Monica turned away and cast her eyes to the floor.
The hair on Katie’s arms stood up. “Do you think Jack suspects something?”
“I think Jessie is suspicious. I’ve managed to keep my sister from knowing what’s going on this long but, now that they are back from the honeymoon, she wants me to come and visit. I’ve put her off, Katie, but the longer I do that, the more Jessie is going to wonder.”
Just when Katie thought she could relax a little, concerns and drama piled up. “It shouldn’t be much longer.”
“I hope so. Jessie and I are close. It would be hard to keep this inside me if she was here and I don’t think she’d keep the information from Jack. I couldn’t ask her to.”
Katie placed a hand on top of Monica’s. “I know this isn’t the easiest secret to keep. I won’t blame you if something slips out. Just promise me you’ll let me know if it does, so I can work on damage control before word spreads.”
Monica lent her a smile. “I will. Now I’ve got to go. We’ve been shorthanded in the ER with a stupid summer flu going around.”
Savannah slept while Katie finished getting ready for work. She sent a quick text to Patrick and told him she needed an update today.
He had to know something by now…
Monica slid onto the worn-out sofa in the break room and ignored her heart rate that she felt reverberating all the way to her toes. She’d hit the ER running. A five-car pileup on the interstate with two full traumas and one full arrest met her before she could manage half a cup of coffee. The emergency room overflowed with patients sick with the flu, the typical accidents that resulted in broken bones and a need for stitches, and the elderly with every medical issue under the sun. But all of those could wait. The traumas pumped her blood and forced her to think fast.
She loved it.
The adrenaline, the pace. Everything about it.
The petty shit choking up the ER tended to piss her off when the serious crap went down. It didn’t help that the department was short staffed and she had to do the work of two nurses and hope to hell no one fell through the cracks.
She helped stabilize one patient and get him to surgery within that golden hour and then was able to comfort a grieving family when they learned their loved one didn’t make it.
In truth, that part sucked. But she had been told when she took the job that, in order to work the ER, she needed to get in and make a difference by helping or get the hell out of the way.
She chose to make a difference.
The alarm of the radio went off announcing another ambulance call. Although she wasn’t the lead nurse on the radio, she forced herself up and out of the break room to find out what was coming in.
Mark, a fellow nurse, sat in the radio room talking to the paramedics in the field. Monica squeezed in the door to look over his shoulder.
“Another car accident?” she whispered to herself.
The medic on the line spoke quickly, rattling off vital signs. The mic on the radio room worked one way at a time. Mark multitasked by writing down what the medic told him and talking to Monica at the same time. “It’s another trauma. Female, late twenties, rollover in a convertible. Head trauma. Five minutes out.”
Monica froze.
Working without emotion was fine, until you knew the patient.
“Go tell Dr. Eddy we have another one coming in,” Mark said.
Monica nodded and left the room. She pulled her cell phone from her pocket and sent a quick text to Katie.
Are you OK?
She paused hoping Katie replied.
It’s not Katie. Lots of people drive convertibles in California.
“We have another one,” Monica told Dr. Eddy. She turned to Alice who manned the phones. “Call a code trauma and call Neuro.”
Alice already had the phone to her ear.
As the code was being called, Monica’s phone signaled a text.
Katie.
I’m good. What’s up?
Relief swelled Monica’s chest.
Nothing…just checking in.
Hours later when Monica was finishing some paperwork, Dr. Eddy plopped down beside her. “What a bitch of a day.”
“You can say that again. The only thing that didn’t come through that door was an MI,” she said with a curt laugh. A heart attack victim was the last thing this day needed.
Dr. Eddy, or Walt, as most of them referred to him, had worked the ER for eight years. He was a good-looking man with short brown hair and chocolate brown eyes. He was known to date many women, but hadn’t yet settled down. No wonder, he was always working and when the ER didn’t call him in, he volunteered his time with Borderless Doctors. “I’m still on for three more hours. Don’t jinx me.”
Monica laughed. “Sorry.”
He rubbed the back of his neck as he spoke. “Listen, I wondered if you’d be interested in signing up with BNs.”
“BNs? What’s that?”
“Borderless Nurses. The same program for Borderless Doctors only for nurses. We can always use the help. You’re young, smart, energetic. It helps that you don’t have a family or kids.”
Monica sat back and considered his words. “I might be interested.”
“I work with the disaster team. We go in after nature screws up an area, stay for a week or two at a time, and pull out.”
“How would that work here? I know the doctors’ group gives you the time off, but I’m not sure the hospital feels the same about the nurses.”