Australian Affairs: Claimed: Dr Chandler's Sleeping Beauty / Countering His Claim / Australia's Maverick Millionaire

CHAPTER SIX

KITTY was putting her things in the locker in the staff changing room the next morning when one of the nurses on duty came in.

‘Hi, Dr Cargill,’ the nurse said. ‘I’m Cathy Oxley. I haven’t been rostered on with you yet. How are you settling in?’

‘Fine,’ Kitty said. ‘It’s a bit of a steep learning curve. I’m still finding my feet.’

Cathy’s brown eyes twinkled meaningfully. ‘I’m sure our gorgeous boss is helping you with that after hours.’

Kitty felt her cheeks heat up. ‘I’m not sure what you mean by that,’ she said, closing her locker door with a little rattle. ‘I’m not seeing Dr Chandler after hours.’

‘Oh, sorry,’ Cathy said. ‘I must have got my wires crossed. I could’ve sworn someone said you two were dating. Mind you, it would be a first for him if you were.’

‘A first?’ Kitty frowned. ‘In what way?’

‘I don’t think he’s ever dated anyone on his immediate staff before,’ Cathy said as she stored her bag in a locker two doors away from Kitty’s. She closed and locked the locker and turned back to face Kitty. ‘One of the nurses last year actually asked for a transfer to another department so he would take her out. Not that it lasted all that long. But that’s Jake-break-your-heart-Chandler for you. It’ll be a very special woman indeed who manages to lure him to an altar any time soon.’

Kitty turned and worked on smoothing over her tightly restrained hair in front of the mirror. ‘Not all men are cut out for the responsibility of commitment and marriage,’ she said. ‘It’s all a matter of maturity.’

‘I don’t think Jake would like to hear you describe him as immature,’ Cathy said with a little chuckle.

‘Men can be commitment-shy for all sorts of reasons, I guess. Particularly if they haven’t had a great experience of commitment in their own family.’

‘Jake doesn’t talk about his background,’ Cathy said. ‘He’s a bit of dark horse in that regard. I know he’s got siblings. His brother’s just as gorgeous in looks, apparently. A younger sister of one of the nurses on the neuro ward went out with him a couple of times.’

‘Looks aren’t everything,’ Kitty said. ‘What about character and values?’

‘Our Jake’s got those as well,’ Cathy said. ‘You just have to go searching for them. He doesn’t wear his heart on his sleeve.’

‘Has he even got a heart?’ Kitty asked with an arch of one of her brows.

Cathy grinned as she shouldered open the locker room door. ‘Last time I looked—but who knows? Maybe someone’s stolen it by now.’

Kitty had barely been on the floor of the unit thirty seconds when Jake Chandler informed her there was a critical incident unfolding right outside the A&E department.

‘Two teenagers have been knocked down by a car,’ he said, issuing orders to the nurses on duty as he strode through. ‘Cathy, Tanya, get airway and trauma kits, hard collars, IV equipment and spinal boards.’

Kitty followed Jake and Lei and four nurses out to the street outside the A&E receiving area, where the police were diverting the traffic and securing the scene from bystanders.

She felt her heart pounding behind the framework of her ribs. She was used to dealing with patients in the unit, not out on the street. She had never attended a real accident, only mock-up ones.

Two kids—a girl and a boy—in their mid-teens were lying on the road. Horns were blaring. Sirens were screaming and lights were flashing. People were screaming and shouting. The police were doing their best to control the scene, but it was nothing short of mayhem given it was smack-bang in the middle of peak hour.

‘Dr Cargill,’ said Jake, calmly but with unmistakable authority. ‘Take Cathy and Tanya and do a primary survey on the girl and tell me what equipment you need. Lei, take Lara and Tim and get started on the boy.’

Kitty started her assessment of the girl who was unconscious. ‘AVPU is P,’ she said. ‘I don’t have an airway.’

‘Get the neck stable and get her intubated,’ Jake ordered.

Kitty felt a flutter of panic rush through her stomach like a rapidly shuffled deck of cards. ‘I can maintain her airway without intubating her out here.’

‘You need to secure the airway and get the rest of the primary survey done now,’ Jake said. ‘We’re not moving her until she’s assessed. Do you want me to intubate her?’

