Resisting Her Rebel Doc

by Joanna Neil

  ‘Maybe.’ The word came out as a whisper, but immediately she was filled with self-doubt. What was she doing even contemplating getting together with him? ‘I don’t know... I don’t know what I was thinking...’ She’d been hurt before—she wasn’t about to put herself through that heartache all over again, was she? In the cold light of day it seemed like sheer folly to go from a broken relationship straight into Brodie’s arms. What was she, some kind of masochist? ‘I should go...’

  She hurried along to her mother’s ward and sat with her for a while, calming herself down, slowing the churning in her stomach by eating one of the sandwiches from the pack she’d bought.

  ‘You seem stressed,’ her mother said, watching her from her bedside chair. ‘Is...everything all...right?’ She reached for a paper hanky. She sounded as though she was out of breath and Caitlin’s head went back a little in alarm.

  ‘I’m fine.’ She frowned. ‘Mum, what is it? Are you...?’ She stood up quickly as her mother began to cough and small flecks of blood appeared on the tissue.

  Swiftly, Caitlin drew the curtains around the bed and called for a nurse. ‘My mother’s not well,’ she told her as soon as she hurried forward. She quickly explained what had happened. ‘I’m concerned this is a new development. Will you ask the consultant to look in on her, please? I understand he’s still here in the department.’

  The girl nodded. ‘He ordered scans—they were done earlier this afternoon. I’ll page him right away. He’s on the next ward, doing a round of his patients.’

  ‘Thanks.’ Caitlin turned back to her mother, doing her best to make her comfortable. ‘It could be a chest infection,’ she told her, though she thought that unlikely with all the antibiotics she’d been given for her hip problem. A stronger possibility was that a blood clot had formed in her thigh because of her mother’s enforced lack of regular activity. That clot could have broken up and spread to her lungs, where an embolus would cause a blockage. That could be very bad news, depending on how large it was.

  The consultant appeared at her mother’s bedside within a few minutes. ‘I was going to look in on you very shortly, Mrs Braemar,’ he said, ‘but it looks like things are taking a bit of a turn. We’ll get you started on some supplemental oxygen right away.’ He indicated to the nurse to set that up then continued, ‘I’ve had a look at your scans and I’m afraid there are a few small blood clots in your lungs. That’s what’s causing the pain in your chest and it’s why you’re having difficulty breathing.’

  ‘Is it bad?’ Her mother took short, gasping breaths, clearly worried.

  ‘Not at the moment, my dear—not as bad as it might have been. The clots are small, you see, so we can start you on medication rather than having to do any more surgery.’

  ‘Tablets, you mean?’

  ‘Well, we’ll give you intravenous heparin to start with, because that acts quickly. It will stop the clots from getting any bigger and will prevent any more from forming. At the same time I want to start you on warfarin tablets. They take two or three days to work and once they’ve kicked in we can stop the heparin.’

  ‘So the clots won’t get any...bigger but they’ll...stay in my lungs?’ Her mother looked bewildered and Caitlin hurried to explain.

  ‘Your body will dissolve the clots gradually,’ she said. ‘You should start to feel better soon.’

  The consultant patted her mother’s hand. ‘At least your hip infection is clearing up,’ he said with a reassuring smile. ‘That’s one blessing.’

  ‘True.’ She made a weak smile. ‘Bring on the rest.’

  Caitlin stayed with her while the medication was started but left a little later when she saw her mother needed to sleep. The consultant had put a light slant on things but it was one more thing that Caitlin would worry about. Her mother had always been so active and healthy prior to these setbacks. It was upsetting to see her like this.

  She was subdued as she went back to the children’s unit. Her mother would be all right, she told herself; the clots weren’t huge and although she was uncomfortable she was in no immediate life-threatening danger.

  Brodie was tending a small patient with feeding difficulties when she went to check up on the lab results for the baby she’d seen earlier. He was in a nearby bay, setting up a drip feed so that the infant would receive nourishment after an abdominal operation. The baby cooed gently, enjoying the attention as Brodie made funny faces and wiggled his fingers.

