Maternal Instinct

by Caroline Anderson

  ‘You look worried,’ the senior sister, Angie, said to her as they left the cubicle together a few moments later.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Eve said, shaking her head. ‘Not worried, exactly…’

  ‘Just not certain?’

  Eve nodded. ‘Something like that.’

  Angie shrugged. ‘We all do it—get funny feelings. I’ll check her again before I let her go. So—how are Meg and Ben and the baby?’

  ‘Oh—you know them?’

  ‘Oh, yes. Meg’s one of ours. They met when Ben was filming here. Love at first sight and all that. I’ve never seen anyone fall so quick—well, apart from Fliss and Tom. There must be something in the water down here!’ She chuckled. ‘Anyway, how are they all?’

  Eve remembered the looks on their faces, and smiled. ‘They’re great. The baby’s gorgeous—absolutely lovely. Perfect. Ten tiny fingers, ten tiny toes, Ben’s mouth, Meg’s nose—I don’t know. Beautiful. Somehow it makes everything fall into place.’

  ‘And Meg?’

  ‘She’s fine. They’re all fine,’ she said. ‘It was a beautiful, peaceful textbook delivery, and it was a privilege to be there. I felt really honoured—does that sound stupid?’

  Angie shook her head. ‘No. I know exactly what you mean. Give them my love when you see them. Tell them I’ll be up when I can. And if you like I’ll keep Mrs Ryan in for a while, keep an eye on her for you. Would that be an idea?’

  Eve nodded, relieved. ‘Can you do that? Will she stay? I don’t want to admit her, really, I’m just—’

  ‘Not certain. That’s fine. I’ll dream up some excuse and delay her for a while and keep an eye. We’ll be in touch.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  She went back up to the ward and found Hugh cuddling the Maguire baby.

  ‘Angie sends her love,’ Eve told the proud parents, and then turned to Hugh. ‘There’s a patient down there—a Mrs Ryan. She’s had a low-speed RTA, and she’s fine. Thirty-five weeks.’

  ‘But?’

  She shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I couldn’t find anything wrong, but I just have a gut feeling.’

  ‘Act on it. Admit her if you’re uncertain.’

  ‘But there’s nothing wrong.’

  ‘There often isn’t. We’ve got space—I’d rather be safe than sorry.’

  ‘Angie’s sitting on her for now. She’ll let us know if there’s anything. Anyway, she’s got a toddler, she won’t want to leave him just because I’ve got a hunch.’

  ‘Don’t worry about it. I’ll get the ward on standby for her.’

  Eve was startled. ‘Really? But it’s probably nothing—just me being over-cautious.’

  ‘Don’t knock it. Listen to your instincts.’

  Heavens. Everyone was telling her to listen to her instincts. She just hoped they were reliable and weren’t going to turn her into a laughing stock. She didn’t like it one bit, but there had just been something…

  When Mrs Ryan’s pressure crashed suddenly two hours later and she was rushed into Theatre for an emergency section because of a placental abruption, Eve heaved a sigh of relief and conceded privately that maybe—just maybe—there was a place in medicine for gut feelings.

  Or maybe there had been something that she’d recognised subconsciously as a warning sign but just hadn’t catalogued.

  Yes. That had to be it. Nothing to do with guts.

  At all.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  ‘GOOD call,’ Hugh said when it was over. ‘So, was there really nothing to go on? Did she have any symptoms at all?’

  Eve shook her head. ‘No, nothing—and nothing showed on the ultrasound. It just felt…wrong.’

  ‘You must be fey,’ he teased, but she got the feeling he was impressed. She wasn’t, because it had been such an odd sensation, and, no matter how she’d tried to justify it to herself, there wasn’t anything else she could put it down to, just a gut feeling that not all was quite as it seemed, and she didn’t want to work like that. She wanted facts and figures, things she could quantify, not fey nonsense. That was too scary, too intuitive, and it might let her down.

  ‘Hey, stop fretting. We all do this from time to time. It doesn’t make you weird, it just makes you a good doctor. Relax. Chill. Live with it.’

  His eyes were kind, his mouth quirking into a smile that did silly things to her insides, and she got the strangest feeling he was going to hug her.

  Again.

  For the second time today.

