Читать книгу The Doctor's Wife For Keeps - Алисон Робертс - Страница 11

CHAPTER TWO

‘I THINK WE’RE HERE.’

Kate looked at the two-storeyed village house they were parked in front of. The door was shut and there was nobody to be seen trying to flag down medical assistance. She had programmed the satellite navigation system with all the GPS coordinates of their daytime tasks herself, however, so she was confident that no mistakes had been made.

‘We’ve got ten minutes. We’ll knock on the door at precisely seven forty-five. You might want to turn off the light.’ The portable flashing light on the top of the SUV was plugged into the car’s cigarette lighter. ‘We don’t want to flatten the battery while we’re on scene.’

‘Roger that.’ Georgia pulled the plug from the socket. She smiled at Kate but then her face scrunched into a grimace. ‘First scenario. You nervous?’

‘I wish we had some idea of what we’re going to. The name doesn’t give us much of a clue, does it? “Sweetheart”?’

‘Maybe it’s got something to do with sugar. A diabetic emergency, maybe?’

‘Good thinking.’

‘Or...’ Georgia wiggled her eyebrows. ‘Maybe it’s a young couple who are madly in love and they were having morning sex in the shower and one of them has slipped over and hit their head on the side of the bath.’

Kate didn’t want to think about people who were so crazy in love they couldn’t keep their hands off each other. She’d never experienced that kind of love. Why was it that the balance always seemed to be tipped far too much in one direction? The people she fell in love with never felt the same way but if she was only mildly interested she could guarantee that the guy would fall head over heels for her and become suffocatingly attentive.

She checked her watch. ‘Five minutes.’

‘Do you think another team is still in there? Luke and Matteo, maybe?’

Kate didn’t want to think about Luke, either. Not when thinking about the past could be a distraction. She had every intention of beating his team in this competition. It was her turn, after all. Payback for him getting better marks in finals.

He’d been so gracious about that, hadn’t he? Toasting her with that excellent champagne he’d brought with him. The first bottle, that was. The second bottle had been a bad idea because it had culminated in concocting ‘the pact’ but the evening had been all about celebrating their graduation to start with. And each other’s success.

‘I owe it all to you, Katy. If you hadn’t been my study buddy and I hadn’t been trying so hard to keep up with your brilliance for the last few years, I’d probably have been at the bottom of the class.’

Not true, of course. Luke had one of the sharpest minds she’d ever had the pleasure of arguing with and, if she’d had the edge on remembering everything she learned, Luke had been better at the practical skills in those days. More confident, with surprisingly nimble fingers. It was no surprise that he had become a surgeon and Kate had no doubt that he was excelling in his field. Did those skills extend to an environment outside of an operating theatre? How much had Matteo taught him about front-line emergency procedures?

‘Time?’

‘Oh, help. It’s seven forty-six.’ How had that happened?

Both Kate and Georgia leapt from the vehicle, slamming the front doors to go around to the back and collect the well-stocked kits that Georgia’s Edinburgh ambulance station had provided for them. She’d been distracted, Kate realised, by thinking about Luke.

It wasn’t going to happen again.

* * *

‘We’re early.’

Luke grunted. Eight-fifteen was their start time for the scenario with the odd name of ‘Sweetheart’ but he’d been determined not to risk disqualification by being late at any of the tasks they’d been set for the day. Especially now, when he had the added incentive of competing with Kate.

Her turn to win?

He found himself smiling. Whatever the result, this competition had just become a lot more fun.

The smile faded, however, as he looked around them at the quiet street dotted with small, village houses. ‘Doesn’t look like much.’ A bit disappointing, in fact. He’d expected to have something like a car versus pedestrian scenario for the coordinates in the middle of this small town. ‘You sure we’re in the right place?’

‘Sì. Assolutamente.’ Matteo pointed through the windscreen. ‘That car parked over there is a competitor. It’s got the numbers. And a light on the roof, like ours. And the flags are...’

‘Scottish,’ Luke murmured. There was only one team representing Scotland here and he knew who that was.

That smile was resurfacing. How astonishing had it been to run into Kate here, of all places in the world?

And how good had it been to see her again?

