Chapter 4
Friday night in Miami’s busiest trauma hospital usually meant anything from broken bones to upset stomachs to gunshot wounds. Tonight was unusually quiet, but Allison knew things changed in minutes.
Seconds.
Never say the Q word. Because after you did, all heck would break loose.
Any minute, an ambulance would screech into the bay carrying a moaning person extracted from a mangled car, or a mother with a screaming child who slammed his hand in a door.
Never mind the times a guy brought in a girlfriend who had something inserted into a body cavity the good Lord never intended to house that object.
She’d treated nearly everything in her years as a trauma nurse.
But the last thing she expected to see tonight was Rafe, running into the ER through the ambulance bay, carrying an elderly woman in his arms.
His dark gaze met hers. “Help her. She collapsed. I think it’s her heart. I did CPR and she’s breathing, but barely.”
Shock at seeing him again gave way to professionalism. Allison grabbed a gurney and wheeled it over. Rafe gently laid the woman onto it. After pushing it into a curtained room, she began taking the woman’s vitals. Pulse thready and thin. Heartbeat with a sloshing sound. Murmur, probably.
“Is she on anything?”
He rattled off a well-known heart medication. Allison glanced at him as she slipped an oxygen cannula into the woman’s nostrils.
“Did she complain of pain before she collapsed? Was it crushing chest pain, with shortness of breath?”
Chest pain meant bad things. If there was ST elevation on the EKG, Rafe’s grandmother could have complete blockage of a coronary artery and that meant cardiac tissue dying.
Rafe shook his head. “She said she felt nauseated. Not crushing pain, but tightness in her chest. Got me worried.”
“Women having heart attacks sometimes experience different symptoms, so it’s good you kept an eye on her.”
Another nurse brought over a portable EKG machine. Allison opened the woman’s dress, thankful it buttoned from the front.
The woman moaned as Allison attached the sticky leads to her chest.
“Hey, gorgeous, what’s your name?” she asked the elderly woman.
“Elena, her name’s Elena,” Rafe muttered, stroking the woman’s white hair. “My grandmother.”
“Tita, Tita, please be okay. Uncle Rafe, tell me she’s going to be okay,” a young girl sobbed.
“Rafey, why did you take her here? Miami Bayshore is closer.”
“Rafe, shouldn’t she be fully awake by now?”
“Rafe, you pushed awfully hard on her chest. Did you break her ribs?”
Allison glanced up. At least twenty frantic, upset people surrounded them, including a pretty teenage girl in a tiara and puffy pink dress. Her gaze shot over to Rafe’s poker face.
Rafe looked up at the crowd.
“She’s a good nurse. The best. Now, everyone, back off and let her do her job. Give Tita some room, please!”
“Do you happen to know all the medications she’s on?” she asked Rafe.
He consulted his cell phone. “Everyone keeps a list on their phones in case of emergencies. I’ll text them to you.”
“I’m surprised you still have my number,” she muttered.
“Kept it just in case.”
In case of what? You wanted to ask me for a date? She shook her head, withdrew her cell and consulted the text. In addition to the heart medication she was on a well-known blood pressure medication.
“You have her number, Uncle Rafey?” The puffy dress teen looked interested more than scared. “Are you guys seeing each other?”
To her horror, Allison felt revealing heat suffuse her cheeks. She focused on Elena.
“We’ll take good care of her,” she assured Rafe and the others. “Stay in the waiting room, and as soon as we know something, I’ll come out and bring you up to speed.”
As she turned, Rafe caught her upper arm. His dark gaze burned with intensity. “Don’t let her die.”
A brief nod. She and the other nurse wheeled Elena away. Allison shifted to the job at hand, pushing back the thoughts of Rafe and his dark gaze, and how he changed from the intimidating FBI agent to a worried grandson.
His grandmother’s life was in her hands now.
The doctor came over and began his examination. At least Dr. Charles, unlike some of the jerk ER residents working the weekend shift, was courteous to nurses and didn’t act like God.
Elena began muttering in Spanish.
Her command of Spanish wasn’t as great as her coworkers, but she was fluent enough. Allison soothed her patient, trying to reassure her.
Don’t let her die.
What would Rafe do if that happened?
* * *
He hated waiting in a hospital emergency room. His family didn’t like it, either, but other than the usual bumps, bruises or accidents with kids, none of them experienced what he had.
Waiting to hear bad news.
Sofia, sitting with her court, who looked as traumatized as she did, came over and joined him in pacing. “Uncle Rafey, Tita has to be okay. Right? We can’t lose her.”
