Seven Nights with Her Ex

by Louisa Heaton

  ‘What if the break is inside the boot?’ asked Rick.

  ‘You leave the boot on. The boot itself can act as a splint around the ankle sometimes—it’s for you to judge what needs to be done.’

  ‘What if we do something wrong?’

  ‘You might never know. Or the patient might get worse, in which case you’ll assess and treat accordingly. You can use sticks for splints, or walking poles, backpacks, snowshoes, the straps off your packs—anything that will provide a steady and supportive purpose.’

  Rick nodded. ‘Okay, but when we put a splint alongside the injury, how exactly do we attach it? In the middle? Where the injury is?’

  ‘No. Fasten the splint above and below the suspected fracture.’

  ‘Right. And what about an open fracture? Do we bind it? Compress it?’

  ‘No. Leave it uncovered before you splint, and if you can find enough splints to go around the injury on all sides, that’s even better. Use padding, if you need to, to prevent discomfort—torn clothing…whatever you can find. But remember to keep checking it afterwards, because the wound may cause swelling and the splinting may then be too tight. You need to assess frequently and often. Have you all got that?’

  They nodded.

  ‘Right. Now the practical. With your buddy, I want you to practise assessing for and splinting a left ankle break. Remember to do a scene survey, and a primary and secondary survey. Remember your rules of three and use the environment around you to find and locate splints. Patients—give your doctor a few surprises. I’ll come round and assess when you’re done.’

  Beau looked to Gray. It was his turn to be the patient. But for some reason he looked extremely uncomfortable, and she wondered briefly what it was that was worrying him. He’d seemed fine just a moment ago.

  Was he thinking of a way to surprise her? As Mack had suggested? If he was, then she was determined to be ready for him.

  CHAPTER SIX

  ‘MAYBE I SHOULD be the doctor for this one,’ Gray suggested.

  ‘No. You’ve already rescued me. It’s your turn to be the patient.’

  ‘I was the patient for the leg wound. It’s your turn.’

  She looked at him, feeling exasperated. Why was he getting antsy all of a sudden? Why didn’t he want to be the patient? He’d get to sit down and have a rest!

  Beau decided to give him ‘the look’—the one that told him, Sit down right now. I don’t have time for this!

  Gray cursed silently, his lips forming expletives she couldn’t hear, before he shook his head in defeat and sank down to the floor.

  ‘Do my right ankle.’

  ‘Mack said the left.’

  ‘Well, I’m surprising you. I broke my right one.’

  ‘Gray, what’s the matter with you? Now, first of all the scene survey. It’s safe for me to approach you…there are no hazards.’ She knelt down beside him and smiled broadly. ‘What seems to be the problem?’

  Gray tried his best glare, but when he could see that it wasn’t having any effect on her, he resigned himself to what was about to happen. ‘My ankle hurts. I think I’ve broken it. I heard something snap.’

  ‘Uh-huh. Which one?’ She smiled at him sympathetically and saw his face soften under her onslaught of sweetness.

  He let out a breath. ‘My left.’

  She nodded, glad he was finally playing ball. Though why on earth he’d wanted to swap ankles was beyond her. She had noticed that he had been limping slightly. Perhaps she was about to find out that he really did have blisters and hadn’t been looking after them properly.

  ‘Okay. So, primary survey—your airway is clear, you’re breathing normally and there don’t appear to be any bleeds. Do you feel pain anywhere else?’

  ‘Only in my pride.’

  She laughed, puzzled by the strange discomfort he seemed to be displaying. ‘Okay…so, secondary survey. Lie back—be a good patient.’

  Gray lay back on the ground, but she could see he wasn’t relaxed at all. He looked tense. Apprehensive. It was odd. This was a simple scenario—he should be fine about all of this.

  ‘Okay, and on a scale of one to ten, with zero being no pain and ten being excruciating pain, how would you rate it?’

  ‘Definitely a ten.’

  ‘And how did you damage your ankle?’

