The Nightshift Before Christmas Read online

  “Why don’t you put your playlist on and I’ll get you something to see if we can relax the uterus.”

  Katie’s mind went blank as she stared at her medical kit.

  “Josh?” She felt like she was speaking to the universe.

  “Yeah, babe. I’m here.”

  Her shoulders dropped an inch in relief. Josh still had her back.

  “Talk me through.”

  “You don’t know how to do this? I thought you said you were a doctor!”

  Mike could not have looked more horrified. Lisa was too busy fighting the onset of another contraction to care.

  “You are a doctor, and you can do this.”

  Josh’s voice came through loud and clear. Katie repeated the words in her head as if she were on automatic pilot.

  And Josh continued to speak—a blond-haired, blue-eyed angel in her ear—enabling her to respond, to act, to react. First they worked their way through the basics—blood pressure, heart rate of the baby and the mother, checks for bleeding.

  “Do you have an IV of fentanyl in your kit?”

  “Yes.” Katie reached for the bag, then chose the vial instead. “I think we’re going to have to get her on her hands and knees. The massage isn’t shifting the baby’s position.”

  “Good thinking.”

  Josh fell silent while Katie explained to Lisa about the injection of painkiller. It would decrease the likelihood of having to treat her newborn with naloxone for respiratory depression after delivery—but it would need to be given again if the pain increased.

  “Right, Lisa, can we have you on your hands and knees, please?”

  Mike helped his wife roll to her side and press herself up.

  “Good. Now, can you drop down onto your forearms?”

  “Why?”

  “It’s going to elevate your hips above your heart. That’s a great way to encourage your baby to shift position on his own.”

  “Huckleberry, you mean,” Lisa pressed as she dropped to her forearms with a huff.

  “Yes.” It was all Katie could manage. Naming a baby before it was born was too much for her to take on board right now.

  “Have a feel and check the heart rate again,” Josh instructed after a few moments had passed.

  “I think it’s working!” Katie couldn’t keep the joy from her voice.

  “Great. Katie—I think we’re going to land in a second. We’ll be out of contact for a minute. But I will call you, and you can put me on speaker if you like.”

  “No, don’t worry,” Katie answered as the infant inside Lisa’s womb turned into a little acrobat. “I think I’ve got this one.”

  She tugged off her helmet and poured her entire store of concentration into Lisa and her child. They were going to do this. And when they did she was going to turn her life around. Just because the helicopter needed to refuel it didn’t mean Josh was leaving her. He’d made it more than clear over the past few days that he had come here for her. To see if what they had once shared was worth salvaging. A year ago she might not have been ready. Wouldn’t have been able to see the possibility. Now...? Now she wanted that man back in her life, and she was hard-pressed to keep the smile of realization off her lips.

  As the medicine began to take effect and the baby shifted position, Lisa called out that another contraction was on the way.

  “Great. Good!” Katie responded confidently. “Mike, do you want to rub your wife’s back? Because I think it’s time to push.”

  “Really?”

  “Really.”

  There was a head full of red hair at the entrance to the delivery canal, and in just a few...

  “C’mon—you can do it. Push!”

  And there he was, landing in her hands as if it were any old day. Huckleberry Penton. He was beautiful. Ten fingers, ten toes, a mouth, two ears...as perfect a baby as a family could hope for.

  “You’ve done it, Lisa,” Katie said unnecessarily as she cleared away the mucus from the little boy’s mouth and nose, making way for a hearty wail. “Turn around real careful now—he’s still attached to your umbilical cord.”

  Katie swiftly gathered together a sterile drape and a heat blanket to swaddle Huckleberry before double-clamping and cutting the umbilical cord between the two clamps. It was cold in the gondola, and the last thing this little one needed was pneumonia.

  She dried off his head, resisting the urge to give him a kiss, and handed him to his mother. She kept the swell of emotion she was experiencing at bay by focusing on the postnatal checklist. She gave Lisa a gentle uterine massage, leaving the rest of the umbilical cord in place and checking that the rest of the placenta did not need to be immediately delivered. It would be safer to do that in the hospital.

  “Shall we get an IV into you? It’ll help replace all those electrolytes you’ve been losing and make sure you don’t dehydrate.”

  Tears sprang to her eyes when she lifted her gaze to the couple, saw both sets of eyes wide with wonder, delight. They hadn’t heard her. The only thing they could see or hear was their newborn baby boy.

  Katie was astonished to realize the tears trickling down her cheeks were happy ones. She was genuinely happy for them. Not that she’d wished anyone ill when she and Josh had lost Elizabeth...but it had been tough to see parents with a newborn. More than tough.

  It came to her that this was what she’d been waiting for—the desire to try for another baby. Three years ago she wouldn’t have dreamed of getting pregnant again. Ever. Two years—she’d become numb to the ache to be a mother. But being with these two—being with her husband...could she really have the strength to try again?

  The lights in the gondola suddenly flickered into life and almost instantly a hum could be heard, accompanied by a slight jerk as the gondola slipped into action.

  “Hold on for the ride!” Katie grinned, but the smile instantly slipped from her face when she saw the expressions on the Pentons’ faces.