‘No,’ Kitty said, mentally crossing her fingers and her toes. ‘I can manage.’

‘Good,’ he said. ‘Get it done and then give me the primary survey.’ He turned to the registrar. ‘Lei, what’s your assessment?’

‘GCS thirteen, Dr Chandler,’ Lei said. ‘Airway patent, multiple fractured right ribs and a flail segment. Probably right pneumothorax. Pulse one-twenty, BP one hundred on sixty. No external bleeding.’

Kitty kept working on her patient, wishing she were half as confident as the registrar appeared to be.

She tried to focus.

To keep calm.

This was not the time to doubt her skills. She had been trained for this. She had worked on similar cases inside A&E.

Come on, she gave herself a little pep talk. You’ve intubated loads of patients before. Why should this one be any different?

‘Good work, Lei,’ Jake was saying. ‘Is it a tension pneumothorax?’

‘No tension, Dr Chandler,’ Lei said. ‘Fair air entry and no mediastinal shift.’

‘Brilliant,’ Jake said. ‘Get a collar on and do a quick secondary survey. Log roll and check the spine. If that’s all, pack him up onto the spinal board, get in a cannula, get him inside and continue in there.’

‘Will do.’

Kitty could feel the sweat pouring down between her shoulderblades as she tried again to intubate the girl. The sun was burning down like a blowtorch on the top of her scalp. Panic was no longer fluttering in the pit of her stomach; it was flapping like a bedsheet in a hurricane-force wind.

This was not a dummy patient.

This was someone’s daughter, someone’s little girl, someone’s sister and someone’s friend. If this young girl died someone’s life—many people’s lives—would be shattered.

The sun burned even more fiercely and the trickle of sweat down between the straps of her bra became a torrent. Her head started to pound as if a construction site had taken up residence inside. The sunlight was so bright her vision blurred. She blinked and white flashes floated past her eyes like silverfish.

‘What’s the problem?’ Jake asked as he came over.

‘This is not the ideal environment to do an intubation,’ Kitty muttered in frustration. ‘It’s too bright and I can’t see the cords.’

‘Accidents don’t happen in ideal environments, Dr Cargill,’ he said. ‘We’re not moving her until the airway and neck is secured. You stabilise her neck while I intubate.’

Kitty moved aside as Jake came around to the head of the patient and took over the laryngoscope. ‘Hold the head from below,’ he ordered.

She did as he directed and watched as he inserted the laryngoscope. It was genuinely a difficult task, which should have made Kitty feel less of a failure, but it was pretty obvious Jake had had extensive training and was far more experienced at resuscitating on site. Everything he did he did with cool and calm confidence. He kept his emotions in check. Not a muscle on his face showed any sign of personal distress or crisis. He was simply getting on with the job.

‘Listen to the chest, Dr Cargill,’ he said. ‘What’s the air entry?’

Kitty listened to the patient’s chest. ‘There’s no air entry on the right and mediastinal shift to the left.’

‘Get a needle in the chest,’ he said. ‘We can put a chest tube in inside.’ He called out to the nurse. ‘Kate—here. Ventilate the patient while I get the collar back on and get a drip in.’

Finally the patients were transferred inside and taken to ICU once stabilised.

‘Good work, everyone,’ Jake said, stripping off his gloves and tossing them in the bin.

Kitty couldn’t help feeling she didn’t deserve to be included in that statement. She concentrated on washing her hands at the basin, hanging her aching head down, feeling the sweat still sticky beneath her clothes.

‘You too, Dr Cargill,’ Jake said as he reached for some paper towels alongside her basin. ‘That was a tough call.’

Kitty looked up at him. ‘I was out of my depth and you know it,’ she said.

‘You’ll get better once you do EMST,’ he said. ‘It’s all a matter of confidence. The same skills apply inside here or outside there.’

‘I was nearly roasted alive out there,’ she said. ‘It looked like you didn’t even break a sweat.’

His dark blue gaze scanned her flushed face. ‘You look like you caught the sun,’ he said. ‘Your nose is a little pink.’

‘Great,’ she said with a rueful grimace. ‘More freckles.’

‘Kisses from the sun,’ he said. ‘Or so my mother called them when I was a kid.’

