emergency cricothyroidotomy kit, which she’d had ready since they’d boarded the flight.
Susie’s small chest struggled to rise and fall, each breath more torturous than the last.
Baden snapped on gloves and grabbed the scalpel.
A sharp incessant beeping from the monitor hammered the air as Susie’s oxygen saturation levels started to fall to dangerously low levels. Each beep told them Susie was edging closer to cardiac arrest.
‘Save my daughter, please!’
Mary’s tortured plea ripped through Kate. She quickly laid the semi-conscious child on her back and extended her neck.
Baden threw her a look, his eyes dark with worry. This procedure on a child was fraught with danger but they had no choice. With a remarkably steady hand he gently palpated Susie’s neck, counting down the rings of cartilage until he found the correct position. He made a quick, clean cut.
Kate immediately cleared the area of blood with a gauze pad. She pulled the sterile packaging of the endotracheal tube halfway down, exposing the top of the tube and insertion trocar.
Baden juggled the forceps and then grabbed the tube, sliding it into place.
Kate swiftly attached the oxygen. A moment later the monitor stopped screaming as Susie’s oxygen level rose. A sigh shuddered out of Kate’s lungs as she injected normal saline into the balloon of the ET tube to hold it in place.
Baden raised his head from his patient and turned toward Mary. ‘We’ve bypassed the blockage and she’s breathing more easily now.’
Mary slumped. ‘Oh, thank you, Baden. Kate. I was so scared that she might…’
Baden nodded. ‘She’ll probably have to go to Theatre when we arrive in Adelaide to repair her lung and trachea, and when the swelling has subsided, this tube can come out.’
He turned back to Kate and spoke under his breath. ‘So much for a quiet first day back at work for you. Nothing like an emergency to pump the adrenaline around.’ He stripped off his gloves. ‘Thanks, Kate. That was excellent work.’ His lips curved upward in a friendly smile. ‘It’s good to have you on board.’
‘Thanks. It’s good to be back.’ Delicious, simmering warmth rolled through her, quickly overtaken by sheer relief. She’d managed to drive away his doubts, the ones that had shone so brightly that morning in his amazing eyes.
Her plan had worked. She’d shown him she knew what she was about, that her medicine was sound. She’d managed to stay one stop ahead of him during the emergency and at times their anticipation of each other’s needs had been almost spooky.
For the first time all day she relaxed. Team Four would be OK. Work would again be the safe sanctuary it had always been—reliable and familiar. No surprises.
Smiling to herself, she adjusted Susie’s oxygen and started to dress her lacerations with non-stick gauze.
‘Prepare for landing.’ Glen’s command sounded in her ears and with one final check of Susie she took her seat, snapping her harness firmly around her.
The paediatric team met them at the airport in Adelaide and within minutes Susie and Mary were on their way to hospital and the ICU unit.
As always happened after a high-powered emergency, Kate’s legs began to wobble. Coffee. She needed coffee. The refrigerated air of the airport terminal hit her the moment she stepped inside. She ordered three coffees to go and some giant cookies so heavily laden with chocolate chips you could hardly see the actual cookie base. Juggling the capped coffees and her bag of treats, she headed back toward the plane. Glen usually liked to get back in the air as soon as possible.
As she approached she saw Baden striding back and forth across the tarmac, his mobile phone glued to his ear and his other hand rubbing his neck. Agitation rolled off him in waves—a total contrast to the cool and level-headed doctor she’d just worked with in an emergency.
He snapped the phone shut just as she stopped beside him. She passed him his coffee.
‘Oh, thanks.’ He accepted the coffee with a distracted air.
‘Let’s move under the wing—at least there’s shade there.’ She offered him a cookie as they took the five steps into the shadow of the plane. ‘Is there a problem?’
He blew out a breath. ‘Sasha is refusing to go to after-school care. She’s never done this before, she’s always been happy to go. I don’t know why she had to pull this stunt today, the one day in weeks I’ve been delayed.’
Confusion befuddled her brain. ‘Why is the school ringing you?’
He shot her a look of incredulity that screamed she was an imbecile. ‘Because I’m her father!’
His frustration hit her in the chest like a ball on the full, almost making her stagger. Rattled, she chose her words carefully. ‘Yes, I understand that, but you’re in Adelaide and your wife’s in Warragurra. Surely she can get away from work for half an hour to talk to Sasha?’
His hand tightened on the cookie, sending crumbs tumbling toward the ground. ‘I don’t have a wife. It’s just Sasha and me.’ His phone rang loudly and he spun away to answer it.
I don’t have a wife. He’d spoken the words softly but they boomed in Kate’s head as if she were standing in front of a 500-watt concert speaker. The five small words tangled in her brain like knotted fishing wire, refusing to straighten out and make sense.
He was a single parent.
Questions surged through her, desperate for answers, but Baden had his back to her, his entire being focussed on the phone call.
She watched him end his call and consult with Glen, his dark curly hair, flecked with grey, moving in the wind. Then he tilted his head back, downing his coffee in two gulps, his Adam’s apple moving convulsively against his taut neck. Crushing the empty cup in his strong hand, he swung around, his free arm beckoning her forward.
As she drew up beside him he stood back to allow her entry to the plane’s steps. ‘Glen’s ready to leave, so after you…’ His eyes sparkled as he gave her a resigned smile. A Pirate smile. Delicious and dangerous.
Her blood rushed to her feet as realisation hit her. He’s not married. Together they were Team Four. They had to work side by side every day. The attraction she’d easily shrugged off yesterday and earlier today suddenly surged through her like water through a narrow gorge—powerful and strong.
The safe sanctuary that was work, the sanctuary she so desperately needed, vaporised before her eyes.
Baden stacked the dishwasher, his thoughts not on the china but on trying to come up with the best approach to handle Sasha’s rebellion. She’d made herself scarce, knowing he wasn’t thrilled with her behaviour. He could see her out the window, jumping on the trampoline, her long brown hair streaming out behind her.
It’s chestnut, like Kate’s. The unexpected thought thudded into him, startling him.
Kate had worked alongside him today as if she’d done it every day for a year. Calm, experienced and knowledgeable, she got the job done. Just like Emily. Except Emily
