank gallons of water, pilate’d, jogged and did a million sit-ups each night between now and then, she might just be ready to start dating! Jumping into her seat and clipping on her seat belt, she wound down the window before she finished her sentence. ‘You can come over for dinner next Thursday.’
CHAPTER SIX
IT WAS actually nice to be back nursing and doing the job she had always loved.
Nice to feel her confidence returning, nice that even on a mere thousand calories a day, the hormone-riddled, labile brain she’d been left with after giving birth was actually capable of making decisions, working out drug doses and being able to chat with a patient all at the same time.
Nice to see Daniel every day, Louise reluctantly admitted, trying and failing not to notice how divine he looked as he raced onto the ward between cases to check on one of his post-operative patients that Louise was extremely concerned about. Dressed in theatre gear, a blue cap tied onto his head, he looked exhausted, concerned and irritated all at the same time.
And also impossibly handsome!
Edward Hamilton had been sent to the ward directly from Theatre following a motor vehicle accident, which meant that the recovery ward had been the first time Louise had met the patient. In a prolonged operation, ‘Dan The Man’, as the theatre nurse had jarringly called him, had repaired a nasty laceration on his liver. A splenic haematoma had been noted, but Daniel had chosen not to remove the spleen, instead ordering strict observation. Which would have been a hard ask, Louise knew that. There was some chance of the spleen rupturing, not just immediately post-op but over the next couple of months, and Mr Hamilton would be told when he was well enough not to travel too far off the beaten track for a while. If his spleen did end up rupturing, emergency surgery would be required.
There’d been nothing she’d been able to put her finger on when she’d called Daniel to request that he come and check the patient over between theatre cases. This had therefore made the call rather difficult, as she had been well aware that Daniel’s theatre list was already way behind schedule because of the prolonged emergency surgery he had undertaken. But in the two hours since Mr Hamilton had been collected from Theatre, though his obs had remained relatively stable and the drains collecting excess fluids from his wound were well within normal limits, Louise didn’t like the look of him, or, as she’d explained to a very disbelieving Elaine, she didn’t like the colour of his tongue.
‘His tongue!’ Elaine gave her a very wide-eyed look.
‘I saw it once on another patient—’
‘You really expect me to ring Danny in the middle of surgery when all the patient’s obs are OK and tell him that the agency RN looking after his patient doesn’t like the colour of his tongue?’
‘No,’ Louise answered tartly. ‘I’m more than capable of making my own phone calls, Elaine. And for the record,’ she added, picking up the telephone and doing just that, ‘I’m not from the agency—I’m employed by this hospital, just as you are.’
And no doubt Elaine would have given an equally smart retort but even before Louise had replaced the receiver, the blood-pressure machine alarm went off and, as was often the case on a busy surgical ward, an already busy afternoon became suddenly hectic in a race to save Edward Hamilton’s life.
‘What’s happened?’ Daniel arrived and didn’t even glance over at her, his concern solely for the patient—and rightly so.
‘Blood pressure’s just dropped and the drains are filling.’ Louise held up the two drains that were clipped to the edge of the bed—normally a few millilitres of haemoserous fluid could be expected but already the drains were full and needed to be emptied, which Louise was onto as Daniel palpated the patient’s abdomen. He stopped as the pager that was clipped to his top started shrilling loudly, warning him he was needed for an emergency.
‘Don’t worry, that’s me,’ Louise said, as he let out a rapid curse, because even Dan the Man couldn’t deal with two emergencies at once. ‘I just had Emergency page you.’
‘It is,’ Daniel affirmed, still having to check his pager, just in case he was required elsewhere, then clipping it back on his top. ‘Right, let’s get some more blood from the lab,’ he said. ‘For now open the IV full bore—he should have another IV site.’
‘Yep,’ Louise said, because she’d already checked, running through some plasma expander before Daniel had even asked for it and connecting it to the other IV site, letting it run at the maximum rate to give Mr Hamilton the fluids he desperately needed.
‘Let’s get him straight to Theatre.’
Louise gave a relieved nod that it was Daniel who had come to do the review, Daniel who didn’t ever waste time procrastinating before he made a decision. ‘I’ll have a quick word with his wife—can you grab me another consent form?’
‘Sure.’
Mrs Hamilton was beside herself with worry. After hastily being asked to leave the area, she had hovered anxiously in the corridor, watching the hive of activity going on behind the curtains, and even though Theatre was what was desperately needed, Daniel took a brief moment to explain the situation to his wife. The difficult conversation had to take place in the corridor as there literally wasn’t enough time to guide the shaking woman to a quiet room, and Louise stood with her as Daniel, in his clipped voice, explained the situation. And though sometimes she wished he could be more compassionate with patients and their relatives, there was something incredibly reassuring about Daniel’s directness. Something in his demeanour that instilled confidence as he explained the facts and obtained the woman’s consent for the further surgery.
‘Do you think it’s his spleen?’ Mrs Hamilton’s voice wavered as she read the hastily drawn-up consent form.