It made him realise that he’d been lonely ever since he’d taken up his new position in Edinburgh. He’d missed his mate, Matteo, who’d been so good for him during his time in Milan as he’d licked his wounds after escaping the disaster that his marriage had been. Focusing so completely on work in Edinburgh had left no time to try and make new friends, which was probably why he’d taken up Matteo’s invitation to join him for this competition.

And while it had been great to catch up with his mate, seeing Kate again was on a whole new level. They had history—heart-warming history—that made her like family.

He hadn’t thought about that ‘pact’ for years.

Not until last night, that was, when Kate’s avoidance of answering his query about whether she was married with kids yet had reminded him of how much time had passed. Plenty of time to have achieved the ‘plan’.

The plan they’d discussed that night after graduation, over that really great bottle of champagne.

‘Me? I’m going to start my stellar career and find the woman of my dreams to share the glory. What about you, Katy?’

‘Oh... I’m going to have a brilliant career, too. And I’m going to find the man of my dreams and get married and have a couple of the world’s most gorgeous children...’

And then they’d polished off that second bottle and things had become a whole lot more mushy. The ‘plan’ had morphed into the ‘pact’.

‘You’re my best mate, Katy. I love you to bits.’

‘Love you, too, mate.’

‘Tell you what...’

‘What?’

‘If we haven’t found those dream people by the time we’re...oh...say, thirty-five...let’s marry each other.’

‘Why would you want to marry me?’

‘I might be desperate by then.’

‘Cheers, mate.’

‘Oh, come on...it was a joke.’

‘Your idea of getting married is a joke.’

‘No... I’m serious. Let’s make a pact. If we’re both still single when we’re thirty-five, we’ll marry each other. Okay?’

She’d drained her glass of champagne, pushed her hair out of her eyes and given him a curiously intent stare. And then she’d done it. Agreed to the pact.

‘Okay. You’re on.’

‘So it’s a pact? Signed and sealed?’

‘It’s a pact. But now I need to go to sleep.’

Ancient memories but good ones.

Yes. It was extraordinarily good to see Kate again. Best of all, he had discovered that she lived close enough to his new home town that they would be able to see each other whenever they both had some free time.

Unless she had a boyfriend, of course. Thanks to Matteo’s conversation with Georgia last night, he now knew that Kate wasn’t married and that she was sharing a house with Georgia, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t someone else in the picture. Why wouldn’t there be? Kate was gorgeous, with that impressive intelligence shining from those bright, blue eyes. And he liked that her hair was a bit longer these days. The blonde bob almost touched her shoulders and had a bit of a swing to it.

Not that it would be a problem if she had a significant other in her life. It could mean that Luke’s circle of friends was about to expand, in fact. Maybe they could even double date. He and Matteo had had a lot of fun doing that in Milan. Nothing serious, mind you. Matteo might be dead keen to settle down and start a family of his own with the woman of his dreams but Luke had abandoned any such fairy-tale long ago. At about the same moment he’d learned that his marriage was a complete sham. As he’d remarked so bitterly to Kate, he had no intention of ever losing his head—or his heart—over a woman again.

Still...he wasn’t getting any younger. It would be a shame to miss out completely and spend the rest of his life caring for other people’s children...

* * *

The noise coming from the other side of the door was enough to make Kate and Georgia share a startled glance.

A party? At this time of the day?

Georgia pounded on the door. ‘Ambulance,’ she yelled.

There was no response, so she opened the door. They walked straight into a living room and there were at least half a dozen people, talking loudly enough to hear each other over the music. A bottle of vodka was being passed around and glasses clinked together. Nobody took the least bit of notice of the newcomers.

‘Hello...’ An earlier coin toss had decided that Kate was taking the lead role in this first scenario and she approached the nearest person. ‘Did someone call for an ambulance?’

‘Not me,’ the young man replied. ‘Hey...’ He put his arm around a young woman. ‘Let’s dance...’

Kate blinked. This was nothing like she had expected. Where were the officials that would be judging their performance? Where was someone who looked remotely like a patient?

Georgia’s eyes narrowed as she caught Kate’s glance and she raised her voice loudly enough to be heard by everyone.

‘Oi...’

The vodka carrier lowered the bottle. Heads turned in surprise.

