by Tina Beckett
“That you did.”
“I told Erica that your pizza was the best around these parts,” Thorne said.
Scooby beamed with pride. “This is true. Would you like a pizza?”
“Your house special.”
Erica’s eyes widened in trepidation. She hoped the special didn’t have some kind of delicacy she’d never heard of or something like eel or other sea creature that she had no stomach for.
“No problem—and two beers?” Scooby asked.
“Please.” Thorne grinned.
Scooby glanced at her. “You look concerned, Commander.”
“I’m not a big fan of pizza.”
“No problem, Commander. You will be.” Scooby nodded and left.
“He’s a man of many layers,” she remarked. “Elvis, Graceland and pizza?”
Thorne nodded. “Don’t forget bowling. He loves bowling. He loves all things American.”
“I can see that, but why didn’t he move there?”
Thorne leaned across the table, his eyes twinkling. “His wife wouldn’t let him.”
Erica rolled her eyes, but she couldn’t help but laugh, and she couldn’t remember the last time she’d let loose like this. This was better than the tense silence, which had fallen between them at the old temple in Ginowan.
“You know, I would really like to go see the Cornerstone of Peace in Itoman one day,” she said, but then realized she was somewhat angling for another date when that was the furthest thing from the truth.
Was it?
Even though the drive to Scooby’s had been a little tense, when Thorne had put up his walls again, she was enjoying herself.
Besides, maybe she wasn’t exactly angling for another date, but another outing with her friend, because that was what they were.
That was all they could be.
“It’s impressive. I think everyone should see it once in their life.”
“Have you been, Thorne?”
“I have. It lists everyone who died during the battle. Civilian, allied forces and axis powers.”
“I’d like to see it.”
“We can go after lunch if you want.”
“S-sure.” And their eyes locked across the table. His was face unreadable as they sat there, that tension falling between them again.
“Here we go. Two beers,” Scooby said cheerfully, breaking the silence between them as he set down two dark bottles of beer.
“These have Shisa on them.” Erica winked at Thorne.
“Ah, you learned about Shisa today, Commander Griffin?” Scooby asked.
“I did. I also learned your name isn’t really Scooby but Sachiho.”
Scooby grinned. “Aye.”
“What does it mean in Ryukyuan?”
“It’s not native to Okinawa. It’s more common in Japan. My mother was from Japan. But, in answer to your question, it means ‘a charitable man’.”
“You’re very charitable, Scooby,” Thorne teased.
Scooby’s eyes narrowed. “You’re not getting a free lunch out of me again, Captain.”
They all laughed.
“I’ll go grab the pizza.” Scooby hurried away.
“Did this drunk soldier try to get out of a tab and felt that Sachiho maybe didn’t suit Scooby at the time?” Erica asked.
“I never thought of that, but I’m not going to ask him.”
Scooby returned and set the pizza down in front of them. “Specialty of the house.”
Erica breathed a sigh of relief. “The specialty of the house is pineapple?”
Scooby looked confused. “Painappurufeisu means ‘pineapple face’. What did you think my specialty would be?”
Erica laughed. “I have no idea, but I have to learn not to trust Captain Wilder.”
Thorne took a swig of his beer, amusement in his eyes.
Scooby tsked. “Captain Wilder, you should be nicer to your second in command. Don’t listen to a word he says, Commander.”
“I’ll take that to heart, Sachiho. Thank you.”
Scooby grinned and left them to eat.
“Is this why this posting was vacant with hardly any applicants? Do you drive your commanding officers away, Captain?”
He smiled. “Possibly.”
“Well, I think I’ll take Sachiho’s advice and not trust you. Unless we’re working in the OR.”
“Probably best.”
“I’ve never had pineapple on a pizza before,” she remarked.
“Well, then, I wasn’t totally off base. It is a delicacy and something you’ve never had before.”
They dug into the pizza and Erica really enjoyed it. While they ate they chatted about life on base and about some of the more colorful characters.
When they were done, she leaned against the back of the booth, staring at the green shag carpeting, chuckling to herself.
“What’s so funny?” Thorne asked.
“My mamère would really like this place. Hawaii was her favorite vacation spot, the second place being Graceland.”
“How many times have you been to…where is Graceland, exactly?”
“Memphis, Tennessee.”
“Really?” Thorne asked. “I thought that’s where Beale Street was—you know, the birthplace of rock ’n’ roll, home of the million-dollar quartet, where Cash got his big break.”
Erica cocked an eyebrow. “And who do you think was part of that million-dollar quartet? It was Cash, Perkins, Lewis and Presley.”
“I only know about Cash,” Thorne said. “Cash was awesome.”
“Well, Memphis is home to Beale Street and Graceland. Who do you think invented rock ’n’ roll?”
Thorne grinned. “You have me there. That would be interesting to see one day, but don’t let Scooby know I have any interest in going to Graceland.”
“Why?”
“He’ll start the slide show.”
Erica laughed and then her phone began to vibrate. She glanced down and saw it was from the hospital. When she looked up she could see that Thorne was looking at his phone as well. “Incoming trauma.”