‘Till I open him up I won’t know,’ Daniel said. ‘As I explained, it could well be his liver that’s hemorrhaging—the sooner I can stop the bleeding, the better chance he has.’
Louise’s heart went out to the other woman as she shakily signed the form, her face as drained of colour as her husband’s, her eyes disbelieving as she tried to fathom how, in a few short hours, her whole world had changed.
‘Can I see him?’ she choked. ‘I won’t be long, I just want to tell him…’
‘Of course.’ Daniel nodded, and only when she dashed off did he close his eyes for a moment and let out a worried sigh.
‘I should have just taken it out—I was that close to doing it.’ He held up his finger and thumb to show a tiny space. ‘But it didn’t look too bad and he was so unstable on the operating table—’
‘You did what was right at the time,’ Louise broke in. ‘That’s all you can do. So you do think it is his spleen?’
‘I hop
e to God it is,’ Daniel answered grimly. ‘Because with the mess his liver was in and the trouble I had repairing it, if he’s bleeding out there, I don’t think there’s going to be much more I can do.
‘Let’s go!’
Staff were everywhere, helping Louise with the many things that needed to be done in a few brief minutes—from running down to the lab to collect more precious blood for the patient to alerting the theatre that their earlier urgent case was about to reappear.
‘Could you call the porters?’ Louise called out as she transferred the oxygen from the wall outlet to a portable machine for the brisk walk to Theatre and collected some emergency supplies. Even though Theatre was only a few minutes away, if the patient collapsed en route he would need to be treated promptly and Louise had to be sure she had all the equipment she might require.
‘We’ll take him ourselves.’ Daniel shook his head, clearly not prepared to wait for anyone, his foot already removing the brake from the bed and starting to wheel it away. Louise hastily grabbed Mr Hamilton’s notes and X-rays.
‘You go right on ahead, Danny, and scrub.’ Elaine somehow managed to flirt and push the bed at the same time. ‘We’ll bring him straight round for you.’
He didn’t bother with thanks, probably didn’t even notice the flirty smile and batting of eyelashes, but Louise did.
And she didn’t like it one bit.
‘Thanks, ladies.’ Clearly exhausted, Daniel appeared on the ward just as Louise was about to head to the crèche to pick up Declan and go home. His hair was damp and messy from a full day stuffed into a cap and there were dark shadows under his eyes and Louise knew that his day was nowhere near over. She’d already rung Theatre to check on Mr Hamilton, but apart from being told that the second lot of surgery had been particularly difficult and that he was now in Recovery, awaiting a bed on ICU, Louise wasn’t much wiser as to what had happened and was genuinely pleased for professional reasons when Daniel managed a brief appearance to check on a different patient and update the ward. ‘His spleen had ruptured. It was good that we got him to Theatre so quickly—it was a massive bleed…’
‘Then it’s lucky that we got him in time—’ Elaine started, and though Louise could easily have pointed out that Elaine hadn’t even wanted to call a doctor to review him, frankly she couldn’t be bothered. And, anyway, it was Daniel who interrupted her.
‘Luck had nothing to do with it,’ he said firmly. ‘It was entirely down to diligent nursing care. On paper, Mr Hamilton looked OK when Louise called. A lot of nurses would have waited—doctors, too,’ he added, and Elaine at least had the grace to blush a little. ‘You did very well, Louise—as always!’ Their eyes met and Louise coloured up, feeling that squirming pleasure of old—remembering the tiny secret smiles that had filled their working days in London, the double meanings in their conversations, the ‘work calls’ that had been anything but, glimpsing the pleasure that could soon be hers all over again.
‘You look completely exhausted, Danny,’ Elaine said, quickly recovering from her flash of guilt and going on to far more important matters! ‘Would you like a coffee? Decent coffee,’ she pushed boldly. ‘I’ve got some in my locker!’ ‘Louise could only admire her boldness, well, only because she knew Daniel well enough to know that he’d turn Elaine down. A coffee and a flirt just wasn’t his style—and Elaine was definitely flirting!
Famous last thoughts! Louise’s head practically turned a full 360 degrees, as after only the briefest of hesitations, Daniel rewarded Elaine’s efforts with a very nice, albeit tired, smile. ‘Sounds good!’
CHAPTER SEVEN
‘WOW!’ Breezing into Jordan’s room the following Thursday, Louise nearly dropped the cup of medicine she was carrying as she saw Jordan, who had long since become her favourite patient, instead of dozing after lunch, up on the treadmill, his skinny, wasted legs struggling to keep up with the slow pace, determination etched on his features.
‘I’m sorry.’ Turning around, Jordan gave an apologetic smile. ‘I know I’m supposed to wait till there’s someone in the room.’
‘For now, you should let us know,’ Louise said, ‘but I’ll speak to Mr Ashwood when he does his round tomorrow and tell him how well you’re doing. I’m sure he’ll be delighted with your progress—you’re doing great!’
