Wedding Date with the Army Doc Read online

  “Sorry, couldn’t resist it.” He slowed down his pace to stay with her.

  “Well, I’m amazed I’ve made it this far without being attacked.”

  “I’ll protect you.”

  Oh, how those amazingly masculine words put new spring in her step. She couldn’t resist and took a quick glance at his shorts and those strong athletic legs. And, holy cow, the man had a prosthetic limb! And he ran like an Olympic athlete, with smooth, even strides and barely any effort at all, not out of breath in the least. He looked like a wounded warrior running on that shiny high-tech blade.

  Her mind worked at laser speed. He usually came to her office wearing scrubs or street clothes. Once or twice she’d noticed his masculine arms, muscles that’d come from weights at the gym, but she’d never had the opportunity to see his amazing abdomen and those runner’s muscled legs. Had she mentioned, holy cow, that he had a below-the-knee amputation on the right?

  That explained his slightly unusual gait.

  So her crush for the better part of a year had been on a man who had more in common with her than she could have ever dreamed! They were both missing something. The next question was, why had he grabbed her just now, obviously slowing down his pace to run with her?

  It had to be because he liked her, too. Hadn’t he proved it Monday afternoon when they’d hugged and kissed? The fact that he’d stayed far away from her and her department ever since, so very unlike him, had made her think differently and had proved he had reservations about starting a relationship. Welcome to the club, buddy. At least now she understood why and it didn’t hurt so much that he’d been avoiding her. But it scared her, and not in a zombie-chasing way but much deeper. Because it was as plain as the sun right there in the sky making her squint. This. Was. A. Test.

  She took another glance at his leg, more blatant this time, keeping her expression blasé, and making sure he noticed. Then she acted like there was absolutely nothing unusual about him.

  He gave her a relaxed smile. She noted relief in his gaze, letting on how much he appreciated her casual acceptance of his amputation. Yeah, her mind was spinning out of control in record time with thoughts and deductions, but she couldn’t help it. This was such a surprise. And it leveled the playing field, which sent a shiver across her skin, warm and damp from running almost five kilometers.

  “So now you know,” he said matter-of-factly, sounding like it was a challenge.

  Think fast for the perfect answer, because if there was ever a time for the right words, it was now. She tried not to remember how cutting Derek’s words had been to her the first time he’d seen her chest. That’s pretty extreme, Charl, and to think it wasn’t even necessary. Who was she kidding? It wasn’t just what he’d said but the shocked, nearly horrified and unaccepting expression that had accompanied it. Pain radiated through her chest as all these thoughts and memories flashed past in less than a second. Think fast! He’s waiting for a response to his comment. “That you’re not perfect? I think I already knew that, Doctor, the day you said you didn’t like my all-time-favorite chocolate bars.”

  He laughed, and she felt good about dismantling the bomb he’d expected to leave her with.

  Then, like the fact he was missing part of a leg meant nothing, they forgot about it and ran on, Jackson prodding her along and scooping her away from another zombie attack as they closed in on the last half-kilometer mark. For someone who hadn’t trained, she’d make sure to finish this race if it killed her, rather than let her new running partner down.

  “I take it you run a lot,” she said, having to gasp the words since she was so out of breath.

  “It’s the best stress reliever I know.”

  “Hey, Dr. Hilstead, isn’t this your second time around?” one of the OR techs called from the crowd on the sidelines as they approached the finish line.

  “I’m helping my friend be safe from the zombies,” he shouted back.

  “Wait, so you’ve already finished this race?”

  “I ran the ten kilometers.” He looked straight ahead, rather than rub it in with a self-satisfied look.

  Yeah, I run five in my sleep. She mocked how she figured what his smug thoughts were about now, though using the last of her quickly disappearing breath. Now she’d have to finish this race even if she had to crawl over the line, just to save face.

  He laughed again, and she was happy a guy who’d taken a big chance and shown the entire hospital his secret was in such a good mood. She hoped she’d had something to do with it, too, because she wanted to think the biggest risk he’d taken had been with her reaction. That would make her special, and she’d passed with flying colors. She hoped so anyway. Was she special?

  “Got any steam left?” he asked. “Let’s finish strong.”

  She understood the “let’s” meant “her” and he wanted her to kick it up for the next several meters. Typical guy. Show him a finish line and he’d have to make a run for it.

  She nodded, lying, and pushed into a sprint, well, her version of a sprint anyway—no hint of form, arms nearly flailing and her feet kicking up in a girlie run way behind her. But in her world she finished strong, simply because she finished!

  He grinned and grabbed her shoulder again, this time not scaring the life out of her but guiding her to the SAG station for water and a banana. Her knees were wobbly, she gulped for air, and her pulse tore through her chest, but other than that she felt great.

  “Good job, Dr. Johnson!” several of the hospital volunteers said in unison.

  She wasn’t able to speak just yet, so she smiled and sipped some water to prove she was still alive. Jackson stood there grinning at her, his chest hardly moving, only a sheen of exertion on his skin. She, on the other hand, was sweating big fat drops, her sports bra with the “natural-looking” silicone padding nearly sliding out of place. He nabbed a towel from the volunteers’ table and put it around her neck.