  ‘I slipped. I wasn’t concentrating.’

  ‘Uh-huh. Okay, I’m going to check the rest of you and make sure there are no other injuries. Just relax for me, if you can.’

  She felt around the back of his neck and pressed either side of his neck vertebrae. No reaction. Then she felt his shoulders, checked his clavicle, then ribcage.

  There was plenty of reaction. In her own body!

  Touching him like this, enveloping the muscle groups as she checked both his arms, patted down his hips and applied a small amount of pressure on the hip bones, aware of how close her hands were to his skin, was almost unbearable. Her hands encompassed the thick, strong muscles of his thighs, moved past his knees down to his…

  Huh? What was that?

  She sat back and frowned, staring at his lower leg, then glancing up at his face in question. Waiting for him to answer. To explain.

  ‘What is that, Gray? A brace?’

  Had he hurt his leg? Had he been hiding an injury all this time? What had he done to himself?

  Gray sat upright and his cheeks coloured slightly. His brows bunched heavily over his eyes and the muscle in his jaw clenched and unclenched before he answered her, without meeting her gaze. ‘It’s a prosthetic.’

  She felt a physical shift in her chest, as if her heart had plummeted to the dirty ground below, and her stomach rolled and churned at the thought that he’d been so hurt somehow. That Gray—her once beloved, powerful and strong Gray—had been hurt to such an extent that he had physically lost a part of him.

  ‘A what?’ she asked in an awed whisper, not wanting to believe him.

  The word ‘prosthetic’ literally meant an addition. An attachment. An artificial piece that replaced a missing body part. Something lost from disease, or a congenital condition, or trauma.

  She could feel herself going numb. Withdrawing, almost. If she heard his answer, it would make it even more real.

  Gray sighed and lifted up his left trouser leg, looked at her directly this time. ‘I lost my foot, and some of my leg below the knee.’

  She stared at it. Watched as he peeled off his boot and then his sock and revealed it to her in its full glory. The shiny plastic exterior…the solid metal bar from mid-shin down to the ankle, where the fake foot began.

  ‘Gray…’

  ‘Please don’t, Beau. Don’t tell me you’re sorry. There’s no need to be. I can still do what anyone else does. People have climbed Everest with a prosthetic.’

  ‘I know, but…’

  ‘You always told me—always warned me—that I took too many risks and, well…here you are. You were proved right. I did something stupid.’

  She reached out to touch it, then stopped. She had no right to touch him there. Or anywhere, really. Her hand dropped back to her lap. ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘Apart from missing half a limb?’

  ‘How did it happen?’

  He pulled his trouser leg back down. ‘It’s a long story.’

  ‘I want to hear it.’

  ‘Why? We’re not together any more—you don’t have to prove you care.’

  ‘Gray—’

  ‘Please, Beau, leave it. Just splint the ankle.’

  ‘Are you sure? I could just—’

  ‘Just…splint it.’

  She looked at his downcast face, the anger in his eyes, and her heart physically ached for him. To see him like this—bared and open…wounded. Not the strong Gray he’d always shown the world, but having to—being forced to—reveal a weakness… Beau knew how that must be making him feel.

  But it didn’t matter. His prosthesis didn’t make him any less. He was still Gray. And he was right. People to
day could do anything with a prosthesis. Look at all those athletes. Or any ordinary person, carrying on with life. He was still a top cardiologist. It didn’t stop him from operating. It didn’t stop him from saving people’s lives. But how to say that to him without sounding preachy? He knew it already. Surely?

  He’s still the same Gray. Life tries to strike you down, and though it feels, at the time, like it’s the worst thing you’ll ever have to get through, like you’ll never survive…well, you do get through it. You do survive. You’re changed. You’re different. But you survive.

  She knew Gray must have gone through a period of grieving for his lower leg and foot. A part of him truly was missing. But he was strong. Resilient. She had to believe in that. He was here, wasn’t he? Hiking across Yellowstone for a week. You didn’t do that on a prosthetic unless you were determined and believed in yourself.