‘So are you.’ Jordan grinned at his favourite nurse. ‘Have you lost weight or something?’
‘A bit,’ Louise gave a pleased, embarrassed shrug.
‘And your hair, it’s…’ Jordan frowned as he peered more closely ‘…nice, sort of shiny.’
‘I just used a different conditioner,’ Louise said blithely, which was a rather paltry summing up for the high-gloss salon treatment and eyebrow wax that would appear on her credit-card statement at the end of the month!
‘Danny’s cool.’ Gossip over and slightly breathless, Jordan stepped off the machine and Louise was thrilled that he didn’t collapse on the bed. Instead, he moved to the chair and opened a can of high-protein drink. ‘I was feeling so sorry for myself.’ Jordan’s voice was getting stronger and, unlike just a few days before when she’d had to strain to catch every breathless word, Louise was able to do his obs and tidy up his rather messy room while chatting to him, though the Daniel that Jordan was describing wasn’t a particularly familiar one! In fact, the Danny Jordan was describing sounded like a different doctor entirely.
‘He comes in to see me quite a lot—sometimes late, when he’s finished operating.’
‘That’s nice,’ Louise said, but she was frowning. ‘How often?’
‘Most days he comes in for a chat—tells me to keep at it. He told me that I should eat within half an hour of exercising if I want to start putting on some muscle. He said that when he….’ His voice trailed off and Louise looked up from the pillows she was changing, checking that he was OK—now and then Jordan struggled to swallow, but from what she could see he was doing fine. In fact, Louise realised, he’d chosen to end the conversation.
‘When he what?’ Louise asked.
‘Nothing.’ Jordan shrugged, blushing a bit. ‘It was just something he told me—made me realise that he understands.’
She had no idea what Jordan meant. Daniel was surely the last person who would understand how it felt to be a teenager. Louise had wondered sometimes if Daniel had bypassed adolescence and gone straight into serious adult mode, but, then again, hadn’t it been Danny who’d reminded his team not to lose sight of the fact that Jordan was so young, to take his acne and depression over his body changes seriously?
But whatever the reason, Jordan had clearly became a rare favourite of Daniel’s, and the fact he was taking some time out of his busy schedule to pay a bit of extra attention to this young patient was clearly reaping rewards. Jordan was more than a little impressed by his ‘cool’ doctor and was finally motivated.
‘Right, if you can leave your cocktail for a moment,’ Louise joked as she pulled on some gloves, ‘can you lift your T-shirt so that I can put some cream on your back?’
His skin was still a mess. The cream and medication he had been started on would take a couple more weeks to start taking effect, as would the anti-depressants the psychiatrist had prescribed, but whatever Daniel had said to Jordan was clearly working. Gone was the sullen withdrawn young man. Visitors were coming in to see him now and just having his friends and a glimmer of confidence back was doing a thousand times more than any prescription ever could.
‘How long do you think till I’m ready for rehab?’
‘I don’t know,’ Louise admitted, as she rubbed in the cream. ‘You’ve had a lot of tests done this week. Once Mr Ashwood’s reviewed all the results, we’ll know more.’
‘Do you think I’ll get rid of…?’
He still couldn’t say it. He hated his colostomy so fiercely that Louise said the word for him.
‘The colostomy is only temporary, Jordan. Depending on your test results, you’ll either go to rehab and come back here for the surgery somewhe
re down the track, or if it’s ready to be reversed then you’ll have the surgery first and stay here in hospital for a bit longer. It’ll take a good couple of weeks to recover enough to go to rehab.’
‘I don’t care,’ Jordan sighed, as Louise pulled down his T-shirt. ‘I just want rid of it.’
‘You’ve got a call, Louise.’ Shona popped her head around the door. ‘And you’ve got some visitors, Jordan.’
A group of teenagers wandered in, offering ‘yo’s’ and high fives, and seeing the expression on Jordan’s face, Louise was only too happy to ignore the two-visitors rule and go and answer her call.
‘Sister Andrews speaking.’
‘God, you sound formal,’ Maggie giggled. ‘Just ringing to let you know I definitely won’t be home tonight—I’m going out with a friend and intend to drink too much to drive home so I’ll crash there.’
‘There’s really no need. It’s not as if…’ Louise started, but Daniel chose that moment to appear on the ward and, like moths to a flame, every nurse within sight chose to have to locate something at the nurses’ station. So Louise was forced into silence as Maggie prattled happily on.
‘There’s every need. I loaded the dishwasher before I left and I’ve moved Declan’s cot into my room!’
‘Why?’ Louise asked as Daniel gave her a brief nod and asked her if she knew where Jordan’s obs chart was.
‘I’ve got it here,’ Louise said, handing it to him. ‘I was just about to write it up.’
‘That’s him, isn’t it?’ Maggie squealed in delight down the phone, taking advantage of Louise’s forced silence and talking ten to the dozen. ‘Why do you think, Louise? For heaven’s sake, it’s hardly a conventional first date. And anyway you two never could keep your hands off each other!’
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