  Uh-uh. There was only so much hugging a person could cope with and still fool herself she could keep things professional, so she moved out of his way, giving them both a little more room, and flashed him a smile.

  ‘Consider me chilled,’ she said. ‘Right. I’m going to grab a break before I go and check on the post-ops. I haven’t had a drink for hours.’

  ‘Good idea. I’ll join you,’ he said promptly.

  So much for putting space between them, but it seemed it was only her head that was objecting, because her body fell neatly into step beside him as he headed for the lift that would take them down to the entry level and the little café at the back of the hospital that the public still hadn’t really tracked down.

  He picked up a mug of tea and a chocolate-chip muffin, and she went for coffee and an iced bun, beating him to the checkout and paying for both lots before he could get his wallet out of his pocket.

  He frowned at her, but she just shook her head. ‘Uh-uh. My turn. I owe you loads of meals, and at this rate I’ll end up having to cook you a slap-up dinner to make up for it.’

  Something wistful flickered in his eyes for a second. ‘Sounds good,’ he murmured. ‘It’s years since a woman under fifty cooked for me. When did you have in mind?’

  She laughed a little awkwardly. ‘I haven’t asked you yet.’

  ‘Well, feel free. I’m not busy on Friday night, and you aren’t either.’

  ‘You sound very sure.’

  ‘I am. I checked the rota this morning.’

  ‘Why?’

  His grin was wry. ‘Because I was going to ask you out to dinner. However, if I’ve got a better offer…’

  Eve felt her heart thump against her ribs. This was so silly. He was her boss. She had to keep a distance—not lure him into her very cosy apartment and threaten the status quo. A glass of wine and a packet of crisps had been dangerous enough. Maybe dinner out would be safer. More people, less intimate.

  Further from a nice, big, comfy double bed.

  ‘No better offer. Feel free to ask me,’ she retorted, and he laughed and sat back.

  ‘I rather liked the sound of you cooking for me,’ he said softly, his eyes tracking over hers, the warmth in them unmistakable now.

  She shook her head. ‘Not enough credit yet.’

  His grin was lazy and easy, but the heat in his eyes was anything but. ‘I’ll have to do something about that—something really special that’ll crank up the balance and tip the scales.’ He drained his cup, brushed off his hands and met her eyes again. ‘Seven-thirty, Friday night. Smart-casual. I’ll pick you up.’

  And without waiting for her to reply, he got up and walked away, leaving her struggling for breath and common sense. Just then she didn’t seem to have enough of either!

  He must be mad, Hugh thought on his way into the hospital on Friday morning. He had to work with her, and muddying the waters was just crazy. So was he—driven crazy by the prospect of spending an entire evening with her in a romantic little bistro just designed for lovers.

  ‘How’s it going?’

  He turned to find Julia falling into step beside him, and his heart sank. The last thing he needed was the clinical director of their department interrogating him on his new staff member.

  ‘It’s going fine,’ he said. ‘She’s excellent.’

  ‘Good. I’m glad. I’d hate you to be proved wrong at a patient’s expense. Just remember—keep your hands to yourself. Which reminds me, there’s a resuscitation refresher course running
tonight. I’ve checked the rota and you’re free, so I’ve booked you in.’

  ‘That doesn’t mean I’m available,’ he pointed out, but she just raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Unless it’s life or death, you’re free,’ she said bluntly. ‘This is a very important course and I think we should take advantage of it. Besides, I’ve booked you a place.’

  ‘OK. You’d better book us all in, then.’

  Her brows hitched together into a frown. ‘All?’

  ‘Mmm,’ he said, suppressing his smile. ‘Me, Oliver and Eve. Alison will be fine, she’s just done a stint in A and E.’

  Her frown deepened. ‘I don’t know if we can fit all of you in.’

  ‘Sure you can. We’ll take turns, be the same person, if necessary.’

  ‘Oh.’ She looked disappointed—no, make that thwarted—and his suspicions were confirmed with her next breath. ‘I had thought we could get together afterwards—have a chat about things over a drink.’

  Hell, would she never give up? ‘Sorry, I’ve got plans for later.’

  Involving Eve, and a postponement of their dinner date, but Julia didn’t need to know that. In fact, the less she knew about his private life, especially where it overlapped with his new registrar’s, the better.

