His Pregnant Sleeping Beauty (The Hollywood Hills Clinic) Read online

  She flashed that genuine killer smile and it took him by surprise. Why did it always do that? Taking every single crumb he offered, she struck him as beautiful and innocent. The sharp pang of longing nearly made him grimace. All he wanted to do was grab her and kiss her, and let his body do the thinking for the rest of the night, so he stayed far across the room, hands shoved in his pockets, and worked on making his smile look halfway real. She noticed his awkwardness and pulled back.

  “So good night, then.” She turned and headed for her room, her beautiful auburn hair forcing him to watch every step of her departure. That constant ache inside his chest doubled with the inevitable thought.

  “’Night,” he muttered. Get used to it, buddy, soon enough she’ll be walking right out of your life.

  *

  At the end of the first week of Carey’s new job, Joe, after agonizing over how best to handle the situation, told her he had to work on Saturday and would have to miss the next Parentcraft class. His intention was to let her down easily, yet he still dreaded it.

  In truth, he’d scheduled the extra shift after he’d talked to Gabriella about helping Carey find a birth coach. He couldn’t be the one. The thought of going through labor with her, being there for her at the toughest time, seemed beyond him. He worried he might have an emotional setback because of it, and fall apart on her. Angela and Rico had really done a job on him. He also understood how important it was for a mother-to-be to bond with their birth coach when it wasn’t the husband or partner. They’d gone over that very topic the Saturday before. The sooner she found one, the better.

  When he got home late that afternoon he saw Carey out on the patio deck, napping on one of the lounging chairs. Though he knew he shouldn’t, he tiptoed to the screen door and studied her up close, afraid to breathe so as not to wake her. A real sleeping beauty. It brought back memories of sitting by her hospital bed, watching her, when she’d been unconscious for those three days.

  Joe remembered trying to imagine who she was and where she belonged then. Now he knew exactly who she was, how wonderful she was, and how much he wanted her for himself. What a stupid fantasy. He may as well try to sprint to the moon.

  She must have felt his presence or she’d been playing possum all along because he turned to leave, then heard her stir.

  “Joe?”

  “Yeah.” He stopped in mid-step. “Didn’t want to disturb your nap.”

  She stretched and yawned, and he didn’t dare go out there, just stayed bolted to the floor, wishing things could be different. Knowing they never could be. Yearning to make it so anyway.

  “What time is it?”

  “Almost five. Want me to get dinner started?”

  She swung her legs around and sat, feet on the wooden planks, facing him. “I missed you in class today. We started practicing relaxation techniques and special exercises. She had us work with our partners, but Gabriella worked with me.”

  “I had to accompany a transfer patient on the helicopter to Laguna Beach today.” He’d volunteered. Would he have been able to function getting up close and personal with her in class? He’d definitely made the right decision to work, but he wondered when he’d started becoming a coward.

  “The thing is, I talked to Gabriella about our situation, and she said she has access to the local doula registry. Those women love to be birthing coaches, so I asked her to give me some names.” She stood and walked toward the screened-in porch door, each standing on opposite sides of the thin barrier. “Bottom line, you don’t have to come anymore.” With sadly serious eyes, she watched and waited.

  He’d wanted to let her down easily because he was a coward. Now she’d beaten him to the task, officially releasing him. He didn’t have the right to feel hurt, hell, he’d wanted a way out, but the casual comment—you don’t have to come anymore—cut to the bone. An ice pick could have done the job just as well.

  He resisted reacting, but his skin heated up anyway. He wondered how much she’d told Gabriella about them, if her story fit in any way, shape or form with his. He hadn’t expected to feel upset, but he was really bothered, and definitely sad now that she’d come out and said it. Ah, hell, truth was it killed him to stand aside, even though he’d already set the ball in motion to arrange this very thing. He hadn’t expected to feel like the air had been kicked out of his lungs and feel a sudden need to sit down. He steadied himself, because he knew one fact that couldn’t be denied. “I guess that’s for the best.”

