Midnight Heat (Black Phoenix Book 2) (7 page)

“Get me a chest tube.” She poured betadine over the boy’s chest as a tray was placed within reach. “Who’s on for surgery tonight?”

“Dr. Connelly,” Karmen answered. “I haven’t seen him yet.”

“Get him down here.” Rebecca inserted the catheter and stepped aside as bloody fluid flowed out the tube. “He’s got a hemothorax. I need O neg uncrossed blood.”

A nurse handed her the connective tubing for attachment to the drainage system. It worked by replacing the negative pressure in the chest, which in turn reinflated the lung. What she’d wanted to happen – the patient’s breathing would ease and blood pressure would improve – didn’t.

An alarm sounded.

Someone swore.

The boy’s blood pressure continued to fall.

“Start a second line and get that O neg hung,” Rebecca ordered.

He was just a little boy. Small for his age. Hair the color of milk chocolate. Knees scuffed in a way that told her he enjoyed roughhousing – as a lot of boys his age might.

A cold sweat trickled down her back as she checked heart sounds. The bleeding in his chest was causing blood to pool around his heart and impede its function. Without surgery, he wasn’t going to make it.

“Heart rate’s bradying down,” the nurse called out.

Damn it!
No way was she giving up without a fight. “Karmen, get a cardiac surgeon down here!”

Splashes of betadine and blood turned her gloves brown and red. Rebecca snapped them off, revealing a fresh pair beneath. “Atropine, point zero two milligram. Push that blood.” She placed the heel of her hand in position, glanced at the medic still manually feeding the child oxygen and began chest compressions. One hundred compressions a minute without stop.

Focusing on her task, the rest of the world slipped away. There was nothing but her, the tiny body beneath her hands, and the monitors that – no matter how hard she wished otherwise – didn’t change. She heard a voice come to here as if from a great distance asking if she needed help. Still she concentrated on those monitors.

Hoping.

Praying with every compression that she could bring him back.

His skin was cool beneath her hands. Each press, meant to deliver oxygenated blood to his brain, only amplified the boy’s dire state. His chest, unstable from the crush injury, gave more than normal. His ribs cracked.

Bile rushed up the back of her throat.

Rebecca didn’t stop. If she could just bring him back, he could pull through. Children were resilient – more so than adults. Sweat began to trickle down her back, her temples. Her hands cramped.

She halted her compressions. “Check his pulse.”

“Dr. Dahlman.” That distant voice spoke. Closer this time. Gentle and familiar.

The nurse shook her head. “No pulse.”

Rebecca wasn’t ready to give up. Not yet. “Epi, push another unit of blood.”

“Dr. Dahlman.”

All activity around the patient’s bed came to a halt.

“What are you all standing around for?” They stared at her like she’d grown a third head. “I gave you an order.”

“Rebecca,” Nathan said softly. “Call it.”

When had he arrived? How much time had passed while she was lost to everything except the young life beneath her hands?

The life she’d failed to save.

Her shoulders drooped and she blew out a breath. “Time of death six fifty-four p.m.”

* * *

Rebecca leaned against the cool tile wall, swallowing back emotion, desperately trying to compartmentalize what she was feeling and get herself under control. Her knees trembled and not just from the crash as adrenaline left her body. Her breath caught. Her gut twisted. Forcing herself to ignore it, she pushed off the wall.

Only to be stopped short when Karmen stepped in front of her. “Are you all right?”

“Sure, why wouldn’t I be?” she asked in a shaky voice.

Karmen had brownish black hair that hung in curls just past her shoulder blades, perfect bow lips Rebecca would have sacrificed a few IQ points for, and large expressive brown eyes. She also had a blunt, in-your-face honesty to be admired. “I don’t know, maybe because you’re ghostly pale and trembling like a newly graduated medical student on the first day of their internship.” She stared at Rebecca for a long moment. “You’ve never taken control like that and done chest compressions. It’s unconventional.”

She was right. As a doctor, Rebecca normally stepped to the end of the gurney where she could observe everything and shout out orders. Yet today, that hands’ off approach hadn’t felt like enough.

“Bec? Talk to me, sweetie.”