  ‘Cancel them.’

  He shook his head. ‘Sorry, no can do. Carved in stone.’

  ‘Family?’

  ‘You guessed,’ he said, failing to point out that she’d guessed wrong. ‘Sorry, got to fly, I’ve got paperwork to catch up on and we’re still on take, so any minute now I’ll be needed in Theatre. Don’t forget, three of us, please.’

  And for the second time in a few minutes, he walked away from a woman without giving her a chance to argue.

  ‘Change of plan.’

  Eve tilted her head and felt her brows quirk together. ‘Plan?’

  ‘For tonight. Julia thought we should do a resus refresher course. She’s booked us in—you, me and Oliver. Six-thirty in the teaching block.’

  ‘Oh.’ How ridiculous, to feel such a surge of disappointment when she’d been panicking about their date anyway and wondering why she’d agreed! ‘We’ll have to take a rain-check on dinner,’ she said, hoping she didn’t sound as pathetically forlorn as she felt, but Hugh shook his head.

  ‘Only for a couple of hours. Unless you’re going to turn into a pumpkin or something, we can make it later. I’ve made the reservation for nine-thirty to be on safe side. That should still give you time to get all gussied up if we finish by seven-thirty.’

  ‘That gussied up?’ she said on a splutter of laughter. ‘Where on earth are you taking me?’

  ‘Somewhere nice,’ he said softly. ‘Somewhere to spoil us both a bit.’

  Her heart thumped against her ribs, but she ignored the warning. ‘Nine-thirty? I can get as gussied as I get in ten minutes. Should we make it earlier so we don’t starve to death?’

  He grinned. ‘I’ll make it eight forty-five. We don’t want you fading away.’

  She grinned back. ‘Sounds good. And I thought it was the coach that turned into a pumpkin.’

  His shrug was the sexiest thing she’d seen in ages, and she had to swallow her little moan of appreciation. ‘Whatever,’ he said, his grin still teasing around those gorgeous honey-brown eyes. ‘Right. Ward round. I’ve got mums that need inducing and patients for discharge and I think there’s a tricky delivery under way, if Molly’s harassed look is anything to go by.’

  ‘Tricky?’ she said, falling in beside him as he set off down the ward, notes in hand.

  ‘Mmm. A breech that’s failed to co-operate, wouldn’t turn and is working on getting stuck. I think if there’s no progress soon, she’ll be in Theatre.’

  ‘What a shame.’

  ‘It is, but not as much of a shame as losing a perfectly healthy baby, which might be the alternative.’

  He paused beside a bed, squirted gel on his hands and rubbed it in as he greeted their first patient, Beth Ryan, the woman who’d had the placental abruption on Wednesday.

  ‘Mrs Ryan, good to see you. How are you feeling?’ he asked, and she rolled her eyes.

  ‘Apart from having an abdominal incision I wasn’t reckoning on, a fractious two-year-old who’s driving my husband crazy and a car with a hole in the side of it? Oh, I’m peachy!’

  ‘But you’re alive, and so’s your baby, thanks to Eve here and her gut feelings, so it isn’t all bad,’ Hugh reminded her gently, and her eyes softened as she glanced at the crib beside her.

  ‘Yes. We’re alive, and you’re right, that’s all that matters. So I have you to thank for not letting me go home?’ she added, smiling at Eve, who nodded.

  ‘Well, sort of. Mr Douglas agreed that it was better to be safe than sorry if I had any doubts.’

  ‘Eve doesn’t like gut feelings,’ Hugh put in, ‘but sometimes they come up trumps.’ He smiled at her and turned his attention to the baby for a moment. ‘So how is young baby Ryan?’

  ‘Greedy and doing really well. They kept him in SCBU for the first night, but they said at thirty-five weeks he was pretty much ready anyway, and as he’s feeding so well, they thought he should be here with me. I’m not going to argue, I hated it up there. All those instruments and everybody hovering and looking haggard and sick with fright—it scared me to bits.’

  ‘It can be pretty grim up there, but they have the most incredible success stories.’

  ‘Oh, I know, and if he’d needed it I would have been more than grateful. I’m just even more grateful that he didn’t, if you know what I mean.’