‘Someone called an ambulance,’ Georgia said sternly. ‘Who was it?’

‘Oh...’ There was a man sitting in the corner of the room, leaning on the wall. ‘That was me. My girlfriend is upstairs. She’s lying down because she has a bad stomach ache.’

‘Anything else we should know?’

‘No. I don’t think so.’ The man raised a glass as he smiled at them. ‘Oh, she is pregnant. Is that important?’

Turning swiftly, they raced up a narrow set of stairs to find themselves in a bedroom and here it was. The scenario...

Two judges with clipboards were standing by. A young woman was sitting on a bed and she was holding a manikin of a newborn infant wrapped in a T-shirt.

‘Check mum and get her history,’ Kate told Georgia. ‘I’ll check the baby.’

The young mother didn’t want to let go of her baby.

‘How long ago was the baby born?’

‘Only a minute...maybe two...’

‘Have you heard it cry?’

‘No. No... Please don’t take my baby away...’

‘It’s okay,’ Georgia told her. ‘We just want to help you. Kate’s a baby doctor.’

Kate moved the folds of the T-shirt to reveal the baby’s face. The cord was wrapped tightly around the baby’s neck.

‘The baby is blue,’ one of the judges said.

Kate scooped the manikin from the patient’s arms. She turned to find that Georgia had stopped her examination of the mother for the moment. She’d laid a towel on the floor and had the kit opened, with the paediatric resuscitation gear that Kate would need within easy reach. A suction bulb, a tiny bag mask unit and tubes in case intubation was necessary.

‘No significant haemorrhage from the mother,’ Georgia told her. ‘And she has a radial pulse.’

Kate nodded approvingly. ‘Thanks.’ If the mother had a radial pulse it indicated that her blood pressure was adequate and that meant they could both focus on saving the life of this baby.

She laid the baby on the towel and positioned its head to ensure the airway was clear.

‘Can I feel a pulse?’ Kate asked swiftly, her fingers now on the baby’s neck.

‘The pulse is thirty,’ the judge said.

‘Can I see or feel any movements of respiration?’ Kate already knew what the answer was likely to be. This infant hadn’t cried and its colour meant that it was receiving no more oxygen than the umbilical cord was hopefully still providing.

‘The baby is not breathing,’ the judge confirmed.

Kate gave five puffs of oxygen through the bag mask unit and then started CPR, which was needed even though there was a pulse to be felt. The heart rate was too slow and the baby wasn’t breathing on its own yet.

She handed the bag mask to Georgia, who had positioned herself at the baby’s head.

‘Three to one?’

Georgia nodded. With only two fingers on the baby’s chest, Kate kept her compressions gentle but swift. After every three compressions, she paused for a moment to allow Georgia to administer a puff of air. At the same time, she kept an eye on the mother, reassuring her that they were doing all they could and watching for any signs of a post-partum haemorrhage that they would need to manage.

Every thirty seconds, she checked what the baby’s heart rate was. It crept up to forty and then sixty.

‘The heart rate is now over eighty,’ the judge informed them after a few minutes.

‘Colour?’

‘Getting pink.’

‘Breathing?’

‘Yes, she’s breathing. She’s crying now.’ The judge was smiling. ‘Well done.’

Kate put the baby back into its mother’s arms and wrapped them both warmly. ‘Keep her against your skin,’ she said.

‘Is she going to be all right?’

‘She’s going to be fine.’ Kate smiled. ‘Congratulations. You have a beautiful baby daughter.’

The young woman was a very good actor. Kate could swear she had tears of relief in her eyes as she thanked her rescuers and cuddled her newborn. The whole scenario had felt so real that Kate found she was having an emotional response of her own. One that she had had many times in her career—the sheer wonder of a new life being brought into the world and...

And envy of the mother who got to hold it and know it was her own?

Good grief. The baby was plastic and the whole scenario, however brilliantly acted, was not real. While this competition set out to test and even improve the skills of the participants, it was nothing more than a game. Kate needed to step back and not become so involved with the stories or she would be too exhausted to be a good partner for Georgia by the time the night tasks came along.

‘That was awesome,’ Georgia said, as soon as they shut the front door behind them again. ‘You were awesome. I think we smashed that one.’