  Beau began to look around her for something to use for splints. There was plenty of wood, but she needed to find something sturdy enough to support a joint. There were some thick pieces of wood over at the treeline and she gathered them and came back to Gray. She silently began attaching them, using the bungee cords from her backpack. She fastened them, checked to make sure they weren’t too tight, then knelt back and waited for him to look at her.

  ‘Please tell me how it happened.’

  For a moment she didn’t think he was going to speak at all, but then he began.

  ‘There’s a place called St John’s Head on the Isle of Hoy, in the Orkneys. Have you heard of it?’

  She shook her head. ‘No.’

  ‘It’s considered the world’s hardest sea cliff climb and I wanted to give it a try.’

  She nodded. Of course he had. That was what he’d always been like. Pushing the envelope. Pushing boundaries. Seeing how far he could go.

  ‘You’re not just fighting the heights and the rock there, but the gale-force winds, the rain, the birds dropping…’ He paused for a moment to think about his choice of words. ‘Dropping stuff on you. It’s a sheer rock face, with almost no fingerholds. There’s a route called the Long Hope. It’s amazing. You have to see it to believe it.’

  ‘It sounds…exposed.’

  He gave a laugh. ‘You have no idea. When you’re up there, you feel like you’re the only person in the world.’

  ‘You went alone, didn’t you?’

  He nodded. ‘I was trying to free climb it. No ropes, no equipment. This other guy managed it a few years ago. I’m an experienced climber—I’d done free climbing before—I thought I’d be okay.’

  ‘But something went wrong?’

  Gray nodded. ‘Before I knew what was happening, I was falling. I hit the rocks below, broke my leg in three places, fractured my pelvis, had an open fracture of the ankle. Luckily I had my phone. More importantly, I had a signal. Mountain Rescue and the coastguard joined forces and got me to a hospital.’

  ‘Did they try and save your leg?’

  ‘They tried. I had three surgeries. But an infection set in and they had to amputate. It wasn’t the fall that lost me my foot—it was bacteria.’

  She felt sick. It was awful. Yet he’d got himself back up, carried on with his demanding work, come on this course…

  ‘Is that why you’re here? To prove to yourself that you can still achieve things?’

  Gray shifted on the ground and fidgeted with the splint she’d assembled on his lower leg. ‘Maybe.’

  ‘You’re still you, you know? Just because there’s a physical piece missing, it doesn’t mean you’re any less than who you were.’

  She was a little shocked that she hadn’t realised he was injured in this way. She’d noticed the limping, but it hadn’t occurred to her that it might be something so significant. What else had she missed about Gray?

  ‘I know that. I was mad at myself for making a mistake on the cliff. Even now I can’t pinpoint what went wrong, and that irks me. But I knew if I got one of the more expensive prosthetics I could still do things like this. Still have my adventures.’

  She smiled at him. That was better. The fighting spirit she knew and…

  She glanced at the ground, feeling her cheeks colour. ‘Go on, then—tell me. I know you’re dying to. What are the specs on this thing?’

  He gave a sheepish grin. ‘It’s got a tibial rotator, which allows the leg to rotate even when the foot is placed firmly on the ground. It also helps prevent skin irritation in the socket, where there’s an extra gel padding cuff for hiking trips. The foot itself is multiaxial, so it can tilt and rotate over uneven ground.’

  ‘Sounds top of the line.’

  ‘It is.’

  ‘I’m glad you’re out here.’

  Gray looked surprised, then reached out and laid his hand on hers, curling his fingers around her palm and squeezing back when he felt her hand squeeze his. ‘Thank you, Beau. I don’t deserve you. I never did.’

  She didn’t know what to say. He was wrong! He did deserve her! Even now she could feel…

  Beau swallowed hard, trying to find an anchor in this sea of swirling emotions she was reeling under. She wanted to wrap her arms around him and hold him. She wanted to press him close. To feel him safe in her arms. But another part…a much smaller part…told her to keep holding back. Told her that this was Gray and she was crazy even to be thinking of giving this man comfort.