  ‘Absolutely. Right, let’s have a look at your tummy and make sure it’s healing OK, and then, if you’re feeling all right over the weekend and they’re happy for you to take the baby home, you can go home on Monday.’

  She looked worried, but Hugh didn’t see, his head bent over her abdomen, checking her suture line and the height of her fundus to make sure her uterus was shrinking back down nicely.

  Eve, though, watching her, wondered if she was uneasy about going home so soon. ‘Is that a problem, going home on Monday?’ she asked softly, and Beth shrugged.

  ‘Not really. I just feel—I don’t know. A bit nervous. Christopher’s a bit full on, you know? Toddlers can be like loose cannons, and I’m quite sore. I don’t know if I can look after him yet.’

  ‘No, you can’t,’ Hugh said firmly, perching on the arm of the chair and looking sternly at her. ‘Definitely. You have to have help. You can look after the baby, but the two-year-old is too heavy for you to lift. You can cuddle him and read to him and play with his toys when the baby’s asleep, but someone else will have to do the physical stuff for a while—maybe weeks. If you aren’t careful you could end up splitting your stitches and getting an incisional hernia.’

  ‘Oh.’ She sagged back against the pillows, her eyes troubled, but then she shrugged. ‘Oh, well, if it has to be, it has to be. My mother’s offered to come, but I didn’t like to ask her. I should be able to cope.’

  ‘No, ask her,’ Hugh advised. ‘You’ll need her and, in my experience, being needed is what mothers do best. I’ll see you in my follow-up clinic in a few weeks just to make sure everything’s as it ought to be, but I’m sure it will be. Until then, you take care, and you’ll be surprised how much better you feel by Monday, anyway.’

  They left her phoning her husband on the patient-line phone attached to the bedside TV screen, and as they walked away, they heard her say, ‘Do you want the good news first, or the bad news?’

  Hugh chuckled. ‘I guess mother-in-law is the bad news,’ he murmured, and Eve shot him a sideways look.

  ‘I thought your mother-in-law was wonderful?’

  He looked surprised. ‘Oh, she is—she was fantastic when we had the children, and she’s fantastic now. But I’ve also learned how to deal with her over the years, and we get on really well. Not everyone’s that lucky. Besides, what could she find fault with in me?’

  His eyes were wide and innocent,
and Eve snorted. ‘Apart from the things you got up to with her daughter at the tender age of seventeen—’

  ‘Sixteen,’ he corrected with a grin. ‘Jo was sixteen when we met. Seventeen when Tom was conceived, eighteen when he was born—and we were married by then, so we were sort of forgiven.’

  So it hadn’t been a silly little teenage mistake, then, more the unfortunate consequence of a slip-up during a long-term relationship. A relationship that, without Jo’s death, would probably still be going on now.

  And she was having dinner tonight with Jo’s husband.

  A sudden shiver ran through her, and Hugh gave her a quizzical look. ‘You OK?’

  ‘I’m fine,’ she said, summoning a smile. Just a trifle haunted by your late wife, she could have added, but getting that out of her would have been harder than pulling teeth.

  ‘I wonder how Molly’s delivery’s going?’ he murmured, and Eve was hugely relieved at the change of subject.

  ‘Should we check?’

  ‘Good idea.’

  Eve paused. ‘I’ve never seen a vaginal breech delivery, only a section. Before we go in, can you tell me what your criteria are for intervening?’

  ‘Of course. Maternal or foetal distress, mainly. Parity’s a good indicator, often. Being a first baby tends to indicate a likely problem for the following head, because it’s bigger than the baby’s bottom so there’s going to be a delay while the cervix dilates further, and in that time the cord’s trapped against the baby’s skull and the oxygen supply is cut off.’

  ‘Not good.’

  ‘No, not good. It’s less of a problem in a multiparous woman because the path’s already been cleared. It’s a bit like trail-blazing. Once it’s been done, it’s usually easier for subsequent deliveries, because the tissues have been stretched, and also there tends to be less maternal tension and conflict with the process. First-time mums can be their own worst enemies without realising it, and a breech presentation just makes it worse. For that reason we almost always prefer to deliver breech-first babies by elective Caesarean section.’