  “Thanks.” She could finally talk.

  “You did great.”

  “You made me.”

  “Then I’m glad I found you.”

  Oh, the things she could imagine with that statement. I’m glad I found you. Wait, he’d been looking for her? Further proof he might be interested, and now that she’d passed the test, why not go for it? She’d finished the run, was now high on endorphins, or was it light-headedness from low blood oxygen? Who cared? She felt good right now, and she could talk again, so she decided to go for it. “Hey, you want to have dinner with me later?”

  After all they’d been through together for the last few minutes—his surprise test, her passing it, his forcing her to excel at a sport she could honestly live without, her probably setting a new “slowest five-kilometer” world record, him acting proud of her anyway, and probably for many reasons—he hesitated.

  Every part of his facial expression put on the brakes, and it took her aback. So she thought fast and covered. “I’ve got an autopsy to do later this afternoon, and I thought if you weren’t doing anything around five, you might join me in the cafeteria for a quick and easy dinner? Nothing special or anything. No big deal.” Had that sounded professional enough? It was nothing like a date date, just dinner with a running buddy who’d shown her his BKA for the first time today.

  Jackson’s mind wandered in a half-dozen different directions. Why was a great and attractive girl like Charlotte spending Saturday afternoons doing autopsies and offering last-minute dinner invitations? Hell, yeah, he wanted to spend time with her, but tonight was a rescheduling of his usual Friday night dinner and a movie with his son. He couldn’t back out from that, they still had too much to work through, and things continued to be strained. But they were making progress. His son attending Pepperdine had been his main motive for moving to California in the first place. What was left of his family had to come first.

  Reality clicked in. Ton
ight wasn’t the night. His fascination with the lovely pathologist, who now knew about his leg, would have to wait.

  “Can I take a rain check on that invitation?”

  * * *

  James, the near-to-retirement morgue attendant, was ready and waiting after Charlotte had showered and changed into scrubs. By the time she’d donned the gown, shoe covers, face mask and clear plastic face shield, plus two pairs of gloves, he’d already weighed the body and placed it on the stainless-steel gurney-style table, complete with irrigation sink and drainage trough. A large surgical table was nearby with the tools of her trade—bone saw, rib cutter, hammer with hook, scalpel, toothed forceps, scissors, Stryker saw and more.

  A family had requested an autopsy on their loved one, a twenty-five-year-old man, who’d arrived in the hospital three days earlier with signs of a bacterial infection. The hospital had agreed to the postmortem examination to identify any previously undiagnosed condition that may have contributed to his death, and to pin down what bacterium had suddenly run rampant throughout his system.

  As a clinical pathologist, not to be confused with forensics like people saw on TV dramas just about every night of the week, her job was to see for herself what may or may not have caused his death. Knowing that up to a quarter of performed autopsies revealed a major surprise other than the notated cause of death, over the next two to four hours she’d systematically examine the outside and inside of this young man’s body to get to the best and most logical diagnosis.

  James, her diener, stood by ready to assist with each aspect of the autopsy. Turning on her Dictaphone, Charlotte described what she saw externally. Then she used a scalpel to make a Y-shaped incision. Before her afternoon was done she’d weigh and measure every major organ, take systematic biopsies and place them in preservation solution. She’d also collect blood and fluid for laboratory specimens, snap pictures and preserve the brain in fixative for future dissection. She wondered what the zombies would think of her now.

  James labeled as they went along and would, after the autopsy, submit all specimens to the histology lab for Monday, when they resumed their work week. Once the autopsy was complete, James would wash the body and make it ready for the funeral home.

  Though the family might want and expect immediate results, like they’d come to expect on those infamous TV dramas, it might be an entire month before she’d have the final report completed. Autopsies needed and deserved the extra time to make the right diagnoses.

  Her beeper went off. Ah, damn, it was Dr. Dupree. Since he’d called on her official hospital beeper, she answered.

  “I need a favor,” he said, before she could even say hello.

  She’d grown to expect the worst whenever Antwan said he needed anything. “Yes?”

  “They told me you’re on call, and I just got an okay from a family for an autopsy. Can you do it for me tonight?”

  “Tonight? Why the rush?”

  “The family gave me twenty-four hours until they send their daughter to the mortuary. I need this favor, please.”

  She wasn’t used to hearing sincerity in his voice. “When did the patient die?”

  “Just now. I operated on her two weeks ago. Removed her appendix. Everything went great. Two days ago she was readmitted for loss of consciousness at home. Medicine was doing a work-up on her. She seemed to be fine. Then a nurse found her unresponsive in the hospital bed. She was already dead.”

  “Okay. Send her to the morgue. I’ll tell James about the add-on.”

  “Thank you. I owe you a special dinner out.”

  “No, you don’t. This is my job.” Why was it that every time she spoke to Dr. Dupree her hackles rose? Because he was such a player, hitting on every woman in a skirt or hospital scrubs. But just now he’d shown a new side, genuine caring for a young patient who’d died of mysterious causes that may or may not have had something to do with the recent surgery. He was either being extra thorough or covering his backside... CYA, as the saying went.