  Caitlin watched them for a moment or two, her heart full. He was a natural with children. Why, oh why, did he make her care for him so much?

  He, in turn, glanced at her; he must have sensed that something was wrong because his expression was quizzical.

  ‘Something wrong with your mother?’ he asked.

  She nodded, not wanting to talk about it right now. She needed to keep a firm grip of herself so that she could do her job properly. Instead of saying anything more, she turned away and went to look through the lab reports.

  ‘How is your little fellow doing?’ Brodie asked later on as she went to check on the baby she’d seen earlier. He looked down at the crying infant in the cot and held out a hand to him. The baby grabbed one of his fingers and pulled, wriggling his legs. Brodie smiled.

  ‘He’s not too happy right now,’ she answered. ‘He’s been on indomethacin to alleviate the pain and try to reduce the swelling in his jaw but I think I’ll add a corticosteroid to get things working a bit better.’

  ‘Sounds good. Have you had the test results back yet?’

  She nodded. ‘They showed an elevated erythrocyte sedimentation rate and raised alkaline phosphatase among other things. After seeing the X-ray films, I think we’re dealing with Caffey’s disease.’ She grimaced faintly. ‘There are changes in the bones of his jaw and his thigh bones are wider than you would expect.’

  ‘That was well spotted, Caitlin.’ He looked at her with renewed respect. ‘From what I know of it, it’s a rare, not very well-understood disease—with a genetic basis, I believe?’

  She nodded. ‘It may be passed down through a parent, or it could be through a gene mutation. Of course, it may be rare simply because a lot of cases go undiagnosed in infancy.’

  ‘Yes—they tend to resolve themselves in early childhood.’

  ‘True. At least I can tell his parents that the disease is generally self-limiting and the bones should remodel themselves in a few months.’

  She organised the new drug regime and then checked her watch. Her shift was coming to an end and she needed to go and collect Daisy and get her settled at home. She would need to buy tins of dog meat, kibble and maybe supplements to sustain the pregnant dog—hopefully the vet would be able to advise her on what to get. A comfy, padded base for the dog bed would come in handy too.

  ‘You’re off home?’ Brodie walked with her to the exit doors.

  ‘Yes, in a few minutes. I have to drop these lab forms off in pathology first. I thought I would take a shortcut through the quadrangle.’

  He walked with her, stopping by the bench seat in the dappled shade of a silver birch. ‘I’m due a break,’ he said. ‘Do you have time to sit for a minute and tell me what’s going on with your mother? I’ve been to see her, but she always says she’s fine, and I know she isn’t.’

  ‘Oh...of course, I’m sorry. You must be worried about her too. I keep forgetting how close you were back when...’ Her voice trailed away. He wouldn’t want to keep being reminded of the time when his life had taken a nosedive. ‘She has some pulmonary emboli that are causing her problems—they’re not too large, and the consultant’s starting her on anti-coagulation therapy, so that should help things to get better.’ They sat down beside one another on the bench.

  ‘I’m sorry, Caity.’ He wrapped an arm around her shoulders. ‘I could see you were upset when you came back down to the unit. If there’s anything I can do to help you, tell me—it must be a shock, everything that’s happening.’

  She nodded wearily. ‘Things see
m to be going from bad to worse. I thought I’d have her at home by now, Brodie.’ She gazed up at him in despair. ‘She was always so active, into everything; it feels so strange, seeing her the way she is now.’

  ‘Her consultant’s a good man. I’m sure he’ll soon have her on the mend.’ He ran his palm down her back in a comforting gesture. ‘She’ll be back home with you before too long, you’ll see. She’s a fighter, your mum. Things will soon be back to how they were.’ He smiled. ‘You were always such a loving family unit—you, your mum and your dad.’

  ‘Yes, we were.’

  He sighed. ‘I’m almost ashamed to say I envied you back then—you seemed to have everything I was missing out on.’

