Читать книгу Emergency Marriage - Olivia Gates - Страница 9

“I’M what?”

A long, assessing glance answered Laura’s shocked question. Then Armando shrugged. “So, you didn’t realize. Anyway, you heard me, Laura. And you heard me correctly.”

Hypoglycemia—she hadn’t eaten since yesterday—that had to be it. Or auditory hallucinations. To be expected with all the sedatives and painkillers pumped into her system over the past week. Or maybe just a plain and simple breakdown.

She couldn’t have heard him correctly!

“Don’t look at me as if I’ve sprouted another head, Laura.” A gentle grasp caught her hands in one of his, steered her to the bed. He lifted her up on it, then kneeled to take off her shoes. “I’ll leave the rest of your clothes to Matilda. Now, por favor, Laura, let me check you. We’ll talk about this later.”

Matilda, the staff nurse he’d rung for, came bustling into the room. Cooing in Spanish, she expertly helped Laura off with her clothes and put her back into a hospital-issue gown. Armando had his back turned, busy reviewing her charts, writing down notes and directions for her continued care and medication schedule.

Once she was tucked up in bed, he came back to her. Her numbness deepened as he gently took her vitals, examined her, making sure her surgical wounds were intact. He deftly placed a cannula in her arm, unscrewed its cap and, dragging the mobile pole closer, placed the end of a saline bag’s giving set on it. He set the drip, broke two ampules, injected one in the cannula’s other outlet and one into the saline. Then he pressed the controls of a patient controlled analgesia pump in her hand and attached an oximeter, to monitor her heartbeat and oxygen levels, to her other finger.

It was all happening to someone else.

That someone else was watching Armando about to close the door behind him after he’d dropped a bomb that had devastated her reality.

He’d said she was pregnant.

Pregnant!

“Armando!”

Armando froze, the temptation to swear a blue streak, to run, overwhelming.

This wasn’t how he’d thought this would happen. Not that he’d given it much thought. He’d still been struggling to come to terms with it himself, and he’d hoped to have this confrontation only once he had. He’d had vague plans that they’d talk, about the baby and what next. He hadn’t expected she’d push him into acting without thinking, hadn’t expected she’d want to leave.

Not very bright since, come to think of it, it made sense she’d want to.

So. No use flaying himself over another bad call. Her bad calls were what mattered now. Judging by what she’d done today, her decision-making was obviously impaired. Only one priority existed. She was staying. He wasn’t letting her go in her condition. And not with Diego’s baby.

You just can’t imagine seeing the last of her, Salazar, a candid voice in his head said. Admit it.

Oh, whatever! He just had to stop her in her tracks. And he surely had.

Not for long, though.

He dragged his feet back into the room, closed the door and leaned on it. “Laura, por favor, leave it till later.”

Her laugh broke out, hysteria tingeing it. “When later? When I’m in labor?”

He stared at her, clutching the blanket, eyes wild, lips trembling. He didn’t know what else to say.

“How could you possibly know I’m pregnant? When I sure as hell don’t? When it’s impossible?”

“It’s not impossible. When you started deteriorating and I knew we had to operate, I had all sort of tests done. That’s how I know.”

“I didn’t know pregnancy tests were routine before emergency ops!”

Shouldn’t she be dulled by the sedative already—by everything else, for that matter? He shook his head and exhaled. “Normally, they aren’t. But I asked for everything. Lab thought everything included a pregnancy test. It was a good thing, too. This way I picked category A medications and anesthetics that aren’t harmful to fetal development.”

“I still tell you it’s impossible. I haven’t—we haven’t…” Her words trailed off, her angry agitation giving way to a look of supreme concentration. Followed by frightening pallor.

Laura felt her consciousness ebbing, then a wave of sickness rose, threatening to engulf her.

She’d fallen into Diego’s arms at first, coming with all the building eagerness of their year-long online romance, of believing she’d finally found her soulmate. The one. Her rose-tinted glasses had been firmly in place and Diego’s incredible good looks and concentrated charm had completed her dazzle. It hadn’t taken long for reality to come into focus once more.

But they’d used protection and—and that did have a failure rate! As for the period she’d had recently, it was possible to have one at the beginning of a pregnancy…

Suddenly it was crucial to know. “How far along am I?”

“I’d say about eight weeks.”

And since Diego had been dead one week, it had probably happened that last time. That time she’d known for sure she didn’t want him any more. The time she’d told him it was over. Just over a month after they’d started their relationship. How ironic.

And how disastrous. An unwanted pregnancy, by an unwanted man. A dead man to boot!

But—but the tests could be wrong, maybe a mix-up. These things happened. God—please, make it a mistake…

The world receded. Armando blurred out of focus. Just before she lost sight of him, she thought, He’s injected me with a sedative. A safe one for pregnant women, no doubt. How thoughtful…

* * *

Time stopped for Armando the moment Laura closed her eyes. He stared down at her sleeping her artificial sleep. An alien, disruptive sensation itched in his chest.

