she whispered into his ear, and the toddler stopped grizzling and looked interested. Stella pulled out the toy box that was hidden away for occasions such as this, and settled the toddler on the floor. ‘This is full of exciting things. See if you can find my special blue car. I’m just going to see to your sister. I’ll be back in a minute.’
While Daniel was questioning the mother, Stella attached the baby to a cardiac monitor and a pulse oximeter.
‘Sats are 92 in air,’ she murmured, and Daniel glanced at the monitor.
‘Let’s give her humidified oxygen and ask the paediatric registrar to come down. Whatever the outcome of my examination, she’s going to need to be admitted.’ Removing a stethoscope from his pocket, he turned back to the mother. ‘You say that you’ve been up all night for three nights. Was that when she first became ill?’
‘I thought she just had a cold. She just had a runny nose and a bit of a temperature. It’s that time of year, isn’t it? And then suddenly she started coughing—this horrible dry cough. And she stopped feeding.’
‘A baby with a respiratory infection can’t always take the same amount of food as usual.’ Daniel slid the jumper over the baby’s head and undid the vest. ‘So what happened to make you call the ambulance?’
‘I put her down for a nap and when I looked at her she was blue and she stopped breathing for a bit. Honestly, I didn’t imagine it.’
‘Her respirations are 70,’ Stella said, and Daniel gave a nod as he shifted the vest and looked at the baby’s chest.
‘I’m sure you didn’t imagine it.’ He glanced at the mother with a smile, everything about him calm and reassuring. ‘It isn’t uncommon for young babies with bronchiolitis to have pauses in their breathing and I suspect that’s what’s going on here. I’m going to take a good look at her and then we’ll decide how best to treat her.’
‘I honestly thought she was going to die.’
‘There’s nothing more frightening than being on your own at home with a sick baby. It’s hard to think straight, especially when you’ve been up all night.’ Daniel watched the baby’s chest rise and fall. ‘You did the right thing to bring her in. We have an excellent paediatric department here and we won’t be sending Poppy home until we’re happy with her.’
In response to his sympathetic comments, the mother put her hand to her face and started to cry. ‘Sorry—you must think I’m a total nutcase, it’s just that I’m so tired and I’ve been so worried.’
‘I’m not surprised. Any normal parent would be out of their mind with worry.’ Daniel gestured to the chair and then put the stethoscope in his ears. ‘Sit down before you drop and I have to treat you, too. Once I have a better idea what’s going on, you can get yourself a hot drink in the café down the corridor. You look as though you need one.’ Then he turned back to the baby, his hands infinitely gentle as he examined her.
‘Poppy sick?’ The toddler wandered across to the trolley, clutching a blue car, and Stella admired the toy before turning back to help Daniel.
He was so good with children and that made the whole thing so much worse.
Although she knew he didn’t think so himself, Stella knew that Daniel would make a wonderful father.
While he concentrated on his tiny patient, she found herself looking at him. Why couldn’t she be indifferent? He was so unsuitable. He didn’t want what she wanted. So why did she still find him so desperately attractive? She gazed at the strong, bold lines of his bone structure and the dark shadow that emphasised his jaw. And her heart stumbled.
Daniel removed the stethoscope from his ears and met her gaze. He frowned briefly, clearly aware that she was thinking about more than the patient. ‘Fine inspiratory crackles,’ he said gruffly, ‘and she has a high-pitched expiratory wheeze. She has nasal flaring, grunting and her chest is visibly hyper-inflated so I think we’re looking at a diagnosis of bronchiolitis. Did you ring Paeds?’
Stella pulled herself together. ‘Yes. The registrar is just finishing a lumbar puncture and then he’ll be down.’ She turned her attention back to the baby, telling herself that her relationship with Daniel would become easier over time. It was bound to feel hard at first, wasn’t it? It was up to her to move on.
Maybe ‘Caring of Cumbria’ hadn’t worked out—but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t meet someone else. She wasn’t going to give up at the first fence.
‘What exactly is bronchiolitis?’ The exhausted young mother stood up and stroked her baby’s head gently. ‘Could I have avoided it somehow?’
‘It’s a viral infection of the small airway, very common in the winter months, especially in this age group.’ Daniel took his pen out of his pocket. ‘There’s absolutely nothing you could have done.’
‘I feel like a terrible mother. I feel like I’ve let her down. I should have brought her days ago.’
‘She wasn’t as ill as this days ago, or you would have brought her.’ Daniel wrote up some drugs on the notes. ‘You haven’t let her down. You’ve done all the right things. You’re a brilliant mum.’
The woman flushed. ‘I don’t feel brilliant. I feel … incoherent. I haven’t been to bed for three nights.’
‘That’s why you’re brilliant,’ Daniel said easily. ‘Some mothers would have just gone back to sleep. You’ve put yourself through the wringer because you’ve been watching over your child. That makes you brilliant in my book. How many feeds has Poppy had today in comparison to normal?’
The mother flushed but it was obvious that Daniel’s words had bolstered her self-confidence and given her the extra strength she needed to get through the crisis.
Stella studied Daniel’s profile, wondering what his own mother had been like. She knew that his childhood had been far from idyllic, but he rarely divulged any details.
He had firm views on mothers, she knew that.
And fathers.
And he didn’t think he’d make a good one.
Oblivious to her scrutiny, he was scribbling on the notes. ‘How many wet nappies?’
The mother pulled a face. ‘I—I don’t know. Why is that important?’
‘Because it helps us assess how dehydrated she is. We may need to give her some fluid into her vein, but I’m going to leave that to my paediatric colleagues to decide.’
‘Can you give her antibiotics or something?’
‘It’s caused by a virus so antibiotics won’t help.’ Daniel looked up as the door opened. ‘This is Deborah—she’s the paediatric doctor.’ He outlined the case to Deborah, who immediately arranged for the child to be admitted.
Stella watched the easy smile he gave to the other doctor and wondered whether they’d had a relationship in the past two years.
Gritting her teeth, she gathered up the baby’s things. None of her business, she reminded herself. She no longer had any interest in Daniel Buchannan’s