  She looked at him in surprise. ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘There was always something not quite right between me and my dad.’ He shrugged. ‘I think your mother recognised that and that’s why she took me under her wing—David too, of course, after Mum died, though somehow he seemed to cope a bit better than I did. Yet your mother must have gone through agonies when your dad passed away.’

  ‘Yes, it was bad. It was very sudden, a heart attack that took him before we could realise what was happening. But she managed to hold things together. I think she felt she had to, for my sake...and yours. David’s too.’ She glanced at him. ‘My father’s death helped bring you and I closer together, didn’t it? It gave us a stronger bond...and my mother sensed that. I think she was pleased that we talked a lot because she knew we could be good for each other. She knew you were deeply troubled—not just about your mother—and she wanted to help.’

  ‘We needed all the support we could get. She’s a lovely woman. She was like a mother to me after my mum passed away. I always felt I could talk to her. She listened—she didn’t always offer advice, but she was there for me whenever I was wound up, wanting to hit out, needing to offload because of some new quarrel with my dad. She usually managed to calm me down somehow.’

  Caitlin frowned. ‘What did you argue about, you and your dad? I never understood it. You were the oldest child, the firstborn—I’d have expected things to be very different. But, like you said, you and your father never seemed to get on.’

  His mouth flattened. ‘No, we didn’t. I was never sure why, but nothing I did was ever good enough for him. The one, constant feeling he showed towards me was...irritation. In the end I learned to be guarded around him, I suppose. I tried to toe the line...until, one day, we had a terrible argument and everything came to a head and boiled over. I’d had enough at that point and I decided I wasn’t going to put up with his hassle any more.’

  She studied him, her grey eyes troubled. ‘What happened? I wish I could help, Brodie. You never spoke about it, so it must have been something major. Can you talk to me about it? Whatever it is, I promise, I’ll keep it to myself.’

  ‘I know.’ He idly caressed her shoulder, drawing her to him. He moved his head so that his temple brushed her cheek and the breath caught in her lungs. She wanted to hold him to her. He said quietly, ‘I trust you, where I wouldn’t trust anyone else—except my brother.’

  She loved the closeness, the warmth, that came from him but after a moment or two he straightened and she felt the loss acutely. Pulling herself together, remembering their surroundings, she said cautiously, ‘What was the argument about?’

  He gave a wry smile. ‘Actually, it was about David...or, at least, me looking after him. Dad was at work on the Saturday morning—Mum had a bad headache and was lying down. I was supposed to take David to a football training session but it was damp and drizzly and on the way there he said he didn’t want to go. He was never that much into football. He said he was going to hang out with a girl instead, someone we met up with along the way. He said he didn’t want me tagging along—he was barely twelve and they were just pals from school, nothing more. She wanted to listen to music back at her house, so I said it was okay.’

  ‘But it didn’t work out like that?’

  He shook his head. ‘A bit later on they apparently decided to go for a walk by the brook. Like I said, it had been raining earlier. David was a bit overambitious—showing off, I expect—and managed to slide down a steep slope, straight into the water. It wasn’t deep but he fell in and finished up soaked through and muddy. Dad caught him before he had time to change his clothes. After that it was all hell let loose. I was the one in trouble because I hadn’t been with him to watch out for him.’

  Caitlin was puzzled. ‘But that’s the kind of thing most youngsters get up to. Why would it cause such a big problem, one that lasted for years to come? Did you both overreact?’

  ‘We certainly did—big time. Dad said I was totally irresponsible...couldn’t be trusted to keep my brother out of trouble. Of course I became defensive and argued back, asked why was it all down to me...why was he putting his job on to me? He was the father, wasn’t he? Not that he’d ever been a decent father to me like he had to David, the favoured one... Et cetera, et cetera; I expect you know how it goes.’

  ‘So you went too far?’

  ‘Oh, yes...and he lost it completely. Said I wasn’t his son so why would he care about me? He didn’t give two hoots about me, just put up with me for my mother’s sake.’

  Caitlin gasped. ‘Oh, Brodie...I’m so sorry. Was it true, what he said, or had he made it up on the spur of the moment?’