Three months since he’d first laid eyes on her. No way could he have predicted then that it would end like this. Diego dead, her pregnant, and him… What about him?

He was getting what he wanted at last—GAO’s resources and connections. But GAO had been in Argentina for a long time, and they hadn’t done much—until she’d come. She’d moved things, made things happen. Diego had said it had all been for him, to please him. That it was all her own personal clout and her family’s.

He hadn’t cared how he’d got help as long as he got it. That was, until he’d seen her.

Breathtaking had been the first thought that had filled his mind. I want her the second. The third I can’t have her.

Diego had known. He’d looked his triumph into his eyes and bragged, “Isn’t she something? And she’s all mine.”

So he’d resorted to being dismissive and remote. Then Diego had made it impossible to stay remote, so he’d stayed dismissive…

But he’d needed GAO, and this had meant more Laura, everywhere in his life. Then Diego had given him…details. More than he could stomach knowing. He’d told him how things had gone downhill, fast, how he’d no longer wanted her, how she’d clung. That hadn’t sat right. He’d suspected Diego had been trying to save face. Laura didn’t seem the type to cling to anyone.

Maybe he should have done something besides providing an unwilling ear. If he had, maybe it wouldn’t have ended up this way.

Yeah, sure. With his track record, they would have both fallen flat on their backs laughing if he’d preached relationship success.

Oh, he’d wanted their relationship to succeed, had he?

A token knock at the door cut through his mesmerized contemplation of Laura, bringing in Lucianna Perez, his godmother and head emergency nurse.

“Sorry, Armando, but there’s been a huge fire in a high-rise housing complex in Rosario and medical services there are swamped and crying out for help. Most victims threw themselves out of windows and there are dozens of them. All multiple injuries besides the burns. Two firemen were injured, too. Since you’re back, I thought you’d want to head the team going to the scene.”

He nodded, snapping back to professional mode. But first… “Luci, get Matilda back in here. When her shift’s over, her replacement takes her place. I want constant monitoring and minimum movement. Anything happens, no matter how minor and no matter where I am, report it immediately.”

With a final look at Laura he ran out, putting on the fluorescent medical team yellow jacket Lucianna had handed him. “What’s ready?”

Lucianna’s answer was prompt—and regretful. “El Bicho is the only one left on the ground right now.”

And was there any wonder why? His pilots avoided the archaic bucket of bolts so aptly called The Bug like the plague. Saddling him with it on his emergency flights was their way of protesting its existence on their meager fleet. As if he could afford to trash the monstrosity and had chosen not to! “And who’s left behind?”

“Only Dr. Burnside’s people.”

Armando gritted his teeth. So the day had come when he was forced to take them on, rely on them. They’d been complaining of lack of occupation. Now they’d get it with a capital O.

With Laura spearheading them, they’d come believing that all that was needed to spread relief and stability was some cutting-edge medical equipment and a forced transfer to American medical protocols. They’d made no allowances for the incompatibility of an imported doctrine, or the ever-expanding shock waves that had fractured the very underpinning of society.

Laura’s experience here so far had been with smiling politicians and eager media people. Today had been her first real dip into Argentinian reality—though he had to admit, she’d surprised him. Flabbergasted him more like. It took incredible guts and skill to do what she’d done back there. It took fearlessness. More, selflessness. Had he been that wrong about her?

Niggling shame uncoiled inside him. He fought it down. So he’d been wrong. He was man enough to admit it. But it didn’t say she was qualified to run things here. If anything, it said she wasn’t. She might be a far better doctor than he’d thought, a far better human being, but the fact still remained—that she was uninformed, out of her element. She needed him in charge until she learned, until she realized…she needed him…

His thoughts fogged with unbidden heat, then scattered at the sight of Laura’s team running to meet him at the helipad.

The two blond men and the redheaded woman were watching him warily, but with a touch of defiance, too. He’d stepped hard on their toes, made them redundant. Now they’d be getting their baptism by literal fire. They’d all see if they could handle emergencies outside the luxurious protocols of American EMS services.

At the helicopter’s door he turned to Lucianna who’d bustled after him, carrying fresh supplies. “Get Romero and Pablo to follow me to the location as soon as they hit ground from their emergencies, along with anyone who can be spared. Prepare ORs One through Four. We’re low on blood, but get Bank to give us all the O-neg they can. Send collectors over to our regular donors and beg for some more. Pay Luca and Estefan whatever they ask. It’s out of my personal pocket so don’t document it.”

He lowered his voice so Laura’s team wouldn’t hear him. “I’d also feel better if you come with me this time. Just until we see how things pan out. This way I’ll give you some more blood on the way, too.”

When she hesitated, he exhaled. “El Bicho is safe, Luci. Noisy and bumpy and under-equipped but safe, OK?”

She nodded at once, trying to cover up her instinctive reaction. “But you can’t give me more blood!” she objected. “You just gave 850 mil a week ago, and that was a risk…”

“I eat like a horse. I’ve made it all up.”

“You know you couldn’t have. And anyway I can’t take blood from you while you’re flying that—the helicopter!”