‘But you don’t have any freckles.’

The corner of his mouth tipped up and a glint appeared in his eyes. ‘None that you can see.’

Kitty flushed to the roots of her hair but stalwartly held his gaze. ‘I’ll pass on the guided tour, thanks very much,’ she said.

‘I wasn’t offering one.’

His blue eyes played tug-of-war with hers in a moment that vibrated with palpable tension.

‘Sorry to interrupt, Jake,’ Gwen said as she approached. ‘Your brother is here to see you. He’s waiting in Reception. He told me to tell you it’s important.’

Jake’s expression tightened, and then locked down to a blank impenetrable mask. ‘Call me on my mobile if anything urgent comes in,’ he said gruffly to Kitty. ‘I’ll be ten minutes.’

Gwen let out a sigh as Jake disappeared through the entrance to A&E. ‘I wish Jake would tell me what’s going on.’

Kitty frowned. ‘Going on?’

‘With Robbie,’ Gwen said. ‘I can tell Jake’s worried sick about him but he won’t talk about it. I guess he’s used to dealing with his family on his own. God knows he’s been doing it long enough.’

‘What do you mean?’ Kitty asked.

‘Jake’s mother was killed in a car accident when he was sixteen,’ Gwen said. ‘And that’s another thing he won’t talk about. I only heard about it because one of the paramedics who attended the accident worked with my husband in the fire department. A drunk driver hit Jake’s mother head-on. She made it to hospital but died a few hours later.’

‘That’s terrible,’ Kitty said. ‘What about his father?’

Gwen rolled her eyes. ‘That’s another one of Jake’s no-go areas,’ she said. ‘I don’t think he’s seen his father since he was a kid. I don’t think Robbie has even met him.’

‘Who looked after Jake and his siblings after their mother was killed?’ Kitty asked.

‘I think they stayed with his mother’s parents for a bit, but it didn’t last,’ Gwen said. ‘They’d disowned their daughter when she hooked up with Jake’s father. They didn’t even know the kids when they were plonked on their doorstep. Jake got his own place as soon as he could afford it and made his own way. Can’t have been easy. He’s done such a good job of taking care of them all, but now Robbie’s got some sort of issue. God knows what it is. Jake certainly won’t let on.’

Kitty looked towards the doors Jake had just gone through. She thought back to her conversation with him about why he hadn’t travelled abroad. Had he stayed home in order to watch over his siblings? How had he coped financially? Had his mother left them well provided for or did he have to struggle to make ends meet? What else had he sacrificed to be there for his family?

The image of him as a protective father figure was at odds with her impression of him as a fun-loving, laid-back playboy. But then she thought of the day she’d seen him at the beach with his young nephew. No one could ask for a more devoted uncle and mentor. Strict but fair, strong but nurturing—all the things young kids and in particular boys needed to grow. Jake had apparently had no such mentor himself. Instead he had been the man of the house for most of his thirty-four years.

Kitty turned and saw Gwen looking at her speculatively. ‘What were you two talking about just then, anyway?’ Gwen asked. ‘You looked rather cosy.’

Kitty felt a flush pass over her cheeks. ‘It was just…nothing.’

Gwen gave her a motherly smile of caution. ‘Tread carefully, my dear,’ she said. ‘He’s a gorgeous man in looks and in temperament, but he doesn’t play for keeps.’

‘I don’t know how many times I have to tell everyone I’m not interested in Jake Chandler,’ Kitty said with an irritated frown.

Gwen’s look was long and measuring. ‘Not that you wouldn’t make a lovely couple or anything,’ she said. ‘I can see the sparks that fly between you.’

‘I’m sure you’re imagining it,’ Kitty said, still frowning. ‘Personally, I think he can’t wait until I hop on that plane back to Britain. He thinks I’m not up to the task.’

‘You’re handling things just fine,’ Gwen said. ‘Jake’s not one to stroke egos unnecessarily. If he was unhappy with your work he’d soon let you know.’

Kitty gave her a grim look. ‘That’s exactly what I’m afraid of,’ she said, and turned back to the unit.