“I’m fine,” she replied in a tone designed to stop any argument to the contrary. “I have to go speak with the boy’s fath—”

“Owen.”

“What?”

“His name was Owen. Owen Masters. I could go with you. To speak with the father.”

“Now who’s being unconventional? No, I can handle it. ”

Karmen nodded, her brown eyes filled with relief and sympathy.

Rebecca wiped her palms on her scrub pants, then started down the hall, heading for the family waiting room and the toughest part of her job. She stepped into the room, thankful to discover it was empty except for a bald-headed man sitting in a chair and a uniform officer leaning against the wall ten feet to his right. The seated man had his head down, elbows atop his thighs, hands hanging between his knees. His wrists were secured with handcuffs.

She didn’t ask what the man had done to earn his police escort. The only thing that mattered at the moment was informing him of the loss of his son. “Mr. Masters?”

His head rose. His eyebrows knitted in a frown, he pinned her in place with his hawkish gaze. “Yes. Who are you? Where’s Owen? I want to see Owen.”

“I’m so sorry, Mr. Masters.”

He blinked rapidly as if warding off her words. His face turned ashen.

Rebecca stepped closer in an instinctive act of comfort. “We did everything we could, but your son’s injuries were too severe. I’m sor—”

Her words were cut short as he launched out of the chair with a strangled cry, plowing into her and taking her with him to the floor. His weight slammed atop her, driving the air from her lungs. Hands circled her neck, tightening as his screams filled the air. “You bitch!”

Footsteps sounded from across the room. The uniformed officer appeared behind Masters, who continued to yell.

“You killed him! You killed my son!”

She clawed at his hands, trying without success to loosen his grip as panic set in. Her heart beat a frantic rhythm in her chest. The officer grabbed him beneath the arms and tugged. Relief flared as she was able to take a deep breath. Until the back of her head glanced off the floor.

The uniformed officer managed to get Masters to release his hold around her neck but struggled to remove his weight from her body. Masters leaned down, the smell of whiskey on his breath overpowering. “You’ll pay for this bitch. You’ll pay for killing my son.”

A second uniform appeared. Together with the first, they wrestled a still screaming Masters to the floor. “Owen! I want to see Owen! I want to see my son!”

“Rebecca?”

She startled before the identity of the voice registered, shrinking away from the hand on her shoulder. Embarrassment flared, followed immediately by a coughing spell as she gulped air too quickly.

“Sweetie?”

Karmen. It was Karmen kneeling by her side, worry evident in the slight tremble of her hands as she replaced one atop Rebecca’s shoulder, and curled the other around her elbow for support. “Can you stand?”

“Of course I can,” Rebecca replied. Getting her feet to cooperate was another matter. She was thankful for Karmen’s steadying hand as the uniforms hauled Masters out the door.

“What the hell happened?” Karmen asked.

“Mr. Masters feels I’m to blame for the death of his son.”

“That’s ridiculous. You did everything possible to save that boy.” It wasn’t until Karmen pushed her hand out of the way that Rebecca realized she was cradling the back of her head. “Here, let me see.” She parted the hair to get a better look. “Did you smack it on the way down?”

“No. It’s nothing, just a bit sore.”

“It’s nothing,” Karmen agreed after a brief inspection. “Your throat on the other hand…”

“My throat is fine, too.” Rebecca replied, ignoring the stares from the crowd that had gathered.

“It’s already bruising.”

Brushing her fingers across the neck, Rebecca frowned. “That’s not at all surprising with my coloring.” Turning on her heel, she made her way back toward the nurse’s station.

Karmen jogged a few steps to catch up. “Rebecca, please.”

She kept walking, unsure how to explain to her friend that any discomfort she was feeling was nothing compared to the agony Mr. Masters felt. Or that were she to stop long enough for an exam, long enough to allow the happenings of the last hour to take hold, she just might succumb to the anger and fear that warred inside her.

Chapter Six

By the time Rebecca returned home after her shift it was nearly one in the morning. She dragged the band out of her hair, allowing the length to fall down around her shoulders, and headed for a warm shower sure to remove the kinks from her neck. She kicked off her shoes and pulled her shirt over her head as she went. The sharp trill of her doorbell stopped her.