‘We certainly saved the baby. And the judges looked happy.’ Kate checked her watch and then opened the back hatch of the car. ‘We’ve only got ten minutes to locate our next task. We’d better get a move on.’

But Georgia had paused. She was waving. ‘Look—there’s Matteo and Luke in that car. They must be next.’

‘I wonder how long it’ll take before they figure out their patient isn’t downstairs.’ Kate felt a sudden urge to help Luke out. To give him a clue...

‘It’s no wonder it’s against the rules to talk about the scenarios until it’s all over.’ Georgia slung her kit into the back. ‘And I got the feeling that Matteo is as much a stickler for the rules as you are, Kate. You two would get on very well.’

‘I’m not here on a man hunt. What’s the matter? Don’t you like him?’

Georgia shrugged. ‘He’s cute but there are a lot of fish in this particular sea and today is not the day to be casting my net.’

Kate snorted. She knew Georgia quite well enough to know that she wasn’t the least bit serious about finding a casual sexual partner just for fun. This was just bravado, that was all. Was she trying to prove to the world that she was over the last disaster and more than ready to move on?

Pausing for a moment, before climbing into the driver’s seat, Kate turned her head to look at the car parked a little further up the road. She lifted her hand in greeting and, by the instant response as he raised his, she knew that Luke had been watching her.

A weird frisson of something she couldn’t identify rippled through her belly. Was it a little disturbing to have someone from her past suddenly appear in her life like this? As if Luke was some kind of ghost?

Or was it just nice to have reconnected with an old and very dear friend?

Yeah...that had to be it. Because the feeling was too pleasant to be a warning.

* * *

‘Look...they’re coming out of the house.’

Luke found himself hunkering down in his seat a little. It was pure coincidence that they were the next team for this particular scenario but, oddly, it felt like he was pushing himself back into Kate’s life or something. Stalking her, even? Was she as pleased to see him as he’d been to see her?

Maybe not. It had been Georgia who’d spotted them and waved. Kate had seemed intent on putting her gear back into the car and checking her watch. Of course she would be making sure she was going to be on time for the next task—that was so like Kate. Responsible and reliable. And she was taking this contest seriously, as she did everything she became involved with.

It looked as though she was going to get in the car and simply drive off, but then she paused and looked straight at him and there was a smile to go with her wave.

Luke let out a breath he hadn’t realised he’d been holding as he raised his hand in response. A sigh of something like relief as something clicked back into place. The connection of their friendship, perhaps, where he didn’t have to worry about how his actions might be interpreted. A place he could relax in and simply be himself.

‘Be nice to have an idea of what we’re heading into,’ he said. ‘They weren’t giving away any clues, were they?’

‘And neither should they,’ Matteo said sternly. ‘That would be dishonest.’

‘Not exactly.’ Matteo liked to have his English improved. ‘Dishonesty is when you fail to tell the truth. Breaking the rules of the competition to give someone else an advantage would be dishonourable rather than dishonest.’

‘Hmm...’ Matteo absorbed the correction. ‘They are both unacceptable.’

‘Too right they are,’ Luke agreed.

The first scenario was initially confusing but, as soon as they discovered that the party was a red herring, the two men worked well on their paediatric resuscitation. In the next task, they found a man who’d summoned an ambulance because of sudden back pain and nausea. Diagnosing a case of kidney stones was easy but there was a twist in the case because the man had an anaphylactic allergic reaction to the morphine they administered for pain relief.

The twist was unexpected but Matteo spotted the first symptoms within seconds and they both reacted swiftly, attaching a bag of fluids to the IV line already in place and drawing up and administering drugs to counteract the reaction. Then they had to answer questions from one of the judges about which of the available hospitals they would be transferring their patient to.

‘Hospital A,’ Luke told them. ‘They have an internal medicine department and an intensive care unit and they are the closest.’

‘And what is the most important information to pass on about your patient?’

‘That he has a previously undiscovered allergy to morphine. We will write it on his notes and make sure the information is received by everyone we speak to. We will also advise the patient that it would be a good idea to wear a medic alert bracelet from now on.’

‘That was good.’ Matteo slapped Luke on the back as they left the house. ‘I might not have thought of recommending the bracelet.’