“Next to flying ‘that—the helicopter’ while fighting off a crazed nut on crack, it’ll be a breeze. And it’ll only take ten minutes.”

Lucianna tutted, her genial middle-aged face disapproving. But she knew it was useless arguing with him. She rushed back to get the necessary blood drawing and preserving equipment.

Once they lifted off, he presented her with his arm, obediently sipping the two bottles of fruit juice Laura’s teammate, Nurse Susan Brent, held to his lips to compensate for the blood volume he was donating. He tried to concentrate on the coming crisis. And failed. His mind was with Laura.

What would he do with her?

What would she do?

* * *

She didn’t want to open her eyes.

She had to. If only to escape the claustrophobic nightmares she was trapped in. But she’d open her eyes to a reality that was even worse for being inescapable. Yet taking refuge in oblivion, no matter how suffocating, wasn’t an option any more. Her mind was already wide awake, her dilemma already in sharp focus and no way out in sight.

May as well get on with facing it all.

Laura sighed and opened her eyes. They immediately fell on Armando’s silhouette, his exhausted pose in the armchair beside her bed unmistakable.

“That was some sigh.”

His rasp shivered through her. Her internalized focus shifted with—concern? For him?

Rising to a sitting position in one brisk movement, she grimaced at her reaction, shaking off the softening. So he sustained an inhuman pace. It was one of the reasons she resented the hell out of him, wasn’t it?

“And that was some imitation of life,” she said. “What are you doing up? Trying to prove you’re Superman again? Matilda said you’ve been on your feet between ER and OR for 72 hours. Since that was before I fell asleep—again—hours ago, you’re into your fourth sleepless day!”

“You sure wake up sharp and ready with your math.” He huffed a hoarse chuckle, rubbed both hands over his face and slumped further in the armchair. “I caught an hour here and there during that time.” A silent heartbeat. “You’ve been crying.”

“Matilda is a darling mother hen but an unprofessional busybody. She had no call reporting that to you.”

“La Clínica isn’t like your US metropolitan medical centers, Laura. We’re close to each other here…”

“Too close, if you ask me!”

His eyes were barely visible in the faint indirect light, but she felt his gaze tightening. He went on, “And she was under strict instructions to report your very breath count.”

“So she had to report its increase when I cried. And here you had me thinking she cared.”

He sat forward in his chair, raked both hands again over his face and through his hair, expression still tight, unreadable. “She cares. We all do.”

“Yes—yes, of course. I was trying for some comic relief…” Her words choked. She felt stupid. Worse, she felt tears rushing to her eyes again. How pathetic she must seem to everyone here. To him.

Suddenly it seemed all-important to know. “Does—does everyone…?” She couldn’t say it, still couldn’t believe it. She was pregnant!

Armando understood, ended her distress. “Only me and Berto at the lab. He won’t tell anyone. That’s one thing you don’t have to worry about…” Armando let his words trail off, too, letting his head fall into his hands.

He really looked finished. And whether she felt sympathy for him or not, she was an extra burden he didn’t need. She hadn’t asked to be and it was his doing that she was, but, well, she wouldn’t be any more. She had his word he’d take out her stitches and release her tomorrow. Then she’d return to that cursed villa Diego had saddled her with for a six-month period, start thinking how she’d put her messed-up life back together, making allowances for—for…

She was going to have a baby!

When she had no home, no money, no man for herself or a father for her baby!

Armando raised his head and even in the semi-darkness what she saw in his eyes was something totally unexpected—sympathy? Empathy? Whatever it was, it hurt, coming from him.

He heaved a deep sigh. “Did you think about…?” The eloquent gesture of his hands painted her plight.

An incredulous laugh almost choked her. “What do you think? But maybe you’re right to ask. Thinking implies a rational mental process, not the panicking and obsessing I’ve been indulging in, considering my options…”

“Options?” His eyes emptied of empathy, if indeed it had been that. “What options? Adoption? Abortion?”

Those possibilities had entered her mind—only to exit the other side as no options. But how dared he presume to have an opinion on this anyway? A judgmental one, too!

“And what if I am?” She swung her legs angrily off the bed. “What is it to you?”

He sprang to his feet, an impatient step bringing him looming over her, exuding power, tension crackling about him. He flicked an extra light on. Now his intensity was visible in every line of his features. His hand shot out. She tensed, only to be surprised by his extra-gentle, supportive grasp. He stunned her more when he talked, his awesome baritone devoid of rancor, almost soft again. “It is a lot to me. This is Diego’s child.”

How had that not occurred to her? Her baby shared Armando’s blood. She should have realized what that would mean to a proud Argentinian who revered family ties above all else. Defiant indignation seeped out of her, and her rigid body slumped. “Those possibilities crossed my mind, OK? But, strange as it sounds, I actually want this baby.”

It was his turn to be surprised. Heavy-lidded eyes widened. “You do?”

“Don’t look so astonished! I didn’t want this baby. Of course I didn’t. But now it’s real, growing inside me, I want it. If it sounds crazy…”