Chapter 3
3
COOPER
My throat felt like dry fire. I attempted a cough, but nothing came out, and I felt my heart race. I tried to lift up my head, but it felt as though it was stuck to the pillow. Raising my hand to touch my face, I felt a tug of pain. Looking at the back of my hand, I saw a butterfly drip stuck into it. Trying to focus my eyes, which felt like they had been taken out and dipped in sand, I saw a dim light in the corner of the room. I felt a warm presence on my other hand, and looked to see what was laid across it. My whole body felt fuzzy, with a dim undertone of throbbing pain. My hand, still resting on the bed, looked unnatural, and I realised that the extra fingers didn’t belong to me. I squeezed gently, which was an achievement in itself. The fingers wrapped around mine squeezed back. My gritty eyes followed the fingers up the arm, and I realised a woman was asleep in the chair next to me. Even in sleep, she looked exhausted, pale blue scrubs encasing her lithe body. The hand holding mine had a wedding ring on it I noticed, and I felt a little pang of unexplained disappointment. Pushing the thought away, I tried to make my eyes focus on her again. She was pretty, little snuffles coming from her as she slept deeply. She had squeezed my hand back in reflex, unconsciously in sleep. I wanted to move my hand away, embarrassed by the contact, but I didn’t move. She felt familiar, her touch soothing.
Looking around, I saw everyone was asleep, except for a couple of nurses milling around the area. It was then that I noticed what was missing: the noise. There was no gunfire, no explosions. All I could hear were the sounds of nature outside the tent. I think that this was more unnerving than being woken by the sounds of war, and I kept my ears open for any sound of impending danger. I felt so groggy, and my legs were numb. Trying to lift my head again, I pushed through the pain to look down at my body. Lifting the covers laid over me, I saw that I was naked. They must have cut my clothes off. I glanced across at the doctor in the chair. Had she seen me naked? I almost laughed out loud. The first time a woman had seen my dick in years, and I was unconscious and bleeding at the time. Very sexy. Go figure.
Pushing down the covers again, being careful not to move my hand from hers, I looked down at my legs. I half-expected to see two stumps, but there they were, although one of them looked like it was in a real mess, the whole thing encased in bandages. The shape was off, like someone had shaved off some ribbons of flesh. But I still had two legs, that was a good start. My torso was bandaged too, with a tube coming out of one side. Probably a drain, I realised. I had seen enough injured buddies to realise that a bomb blast ripped through your body like a hurricane, tearing organs, snapping bones, taking the very soul from a man. I was still here, so I would take it from there.
‘Morning, Captain,’ a soft voice said, thick with sleep. I lowered the covers quickly, aware that I had probably just been flashing the crown jewels. ‘It’s Kate. I’m glad you got some rest. You needed it.’
I looked across at her. She was stretching in the chair, hand still on mine, rubbing the sleep from her pretty almond eyes. ‘I didn’t see a thing, don’t worry. How are you feeling?’
I cut her off before she could go into full bedside manner mode. ‘My unit?’
‘You don’t remember?’
‘Remember what?’ I replied, my voice gruff, raspy. It came out harsher than I intended. I wasn’t one for small talk at the best of times, and worry was spiking my adrenaline. The monitor beeped a little faster from somewhere behind my head.
Her face fell. ‘The man you were carrying, he didn’t make it. I’m s?—’
I raised my drip hand at her. ‘I know about Smithy, what about the others?’
She smiled a little then, relieved to have been asked another question. ‘They are all out, safe and sound.’
I nodded, a wave of relief coursing over me. Then I remembered something.
‘There was a boy, on the roof.’ My voice pushed out the words in a croak. Her smile was dazzling this time.
‘He’s fine. Safe. You saved him.’ She was looking at me like I was a hero. It was… new.
‘Hightower okay?’
Kate laughed. ‘He’s good. Tried to take down half the staff to get to you. I’ll make sure he knows you’re awake. How’s your pain?’
‘Can’t feel a thing.’ She didn’t look too pleased about that, but I brushed it off. ‘When can I get back to duty?’
Her face fell, and she looked down at our hands. I pulled mine away then, and she let it go without a fight.
‘Dr Trevor Tanner is going to come and talk to you soon, on his rounds.’
I grunted in annoyance. ‘I’m not some idiot, missy. I just want to know when.’
She raised her chin at me then, her face hardening a little. ‘First of all, I’m not “missy”, I’m Dr Kate Harper. I’m an orthopaedic surgeon attached to your unit and several others, and as I said, Dr Tanner, my superior, is going to come and speak to you on rounds…’ She checked her watch. ‘…Which started half an hour ago. I need to go, I’ll come and check on you soon.’