  “Um... Dr. McGann...?” Mike began, making a little dabbing gesture with his hand around his nose area. “I think you might need a little cleanup.”

  Katie’s hands flew to her face. Her nose! With everything that had happened she’d completely forgotten her blood-smeared face.

  She grabbed for a packet of antibacterial wipes and gently swabbed at her lips and cheeks, happy to note that there was a big grin on her face it would be near impossible to wipe away.

  CHAPTER TEN

  “QUIT PACING.”

  “I’m not pacing,” Josh retorted, feeling about ten to Jorja’s twenty-five years as he did so.

  He’d been ramped up for going back in the chopper to get Katie down from that blasted gondola, but when the generator had unexpectedly kicked into action they’d been told to stand down. Now he was ready to lay everything on the line. See if it was time to hand over the signed divorce papers and try to find a way to move on or—and here was where it got tricky—see if there were some way—any way—he could get the real life he wanted back with his wife.

  So sitting down, standing still, anything stationary was not an option. Pacing like a caged beast was a bit more like it. He’d just do it in front of the patient board to make it look a bit more...functional.

  “The ambulance should be here any minute,” Jorja finally allowed.

  “And she’s in it?”

  Jorja looked at him like he was crazy. “Of course the woman who just gave birth in a freakin’ gondola on New Year’s Eve is in it! What are you? Nuts?”

  “I meant Dr. McGann.”

  “Oh,” Jorja replied. Then visibly experienced a hit of understanding. “Oh!”

  Josh narrowed his eyes. “You’ve spoken to Michael, haven’t you?”

  “I work with him—of course I’ve spoken to him.” Her eyes flicked back to
the files she had been ignoring.

  “About Katie—Dr. McGann...” Josh tried to give her his I’m-Not-Messin’ look, failing miserably, from the looks of things.

  “Sorry, Dr. West. Nothing’s secret for long in a small town. But your business is your business. If you want to spend New Year’s Eve trying to convince Copper Canyon’s most unavailable doctor to go out with Michael so that he can get fired for inappropriate behavior and you can get his job—be my guest.” She folded her arms defensively across her chest. “And good luck tryin’,” she added, quite obviously not meaning the last bit.

  Ah. Wrong dog, wrong tree.

  If he hadn’t been so stressed he would have laughed. He’d have to remember to meet up with Michael for that coffee. He owed him for the red-herring behavior. Hang on a second!

  “Jorja, are you sweet on Michael?”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she replied primly, giving a stack of patient files a nice clack on the countertop as she did.

  “Jorja and Michael, sitting on a—”

  “Dr. West!” Jorja put on her most outraged face. “I’ll have you know my brothers are all taller than you.” She sized him up quickly, to make sure she’d been correct. “And stronger. I will not have my name tarnished in such a way.”

  “Shame...” Josh leaned against the counter, thoroughly enjoying himself now. “I think you two would make a cute couple.”

  “You do? I mean...” She quickly dropped her happy face and went for nonchalance. “That’s interesting. I’ve never given it much thought.”

  “Why don’t you ask him out for a coffee? The diner makes a mean cup.”

  The ambulance crew burst through the double doors, pushing a gurney with Lisa on it, holding her baby tightly in her arms, and her husband by her side, sending a mix of anxious and proud looks at anyone who was looking while the EMT crew hurriedly rattled off handover information to Michael, who had appeared alongside them from the ambulance bay.

  Jorja gave her cheeks a quick pinch, even though they didn’t need any extra pinking, and flew out from behind her desk with a chart to assist.

  They all passed him in a whirlwind of activity, leaving the waiting room entirely empty of people save a weary-looking mother with a pile of knitting well under way as she waited for her skateboarding son to get his leg put in a cast after inventing a whole new style of ice-skating.

  No Katie.

  Josh looked round the waiting room to see if it would give him an answer.

  No dice.

  Just the clickety-clack of the mother’s knitting needles and the low hum of a television ticking off the New Year’s Eve celebrations around the world.

  He took a few steps closer to see if... Was that...? Huh. Paris. He glanced at his watch. That would have been over hours ago. Ah—there was London. He’d clearly hit the replay... Yes, there was the Statue of Liberty...and cut to Times Square...

  New York City was moments away from dropping the gong on the New Year. That gave him a paltry three hours. He’d promised himself he’d have this sorted by midnight. He didn’t know if he was Prince Charming or Cinderella in this scenario—but whatever happened, he was going to cross everything he had in the hope that Katie was up for a bit of glass-slipper action.

  * * *

  Katie sank onto the bench in the locker room, relieved to have found the place empty. She’d left the EMTs and Michael to sort out the Pentons and had taken a fast-paced power walk round the hospital, sneaking in at the front door in the hopes of just a few more minutes to regroup before she saw anyone—c’mon, be honest!—before she saw Josh again.

  If the past few days had been an emotional roller coaster, the last few hours had been... She looked up to the ceiling for some inspiration... Seismic. Everything she had held to be true over the past two years had been a fiction. A way of coping with the tremendous loss she and Josh had suffered. But ultimately she had been hiding. And not just from her husband. She’d been hiding from life.