  Clearly feeling let down, if he read her sudden drooping shoulders right, she covered well, too. Just as he had. “Yeah. I guess so, but thanks for being there for me all these weeks.”

  They’d been reduced to communicating in robotic trivialities.

  “You’re welcome. It was fun.” While it lasted, which he’d known from the beginning couldn’t be long. He’d just never fathomed the profound pain that would be involved. He’d gotten swept up in emotion and carried away that first Saturday, letting his feelings for Carey blur reality. He couldn’t let her be the only one without a partner. He’d let down his usual guard, acted on a whim, and had paid for his mistake every single week since. Sitting beside her, acting like they were a couple, wishing it was so, scaring himself with the depth of desire for it to be so, but knowing, always knowing, it could never be.

  His mouth went dry with unexpected disappointment. He needed to get away from her now. “Hey, listen, I’m going to the gym. Don’t hold up dinner for me, okay? I’ll grab something on the way home.”

  He left without before he could see her reaction.

  *

  The next Friday, Carey admitted a late-afternoon patient. The forty-eight-year-old male had a face everyone who’d ever gone to a movie or watched a TV show might recognize, but no one would know his name. The character actor had been admitted with the diagnosis of severe acute pancreatitis. Basically the guy’s pancreas was digesting itself thanks to an overabundance of enzymes, in particular trypsin. His history of alcohol abuse—according to Dr. Williams, the doctor who’d been the attending doctor for Carey, and who she had enormous respect for—had made a major contribution to his current condition. However, according to the doctor’s admitting notes, they would do studies to rule out bacterial or viral infection as a possible source as well.

  Carey found the computer notes fascinating, and Dr. Williams had left no stone unturned. She’d even commented on the fact the man was almost fifty and still extremely buff. Probably because of his need to stay fit for the action/adventure roles he normally took, Carey decided. But getting back to the doctor’s notes, she intended to consider his possible use of steroids as well.

  To add another angle, when Carey did the admitting interview, the actor, who also did his own stunts for most movies, told her he’d had an accident on the job and had sustained blunt abdominal trauma. Well, that wasn’t how he’d put it—I got kicked in the gut—but Carey’s notation was worded that way. She put a call in to Dr. Williams to inform her.

  Carey often thought how the practice of medicine was like a huge mystery where patients arrived with symptoms and the doctor’s job was to gather all the evidence and figure out what was going on. Carey knew the clinic staff’s job with this patient would be to watch for fluid and electrolyte imbalance, hypotension, decrease in blood oxygen, and even shock. This guy with the affable smile but pained brow was not to be taken lightly. Like many in the clinic, he was fit and healthy looking on the outside but a mess on the inside. These days, Carey could relate perfectly to that, too.

  He’d been complaining of severe abdominal pain for a day or two, and had assumed it was because he’d been kicked in the gut, as he’d described it. Carey noted his abdominal guarding when she made a quick but thorough admitting physical assessment, and found his abdomen to be harder than usual. Of course, that could be due to the fact the man looked like he did hundreds of crunches a day. He’d said his symptoms had gotten worse in the last twenty-four hours, and had told her he felt “sick al
l over” so he’d come to the clinic’s ER. After a few more questions he’d also admitted to going on a drinking binge a few days back. Yet somehow the guy was tanned and youthful looking for his age, until she looked closer. The saying about the eyes seemed true, and they were the mirror to, if not his soul, his health. There she could see the lasting effects of his living extra-large for many years.

  His admitting labs showed his amylase and lipase levels were over the top, and that alone could have gotten the guy admitted. Add in the bigger picture, and this actor’s next gig turned out to be the role of a hospital patient.

  Carey inserted an IV to be used for medications as well as parenteral nutrition since he was on a strict NPO diet. Next she needed to perform a task no patient ever wanted to go through, at least from her experience as an RN. She had to insert a nasogastric tube.