“I know,” he said. “Accident on trawler.”
“We better go.”
Thorne nodded. “Agreed.”
They slipped out of the booth and he paid Scooby. As they headed outside Erica could hear the choppers bringing the wounded from the trawler out at sea. The chopper was headed straight for the helipad at the hospital. Several vehicles whizzed by as on-call staff raced toward the hospital.
As she opened the door to Thorne’s car a large chopper zoomed overhead. It was loud and nearly ripped the door from her hand, it was flying so low and so fast toward the hospital. It reminded her of the chopper which had brought Thorne aboard the Hope.
Only this time it wasn’t night, they weren’t on a ship in the middle of the ocean, which had gone into silent running and it wasn’t a covert operation. This was what she was used to, though she couldn’t even begin to fathom the kind of emergency, which would’ve happened on a trawler off the west coast of Okinawa.
“Let’s go, Commander.”
Erica nodded and climbed in the passenger seat.
“You know,” Thorne said as he started the ignition. “I had every intention of taking you to the Cornerstone of Peace today.”
“You did?”
He nodded. “I did.”
“Well, maybe another day, then.”
Thorne nodded. “Another day.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
“WHAT HAPPENED?” THORNE asked the nearest nurse as he came out of the locker rooms, his casual attire abandoned for scrubs. Once they’d pulled up to the hospital Erica had left, running ahead into the fray. Thorne couldn’t keep up with her and when an emergency like this was called it was all hands on deck.
He grabbed a trauma gown, slipped it over his scrubs and then grabbed gloves.
“There was an explosion on a trawler. It burned a lot of men and then the trawler started to go down. We have some men with hypothermia a
nd water in their lungs.”
“Okinawan?”
“Some. Most of the men are Indonesian, but the trawler was registered to several different countries off the east coast of Africa.”
Thorne frowned. “They’re fishing far from home.”
“You said it, not me.”
Thorne nodded at the nurse. Maybe the trawler hadn’t been fishing exactly and maybe the men had been up to something else. Either way it didn’t matter and it was out of his jurisdiction. Right now he had lives to save. He headed out to meet the gurneys as they came in.
It wasn’t long before the doors opened and the rescue team wheeled in a burn victim, who was screaming.
“Male, looks to be about twenty. Indonesian, doesn’t speak a word of English.”
Great. It was going to be tricky to get any kind of history.
“Get me a translator that knows Indonesian here, stat!” Thorne demanded.
“Yes, Captain!” someone in the fray shouted. He didn’t know who, but it didn’t matter, as long as his order was taken care of. He needed to know if this boy was allergic to anything and he needed to know what had caused his burn.
Was it fire? Was it chemical? These were the questions he needed answered before he could help his patient. He wanted to make sure if it was a chemical burn that any trace of the chemical was washed from his skin.
“I’ve got it.” Thorne grabbed the gurney and wheeled it to an open triage area. “Don’t worry, I’m a doctor, and you’re in good hands.”
The young man just whimpered, his brown eyes wide with fear and pain. It was obvious that the boy was in shock by his pale complexion, his shaking and his shallow breathing. Thorne slipped nose cannula into his nose.
The boy started to freak out, but Thorne tried to calm him down.
“Breathe, just breathe. It’s oxygen.”
The boy began to shake, but his breathing regulated as he inhaled the oxygen.
“We need to start a central line.” A nurse handed Thorne a tray and he moved into action. The boy reached out and gripped his arm. His eyes were wild as he watched Thorne in trepidation. “I’m sorry, this will hurt—but only for a moment and then it will help.”
The boy shook his head, not understanding. He took one look at the needle and started to cry out in fear.
“I need that translator now!” Thorne barked.
“I’m here. I can help.” Erica stood in the doorway.
“You know Indonesian?”
“I know a few languages and we helped out in Indonesia quite a lot when I was on the Hope.”
“Good. Could you tell him that this will help with the pain?”
Erica nodded and leaned over the patient. “Hal ini akan membantu.”
“Ask him what kind of burn he has.”
Erica asked the boy how he’d got his burns.
“Api.”
“Fire, Captain.”
“Okay. Then we know how we can proceed. Tell him we’ll help him, that this will ease his pain and we’ll take care of him.”
Erica gently spoke to him. The boy nodded and calmed down. Erica continued to hold his hand.
Thorne inserted the central line as Erica continued to murmur words of encouragement to the frightened boy. Soon he was able to feed the boy medication to manage the pain and the grip on Erica’s hand lessened until she was able to let it go.
“You should go back out and lend a hand.”
Erica nodded but, the moment she tried to leave, the boy reached out and grabbed her.
“Silakan tinggal.”
“What’s he saying?” Thorne asked.
“He wants me to stay with him.”
“We have other trauma.”
“And other surgeons. I can stay for a while. At least until he passes out. He’s scared.”
Thorne frowned. “I understand your compassion, but this boy’s burn will require hours of debridement. Your presence as my second in command is required on the floor.”
“I’m sorry, Captain. I have to stay here.”
“Are you disobeying me, Commander?”