  Her right hand sought purchase on her ring finger. It surprised her how much relief she felt at finding the rings still there. Side by side. First one promise and then another. Promises she’d blamed Josh for breaking when maybe all along she had been the one who had let him down.

  He had changed. She could see that now. But she still wasn’t entirely sure what sort of future—if any—he was offering her. He’d said he had come here to Copper Canyon to find her, but to what end? Another chance? Another child?

  She opened up her palms and imagined the weight of the newborn she’d just held in them. Tears welled. Could she do it? Maybe she had changed too much. Become too clinical. Or had her time away been more about healing than hiding? Josh’s surprise appearance had definitely taught her one thing—there was always room for another way of seeing things.

  She glanced at her watch. Three hours and counting. What would this New Year hold in store for her?

  She slowly unwound the scarf Josh had twirled round her neck before she’d descended to the gondola, then pushed herself up and opened his locker. His winter coat was hanging on its hook. She folded the scarf and put it in his pocket—but when it was obvious the wool wrap wasn’t going to fit, she tugged it out again. A few pieces of paper fell to the floor with the movement.

  She knelt to pick them up, eyes widening, stomach churning as she took in the contents of the paperwork.

  She shouldn’t have looked.

  A sour sensation rose from her belly as she absorbed the writing on the letter, the airplane ticket and—her hand flew to her mouth, hoping to stem the cry of despair—the divorce papers.

  Signed.

  Unsealed.

  About to be delivered?

  She felt herself going numb. How could she have been such an idiot? Josh was here to give her the signed divorce papers. Why else would he have a job offer and a ticket to France falling out of his pocket? The whole “making peace” thing had just been a ruse to make himself feel better.

  Running away again suddenly seemed too exhausting. She pulled her feet up and curled into a tight ball on the bench, no longer interested if anyone saw her. Two years of holding it all together, pretending she was nothing more than a dedicated physician—no personal life, no history, just medicine. And now everything she’d sought to keep under control was unraveling from the inside out.

  She lay on the bench, her cheek taking on the imprint of the wooden slats, and for once she just didn’t care. Her body was too weighted with the pain of knowing that her life wasn’t going to be about suppressing anymore. It was going to be about letting go. She lay perfectly still for she didn’t know how long, just thinking. Because once she started to move it would be the start of an entirely new life.

  One without the baby she’d had to say goodbye to sooner than anyone should have to. One without the family she’d always dreamed she’d have. A life without Josh. Her sweet, kind, loving husband who had brought out a spark in her she’d never known she’d had.

  A surge of energy charged through her, making a lightning-fast transformation into a burning hot poker in her heart. She felt branded. Marked with the painful searing of anger, sorrow and indignation. She’d been such an idiot for thinking Josh had changed. It was all she could do not to ball her hands up and try to knock some actual sense into her normally oh-so-logical head. She’d actually believed that he was here to try again—to start anew. To try to make that family they had both ached for. And...for the most tender of moments...she had believed she could do it.

  A primal moaning roar left her throat as she pushed herself up and shook her head. Maybe she could shake out everything that she didn’t want to carry into the future. Turn into a whirling dervish and spin everything away. A human centrifuge. It would be hard—and by heavens it would hurt—but she could clear her system of Josh West again. And this time for
good.

  She glanced at her watch, surprised to see how close to midnight it was.

  She needed air. Light. Cold. Anything to remind her that she was vital. Alive. Just one tiny thing to show her that she would survive this.

  * * *

  Josh pushed the plug into the extension cord, not even daring to look for a moment. He knew this was a make-or-break moment. He shifted his chin along his shoulder until he could catch a glimpse of his handiwork. It was cold, but with the wind dying down, the stillness added a strange sensation of otherworldliness to the twinkling lights he’d laced into hearts and trees and stars, to the lengths of decorations he’d stolen from the nurses’ lounge.

  Perfect. Even if he was a caveman in the home-decor department, he’d done a pretty good job of gussying up Valley Hospital’s roof. Now to rustle up something poetic to say about—

  He whirled around at the sound of the roof door slamming open.

  “Can’t a girl get a single moment alone?” Katie looked little short of appalled to see him standing there. “What is all this?” she snapped.

  “Oh, just a little decorating...” Josh started—not altogether certain his words were even being received by his wild-eyed wife.

  “All I wanted to do was make a snow angel. One tiny little freakin’ snow angel to prove that the world is nice, and good things can happen, and what do I get instead?”

  She didn’t wait for him to fill in the answer to what was obviously a rhetorical question.

  “You! The one person I loved the most in the whole world, leaving me again. And just when I thought we were beginning to repair things.”

  “Wait! What?” Josh strode up to Katie, hands outstretched in a What gives? position. “What are you talking about, Katiebird?”

  “Oh, don’t Katiebird me.” She all but spit at him.

  Josh had never seen her so riled, and the force of her anger nearly pushed him back. Nearly. He ground his feet in and pressed himself up to his full height.

  Tough. It was less than an hour to midnight and he was damned if he was going to hit the New Year without finding out if he had a future with his wife. Her face told him everything he’d feared—but he wasn’t going to let go of this one without a fight.