2. Reed
Chapter two
Reed
“Paging Dr. Bellamy. The patient in room two is requesting a second opinion. ” The overhead speaker crackles above me in the nurse’s station, and I close my eyes as I sit back in the rolling chair.
Taryn props her elbow on the counter beside me, resting her chin in her palm. She tucks her chopped bob neatly behind her ears, and mirth lights her steel eyes as she nudges me with an elbow. “They’re calling you, Dr. Bellamy.”
“I heard,” I grumble before getting back to my patient’s chart. “There are only so many second opinions you can ask for with an obvious spiral fracture.”
Taryn snickers as she opens her patient’s folder on the desktop beside mine. “This is the life of the ER. Get used to it.”
I side-eye her. “I’ve been getting used to it for over two years now. Bring me back to my ICU days, I beg of you.”
Being a traveling surgeon seemed like the perfect path three years ago. I was new in the field and felt like I could do it all. With no kids or a wife waiting for me at home, it was the reasonable option to keep things fresh. It didn’t begin to lose its luster until recently.
I’m in my thirties and have yet to keep a stable home because of the bouncing around. I don’t know what I’m looking for in life, but this is growing tiresome. I’m not young anymore, and I find myself craving security and, potentially, love.
The only downside, you may ask?
Finding someone who won’t consider me a freak the moment they learn just what I’m into.
During my last contract in Texas, I met a woman whom I thought was the one for me.
We shared similar interests, and our relationship just seemed to grow and mature effortlessly.
It wasn’t until things got hot and heavy that she tucked tail and ran out of my life.
Her quickness might have offended me if I didn’t know my tastes were…
different. But I couldn’t blame her. So, it’s easier to just keep to myself.
It doesn’t stop me from craving a connection with another person, but I know it isn’t possible.
Well, I wouldn’t say it’s unattainable, but it’s easier to focus on work rather than sit and ponder about what I’m lacking.
“You need to get laid,” Taryn comments as she types on her keyboard, her massive wedding band taunting me with each flick across the keys.
My lips thin. “Coming from the woman who has a wife waiting at home for her.”
She smirks. “Ten years and still going strong. You’ll get there one day.”
Yeah, if the women in my life become really cool about a bunch of stuff quickly.
Taryn sits back, cutting her eyes at me as she crosses her arms over her chest. Her white coat bunches as she scrutinizes me. “I’m not privy to the male population, but you’re attractive, right?”
My face twists. “I guess?”
She rubs her chin as she contemplates my looks. “You could use a haircut.”
“I like my hair.”
It’s cropped with the sides faded. The top may be a little unkempt with my unforgiving work schedule, but I don’t think it looks bad.
Maybe I do need to freshen up a little?
“Maybe if you shave?” Taryn asks, squinting her eyes at me.
I rub a hand over my dark scruff, frowning at her. “Does it look bad?”
“I don’t know, dude!”
I run my hand through my hair, musing it further. “I think I'm a lost cause at this point.”
“You are,” she concurs, pointing a manicured finger at me. “Why don’t you come with Emma and me to the new bar downtown? I heard the atmosphere is nice, and I’m sure you’re bound to pick up someone.”
My features twist further at the thought of some dimly lit bar and a drunk woman hanging off my arm.
Hard pass.
“And watch you and your wife make googly eyes at each other all evening?” I chuckle, closing out my chart. “You two enjoy your night.”
She shrugs. “Invite is always open. It would be more interesting than having to explain the same shit to room two all night.”
If that isn’t the fucking truth.
I sigh as I run my hands along the bridge of my nose, preparing myself for round three with Mrs. Gertrude, an old bitty with a loud, shrill voice and the heart of a champion, who occupies our second ER suite. I’m just about to push my chair out when the code alarm chimes overhead.
“Code Grey, Code Grey, Code Grey,” the monotone recording produces from the nurse’s station. In a flurry, men and women dressed in standard blue scrubs scurry into action. Security darts through the ER automatic doors, looking around frantically for the assailant.
“Combative patient,” Taryn muses. “Those are yours. I’ll handle room two.”
I’m already in motion, grabbing my stethoscope as I intercept a nurse who’s wheeling a trauma cart into one of the open rooms. “Was there any alert from EMS?”
Wanda, an experienced nurse with grey hair pulled tightly into a bun at her nape, shakes her head as she hands the cart off. “It happened just up the road. They barely had time to stabilize the poor thing. She’s a biter.”
I blink. “You mean she’s a fighter?”
The older woman gives me a patient look. “I didn’t stutter, Dr. Bellamy.”
Fuck me.
“Okay, was anyone able to assess the damage?” I ask over the chaos ensuing in the small ER room.
Jackson, another nurse and the youngest on staff, rattles off the report.
“We couldn’t get a name, but the patient is a female in her early twenties.