Erica’s eyes narrowed and he could tell she was angry. Heck, he was too. He wished he had the luxury of keeping her in the same room as him as he did his work, but he needed her out there helping, not catering to this boy.
Bunny poked her head into the triage room. “The translator showed up.”
“Thanks, Bunny.” Thorne turned to Erica. “The translator is here. Go back to the floor, Commander.”
Erica bent over and whispered some words to the boy, who nodded and let go of his hold on her. Once he did that Erica moved out of the triage room without so much as a backward glance at him.
Thorne didn’t want to annoy her, far from it, but she was a valuable asset to the trauma floor. He couldn’t have her playing translator to a scared young man.
“Captain Wilder?”
Thorne glanced up to see a young lieutenant standing in the doorway. “You the translator?”
“Aye, Captain.”
“Good. I need to explain what I’m doing to this young man and reassure him that this will help. Nurse, will you gown our translator?”
“Of course, Captain.”
Thorne turned back to his instruments while the nurse put a gown and mask on the translator. He glanced out into the trauma floor and saw Erica assessing another patient who had just been brought in. The paramedics had been working on him, giving him CPR as they wheeled him through the hospital doors.
Only now Erica had taken over, shouting orders as she climbed on the gurney to administer CPR, nurses and intern surgeons racing to wheel her away from the oncoming traffic and to a triage room.
Thorne knew he’d made the right decision booting her out of the room. She was a surgeon and a damn fine one.
One that he was proud to have on his team.
* * *
Erica stretched. It felt like her back was going to shatter into a million pieces and her feet were no longer useful appendages that she sometimes liked to apply the occasional coat of red nail polish to. No, they now were two lumps of ache and sweat.
“How long was that surgery?” she muttered under her breath as she scrubbed out because she’d lost track of time in there.
“Eight hours,” a scrub nurse said through a yawn. “Good work in there, Commander.” The nurse left the scrub room and Erica stretched again.
Yeah, she’d believe eight hours for sure, though it felt like maybe that surgery had lasted days. There were a few times she hadn’t been sure if her patient was going to make it. She placed her scrub cap in the laundry bin and headed to her locker.
“I heard you had a piece of the trawler’s engine embedded in your patient’s abdomen?”
Erica groaned, recognizing Thorne’s voice behind her. She’d been angry with him for forcing her away, for not letting her comfort that young man, but Thorne had been right.
She needed to be out on the trauma floor, practicing medicine and not translating. If she’d disobeyed orders she wouldn’t have been able to operate on her patient and save his life. Her back might’ve liked that, and definitely her feet, but she was glad she was in the OR doing what she loved.
Saving a life.
Damn. He was right and he probably wasn’t going to let her live it down.
“Yes. Part of the engine decided my patient was a good resting place.”
Thorne winced. “The prognosis?”
“So far so good. He’s in the ICU. How’s your patient?”
“Resting comfortably in the burn unit. From what he was telling the translator, that trawler was not fishing off the coast of Okinawa.”
“I thought as much.”
Thorne crossed his arms. “What made you think that?”
“There were traces of methamphetamine in my patient’s blood stream. We had a few close calls on the OR table. A few codes.”
Thorne nodded. “The proper authorities have been called. Since they weren’t in international water
s, we’ve called the Japanese officials. I’m sure several patients will be interrogated.”
“I wouldn’t doubt it.”
Thorne hesitated, as if he wanted to say more, but couldn’t.
Or wouldn’t.
Though she barely knew him, Erica recognized a stubborn soul. Sometimes it was like looking in a mirror, because she was stubborn too. Stubborn to the point it had almost cost her her commission a few times.
“You did good in there, Commander.”
Erica nodded. “Thank you, Captain.”
“Go rest.” Thorne turned to leave, but then stopped. “I heard the Hope will be in port in a week.”
“Really?” she asked.
“Does that make you happy?” he asked.
“It does bring some cheer. Yes. It’ll be good to catch up with some old friends.”
A strange look passed over his face. “I thought you didn’t make friends. I thought you were something of a lone wolf. Like me.”
“I had a select few on the Hope. It’s hard to be confined in close quarters and not make friends, Captain.”
“You’re right.” Then he turned to leave.
“What about our rain check?” she asked, not really believing that she’d asked that. “The Cornerstone of Peace?”
He glanced over his shoulder briefly. “Maybe some other time.”
And with that he walked away. He never once brought up her insubordination to her. How she’d almost disobeyed his orders in that triage room. Nor did he apologize for ordering her out. Not that he had to. Captains rarely apologized.
Especially when they were right, and he’d been right.
She’d been the fool. The one in the wrong. And it had probably cost her the friendship.
And more.
Erica closed her eyes and took a deep, steadying breath before turning and heading back toward the locker room. Really, she should be glad that it was such a quick break. That nothing awkward had come between them, which would make it impossible to work with him and would result in her eventual transfer.
This was better.
A working relationship. That was all she wanted from him. He was her commanding officer and she’d do her duty right by him, this hospital and her country.
Still, it stung when he walked away from her and she hated herself a bit for that because, despite every lie she told herself, she really enjoyed their day together.