CHAPTER SEVEN

KITTY didn’t see Jake face-to-face for the rest of her shift. He had come back to the unit after a few minutes, but she had been tied up with a patient with chronic asthma whose condition hadn’t been properly managed by either the patient or his doctor. By the time she’d sorted the middle-aged man out Jake had been busy with other patients.

But when she was walking along the Bondi shopping and café strip later that evening, in search of somewhere to grab some dinner, she saw him coming towards her.

He looked preoccupied. There was a frown between his brows and his jaw looked as if it had been carved from stone. He didn’t even see her until she was practically under his nose.

‘Dr Chandler?’

Her softly spoken greeting didn’t even register, so she reached out and touched him on the bare tanned skin of his forearm with her fingertips.

‘Jake?’

He jumped as if she had probed him with an electrode. ‘Oh,’ he said, absently rubbing at his arm. ‘It’s you.’

‘Yes…’ Kitty shifted her weight from foot to foot. ‘Are you OK?’

His marble mask stayed in place. ‘Sure. Why wouldn’t I be?’

‘I just thought you might like to…talk.’

Something moved across his gaze, leaving in its wake a layer of ice. ‘About what?’

‘Gwen told me you were having some trouble with your brother and I thought—’

‘You thought what, Dr Cargill?’ he asked with a mocking look. ‘That you’d offer your sweet little shoulder for me to cry on?’

Kitty held his glacial gaze for a beat or two before giving up. ‘I’ve obviously caught you at a bad time,’ she said, stepping away from him. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to interfere.’

She had walked past three shopfronts before he caught up with her. He didn’t touch her. He walked alongside her, shoulder to shoulder—well, not exactly shoulder to shoulder, given he was so much taller. Kitty was wearing ballet flats, which put the top of her head in line with the top of his shoulder. She felt the warmth of his body. She had to fight to keep walking in a straight line in case her body betrayed her with its traitorous, shameless desires.

‘Don’t let me keep you,’ she said, sending him a sideways glance that made her loose hair momentarily brush against his arm. She grabbed at the wayward strands and fixed them firmly behind her ear.

‘Sorry,’ he said in a gruff tone. ‘That was uncalled-for.’

‘It’s OK,’ she said, only marginally mollified.

They walked a few more paces in silence. Kitty wasn’t sure what to say, so said nothing. She figured if he wanted to talk to her he would. Every time she sneaked a glance at him he was frowning broodingly. His shoulders looked tight and were hunched forward slightly, as if he was carrying an invisible weight that was incredibly burdensome.

‘Have you got any siblings?’ he finally asked.

‘No, there’s just me,’ Kitty said.

‘Happy childhood?’

‘Mostly.’

‘Are your parents still married to each other?’ he asked.

Kitty gave him another sideways glance, trying to ignore the way her heart kicked in her chest when she encountered the unfathomable darkness of his sapphire-blue gaze. ‘My parents didn’t get married in the first place,’ she said. ‘They met at a free love commune. They’re still together, more or less. They occasionally have other partners. They have what they call an “open” relationship.’

His eyebrows lifted. ‘I wouldn’t have picked you as a hippy couple’s kid,’ he said. ‘Did the stork get the wrong address or something?’

Kitty couldn’t hold back a little rueful smile. ‘My parents have spent a great deal of the last twenty-six years looking at each other in a kind of dumbfounded way,’ she said. ‘They were hoping for a free-spirited indie child much like themselves. I constantly embarrass them.’

His mouth kicked up at the corners. ‘I just bet you do.’

Kitty caught a whiff of his cologne as he raised a hand to brush his hair back off his forehead. The faint hint of hard-working male was like a potent elixir to her nostrils. She even felt herself leaning closer to catch more of his alluring scent.

He met her gaze again, holding it with the dark intensity of his. ‘I lost my mother when I was sixteen,’ he said. ‘And my father…’ He paused, a frown cutting his forehead in two, and the lines and planes of his face clouding. ‘My father left us before my brother was born. My two sisters can barely remember him. None of us have seen or heard of him since he left. Not even when Mum died.’

‘I’m very sorry,’ Kitty said. ‘Life can be pretty brutal at times. You must have had a hard time of it.’

‘Yeah, you could say that,’ he said, stepping aside for a group of teenagers carrying bodyboards to pass between them.