She stood up and strode off haughtily. I laughed at her swagger. This one was a real ball buster, I could tell. I could have been nicer to her. The thought of her sleeping with her hand holding mine clouded my thoughts. I had no time for anything that wasn’t getting back to my unit. I was Captain Cooper, not Mr Hearts and Flowers. She was a medic, she patched people like me up and sent them back out there. Still, winding her up gave me something. A distraction from being in this bed.
‘Okay, Missy,’ I shouted after her, chuckling. ‘Don’t get your knickers in a twist.’
I sniggered again as she made a ‘humpf’ sound, her nose pointing at the air furiously as she sped up her stomp. My whole body screamed at me for laughing, but it was so worth it.
Trevor was doing his rounds when she found him, and she could tell from his face that they had had a good night. A good night here was when they still had the same number alive as the day before. A great day was when there were no casualties at all, but sometimes the team was hard pushed to remember many days like that.
‘Captain Cooper thinks he is hilarious. I’m just waiting for him to call me “toots” and slap me on the behind,’ Kate said, still a little shocked at his reaction. She’d just spent the night holding his hand, thinking what a hero he was. What was it with alphas and their bravado? Trevor checked the vitals on his sleeping patient, and satisfied, made notes on his chart.
‘So he’s awake? That’s amazing! How is he doing? How are his vitals?’
‘He’s stable, the chest drain is working well. I’m still concerned about his leg though. He has limited blood flow to the area, and I’m worried about sepsis. I think the next couple of hours will be crucial.’
Trevor nodded sadly. ‘So, he will probably lose the leg, if we try to keep him alive.’ He rubbed at his temples. ‘Not told him any of this, have you?’
Kate shook her head. ‘I told him you would explain on this morning’s ward round. I wanted to go through everything again, monitor him closely for as long as we safely can before we make a decision.’
Trevor looked at her, his face unreadable. ‘It may not be our decision, it’s up to him.’
Kate looked nonplussed. ‘The evac chopper is coming in two days. At present, he’s too unstable to move. We need to get him home then, leg or no leg. A decision between losing a limb and dying is not a great thing to have thrust at you, granted – but he wants to live, surely?’
Trevor placed the chart at the foot of the bed and started to walk towards the next patient, issuing medication instructions to the nurse as he walked.
‘Kate,’ he began in a tone he might have used to tell his child that Father Christmas wasn’t real. ‘I have worked on men like Captain Cooper since this whole nightmare started. These are army men to the core. Sometimes going home means no family, no buddies, no job, and a lifetime of relying on other people. They are proud, and sometimes, to them, the reality is worse than death. Don’t take anything for granted when it comes to patient wishes.’
Kate ran her fingers through her hair, suddenly feeling tired all over again. He’d never asked anything about himself, his injuries. Whether he was going to live through this. He’d only asked about returning to his team. His sudden macho turnaround made sense now. He was fearful for his career, and she understood that. Trying to keep her career on track hadn’t been life or death, but she had felt torn about not being able to do it, or do it well. Hell, if she didn’t have Jamie to go home to and a marriage breakdown to navigate, she would already have signed up for another tour. She couldn’t imagine not being a doctor. It was part of her.
‘Cooper knows that. Better than most, probably. Let’s see what happens. If we can head off the sepsis, we might not have to cross that bridge.’
‘Understood.’
‘So what you’re saying, Doc, is that I’m screwed.’ Captain Cooper was sat up in bed now, the drain poking out from his side. The internal bleeding had been dealt with, his chest now free from shrapnel. All his organs were intact, and the tears in his body had been sewn up, the bleeding stopped.
Trevor pulled a chair across to sit near his bedside. ‘Your left leg is bad, Captain. You’re starting to show signs of severe infection, and we feel that a below knee amputation is needed. Your chest injuries will take substantial time to heal, and your right leg has been injured by shrapnel from the bomb too. Returning to your unit is out of the question, at least for now. You have a place on the chopper, but the next few hours will decide whether you are fit enough to make the journey back to the UK.’
Captain Cooper sat motionless in the bed, his mind obviously working overtime as he processed the information. Kate stood behind Trevor, watching Cooper with interest. She couldn’t imagine having to make a decision like this. The consent to surgery papers in her hand felt heavy, weighted with their implication.
‘And when do you need an answer?’ Cooper said flatly, not looking at Trevor, but directly at Kate. She blushed under his intent gaze and felt pathetic that her body responded to the pull of attraction she felt to this man at such a time. Trevor pulled a marker pen out of his top pocket, and lifting the covers, made a mark on the area of skin just poking out from the top of the bandages.
‘We need to monitor you. This will tell us if the antibiotics are working – we need to watch out for any colour changes above this line on your leg. We have to make a decision tonight, and I would highly recommend that you have the surgery Captain, and be on that chopper when it leaves.’
Kate looked away from the captain’s face, feeling his gaze on her again. She didn’t trust her own face not to betray her emotions. A deep voice broke the silence of the machines beeping in the room.