  “This is more to help relieve your nausea and vomiting than anything else,” she said calmly. “You’ll thank me for it later.”

  He gave her a highly suspicious stare, especially when she gave him a cup of ice chips.

  “Suck on these when I tell you,” she said as she manipulated the thick nasogastric tube with gloved hands and approximated externally how deep it would need to go to reach his stomach. “Okay, now.”

  He took a few ice chips and sucked at the exact time she used his nostril to insert the well-lubricated tube and push past the back of his throat and down into his esophagus and all the way to his stomach. His sucking on the ice would prevent her from going into his lungs. He gagged and protested all the way but didn’t fight her. He gave no indication of the tubing mistakenly going into his lungs by having shortness of breath or becoming agitated, but she did the routine assessment of the placement anyway. She listened through her stethoscope as she inserted a small amount of air with a big syringe into a side port of the NG tube, hearing the obvious pop of air in his stomach when she did so.

  “You did great,” she said as she taped the tubing in place on his cheek and attached the external portion to his hospital gown, then connected the end to the bedside suction machine. He gave her the stink eye, but she knew he was playing with her so she crossed her eyes at him. “It’s one of the perks of my job. You know most nurses have a tiny sadistic side, right?”

  That got a laugh out of him, and she figured she’d tortured the guy enough for now, even though she knew he was lined up for all kinds of extra lab work and additional tests in the next twenty-four hours. So she made sure the side rails on his bed were up and the call light was within his reach, then prepared to leave. “Get some rest.”

  “Like I can!” he managed to say.

  “Carey?” Anne, the ward clerk she’d covered for while she’d gone on vacation called her name just as she exited the patient room.

  “Coming.” Carey marched to the nurses’ station to see what her co-worker needed, only to find a huge vase of gorgeous flowers sitting on the counter. Lavender asters, golden daisies, orange dahlias, and roses, oh, so many perfect roses! “Wow, where’d these come from?”

  “They’re for you!”

  “What?” Joe? What was he trying to do, make up for bailing on the parenting class? Why go back and forth like this, mixing her up even more? Ever since he’d said all those things about not confusing their living situation by getting involved with each other, and especially after the Fourth of July when he’d introduced her to his family, and especially later when they’d shared that significant moment during the fireworks, he’d been avoiding her like crazy. It’d stung and confused her, and she was only just getting her bearings back, thanks mostly to having the new job and not seeing him nearly as often. Was he feeling guilty for leading her on or letting her down? Both? She wanted to pull her hair out over his inconsistency.

  Carey searched for a card, but all she found was an unsigned note.

  These flowers are as lovely as you.

  Sorry, Joe, but that is just inappropriate. Either you want to be involved with me or you don’t. You can’t have it both ways!

  Hadn’t he learned in the parenting class that hormones during pregnancy made every emotion ten times stronger? This tug-of-war with her feelings had to stop.

  “Do you mind if I take a short break?” she asked one of the other nurses who’d begun to gather around the spectacle of colorful blooms, admiring them. The more she thought about those flowers, the more upset she got.

  “Sure. I’ll cover for you.”

  “Thanks.” Carey marched to the elevator and pressed the “down” button, got off on the first floor and headed toward the ER. It was after two, and she knew Joe had been avoiding her by working the afternoon shift from two to ten p.m. in case he actually thought he was fooling her. Her eyes darted around the room until she spied him over by the computers, so she trudged on, determined to get some things straight.

  “You got a second?” she asked.

  “Sure. What’s up?” His hair was a mess. Had he not even combed it? Her first thought was how endearing it made him look, but she stomped it out the instant she thought it. There was no point.

  She had to admit the guy didn’t have the self-satisfied look of a man who knew he’d just surprised a lady with flowers. “Did you send those flowers?”

  He pulled in his chin, brows down, nose wrinkled. “What flowers?” He wasn’t an actor and, honestly, he couldn’t have made up that reaction.

  “Are you horsing around with me?” Her frustration growing, she needed to be sure.

