upside the head for giving his mother false hope. Vivian would hound him until she met the mythical woman herself. He loved his mother fiercely but if she thought one of her brood needed a helping nudge in the right direction she wasn’t above using both hands.
“You have?”
Oh, hell. His mother sounded so delighted at the prospect that her son was dating again after his friend’s death. She thought all her children were amazing and wouldn’t be able to resist meddling.
“That’s wonderful, darling. Where did you meet and when can I meet her?”
No pressure there, St. James, he thought with amused exasperation. “Who says it’s a her?”
There was a moment’s stunned silence on the other end of the phone and Dylan could picture his mother’s expression.
Then Vivian snorted. “Dylan Thomas St. James!” She chuckled. “There’s nothing wrong with being gay but I know you’re only trying to wind me up. So, when can I meet her?”
Fortunately he was saved from replying when his phone beeped an incoming call. Talk about being saved by the beep.
“Just a sec, Mom. I’ve got a call coming in.” With a flick of his hand he accessed the call. “St. James.”
“This is Rona Sheppard from the ER,” a brisk voice said. “Are you still in the building?”
“I am,” he said, shrugging out of his leather jacket and reaching for his lab coat because any call that included the words Are you still in the building? meant he wouldn’t be going anywhere for a while. “What’s up?”
“A young child with a traumatic arm injury,” the supervisor said briskly. “ETA three minutes—vitals shaky.”
“I’ll be right down,” he said before disconnecting, his mind already flying ahead to the case.
He was about to shove his phone in his pocket when he remembered his mother.
“Mom,” he said, returning to his call. “I’m sorry but I won’t make dinner tonight.” He didn’t say he’d been headed to Harry’s on the marina anyway—mostly to prevent the lecture he knew would follow about the kind of women who hung out in sports bars.
“Oh, darn.” Vivian sighed. “I’ve been giddy with happiness since you got back.”
She very obviously didn’t say she was disappointed that he wouldn’t meet their friends’ daughter but Dylan could read between the lines.
“Is it something bad?”
“I don’t know yet but it’s a little kid.”
“Oh, darling, I know how much you hate these cases. Call me when you can.”
He said goodbye and disconnected, taking the stairs instead of waiting for the elevator, because traumatic injuries were always bad. That it was a child made it that much more urgent.
Dylan had spent enough time in the ER to appreciate that when children were involved emotions ran high. It was one of the worst parts of working in trauma and he held a huge respect for the people who dealt with it on a daily basis.
Even as he hit the swing doors and headed down the hallway he could hear someone rapping out orders in a soft, feminine voice that sent skitters of recognition across his skin. From the rapid-fire instructions, he knew even before he approached the trauma bay that the patient had just arrived. Even more surprising was that right in the center of the chaos, directing proceedings, was the brunette from the parking lot.
The attending physician.
He didn’t know why the sight of her so competently handling the emergency threw him but it did—enough that he paused at the entrance, his gut clenching in a combination of dread and anticipation.
The kid, probably no more than six or seven, looked so tiny and fragile on the bed that he felt his heart squeeze before he had a chance to take an emotional step back. These were the cases that ripped at him. And he’d feel it all the more deeply if his team wasn’t successful in reattaching the severed limb.
The sight of the blood-soaked compression dressing instantly sucked him back to West Africa where he’d spent the past two years replanting limbs torn off in explosions and artillery fire or lopped off by panga-wielding soldiers. The young victims had been the hardest to deal with because often there had been no limbs to reattach, or necrosis and infection had already set in by the time they got to him.
It meant a lifetime of unnecessary pain, suffering and disability—if they survived—and it made him wonder what the hell it was all for.
Lost in horrific memories, he scarcely heard the attending ask, “Who’s the ortho on duty? Has someone called?”
It was only when he heard his name that he was jolted back to reality.
“Rona said Dr. St. James is on his way.”
Momentarily rattled by the abrupt shift from memories that were still far too fresh and vivid in his mind to the bright lights of the trauma bay, Dylan watched her frown and pull the stethoscope from around her neck.
“Isn’t that the new guy everyone’s swooning over?” she asked absently, fitting the scope in her ears and sliding the metal disc over the boy’s chest. Without waiting for an answer, she addressed the second nurse. “Paula, we’re going to need more blood before we can get him into surgery. Set up another bag and make sure we have enough on standby. Let’s hope Hot New Guy’s not just a pretty face. The last thing this little guy needs is to grow up without an arm.”
Taking a deep breath, Dylan shoved the memories aside and stepped into the room as she turned to the monitor.
Removing the stethoscope, she impatiently slung it around her neck. “Dammit, where is he? Amy, call him again. We—”
“No need,” he interrupted, his eyes already assessing the boy’s condition as he reached out and pressed his fingers against the brachial artery above the boy’s severed arm. It was slow and ragged, barely there.
Hyper-aware of her just two feet away, he knew the instant she recognized him by her audible inhalation. His peripheral vision caught the way her body stilled and he looked up into eyes wide with shocked recognition.
Holding her gaze, he kept his voice low and soothing. “What kind of injury do we have, Dr...? Uh... Stevens, is it?”
“I... I...” she stuttered.
Dylan didn’t know whether to feel pleased or insulted that she appeared so rattled. The blond nurse must have also noticed her reaction because her gaze narrowed, bouncing between them as though she sensed the abrupt tension in the room.
“Dani?” the nurse said, not pausing in bagging the intubated child. “You okay?”
The words clearly jolted her and she abruptly blinked, going from in control to flustered in the blink of an eye. “He’s...uh...he...um—” She frowned and firmed her soft mouth as she visibly pulled herself together. “He lost his arm an inch above the left epicondyle.”
The