‘I withhold consent.’
Kate snapped her head towards the voice. Cooper looked determined, resigned to his decision and angry, as though he was daring them to challenge him. Her heart sank.
‘Captain, you do realise that?—’
‘Yes, Missy. I realise what I am saying, and I withhold consent. You can’t take my leg.’
‘You have to live, you can live without a leg. With modern-day medical advances, you can still live a good life. It’s not over for you.’ She was speaking too much, going against her training, but she wanted him to have the facts. That was her job, to lay out the options. She had no personal stake in this, even though everything in her was screaming that she wanted him to live. What was the point if not? Of meeting him, of the boy being saved, just for another life to be wasted in its place?
‘I withhold consent. You can keep your medical advances.’
Kate opened her mouth to argue, moving closer to the bed, but Trevor stood up to stop her.
‘Captain, that is your decision, but let’s see what happens over the next few hours, okay? Think it over, we realise it’s a huge decision to make.’
The captain snorted. ‘No shit, Doc. I won’t change my mind.’
Trevor nodded, an almost imperceptive movement. ‘Kate, keep me updated.’ He left the area to tend to other patients.
The captain looked at her again, and she felt a flush creep across her skin as his eyes ran over her body. For a nude man, he had the undressing people with your eyes thing nailed. She was the one who felt naked, exposed in front of him.
‘I know you don’t get it, but this is my life. Without it, there’s not much to stay alive for.’
‘I get it more than you think,’ she sighed. ‘But we are not there yet. The medication could still turn things around.’ She put the papers down at the side of his bed. ‘Is there anyone I can call for you?’
‘Nope, everyone’s already here.’ Cooper crossed his arms gently, his pale face wincing at the pain of his movements. Which meant he was getting worse, if the injuries were making themselves known even over the pain meds. She checked his morphine drip as his eyes followed her movements. He was looking sicker and sicker as time passed, and she knew he must feel it.
‘So,’ he rasped. ‘Your husband serve too?’
The mention of a husband had her head turning towards him.
‘No, he’s back home, with my son.’
Cooper nodded, his jaw tightening. ‘What does he think of you being out here, in all this?’
‘Well,’ she checked the monitors again and sagged down into the chair she’d slept in. ‘My son is still little and believes in superheroes, so he thinks I’m pretty cool. Like Captain America or something.’
‘Wonderwoman,’ Cooper added. ‘What about your husband?’
The smile dropped from her lips. ‘Well, he’s my soon to be ex-husband, so he’s not so keen about…’ She waved a hand around the tent. ‘…all this. He thinks I ran away.’
‘Did you?’ When she met his green eyes, she saw no judgement.
She laughed a little, despite herself. ‘No. Yes. A little bit. I wanted to come and help, do something. Learn new skills, I guess, but I can’t say that I wasn’t glad to come out here.’
‘How long you been married?’
‘Too long,’ was all she would allow herself to say. ‘We had Jamie by accident, really. It seemed like the natural thing to do.’
‘Jamie’s your son?’
‘Yeah.’ She pulled out her phone, showed him her screensaver of him in his football kit.
‘Cute kid.’
‘What about you?’
His dark brows knitted together. ‘What about me?’
‘What do you have back home?’ His expression started to close off, and she rushed to fill the awkward pause. ‘I mean, when you’re not protecting the world and saving kids on rooftops.’
‘I never really did the traditional way of living,’ he tried to shrug but his whole body tensed from the movement. ‘I have my unit, and that’s more than enough.’
They stared at each other for a long time, but it wasn’t awkward. He looked like he was trying to figure her out just as she was him. ‘What if you need the surgery?’
His lips pursed. ‘I won’t.’ She felt like she should say more, tell him how precarious his condition was, but he spoke first. ‘Tell me, if you couldn’t be a doctor, what would you do? How would you spend your life?’
Kate’s mind flashed to an image of Jamie, at home with Neil, the man she had flown to a warzone to get some space from, and she closed her mouth, tensing her jaw. ‘I honestly don’t know,’ she murmured. ‘I love my son, but?—’
‘You don’t really like the traditional way either.’
‘I guess we’re similar in that way.’
‘Guess we are.’ His smile, when it came, lit his pale face up. ‘My life is here, I have no plan B.’
Kate thought of his wallet, bearing no pictures of home or family. There wouldn’t be anyone flying a banner for the captain when he touched down on the tarmac. He needed to get through this. She pushed the thought away, taking a breath.
‘Well Captain?—’
‘Coop, please. We’ve held hands, and I’m pretty sure you’ve seen me naked.’
She nodded, the corners of her mouth lifting up. ‘We’re not at plan B, Coop. Get some rest.’
He relaxed a little, offering her a cheeky half-smile as he rested back against his pillows.
‘Maybe just for a minute,’ he winced as he adjusted himself into a better position. ‘Feel like I’ve been hit by a damn truck.’