  He raised his hands, palms up. “Honest. I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about. It wasn’t me.” Now he looked curious. “You got flowers and no one signed their name?”

  She nodded, racking her brain to figure out who besides Joe would do such a thing.

  Now he looked perturbed. “You must have an admirer.”

  “Oh, come on.” Where did he get off, making such crazy statements?

  “You don’t think guys watch you?”

  “I’m pregnant, Joe.”

  “You wear those baggy scrubs, and you’re only just now starting to really show.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding. I don’t encourage anyone. I mean I smile at people, I’m nice, but that’s just being polite.” If not Joe, then who? And, honestly, she was disappointed they hadn’t been from him, and, she wanted to kick herself for even allowing the next thought.

  Was that a look of jealousy on his face?

  *

  Joe hadn’t felt this jealous in a long time. He’d skipped the jealous part with his wife, going directly to fury once he’d found out she’d gotten pregnant with Rico. But this was different. This feeling eating through his gut right now was good old-fashioned jealousy.

  Who the hell had sent Carey flowers?

  He looked suspiciously around the department. He’d introduced Frank to her at the party on the roof, but surely he could tell Carey and Joe were more than roommates. Plus they hadn’t spoken two words to each other beyond, “Hi, how are you?”

  It was time to get honest with himself. What could he expect? Carey was stunningly beautiful and he’d noticed admiring glances around the hospital whenever she passed by. At first it had given him great satisfaction to know she was living with him, and no one knew about it. It had been his big, fun secret. The gorgeous woman who’d come in as Jane Doe was his housemate. Now someone had the nerve to make a move on her. And it really ticked him off.

  If—no, when he found out who it was he’d have an in-your-face moment and straighten out any misunderstanding. Carey was off-limits. Got that? Did he have the right to do that? No. But he felt unreasonable whenever things involved her, and he was being honest with himself. He. Was. Jealous.

  “Um, I’ve got to get back to work. My shift’s almost over,” she said.

  “Sure. Okay. If I find out anything, I’ll let you know.”

  “Thanks.”

  He watched her leave, her hair high in a ponytail that swayed with each step. When he noticed one of the ER docs also watching
her, he wanted to cuff the back of the guy’s head. Carey was off limits. Was he being territorial when he had no right to be? Yes. Hell, yes. He folded his arms across his chest, the anger soon turning to self-doubt. How could he honestly expect loyalty from Carey when he wasn’t even prepared to come clean with her about the truth of his past?

  In a frustrated fit he flung his pencil across the desk. His EMT lifted a single brow at him.

  Don’t dare ask, if you value your job.

  *

  Back home that night, the more Carey thought about it, the more upset she got about the flowers. She tried to remember giving anyone the slightest misconception that she was interested. Beyond Joe, that was. But what bothered her more was that Joe seeming to run hot and cold with her. She still didn’t put it past him to send those flowers and pretend he hadn’t. Surely he’d noticed how down she’d been lately, since they’d been forced to change their relationship. But wait, they hardly saw each other anymore. Maybe he hadn’t noticed anything about her mood swings.

  One thing she knew for a fact, she’d gone and ruined everything by kissing him and coming on to him that night. She was a runaway, pregnant with another man’s baby. Did she expect Joe to be a saint on top of everything wonderful about him and welcome her into his life with open arms? She should have left well enough alone.

  She took the bouquet home and put the vase on the coffee table in the center of the living room. Might as well enjoy them since someone had spent a lot of money on them. She chewed a nail and stared at the flowers. Had their one incredible night together been worth all the confusion and heartache it had caused?

  She thought for a couple of seconds and shivered through and through with some incredible memories. Hell, yeah!

  Dejected, she went to the bathroom and washed her face and was getting ready for bed when she heard Joe let himself into the house.

  There was no way Joe could avoid those flowers when he came in. They may not have been from him, but they sure would be a perfect catalyst to force them to have a long-overdue conversation about a few things.