“Princesa, the nurses and doctors are doing all they can.”
“Like they did with you last year? We thought...” Tears glistened in her dark eyes. “We thought you were going to die in this hospital. Mama was even talking about funerals and burial plots.”
Inwardly he cursed his thoughtlessness. Here he was, remembering the agents he’d lost and his family had been here, waiting to hear if he lived or died. Guilt filled him. Oh yeah, this was a well-known emotion. When he focused on the job, he neglected his family.
When he focused on his family’s need, the job and his team took second place.
So where do I stand? I’ll think about that later. They need me now.
Rafe hugged Sofia. “I’m here. I’m a tough guy. Elena is tough as well. You come from stock that’s tempered as fine steel.”
He glanced at his cell phone as Sofia brushed away her tears and walked off. Nearly two hours. Not a word. It could mean anything...
His family milled about the waiting room. Elena was the glue holding them all together.
Rafe knew his grandmother never fully approved of his dad. She always worried something would happen to him, leaving her beloved Carmela a widow. And then the worst happened.
Small wonder I have commitment issues.
He looked at his niece, who was doing her best to try to hold it together.
The double doors swung open, but instead of a young, tired resident doctor, Allison hurried out. She spotted him and started toward him, but his family beat him there.
They formed a circle, anxious looks on their faces. Rafe knew instantly it would be okay. Allison was smiling.
Through the relieved shouts and exclamations, he could barely hear her. Broken sentences reached him, including, “going to keep her overnight,” “meds adjusted,” “less stress” and “a couple of you can see her for a few minutes.”
Relief made all his tensed muscles relax. He rubbed the back of his neck to ease the knot there. Allison looked at him.
“Headache?” she asked, amid the happy buzz of voices.
“Yeah. I’ll live.”
She looked him up and down. “Yeah, you will. Too bad.”
He blinked as she flashed him her sassy grin. Rafe rolled his eyes.
Allison gestured to Sofia. “Let me guess. Quinceanera party interrupted?”
He nodded. “My niece Sofia’s. No one will want to return to the hall. Most of the guests have left anyway.”
Allison pursed her lips. She had a lovely mouth, soft lips in a Cupid’s bow. A brief thought flashed across his mind—what would her mouth feel like beneath the subtle pressure of his?
You’ll never find out, chump. She’s not for you. Find a nice Cuban girl who prefers a Mercedes-Benz over a motorcycle.
“Your family is here, right? Most of them?”
Rafe glanced around the crowded waiting room. More of the relatives had arrived to join the long wait. Except for two other strangers, his family took up all the space. “I’d say all of them, actually. And some of Sofia’s friends.”
Sofia joined them and slid an arm around Rafe’s waist. “Thank you for saving my nana. My quinz doesn’t matter as much as she does. That’s the best birthday present anyone can give me.”
Allison’s smile softened. Never had she looked at him that way, but he felt a strange tug in his chest.
“I daresay all of you won’t leave the hospital anyway, until you see Elena is okay,” she said.
Vigorous nods all around.
She glanced at her phone. “It’s late, but I hate to see a good party ruined. A quinz only happens once. Let me think.”
As she glanced around, he recognized the spark in her eyes. Allison had a daring side, one he’d glimpsed when working with her when she’d accepted the assignment to be an informant.
“There’s a new doctor’s lounge on the second floor, away from the patient rooms. It hasn’t been officially opened yet, but it’s finished. We could set something up, if you rescue the cake and some drinks, no alcohol, and maybe someone can plug in their iPhone for music...”
Several voices began talking in excited tones. One of Sofia’s friends who lived closest to the hospital offered to go home and get his portable speaker.
Sofia ran over and hugged her. “You’re so nice!”
Rafe felt a tingle of gratitude toward her. “You sure this is okay? Don’t you need approval?”
Allison grinned. “From whom? It’s after midnight. Besides, I have a key.”
There it was again, that spark of defiance and nonconformity. Troublemaker. He hesitated as Sofia gave him a pleading look. Hell, everyone was looking to him for the nod of approval.
“Uncle Rafey, please?”
Allison’s grin turned crooked. “Please, Uncle Rafey? I promise it will be okay. I won’t even be there long because I do have to work.”
Instead of answering, he chucked Sofia under the chin. “You got it. Anything for you.”
She clapped her hands, and the glum teens perked up.
Rafe turned to Allison. “Thank you for doing this for her.”
Some unknown emotion crossed her face. “It’s not a big deal. I hate seeing kids disappointed. Come on, I’ll show you where the lounge is.”
* * *