‘I was too slow to spot the change in our patient’s condition. Well done, you.’

Matteo grinned at him. ‘We make a good team.’

‘We’ve got a break now, haven’t we? About an hour?’

‘We should use it to do the driving test.’

‘Okay.’ The driving test was something they could do at any point of the day. A gravelled area beside the river that ran through this village had been cordoned off. A line of orange road cones marked the test area. They could see an ambulance completing the test as they arrived, clouds of dust billowing as it snaked around the cones at high speed and then came to a sudden halt between the cones marking the end of the course.

Another car was waiting for its turn.

The car with the Scottish flags.

‘Cute.’ Matteo grinned. ‘I didn’t notice that before.’

Luke raised his eyebrows. ‘You mean Georgia? Or Kate?’ He wasn’t sure he liked the idea of Matteo being attracted to Kate. Then he shook the reaction off. Why not? Matteo was a great guy and the best friend he’d had since Kate had vanished from his life. He’d make some lucky woman an ideal husband and father for her children and, if Kate felt the same way, he should do his best to make it happen.

But Matteo was laughing. ‘Oh, the girls are both cute but that wasn’t what I was looking at. Have you seen what is tied to the front of their car?’

No. Because Luke had been looking at Kate who was standing beside the car, talking to Georgia who was in the driver’s seat. He glanced at the stuffed toy bear that was wearing a kilt and holding a set of bagpipes.

Matteo rolled down his window and pointed to the toy. ‘He is going to get dirty, I think.’

‘All part of the fun,’ Georgia called back. ‘Which one of you is going to do the driving? You’re only allowed one person in the vehicle.’

Georgia was clearly the one doing the test for their team. Luke glanced at Matteo and unclipped his seat belt.

‘You do it,’ he said. ‘You’ve got far more experience with emergency driving skills than I have. I’ll wait with Kate.’

‘Cool.’ Matteo was already focussed on what Georgia was doing to see what his turn would involve.

Luke walked over to where Kate was standing, well away from where the dust clouds would drift.

‘How’s it all going?’ he asked.

‘Great.’ Kate’s expression was animated and she opened her mouth again as if she couldn’t wait to tell him about something but then it snapped shut and the excitement faded into disappointment. ‘But we can’t talk about it yet.’

‘No.’ It was a moment longer before Luke turned away from watching her face. Did she have any idea how much of what she was thinking was revealed in how quickly her expressions could change? He’d forgotten that about conversations with Kate. Forgotten how entertaining it was.

They both watched Georgia as she careened through the serpentine, knocking over a couple of cones.

‘She’s a bit wild.’

‘Enthusiastic,’ Kate conceded. ‘But she’ll get another go. The team before us had three goes.’

So they had a few minutes, then. And nothing to talk about?

‘Where did you say that you’re working in Glasgow? At the Western?’

‘No. The Eastern. We’re a specialised maternity and paediatric hospital. Best PICU in Scotland.’

Luke nodded. ‘Yes...some of our surgical cases have been transferred there. Are you based in PICU?’

‘No. I’m on the wards as a senior paediatric registrar. I do the occasional shift in Emergency as well.’

‘Are you happy?’

Kate’s eyes widened. ‘With the job? Of course. I’ve always loved working with kids.’

Luke wanted to know what that flicker in her eyes suggested. That she wasn’t happy with her life away from work?

‘I remember,’ was all he said. ‘You had a rapport with small people right from the start. How come you haven’t got some of your own now? You never said last night...’

‘Huh? Some of my own what?’

‘Kids.’

‘No.’ Kate’s gaze slid away from his to watch Georgia’s second attempt at the course. ‘I will, though. One day. It’s certainly still part of the grand plan.’

There was a wistful note in her voice. A flick of a glance that made him wonder if she was hearing the echoes of that champagne-doused conversation. Remembering his plan to have a stellar career and find the woman of his dreams to share the glory with?

His breath came out in a soft snort. Ah, well...he was well on the way to the career he’d dreamed of, at least. He flicked a glance back at Kate.

‘So you’ve got a potential father lined up?’

Kate shaded her eyes against the sun. ‘That’s better, Georgia, but you’re too slow now...’