‘What about your sisters?’ Kitty asked when he didn’t offer anything else once they had resumed walking side by side. ‘What do they do?’

‘Jen’s a hairdresser,’ he said. ‘She’s saving up to buy her own salon. Rosie works part-time as a teacher’s aide. She’s studying to be a teacher.’

A small silence passed.

‘And your brother?’ Kitty asked.

His gaze cut to hers. ‘Didn’t Gwen tell you during your little heart-to-heart session? I’m sure she along with everyone else at the hospital has a theory or two on why Robbie’s running amok.’

‘I didn’t probe her for information,’ she said. ‘She didn’t know much in any case. She simply told me she sensed that your brother seemed to have some…issues.’

‘Issues.’ He gave a harsh laugh. ‘That’s how everyone makes excuses for any sort of bad behaviour today. They’ve got issues. Do you know what bugs me about that? It’s always someone else’s fault. It’s a get out of jail free card. No one has to take responsibility for their own actions any more. There’s always someone else to blame. Bad childhood or bad parenting. Or in my case practically no parenting. I hate that victim mentality that everyone adopts these days. It achieves nothing. You just have to get on with life. There’s no point wishing things were different. You get what you get and you damn well have to deal with it.’

Kitty walked with him for a few more paces. ‘I guess different people cope with things in different ways,’ she said after a moment. ‘What makes one person stronger makes another one crumble.’

‘Yeah, well, I just wish my brother would snap out of this phase of his,’ he said. ‘I’m sick and tired of cleaning up his mess.’

‘You sound just like a concerned parent,’ she said. ‘At least you’ll have had plenty of practice when it comes to having your own kids.’

His expression became even more dark and brooding. ‘No way,’ he said. ‘I’m not making that mistake.’

‘You don’t want kids?’

‘Why would I want kids when I’ve already brought up three?’ he asked.

‘Helping to rear your siblings is not the same as having your own children,’ Kitty said.

He gave a grunt. ‘It is for me,’ he said. ‘I’ve made enough packed lunches to last me a lifetime.’

‘Having children is much more than just packed lunches,’ she said.

‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘And don’t I know it. The cute chubby cheeks stage is over before you know it. Then it’s suddenly all about spending hours awake at night wondering where they are and who they’re with and what they’re doing. I’m not putting myself through that again. No way.’

‘What about marriage?’ she asked. ‘Are you against that too?’

‘I’m not against it in principle,’ he said. ‘I have plenty of friends who are married and it seems to work for them. I just don’t think I’m cut out for it. I think I’d get bored with the same person.’

‘Maybe you haven’t met the right person yet.’

He shrugged indifferently. ‘Maybe.’

They’d walked halfway along the next block when Jake suddenly stopped and turned to look at her. ‘Have you had dinner?’ he asked.

‘No, I was just about to get some when I saw you.’

‘Have dinner with me.’

She arched a brow at him. ‘Are you asking or telling me?’

‘Are you refusing or accepting?’

‘I’m thinking about it.’

‘What’s to think about?’ he asked. ‘You’re hungry and you need food.’

‘It’s not that simple…’

‘Are you worried about the boyfriend back home in Britain?’

Kitty avoided his penetrating gaze. ‘It has nothing to do with Charles,’ she said. ‘I don’t want people to talk.’

‘They’re already talking,’ he said. ‘Besides, what’s one casual dinner going to do?’ He stopped outside a bar and grill restaurant. ‘Is this OK? A friend of mine owns it. He’ll squeeze us in without a booking.’

Kitty met his impossibly blue gaze with her guarded one. ‘So it’s not a date or anything?’ she asked.

‘No,’ he said, giving her a glinting smile. ‘I’d have to pay my sister a thousand bucks if so.’

Kitty tried not to blush but with little success. ‘So an official date with you usually leads to sex, does it?’

He held the door of the restaurant open for her. ‘It depends.’

‘On what?’

‘Chemistry. Animal attraction. Lust.’

Kitty pursed her lips disapprovingly even though her skin tingled and prickled as his gaze held hers. ‘What about getting to know someone as a person first?’ she asked. ‘Finding common ground, similar values and interests, mutual admiration and respect?’