  Brodie moved his arm from around her and brought his hands together in his lap, clasping his fingers together. It was as though he was totally alone in that moment; she wanted to reach out, wrap her arms around him and comfort him. He was rigid, though, his whole manner isolating himself from everyone and everything.

  ‘Oh, yes. It was true. I asked my mother and she eventually admitted it to me. She was pregnant with me when she married my father, she said. He knew... He didn’t like it, because she was having someone else’s child, but he married her all the same. He just never wanted me and when I came along he couldn’t bring himself to make a bond.’

  Caitlin reached out and laid her hand over his. ‘Did your mother tell you who your real father was?’

  He shook his head. ‘She didn’t want to talk about him; said it was a fleeting thing—she made a mistake with a man who was never going to stay around for long. He was ambitious, wanted to go back to the city where he lived, wanted to make something of himself. She was a home bird, a country girl, and she didn’t think she would ever be part of his world.’

  ‘No wonder you went off the rails. You must have been so bewildered.’

  ‘I was angry... Not with my mother—I could understand how she might have fallen for someone and how she turned to my dad when this man went away. She was always loving towards me, and there were endless rows between her and Dad over the way he treated me. He loved her, I’m sure, but he couldn’t get beyond the other man who had figured in her life and things were never easy between them. We weren’t what you’d call a contented family.’

  She ran her hands lightly over his forearms. ‘I wish I’d known at the time. Perhaps I could have helped, instead of being mad at you for the way you behaved. I knew there was a reason but I couldn’t fathom it and I didn’t know how to reach you...the real you.’

  He gave a crooked smile. ‘That’s because he went missing for a while.’ His expression was sombre. ‘Perhaps part of him is still beyond reach.’

  She shook her head. ‘You don’t mean that.’

  He looked at her, taking in the vulnerable curve of her cheek and the soft fullness of her pink lips. ‘I don’t know—I’m still unsure about a lot of things—but it makes me feel good to know that you wanted to reach out to me.’

  ‘I’m glad about that.’ She wanted to say more—to go on talking with him, get him to open up to her—but someone stepped out into the quadrangle and they moved apart. ‘I should go,’ she said and he nodded.

  ‘Me too.’

  CHAPTER FIVE

  ‘YOU’VE BEEN BUSY.’ Caitlin’s mother looked at the basket of fruit Caitli
n had brought for her. ‘That’s not all come from home, has it?’

  ‘It has, actually.’ Caitlin was proud of the amount of fruit she’d managed to harvest. It was mostly being sold at the local market but she’d gathered together an assortment for the gift basket. There were early fruiting James Grieve apples, a few pears, pink-skinned Victoria plums and some of the later varieties of strawberries. ‘I thought it might help to cheer you up.’

  It had also given her something to do, had helped keep her occupied outside of work. It gave her less time to dwell on situations that were fast running out of her control. Brodie had given her a lot to think about with his revelations about his father. His background meant that he probably still had a lot of self-doubt and she wondered if he would ever be able to make a proper commitment to her. She was falling for him all over again but for her own self-preservation she knew she should guard against losing her heart to him.

  ‘Bless you, it’s wonderful; a real treat.’ Her mother smiled. ‘Oh, it makes me long to be back home. I can’t wait to get back there and see how everything’s going on.’

  ‘I’m sure it won’t be too long now,’ Caitlin agreed, trying to give her some encouragement. ‘You’re certainly looking a bit brighter. There’s colour in your cheeks and you seem to be breathing a little easier.’

  ‘I am. I’m managing to get a bit further with the walking frame now before the lack of breath stops me.’

  ‘That’s good to know.’ Caitlin smiled. ‘And there’s a bit of news I thought you’d want to know about—David has asked if the film unit can use the smallholding as one of their sets for an episode of Murder Mysteries. He said they would pay well, so I said I’d ask you. I didn’t really think you’d have any objection. They promise they won’t leave a mess, and the filming will all be done over two or three days. I think they especially want to use the barn and the area around the hen hut.’