She suffered a gunshot wound to her right shoulder and fell three stories onto the roof of a car.
EMS believes her ribs are fractured and she sustained head trauma on impact. ”
Jesus Christ.
What the fuck was this woman doing?
I shake myself out of my shock as I get to work. I know she’s going to need surgery to remove the bullet that’s lodged in her shoulder. She’ll also need X-rays and a CT to check for any bleeding on the brain. I order for a full exam, setting this mystery patient’s status to STAT.
“What about restraints?” I call out behind me.
“She broke free of the cuffs,” Wanda supplies as she rushes past me.
Jackson whips around as he sets up the bedside monitors. “She broke free? Is this woman the Incredible Hulk?”
That earns a few chuckles from our colleagues as everyone finishes their tasks.
“I’m ordering midazolam. Can you get it, Wanda?” I ask.
She throws a hand up over her head as she shuffles back toward the nurses’ station. The air in the room seems to calm a fraction, but I know it’s just to prepare for the storm that’s brewing.
As if on cue, the automatic doors leading to the waiting room slide open, and two men dressed in blue button-down shirts and tactical cargo pants stand on either side of the gurney as they wheel the combative mystery patient in.
To be honest, I don’t know what I’m expecting. Maybe a tourist or a hunter who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. But I stop as the entire world seems to slow down around me.
The woman is young, with pin straight, black hair that hangs to her waist and siren pale-blue eyes that are enchanting and dangerous to get lost in.
Her features are soft, with a narrow nose that upturns subtly over plump, pale pink lips with a pronounced cupid’s bow.
She’s dressed in black jeans that cling to her long, shapely legs and a black compression shirt that molds to her figure, showing off her slender waist that leads to generous hips.
A dark stain mars her shirt from her shoulder wound, and I can see the fabric torn by the bullet.
Despite her state, she doesn’t seem to care.
She’s stunning.
But she also looks very awake and very angry.
I watch, completely shell-shocked, as she rips free of the restraint cuffs again. Her free hand shoots out before she grips the collar of the EMS worker to her left and drags him down to her. Her strength startles the poor guy, his brown eyes saucering.
“I told you, you were going to have to try harder than that to euthanize me!” Her tone is mellifluous and pleasing to the ears, but her eyes have a glint in them I’ve never seen before.
Like she’s itching for a fight.
She looks alight with mischief and dazzling in her intensity. A startled, low chuckle tumbles past my lips, and I quickly pick my jaw up as I blink myself back to normalcy.
The EMS look frazzled as a nervous sweat breaks out on his brow. He grabs her wrist, alarm flickering across his features. “Ma’am, for the last time, we aren’t trying to euthanize you—”
“Get fucked, Hat Man! You can’t take me alive!” She bellows so loudly that a few ER room doors open as patients poke their heads out to see what all the commotion is.
“My name is Caleb…” The EMS trails as she shakes him.
“I bet it is,” her eyes narrow on him. “Sounds like something the Hat Man would say.”
His partner reaches across the gurney and shoves her back onto the bed as he braces a strong arm over her abdomen. “Can we get some sedatives here?”
That jars me into action as Wanda returns with the midazolam. A few nurses close in on the mystery woman, ready for a fight. She notices and begins to thrash wildly before Jackson secures her legs and the EMS holds her arms.
“Can I get your name, sweetheart?” Wanda asks sweetly as she fills the syringe with the clear liquid.
Mystery Woman scowls at her. “My name is Rowan Kingsley. Get fucked!”
Wanda only tilts her head, giving our patient a knowing glance. “Is that really your name?”
The woman on the gurney smirks, her plump lips pulling up with breathtaking mirth. “Why don’t you try to take my ID out of my pocket, lady?”
Wanda hums as she levels the needle at Mystery Woman’s bicep. “Jane Doe, it is.”
The needle pricks her skin, and I see the moment her eyes droop. “That’s…a fucking stupid name…”
“Well, until you give us your real name, you’re going by Jane.” Wanda tuts like a disappointed mother.
“Suck…my ass,” Mystery Woman slurs as her body sags.
“The mouth of a sailor,” Wanda muses as the EMS finish wheeling the patient into the room. “Are you ready for surgery, Dr. Bellamy?”
I stare down at the woman on the gurney, my eyes flickering across her soft features that are slack with sleep. That fire doesn’t seem to douse in her state, and I’m left reeling as I observe her.
I don’t know what it is about her, but I can’t look away as the staff position her to move her onto the ER bed. Jackson is having trouble grabbing the end of the sheet under her, and I push him out of the way before I can stop myself.
“I got it,” I say, trying to mask my annoyance with the nurse.
He steps aside, raising his hands in surrender. “Sorry, Doc.”
“On the count of three,” I instruct before we all successfully shift her over to the bed. “Call the OR and get my table ready.”