Who in the world is outside my door at this time of night?
After the evening she’d had, company was the last thing she wanted. After returning to the door, she peeked through the viewfinder. “What do you want, Nathan?” she asked, holding her shirt in front of her breasts even though he couldn’t see her through the closed door.

“I thought you might need someone to talk to.”

She sighed. Why did everyone think she was going to fall apart? First Karmen, now Nathan. “I’m fine. I’ve been through worse.”

“Have you?” he asked, his voice pitched lower than normal.

“I’ve lost patients before.” Every physician had.

“But you’ve never been physically attacked afterward.”

Rebecca swallowed hard, as memory of her earlier panic flared with his matter of fact statement. Thankfully, Karmen had been wrong and all evidence had faded with the exception of one lone mark. She fingered the bruise, then pulled her shirt on and the door open.

Nathan’s gaze dipped to her neck. His eyes darkened, a frown forming on his forehead.

“I’m tired Nathan, it’s been a long day.”

“You should really have allowed someone to check you out. The bruising is minimal but the potential for complications is another story. Strangulation can cause—”

Rebecca held a hand up, palm out, stopping his clinical description of possible side effects. The last thing she needed right now was a reminder of how much worse the situation could have been. “I know all about the possibility of complications,” she reminded him. She’d been lucky to have come away from it with only minimal swelling and a sore throat.

“Then you know how important it is to—”

“Nathan, please. Is that why you dropped in? To lecture me? Because honestly, I’m too tired. I have no interest in talking through the day’s events or hashing out what I’m feeling or thinking.”

“No, of course not. I…wanted to see you. I was worried about you.”

A multi-car MVA had come in immediately following the code on the young boy. Nathan had been in surgery for the remainder of Rebecca’s shift.

“I was worried about you,” he repeated, shifting closer, right up into her space. Without warning, he pulled her into his embrace and touched his mouth to hers.

Rebecca went very still. Placing both hands on his chest, she took a step back, forcing Nathan to release her.

He slid her a long, questioning look. “I don’t suppose this has anything to do with the return of your musician?” He didn’t wait for a response. “Of course it does.” Turning on his heel, he stepped out the open door before turning back. “He won’t stay this time either, Rebecca. Men like him are never in it for the long haul.”

“Men like him?”

“Arrogant, too-handsome-for-their-own-good.”

A grin broke free. Didn’t he see he was describing himself?

“He’s a rock star for Christ sake.”

The grin faded. “You should go.”

“You deserve better, Rebecca.”

“Thank you, Nathan, but when I require your opinion on something I’ll ask for it.” And with that, she closed the door in his face.

Damned arrogant, too-handsome-for-his-own-good stuffed shirt!
She hadn’t asked for his opinion, she didn’t want his opinion and frankly what the hell did his opinion matter?

It didn’t. It absolutely did not.

Except, she feared the same thing – that no matter the reason behind Dominic Price’s return, he wasn’t in it for the long haul. No matter how much she wished otherwise.

Damn it.

With a sigh she leaned against the door and closed her eyes. What had been the point of Nathan’s visit? He’d claimed he was worried about her then what does he offer? Clinical rhetoric followed by a passionless kiss? Oh, how she wished she could hit rewind and start this day over.

A knock sounded directly opposite her head. Rebecca startled. “Go away, Nathan,” she said without opening the door.

“Who’s Nathan?”

Dom.
The surge of excitement coursing through her cemented the fact that she was in trouble. Big trouble. She opened the door with a smile on her face. “It must be my night for visitors.”

“It’s a beautiful one. I wanted some air. Thought I would see what you were up to.”

“You have a habit of doing that.” Not that she minded all that much.

He shrugged, a move that pulled his black tee even tighter across his shoulders and afforded her a glimpse of abs she knew were flat and ridged. The dark sunglasses were nowhere to be seen. “You’re not going to tell me to sod off, as you obviously did with this Nathan bloke, are you?”

She glanced at her driveway, where the motion light on her garage illuminated a sleek black convertible, top down. “Rolling down the windows just isn’t the same, huh?”