Kate waited till he was asleep, his breathing even, before she reached for his hand again. Resolving that while he was here, he would have someone. Her.
Kate was sleeping in her cot when she was shaken awake by a frantic nurse. ‘Dr Harper, Cooper is crashing.’ Kate leapt from her bed, still fully dressed in her scrubs and raced to the tent with the nurse hot on her heels. ‘How long has he been down?’ she shouted over her shoulder.
‘Less than two minutes, I came straight here.’
‘Where’s Trevor?’ Kate shouted, racing across the dust for the entrance to the tent, ignoring the burn of the sand in her eyes from the grit her frantic feet were kicking up.
‘He’s in surgery, we had another IED casualty come in an hour ago.’
‘Shit,’ Kate said. ‘Fuck!’ Racing across to the captain, she saw doctors and nurses running around. Whipping back the covers, she saw what she had feared and she sent up a curse to the almighty. His infection had taken hold with a vengeance, the discoloured skin now seeping well past Trevor’s pen line.
‘Okay, let’s run the code. Charge to 300.’ Kate grabbed the paddles, hands shaking. ‘Now guys, let’s go, his organs are failing! Someone should have called me sooner!’
‘We were checking him,’ the nurse protested. ‘He kept refusing to let us check!’
Damn it. I withhold consent. She could hear his voice in her head as she fought to bring him back.
The machine bleeped its readiness. ‘Clear!’ she shouted, shocking the captain’s chest. She checked the monitor again. ‘No output, charge to 350.’ She turned, wide-eyed to the side table. ‘Did he sign the papers? The consent papers, did he sign them?’
‘No,’ the nurse confirmed. ‘He was asleep, but we operate, right? We need to take the leg to save him.’
It was different here. Not everyone was in shape to give consent, and when medical intervention was needed it was done. To save the patient. ‘He didn’t want this, I need Trevor. Clear!’
The 350 charge jolted his body.
Nurse Abby looked at Kate. ‘Kate, he refused amputation verbally only. He didn’t sign papers to withhold consent. Protocol is we save him, given that he’s not in a position to sign either way. He’s been down for three minutes, and unless we amputate, his body will continue to shut down. I think we need to make a call.’ The monitors continued their music, the beep of a man circling the drain.
Kate stood, paddles in hand, trying to think. ‘Have you called Trevor?’
‘He’s in surgery, he can’t come.’
‘Did he sign a DNR?’ Kate asked frantically, trying to justify the decision she knew she wanted to take. ‘Did he put anything in writing?’
Abby shook her head. ‘No. We could wait for Trevor, he’s being told right now but that might be too late. Kate! We need to prep for amputation!’
Medic Jones came running in, radio in hand. ‘Trevor made the call – if no papers were signed, we proceed as normal.’
‘Shit. Okay, okay. Thanks.’ Trevor was there when he said he didn’t want the operation. He was her superior. It came down to him, but she would have to be the one to do it. To look him in the eye after. He might never get back to his unit. Active duty was far harder for amputees. He wouldn’t be the captain he loved being after this. Kate looked at the man on the bed, and thought of the boy on the roof. If Cooper died, what would be the point in any of this? Would she want Jamie’s survival to mean another life lost, if her child had been on that rooftop? Life was made of split-second decisions, and Kate had made enough to know that she would rather choose fast and live with the fallout. The thought of letting him die felt wrong. She just knew that the world still had plans for this soldier, even if he didn’t realise it yet. She would live with her decision. If the captain couldn’t deal with it, then that was his choice. He could die, just not today, and not on her watch. She had to follow orders.
‘Patients change their mind. Do you want to be responsible for a death that could have been prevented? Kate, please – charge!’ Kate looked at the nurse, feeling the sweat drip down her spine inside her scrubs. She was terrified, but she just couldn’t let him go out like this. Her mind was set. Abby looked at her and the others around them, and shaking her head, she ordered another charge.
The beeping noise told Kate the unit was ready.
‘Clear!’ she shouted, shocking the captain again. His body jerked and this time, his eyes fluttered. A flash of green she thought she might never see again. She looked desperately at the monitor. Nothing. Nothing on the screen but a line, and a beep heralding the call of the end. Nothing, nothing, then a beat, beat, beat. The pixels on the screen danced across, levelling into a pattern. The prettiest pattern Dr Harper had ever seen.
‘We have him back,’ she said, putting the paddles away. ‘Gown me up,’ she ordered.
‘I need a bone saw and a ten blade, now.’
Abby nodded, running to the sterile equipment store and grappling for implements with sure hands. Kate snipped away the bandages, another nurse prepped the surgical field, and a doctor worked on anaesthetising the captain.
Moments later, someone passed the blade to her. She took a deep breath, looking at Cooper’s unconscious face, and made the first cut.
Please forgive me.