‘A partner?’ Luke persisted. ‘A boyfriend? Any kind of significant other?’

Kate sighed, sounding a little exasperated. ‘No.’

Luke was silent for a moment, digesting the information, as Georgia circled back to where the officials were standing. They seemed to be having a discussion about whether she would have another attempt.

So Kate was single.

This was good, he decided. It meant that there were no barriers to them spending some time together and he didn’t have to find someone so that they could double date.

This was more than good. It was excellent.

‘And you’re thirty-five...’ Oh, help. Had he said that aloud?

Judging by Kate’s dismissive snort, she had heard the impulsive statement.

‘I can’t believe you even remember that, given how drunk you were at the time.’

Kate had been just as enthusiastic about opening that second bottle of champagne. And she obviously remembered the pact...

‘Anyway, it’s null and void now. You got married.’

‘Hey... I made a mistake.’ Luke kept his tone light. ‘You don’t need to rub my nose in it.’

‘Sorry.’ Kate offered him a smile. ‘Good thing you didn’t have kids, I guess. Or did you?’

‘No. Thank goodness. It was a clean—and complete—breakup.’

There was a moment’s silence. Georgia was lining up to have what would probably be her last attempt at the driving test. Matteo was leaning out of his window, watching carefully.

Kate was also watching carefully but Luke couldn’t resist the opportunity to tease her a little.

‘The pact didn’t have any sub-clauses that I remember,’ he said. ‘Didn’t we solemnly declare that if we were both still single when we were thirty five, we would marry each other?’

The glance Kate gave him over her shoulder was dismissive. ‘Thanks, but I intend to give it a bit more time. I haven’t given up on true love yet. My soul mate is out there somewhere—I just haven’t found him yet.’

Luke had to groan. ‘You don’t really believe in that, do you? Finding ‘the one’?’

He could see her shoulders stiffen. And her voice was cool. ‘Maybe I want what you and Nadia had.’

‘No.’ The word came out with unexpected vehemence. ‘You don’t.’

‘It was great when it started, though, wasn’t it? I’d never seen you so happy.’

There was that wistful note again and Luke’s brain broke the rules and dredged up a memory of what it had been like to be so in love. How magic it had been. He shut down the memory instantly. He didn’t need that kind of magic in his life now because that was all it was. A spell. One that could be reversed with no more than a click of someone’s fingers to leave devastation in its wake.

Kate broke the silence. Maybe she realised she’d stirred up something unpleasant for him because her tone was gentle.

‘You just found it with the wrong person,’ she said.

‘And you think you can find the right one?’

‘I hope so.’

‘How will you know?’ Luke was genuinely curious.

‘I don’t know exactly,’ Kate admitted. ‘I guess I’ll have to trust my instincts.’

‘Good luck with that.’ Luke was more than happy to leave this conversation. He was relieved to see that Georgia was driving back towards them, passing Matteo who went to take his position at the start. ‘I really hope you’ll find him,’ he added. ‘And that you’ll live happily ever after.’

Kate smiled at him. ‘So you agree that the pact is null and void, then?’

Luke shrugged. ‘I’m over the whole marriage thing, anyway. Been there, got the T-shirt. Friendship’s better.’ He smiled back at Kate. ‘Seems to last a lot longer, too.’

He could see sympathy in Kate’s eyes. And something more. Something warm.

‘You’re right. True friendship is the most important thing in the world.’ Her breath came out in a sigh as she smiled again. ‘It’s really good to see you again, Luke.’

‘Likewise. We’ll have to make sure we don’t lose touch when we get back home. I’m still a fish out of water in Scotland. I haven’t had time to meet anybody, apart from the people I work with, yet. I haven’t been anywhere or seen anything, either.’

‘I haven’t done much sightseeing myself,’ Kate told him, as Georgia joined them. ‘I’m sure there are some great places to go in Scotland.’

‘Are you kidding?’ Georgia sounded offended. ‘It’s the most beautiful country in the world. We’ve got the most gorgeous lakes and forests and more castles than could ever wish for.’ She grinned. ‘The weather can be a bit grey and wet, of course, but it’s summer now. You’ll get at least three days of sunshine.’