  Instead she concentrated on the feel of his hand in hers. Its steady strength. Its warmth. The solidity of him near her. His presence—all too real and all too confusing.

  Why couldn’t she have been there to help him during his time of need?

  Would I have gone if he’d called me and asked?

  Yes. I would have.

  They sat quietly, holding hands, until Mack came alongside them to assess Beau’s splinting skills and medical surveys. They dropped each other’s hand like a hot coal at the ranger’s approach. Only once Mack had given Beau a big thumbs-up and suggested that they swap roles did they manage to look at each other again.

  Something had changed between them.

  Something weird and almost intangible. Whatever it was, it had strength and influence, and Beau lay on the ground and tried to ignore the feelings raging through her body as Gray assessed her for injury and applied a splint to her left ankle. Her cheeks kept flushing, she felt hot, her stomach was turning and spinning like a roulette wheel, and she tried to tamp down the physical awareness she felt with every touch of his hands.

  When Mack called for a break, and told them all to make camp and put up their tents, she hurried over to her backpack and put her tent up quickly, eager to get inside and just hide for a while. Gather her thoughts. Regroup her emotions. Wipe away the solitary tear that rolled down her cheek at the thought of Gray broken and alone at the base of a sea cliff.

  What does all this mean?

  Am I in trouble?

  *

  It was Leo’s turn at the cooking pot, and he had rustled up a spicy potato dish. Gray had no idea what had gone into it, just knew that it tasted good and he wanted more. But, as always, Mack had limited the rations so that they were always just the empty side of full, burning more calories in the day than they were able to take in, so they could see how hunger might affect their choices.

  Tomorrow would see the start of the paired orienteering—sending the buddied couples out into the wild on their own, to see if they could navigate to a particular spot, make it safely and deal with any issues on the way. It had been the part of the week that he’d been looking forward to the most—surviving on his own wits with just one other person. But now…now he wasn’t sure.

  Now Beau knew about his leg. He’d tried his hardest to hide it from her, feeling a little foolish about it at first, but now he’d come clean and she wasn’t fazed at all.

  But I still feel incomplete. Is it just my leg? Or is something else bothering me?

  If he’d ever felt he might stand another chance with her, that feeling had died when he’d fallen from that cliff and lo
st that part of his leg. It had been a physical manifestation of the fact that he wasn’t whole. That he wasn’t the complete package. That he couldn’t offer her what she wanted from life. And that realisation still hurt like hell. He might have a new bionic foot and ankle, capable of coping with any terrain thrown at it, but what about him? What could he cope with?

  Beau had meant everything to him. She’d made his heart sing and he’d been able to forget all the drama and misery of his own home when he’d been with her. She had brought him comfort and repose. A soft place to fall. She had been his home.

  But he’d ruined it. That tiny slip, that tiny lapse of concentration, and he’d blurted out the one question he’d never thought he’d ask… Will you marry me?

  It had changed everything. Turned his happiness upside down, put a deadline on his joy. No, not a deadline—a death sentence. Marriage would have killed who they were. Their happiness at being in each other’s presence would slowly have been eroded and familiarity would have bred contempt. Living in each other’s pockets would have caused them to seek time apart, space from one another, just so they could breathe again. They would have grown to dread being in each other’s company, started to hate the way they ate their food, the way they fought about who wanted to go out and who wanted to stay in, whether they squeezed the toothpaste tube right… Every tiny thing would have been used as a stone to throw at the other.

  He’d lived it. He’d seen it. Been stuck in the middle of two warring factions—both sides of which he loved for different reasons, both sides of which he stayed away from for the same reasons…

  It was a fact that children imitated their parents. Gray might try not to be like them, but he was sure little things would sneak through. Sure, he might just have little quirks that at first Beau would find amusing, and then irritating, and then soon she’d be so opposed to them she would threaten to leave him unless he changed his ways…