  For the sake of the family and the concerned doctor, Charlotte would do her usual thorough examination, and if she got lucky tonight, she might solve an unfortunate mystery.

  Four hours later, having completed the long and complicated second autopsy, with strong suspicions that the young female patient had most likely died from an undetected brain aneurysm, she opted to shower in the doctors’ lounge. It was nearly ten by the time she was dressed and ready to go home, but she decided to make a quick stop at her office first to call Security.

  The elevator dinged as she unlocked the door to the pathology department, which was a few doors down from the morgue. She glanced over her shoulder in case it was Security, in which case it would save her a call, but out came Jackson. Though tired from a long day, her mood immediately lifted.

  “Hi,” he said, looking as surprised as she was. “I took a chance and got lucky.”

  “Hi, yourself. What are you doing here?” She unlocked the door and opened it. He followed her inside.

  “I realized I didn’t have your personal cell-phone number, and thought I’d see if you were still around so I could get it.”

  He’d come back to the hospital at...she glanced at her watch...ten-fifteen p.m., hoping to run into her? Sure, she was happy the man was pursuing her, but it also made her wonder about his dinner date. She gave him her number and watched as he entered it into his cell phone. Then he insisted she take his. A good sign.

  “How’d the autopsy go?”

  “I wound up doing two.”

  “No kidding. You must be beat.”

  “Yeah, it’s been a long day, starting with getting chased by zombies and ending with, well, you know.” Out of respect for the dead she always recalled the Latin phrase—Hic locus est ubi mors gaudet succurrere vitae. This is the place where death rejoices to help those who live. It was her way of reframing the tough job she did as a pathologist, especially when both of the autopsies she’d performed tonight had been on young people, which always seemed wrong.

  His hand came to her shoulder and lightly massaged. “Yeah, I know. It must be hard.”

  “No harder than what you do in surgery.” She turned and looked up at him. Though he stood behind her, she got the distinct impression he might like to kiss her again, and admittedly, with that warm hand caressing her tight shoulder muscle, the thought appealed.

  But he didn’t. “You’ve got a point. Why don’t I stick around while you do whatever you’ve got to do? Then I’ll walk you to your car.”

  The rule at St. Francis Hospital was for every female employee—or any employee who preferred to be escorted, for that matter—to call Security after dark for the walk to the parking lot. Charlotte had used the service many times. In fact, it was the sole reason she’d come back to her office, to make the call and wait until a security guard arrived. Now she wouldn’t have to.

  “Thanks for saving me a call to Security. It usually takes twenty minutes for anyone to show up, so I was going to look at a few slides while I waited.”

  “I’ll stick around if you still want to check those slides.”

  “To be honest, I’d really like to get home.”

  “Let’s go, then.”

  As they walked, Charlotte couldn’t let her question remain silent. “So how’d your evening go?”

  “It was good. I had dinner with my youngest son, Evan—or Ev, as he prefers to be called these days.”

  Relieved that his mysterious dinner date had been with his son, she smiled. “You get together often?”

  “Yeah, usually on Friday nights, but he had other plans last night.”

  So that was who he rushed off to every Friday afternoon. Her spirits kept lifting with each tidbit of information Jackson dropped. “That’s great.” And she really meant it.

  He grimaced. “Well, we’ve got a lot to work
out. The divorce was hard on both my sons but particularly on Evan. I’ve got to rebuild his trust, and we’re getting there little by little.”

  She admired how much Jackson’s family meant to him. It put him in a good light—a man who loved his family. The more she learned about him the more she liked, and the fact he had a BKA had zero impact on his appeal. If only she could trust that her situation would be as easily dealt with by him as his was for her. Unfortunately, her experience with Derek had set her up to expect the worst.

  Sooner than she expected, because they always found conversation easy, he delivered her to the car.

  “So thanks, and good night, then,” she said, and as she unlocked the door and prepared to slide behind the wheel, he pecked her on the cheek. It surprised her, but in a good way, though she’d kind of wished for more and sooner than now.

  “So I’ll call you later, okay?”

  “Sure.” She grinned, enjoying being pursued by a man she was definitely attracted to. Maybe that was why the second part of her thought slipped out. “I’d really like that.”

  From the look on his face, he really liked that, too. Good!

  Once inside her car, as she placed the seat belt over her shoulder and across her chest, her elation ebbed a bit. What was she thinking, acting like she was just a regular woman living a regular life, hoping to have a regular relationship with a new guy? That was ancient history for her—love, marriage, a career and family—a dream she could never achieve now.

  Mindlessly, her hand brushed over her silicone pads. She was anything but regular.

  But forty-five minutes later, when Charlotte was home and in her pajamas, Jackson didn’t waste any time before using his newly acquired phone number. He said he’d called just to make sure she’d got home okay and to bid her good night again. She went to bed wearing a smile and thinking of his handsome face. Maybe taking a risk on a man like Jackson made perfect sense. Who could possibly be better than a guy with a BKA to understand her sense of feeling incomplete?