His Irresistible Darling - Sarah Randall Page 0,44
cup of coffee, which she gratefully accepted along with the fact that the staff were all happy to converse in English.
“The doctor will be along shortly, honey. Try not to worry.” But Pip could only conjure a weak smile in response.
Pip had never felt so powerless. She didn’t have her phone to contact anyone. She didn’t know Jumal’s parents’ number or Faridah’s anyway. The hospital had let her call Matt who promised to try to get hold of Jumal’s parents for her, but that must have been over two hours ago and so far, nothing. She paced in time to the beeping coming from Jumal’s medical machines.
“Miss Darling?”
“Yes.” She jumped anxiously and took in the tall, dark-haired man sporting a pair of rimless glasses, white coat and a sombre expression on his face.
“I’m Dr Neri,” he announced, shaking her hand gently. “Shall we sit?” he gestured.
Sit? Oh good grief, why did she need to sit? Did they always make people sit down before delivering devastating news? Surely this wasn’t bad news? Couldn’t be.
“Jumal remains unconscious at the moment, which is to be expected after the fall. It’s the body’s way of coping whilst it assesses itself,” he told her in what she presumed was supposed to be a soft, reassuring voice. It missed its mark.
She nodded, twisting her hands together anxiously as they rested on her knees.
The doctor continued, “We have monitored him and performed a CT scan, and there’s no internal bleeding or damage to his spine.”
Pip’s breath left her quickly and her heart skipped a beat. “Right, thank God,” she offered. “So he’ll be all right?” she checked as her eyes darted back towards Jumal.
“I’m confident that he will make a full recovery,” the doctor assured her. “That’s not to say that he escaped entirely and he will be in a lot of pain. He suffered a dislocated shoulder on impact, which we have popped back in whilst he’s been unconscious. He also has a small crack in his clavicle and a couple of broken ribs.”
“What?” she asked, shocked by man’s calm attitude. “That sounds bad.”
He tilted his head slightly and pursed his lips before he said, “Well, it could have been a lot worse, Miss Darling.”
“Pip. Please, call me Pip.”
He nodded. “Pip. Jumal will make a full recovery after a few weeks but in the meantime he will be in a lot of pain as I said and will need strong painkillers. We are managing his pain with the drip at the moment.” She followed his gaze towards the stand at Jumal’s bedside. “It will take up to several weeks before he is able to do any lifting, but he will get there eventually.”
“Huh,” she said, twirling her fingers around her hair and nervously biting her lip.
“I promise you, Pip, your fiancé will be fine. You’ll just have to be patient with him. He won’t be swinging from the chandeliers any time soon.” He winked at her and Pip felt her cheeks heat in response to his joke.
“Okay. Can I carry on sitting with him until he wakes up?” she begged.
“Sure, but it could be some time. I’ll tell the nurses you’re staying put and I’ll be back to check on him again later,” he told her, rising and striding from the room.
“Shukran, Dr Neri,” she called after him and finally took a deep breath.
He was going to be okay. Battered, bruised and broken in a couple of places but okay.
She quietly pulled her chair towards the side of his bed and slumped down, emotionally and physically exhausted. Her eyes closed and she allowed her head to drop to the edge of the bed. She was unable to hold her head up any more. The adrenalin rush was well and truly over.
Pip picked up Jumal’s left hand in hers and gently rubbed her thumb along the fleshy bit of his hand, between his thumb and index finger. Back and forth—she found the repetition soothing. Jumal looked vulnerable. She didn’t like it; vulnerability and Jumal were two words that should never be in the same sentence. It went against the natural order of things. She needed him to wake up and start dictating orders at her, shouting for his mobile phone and laptop so she could make some sarcastic comeback.
Opening her eyes, she allowed herself the indulgence of gazing, uninterrupted, at his face. Perfection, she thought, and how had she never noticed the length of his dark eyelashes? They cast crescent shadows on his high cheekbones from the